Introduction:
"For ever and ever", as presented in modern English bible translations suggests to us that
He who "so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son" and also He who "is love" sees
fit to have the wicked tormented throughout eternity. This does not ring true.
This webpage presents arguments that "for ever and ever" is an incorrect translation, and that
a better one would be: "until total and irrevocable destruction".
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"Eternal Torment?... Or Second Death?
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Two quotes out of the book of Revelation that suggest that
sinners will be tormented "for ever and
ever":-
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Three Parallel Quotes that Refer to the same treatment of sinners as "the Second Death":-
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And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no
rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth
the mark of his name.
Rev 14:11
And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone,
where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night
for ever and ever.
Rev 20:10
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Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the
second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and
shall reign with him a thousand years. Revelation 20:6
And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
Revelation 20:14
But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers,
and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which
burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. Revelation 21:8
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So is it torment "for ever and ever"? Or is it torment until the moment of "the
second death"? Which bible description is the true one? Either the bible writers
are being inconsistent, or the bible translators have gotten it wrong.
If you are one of those that believe that the dead are in some way sufficiently "alive"
to suffer torment, feel free to explore the following digression...
Digression: There is no Consciousness after Death
(Show/Hide)
I know very well that some will say that torment "for ever and ever" and death could be the same thing.
But that would mean that a person continues to exist beyond the moment of his death.
That is to say that a "dead" person still has a conscious existence. The bible
explicitly opposes this popular modern thinking. That is, the bible states that to die
is to cease to exist:
"His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts
perish." (Ps 146:4 - if thoughts perish, then suffering ceases - thus suffering cannot
continue "for ever and ever"), likewise:-
"the dead know not anything"
(Ecc. 9:5 - if you don't know anything, you don't know you are suffering;
indeed you do not exist).
Consider the words "Forever" and "Everlasting" in the Letter of Jude.
Both of the King James bible quotes that follow use the words "forever" and "everlasting".
The casual reader would think that that both these terms refer to something that will never cease, and
in fact continue
for all time. But the context of both quotes implies an ending (see comments alongside quotes).
"Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving
themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an
example, suffering the vengeance of eternal (Gk. aionios, Strong's 166) fire". (Jude verse 7)
[Comment: Since Sodom and Gomorrha ceased to burn once they had totally burned up,
this "eternal fire" actually ended long ago].
"And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation,
he hath reserved in everlasting(Gk. aidios, Strong's no. 126) chains under darkness
unto the judgment of the great day". (Jude verse 6)
[Comment: These "everlasting" chains will only last until
"the judgement of the great day" - either the writer
was confused, or the translators have mistranslated].
So the translators have gotten it wrong. Somewhat depressing don't you think? -
How on earth can we come at a better translation
than that of the highly learned Greek Scholars?
Digression: What Jude was actually saying in his letter
(Show/Hide)
(a) The letter of Jude is only obscure to us if we neglect its key feature. Its key feature is that it is
highly steeped in biblical history.
By this we know that Jude verse 6 refers to an historical biblical event - the rebellion of Korah
(refer Jude verse 11 and Numbers chapter 16) is the best historical candidate for the "angels which kept not
their first estate" of Jude verse 6.
(b) Note also that angels can be (human) "messengers" - the Greek for
Angels in Jude 6 is translated (human) "messengers" in both Luke 9:52 and James 2:25.
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How to come at a better Translation for the Greek Word "Aion"?
We are now going to look for a strategy of translation that is superior to that
of the original translators.
Why the Greco-Roman Scholars got it Wrong...
But first a comment as to why the high power Greek
Scholars misunderstood the word "aion" in the Revelations quotes that started
this article. Since the Greek for "for ever and ever" (eis tous aiones ton aionen)
is only used by the New Testament writers(1), and is not to be found anywhere outside
of the bible, it is understandable that the translators would have struggled to
understand it. They simply did not have the key that would "break the code".
The key is that the New Testament writers spoke and wrote is a sub-dialect of the
("Koine", or "shared") Greek of the day: They spoke and wrote in "Septuagint Greek".
"Septuagint Greek" is the version of Greek spoken amongst the
Jewish Communities of the Eastern Roman Empire of that time.
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Why the Greco-Roman Translators did not have Access to the Septuagint Speaking Jewish Community
I feel certain that the Greco-Roman scholars (who set the pattern for
biblical translation when they rendered New Testament Greek into the Old Latin source
documents that made up the Vulgate Latin Bible) had neither respect of, nor
access to Jewish speakers of Greek. Jews at that time were not a respected
source for understanding the New Testament: they were despised as "killers of Christ",
and also as blood thirsty and rebellious fanatics. They had perpetrated not one, but two fanatical and
blood thirsty rebellions in the Holy Land, the first in AD 70, and the second in AD 130.
After the last of these rebellions,
"the Jews were completely subjugated and sold into slavery"(5). Between AD 115 and 117, (while the Emperor Trajan
was busy fighting Parthians to the East), a series of Greek-Jewish racial wars occurred
along the North Coast of Africa and in Cypress. These finally lead to massive Roman backed reprisals
against the Jews(4). You can now understand why the Greco-Roman translators were not able to understand the
nuances of the Septuagint Greek dialect that the New Testament was written in.
