The Unanswerable Argument on Immortality
By Alexander Ritchie
I. An Argument from the Bible
WHEN Moses was comparing the heathen with Israel, he said, "For their rock is not as our Rock." When Christ was portraying the difference between the wise man and the foolish man, He declared the wise man built on the rock, but the foolish man built upon the sand. In both these scriptures, the great difference between the two classes is shown in the radically different foundation upon which they build. John says, "We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness." And the same inspired writer declares yet again, in the book of Revelation, that the "old serpent, called the devil, and Satan, . . . deceiveth the whole world." Yet that same "old serpent" is "the god of this world." A god of any kind expects worship, and usually receives it from those who are of like character. "The whole world lieth in wickedness;" and yet the whole world is religious. All believe in something above themselves. All worship that which they believe in. And the form of their belief is a fairly good measure of the character of their god. The word of God is truth; and that Word speaks truth when it declares, "The whole world lieth in wickedness." And as everybody knows that the whole world worships, it is only in harmony with the premise to find the same Word calling "the god of this world" "that wicked one." So we have a wicked world worshiping a wicked god. Christ said: "He is a liar, and the father of it." "He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth." He deceives his worshipers, for he "deceiveth the whole world." He blinds his worshipers, for he "hath blinded the minds of them which believe not." The first lie he ever uttered in this world was, "Ye shall not surely die." That lie first blinded Mother Eve, and then murdered both her and Adam. It cut them off from God; it cut them off from the tree of life; and it drove them from Eden, to die physically, and become food for worms. This first lie was so horribly successful in performing the work it was designed to do, that it at once became Satan's favorite lie; and probably ninety-nine per cent of all the inhabitants of this world from that day to this, have believed it with a reverential devotion.5 O, weird fascination!
O, stony blindness!
O, mystery inscrutable! that a falsehood which could destroy perfection, separate from God, despoil peace, and murder the fairest handiwork of God, should nevertheless be received and welcomed, and defended as heavenly truth, to this very day! In vain does the God of truth declare:
God "only hath immortality."
"The dead know not anything."
"His sons come to honor, and he [the dead man] knoweth it not."
"The soul that sinneth, it shall die."
"Death can not celebrate Thee."
"The wages of sin is death."
"Fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell."
"Seek for glory and honor and immortality."
"He that believeth not the Son shall not see life." The great deceiver has such subtle power over his worshipers, that by various artful devices, he teaches them how to evade the sword of truth, and explains away the glorious truths which to the unsophisticated mind would be unmistakable in meaning. To the dreadful results of the first utterance of that lie, "Ye shall not surely die," time has added other inevitable results. The immediate results of its acceptance, to Adam and Eve, are now lost sight of largely, in the dim vistas of time. But the awful results of the acceptance of that hoary lie, by the teeming millions who people the world to-day, are painfully present and real. For look squarely at this fact, dear reader: That doctrine of inherent immortality is the rock upon which every heathen religion in the world to-day is built. And that being undeniable, how can "their rock" be the same as "our Rock"? Their rock is "natural immortality."
Our Rock is "Christ the Lifegiver." They are building upon the sands of fable, imagination, sentiment, and "the precepts of men," resting at bottom upon Satan's lie. Their foundation is "the deathlessness of the human spirit." Our foundation is Him who "brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." Their hope is in death.
Our hope is in the resurrection.
Therefore "their rock is not as our Rock, even our enemies themselves being judges." This being so, the doctrine of inherent immortality, which is the foundation rock upon which every heathen religion in the world is built, can not possibly be the foundation of the religion of Jesus Christ. Instead of that, in very deed, it is His most insolent enemy. How?
It pours contempt upon His death.
It makes His resurrection a needless thing.
It makes His second coming but an empty show.
It robs Him of His glory as the Lifegiver.
And it involves His reputation in this world, and His character in the heavenly world, in dishonor, because it pictures Him as the author of punishment, which, upon immortal sinners, could only mean immortal suffering. Away with such a doctrine! Fie, upon its fiendish author! It has no place in the Christian religion; and how can any people who profess to be Bible Christians, believe, defend, and propagate such a teaching? The immortality of man is the channel through which "the god of this world" draws to himself the worship and devotion which belong to God only. And demons impersonate the dead, to confirm the lie uttered by their father in Eden. For "the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons, and not to God."