HOW CAN ONE REAP ACCORDING TO HIS SOWING IF ANNIHILATION IS THE PUNISHMENT?
By William Penniman
We only notice those objections the most urgent. There are many more which are so frivolous that they are not worth noticing, and they only prove how hard it is to bolster up a doctrine for which there is no Scripture authority. Mr. Lee, in his "Theology," p. 327, uses the following comparison:— One dies so soon as he is capable of knowing right from wrong; his first act of sin is his only one, and that involves as little guilt as any wrong act can, and yet for that he must be annihilated. Another lives to be a hundred years old, and fills up the entire period with crimes of the deepest dye, and goes to his retribution as quietly as a sinner can make himself in one hundred years, and he can be no more than annihilated. By this comparison he endeavors to make it appear that there are no degrees in punishment according to the annihilation plan, and no doubt many who do not think for themselves will drink this theology in. But how do we know how long God causes the wicked to suffer before they die? or, even admitting that all die at the same time (which is quite impossible), may not the degree of suffering differ much while they do live? This thought does not work against the position that death, or destruction, is the final punishment. This extreme comparison shows how much more merciful God is (if He does do this) in causing a child who has only committed one sin to cease to exist, than to torment in fire and brimstone forever. There is nothing in the Word of God which teaches that a person will be punished forever for one sin. Christ says (John 8:21), "Ye shall . . . die in your sins; whither I go, ye can not come." As Mr. Lee has made an extreme comparison, so we will try to make one. Is it consistent with the justice and goodness of God that Judas Iscariot, who betrayed our Saviour, or Nero, who illuminated the city of Rome with Christians saturated with combustible substances, or the wickedest man among the Spanish inquisitors, or among those who took delight in tormenting Christians or heretics in every possible way that human ingenuity can invent to make man wretched and miserable—that the wickedest person who has ever lived or ever will live should receive no more punishment than the one will who has committed the least guilty act one can commit? We know that God is more merciful than man. What human tyrant would punish a person one year for the least guilty act? It is said that the Siamese god only punishes sinners 1,000 years. Is it consistent with the attributes of God to administer infinite or eternal suffering for a finite sin, or for the sin, comparatively, of a moment? How can any of the wicked be said to suffer or "be beaten with few stripes" (Luke 12:47, 48) if all the wicked will suffer torment without end? A few words in conclusion in regard to the word "annihilation," which Mr. Lee and many of our opponents urge against us. It is said that all nature and the universe rebel against this doctrine of annihilation, yet its second definition, according to Webster, is "to destroy the form or the peculiar distinctive properties, so that the specific thing no longer exists." This definition does not imply the non-existence of matter, but only a change of condition. It is also a literal change, as represented in Mal. 4:3 (see also verse 1): "And ye shall tread down the wicked, for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet," etc. The objector who holds to the immateriality of the soul, and, consequently, to its indestructibility, can easily be taken on his own ground by the following texts, Eze. 18:20; Rom. 6:23; and Matt. 10:28, which prove that to die is to cease to exist. As the objector contends that the soul is immaterial, we ask what there is left of it after it dies? One may attempt to evade the question by ignoring the laws of language and the right definitions of terms in saying that to destroy is to preserve whole; to be dead is to be made more alive; to die is to wander in misery; not to be is to be; and "to burn up is to make a living salamander." We can not better close this article than by using the words of the Lord: "Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?"