On the Harrowing of Hell
On Let's Talk Creation this week [the episode on YouTube], I briefly mentioned the doctrine of the Harrowing of Hell as an example of something that might be too much doctrine read into too few verses. This inspired a few questions and comments, and I felt it warranted a bit of clarity (which I thought was clear enough in the episode but evidently not). I'm glad to have the chance to elaborate on a point that didn't need to be elaborated on in the podcast.
That part of our conversation was inspired by a point in the Apostles' Creed, "He [Christ] descended in to Hell," which is an expression of an earlier belief that after his death and before his resurrection, Jesus went to Hades, the place of the dead, preached the gospel to the spirits there, and took the righteous dead to heaven after his resurrection. This is collectively known as the doctrine of the "Harrowing of Hell" (to harrow is to torture, as in, Jesus struck a blow against hell by freeing a bunch of its captives).
Earlier predecessors of the Apostles' Creed are more succinct and lack this particular phrase. But the Harrowing is taught by several early church fathers. Writing in the second century, Irenaeus says, "the Lord descended into the regions beneath the earth, preaching His advent there also, and [declaring] the remission of sins received by those who believe in Him" (Against Heresies 4.XXVII.2). Clement of Alexandria (also second century) has an extensive discourse on the subject in Stromata book six, chapter six. Not everyone agreed, however. Tertullian (second century) claimed only Christian martyrs went to heaven, and all the other righteous dead waited in Hades for the resurrection at the Second Advent (A Treatise on the Soul LV). Following the patristics and the Apostles' Creed, belief in the Harrowing of Hell has passed on as an article of faith for Catholics, Orthodox, and some Protestants.
Where this idea comes from is much more complicated. I suspect the Harrowing was particularly fitting for the early church's understanding of Christ's substitutionary death as a defeat of Satan. In this view, Satan agrees to accept Christ's death as a substitute for sinners, but Satan does not realize that the death of a true innocent would result in a resurrection and the defeat of death itself. Think Aslan in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe - The deep magic and the deeper magic are both right out of early church theology. Also, Aslan's assault on the witch's castle and the freeing of those turned to stone is essentially the Harrowing of Hell. This conception of Christ's substitutionary death and the Harrowing go very well together in a dramatic sense: Satan accepts Jesus into hell, thinking that Christ is defeated, only to discover that death cannot hold him and that Jesus frees the souls of the righteous from the devil's power. They may sound dubious to us today, but it was common enough in the early church.
As for scriptural support, Justin Martyr (second century) cited a passage from Jeremiah that he claimed was removed by unspecified Jewish scribes: "The Lord God remembered His dead people of Israel who lay in the graves; and He descended to preach to them His own salvation" (Dialogue with Trypho LXXII). This verse reportedly no longer exists in any manuscript of Jeremiah, so we can't presently evaluate Justin's claim. If that were a real verse, that would be a whopping good support for the doctrine in my opinion. But we don't know.
Within the known texts of scripture, these are the principle verses cited in favor of the Harrowing:
- Acts 2:31. In Peter's Pentecost sermon, he quotes Psalm 16, and says, "Seeing what was to come, he spoke of the resurrection of the Messiah, that he was not abandoned to the realm of the dead, nor did his body see decay" (ESV). Here we have Jesus in "the realm of the dead," which could simply refer to the grave.
- I Peter 3:18-20. Here is the reference to preaching to the spirits. "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits—to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built" (ESV). In context here you can see that the imprisoned spirits were disobedient in the days of Noah. Who these could be is unclear from this passage.
- Eph. 4:7-12. This is where the idea of emptying Hades comes from. "But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. This is why it says: 'When he ascended on high, he took many captives and gave gifts to his people.' (What does 'he ascended' mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up" (ESV). Paul quotes here Psalm 68, but he does not specifically explain the "captives" that Jesus took or where Jesus took them.
- Matthew 27:51-53. This passage is less commonly cited, but Matthew's testimony is remarkable on this point. "At that moment [of Christ's death] the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people." So Jesus' resurrection was accompanied by the resurrection of other righteous people? That's what it says. Who they were and what happened to them after entering the holy city is not explained.
Can we put all these together and infer the full and dramatic doctrine of the Harrowing of Hell? Well, I'm not sure. Taken individually, I'm not sure any of those passages are clear enough to support the full doctrine. But I could see how someone might derive the Harrowing from reading all of those passages together. So I remain unsure, and I think that's a good position to hold on this question. The Bible is not crystal clear on this point. It does not explicitly say what happened to Jesus after his death and before his resurrection. Some of the verses cited in favor of the Harrowing could or should be interpreted in other ways (especially the imprisoned spirits). It's best then not to be too dogmatic on the point, which is the point that Paul and I were trying to make in the podcast episode. The broader point, of course, was that questions about the details of creation are not small issues that have been inflated into invalid doctrines by obsessive creationists like us. You can listen to the podcast for that.
On the other hand, I also don't think the Harrowing is a doctrine that's easily shrugged off as a misreading of a single verse. It was evidently widely held by Christians of the earliest generations after the apostles. These early advocates were held in enough esteem that their writings were preserved and commented on for generations to come. Biblically, the Matthew and Ephesians passages are especially interesting to me on this subject. I can't see how they support the full and elaborate doctrine of the Harrowing, but they do hint that more was going on at the time of the death and resurrection of Christ than the New Testament explains (especially Matthew's account of the resurrection of the righteous dead). Again, I want to emphasize that I don't firmly and confidently accept the full doctrine of the Harrowing based on these verses. I just note that these passages are unclear but very intriguing. I can understand how someone might find the Harrowing a very appealing position to hold.
That's my take on the Harrowing of Hell. I don't know that it's any more clear, but it is a fascinating subject. I hope you enjoyed reading.
Have you read my book? You should check that out too!