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The Key to Translating is to put Oneself into the Mind of the Writer!..
But we can access the thoroughly Jewish minds of the New Testament writers, which we
shall now do. We can do this:
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By paying careful attention to the way they quoted
the Old Testament in the New (we did this when we analysed the Jude 7 quote)
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By comparing the text of the Hebrew bible with the text of the Greek Septuagint bible
that the early Christian used.
Let me explain item (2) on the list. The New Testament writers knew
Hebrew and the related Aramaic. They were also very competent in the Greek language
in common usage at that time (Koine, or "common" Greek). But (and this is not
generally recognised by modern bible scholars), the Koine Greek that the Judeo-Christians
spoke was subtly different to main stream Koine Greek. When one considers that
at the time of Christ there were some one million Jews living in the Egyptian
city of Alexandria, and that these Jews routinely spoke Greek within their massive
community, it is not hard to imagine that the Greek they spoke would have been
subtly different from the Greek spoken by none Jews. The same situation exists
today in the case of modern Yiddish, which would be more accurately described
as a German dialect, rather than a stand alone Jewish language: A German speaker
can with some difficulty understand Yiddish, but would inevitably run into trouble
when translating some of the words and phrases that were to be found only in the
Yiddish, and not in mainstream German. This is exactly the situation faced by
modern scholars when they attempt to translate certain words or phrases that are
only to be found in the New Testament Greek.
So the Jewish Christians spoke a Greek dialect, which we shall call Septuagint
Greek, because that is where it comes from.
Digression: Where did Septuagint Greek come from?
(Show/Hide)
Septuagint Greek is the version of
Greek that was used by the scholars (traditionally 72 of them) who about 250 BC
started to translate the Hebrew Old Testament into a Greek Old Testament. This
Greek Old Testament is called "The Septuagint"(6),
and is the source for most, if not all of the Old Testament quotes that are to
be found in the New Testament writings.
That Septuagint Greek is genuinely different to mainstream Koine Greek is
demonstrated by a study of the word agape (see appendix 1).
So now that we know that the New Testament writers spoke a slightly different
version of Greek, we can appreciate that their understanding of the Greek word
"aion" may be different to that of the mainstream Koine Greek speakers.
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Comparison of Septuagint-Greek and Hebrew Texts for the Idiom of "Aion"
The key to understanding the New Testament meaning of "Aion" is to find out the
meaning of "aion" as used in the Old Testament Septuagint. And we can readily
do this by comparing the Septuagint and Hebrew texts.
The first time that the word 'aion occurs in the Septuagint is in Genesis 6:3-
And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also
is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years (Gen 6:3).
"Always" in the King James corresponds to "aion" in the Septuagint, and "olam"
in the Hebrew. If we know what "Olam means, we know what "aion" would have meant
to the New Testament writers. According to Strong's concordance (Strong's number
5769), "olam" is derived from the verb "to conceal", or "to veil". Thus the idea of "concealment"
is what drives the New Testament writer's understanding of the Greek "aion".
If we insert the idea of "vanishing" into Genesis 6:3, we have "?My spirit shall
not (unto concealment) strive with man?" If we understand the idea of "concealment"
to mean "concealment from view beyond the distant horizon", then we can see how
the idea of concealment can engender a very long time span, which stretches beyond
"the vanishing point" (as Strong's concordance puts it), or beyond the horizon
of time. Supposing we take this idea of concealment into our troublesome "forever" quotes:
And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever [better translation - "concealments of concealments"]:
and they have no
rest day or night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth
the mark of his name.
Rev 14:11
And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone,
where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night
for ever and ever [better translation - "concealments of concealments"].
Rev 20:10
So with our new translation skills, we have the picture that the torment in Revelations happens until
the subjects of torment have undergone "concealments of concealments", such that
they have been so thoroughly burnt up that they are totally and irrevocably
"concealed", and never again to be seen. This same strategy of translation makes
sense also of Jude verse 7:
"Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving
themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for
an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal [better translation - concealing] fire". (Jude verse 7)
If we use the idea of concealing in this quote, we can see that a workable quote
(one that makes sense of the story), would be "vengeance of concealing fire" -
that is, fire that consumes to the point that there is nothing more to be seen.
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Summary and Personal Comment
This article has argued that "for ever and ever" in Revelation Rev 14:11 and Rev 20:10
is an incorrect translation, and that a better one would be: "until total and irrevocable destruction".
In order to do this we have gone against the opinions of the influential translations of the last
1800 years. We have done this by arguing (1) that God is a loving and just God who would not make
even the very wicked
subjects of his creation suffer for ever; (2) that the Jewish-Christian writers spoke a Greek dialect
(Septuagint Greek) that
was foreign to the Greco-Roman translators of the subsequent 200 years; and were therefore unable to
reliably translate any words or phrases that were idioms of the Septuagint Greek;
(3) that by comparison of the Hebrew and Septuagint Old Testament of such idiomatic phrases, we
can understand the unique way that the Jewish minds of the New Testament understood such idioms.
