SHAME AND EVERLASTING CONTEMPT.
By Wm. Penniman
THERE are only two texts in the Old Testament which can be claimed to support the "endless misery" doctrine. We will first notice Dan. 12:2: "And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt." If the original would admit of the rendering of everlasting torment, instead of "everlasting contempt," then those who so tenaciously cling to the false doctrine would have some proof for it. But everlasting contempt is one thing, and everlasting misery quite another. On this text we read in "Thoughts on Daniel" (old edition), page 307:— What is here said is supposed by some to furnish good evidence of the eternal conscious suffering of the wicked, because those of this character come forth to shame and everlasting contempt. How can they forever suffer these unless they are forever conscious? Shame implies their consciousness; but it will be noticed that this is not said to be everlasting. This qualifying word is not inserted till we come to contempt, which is an emotion felt by others towards the guilty parties, and does not render necessary the consciousness of those against whom it is directed. We also read on page 323 of "Here and Hereafter," that the Syriac sustains this idea. It reads, "Some to shame and the eternal contempt of their companions." And thus it will be. Shame for their wickedness and corruption will burn into their very souls, so long as they have conscious being. And when they pass away, consumed for their iniquities, their loathsome characters and their guilty deeds excite only contempt on the part of the righteous, unmodified and unabated, so long as they hold them in remembrance at all. The text therefore furnishes no proof of the eternal suffering of the wicked. How important it is to have a part in the resurrection which is "to eternal life."