My God who made me is a just God, and a loving God. He does mete out punishment
to those who have knowingly and wilfully disobeyed,
but that punishment is not infinite in its duration.
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Postscript
There is one other use made of the 'for ever and ever" quote in the New Testament.
It is a stock phrase, and always to do with Glory to God and or to Jesus the Christ.
The first example of this usage is to be found at Galatians 1:5:-
"To whom is glory for ever and ever. Amen".
Ever and ever takes upon itself an enhanced meaning (over and above that comprehended by
the current wisdom in translation), when we consider that this phrase
would have conjured up in the writer's mind a vivid picture of glory continuing
beyond the "vanishing points of vanishing points": never ending vistas of glory
vanishing one after another into the infinite continuity of time, or times.
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Appendix 1: Agape
[The following are quotes from "aga'pe" to be found in Thayer(ref 1)]
"A purely biblical and ecclesiastical word"...
"[When referring to "love", the Greek authors from the time of] Aristotle on used agapesis".
"The Septuagint [scholars] use agape for [the Hebrew] ahabe...In Philo, and Josephus [Jewish philosopher
and Jewish historian respectively] "I have never met with it".
From this, we draw the picture that "Agape" was thus a dialectical variant of the Greek
"agapesis". Why did the Septuagint scholars feel free to use this particular
word? Firstly, because the standard of translation for the whole of the Septuagint
writings was not as consistently high as it was for the first five books of the
bible, and second, because the Septuagint (and New Testament) Greek "Agape"
sounds very much like the Hebrew "Ahabe". The scholars were merely using the word
that the huge and vibrant Greek-Hebrew communities were already using.
Compare the sounds of the two words (mp3 recordings):
Septuagint Greek Agape: (Play mp3)
Hebrew Ahabe: (Play mp3)
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Appendix 2: Origins of the Vulgate New Testament
My purpose in compiling this history of the earliest New Testament translations was
to attempt to determine whether the original translators of the Greek New Testament
were sufficiently well versed in both Greek and Hebrew to be able to establish for
themselves the specific Septuagint idioms of the New Testament Greek. I could not
establish if this was so. What I was able to establish was that Jerome, who is
credited with the original authoritative translation and/or compilation of the New
Testament, was probably not competent in Hebrew at the time of his New Testament
translational work. He would therefore not have been aware of how the Hebrew mind
would have understood the word "aion" that is the subject of this article. I
suspect that Jerome would have been the only translator of sufficient reputation
to have corrected any bias that the early post Jewish Christians might have suffered.
Since the Jews rebelled in an extremely violent and fanatical way in 70 AD and later in
The original Latin Bible manuscripts were collectively referred to as "the Vetus
Latina, and accumulated via translation from the Septuagint (Greek) Old Testament
and the (Greek) New Testament manuscripts. By 382 AD when Jerome was commissioned
to revise and translate these original Latin bible texts, there were many Latin
translations of the various texts.
Between 382 AD and 384 AD, Jerome translated the four gospels from the best of the
Greek texts. Jerome noted in his preface to his Vulgate Gospel translations that
there were "as many [translations] as there are manuscripts."
How much the rest of Jerome's compilations were revised by him is difficult to judge, but
it is thought that while he translated much of the Old Testament from the original Hebrew, he merely
compiled the NT mostly from already existing Latin versions(2,3).
This is an important point when we follow the history of Jerome subsequent to
his revision of the Gospels.
In 385 AD, Jerome was forced out of Rome, and settled
in Bethlehem. Having already compiled and established the Vulgate New Testament
(as already stated, this was mostly from pre-existing translations with minimal revision), Jerome
worked for a further five years on Greek to Latin translations
of the Old Testament. By 390 AD until 405 AD, Jerome had switched to
translating the Old Testament directly from the Hebrew (presumably, it had
taken him a good five years to become sufficiently proficient in the Hebrew
and Aramaic of the original Old Testament to be able to perform this work).
Approximately 405 AD, Jerome had completed and compiled "the Vulgate Bible".
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References
- JH Thayer: Thayer's Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament Edition. 4 © Baker Book House Co.
Grand Rapids Michigan
- Vulgate:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulgate
- Bible History Flowchart:
www.gentles.info/BibleHistory/Index_History.html
- Benjamin Polen, May 11, 1999: The Causes and Effects of the Jewish Insurrection in Cyprus
http://www.allenwood.org/essays/cyprusjews.html
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Shimon bar Kokhbah, Leader of the Jewish Rebellion:
http://www.jewishmag.co.il/77mag/barkokhba/barkokhba.htm
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The Septuagint:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint
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Further Reading
(For thoughtful bible based arguments, see:
- Are the Wicked Tormented
Day and Night for Ever and Ever?
- HELL: Eternal Torment or Complete Annihilation?
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The Google search:
eternal torment
will provide useful articles to the searcher.
Eternal Torment: Are the Wicked Really Tormented "for Ever and Ever"?
© Bruce Thomson, EasyVigour Project
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© Bruce Thomson, EasyVigour Project
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