ist, "Thou shalt not leave my soul in hell," was verified in Christ; St. Augustine's conclusion must necessarily be inferred thereupon. "Whod therefore but an infidel will deny that Christ was in hell?" Thus "all agree, that Christ did some manner of way descend into hell," saith cardinal Bellarmine: "but the whole question is touching the exposition of this article." The common exposition which the Romish divines give thereof, is this: that' by hell is here understood, not that place wherein the wicked are tormented, but the bosom of Abraham, where in the godly fathers of the old Testament rested, for whose delivery from thence, they say, our Saviour took his journey thither. But St. Augustine in that same place, wherein he counteth it a point of infidelity to deny the going of Christ into hell, gainsayeth this exposition thereof, professing that he could find the name of hell no where given unto that place wherein the souls of the righteous did rest. "Wherefore," saith he, "if the holy Scripture had said, that Christ being dead did come unto the bosom of Abraham, not having named hell and the pains thereof; I marvel whether any would have been so bold as to have avouched that Christ descended into hell. But because evident testimonies do make mention both of e Psalm. 16. ver. 10. d Quis ergo nisi infidelis negaverit fuisse apud inferos Christum? Augustin. epist. 164. op. tom. 2. pag. 574. e Ac primum omnes conveniunt, quod Christus aliquo modo ad inferos descenderit, &c. At quæstio tota est de explicatione hujus articuli. Bellarm. de Christo, lib. 4. cap. 6. In 3. sent. dist. 22. D. Thom. Bonavent. Richard. Gab. Pallud. et Marsil. quæst. 13. et reliqui in hoc conveniunt, quod ad locum damnatorum non descendit. Fr. Suarez, tom. 2. in 3. part. Thom. disp. 43. sect. 4. Non descendit ad inferos reproborum ac in perpetuum damnatorum, quoniam ex eo nulla est redemptio igitur ad eum locum descendit, qui vel Sinus Abrahæ, vel communiter Limbus patrum appellatur. Fr. Fevardent. dialog. 6. contr. Calvinian. pag. 509. edit. Colon. Quapropter si in illum Abrahæ sinum Christum mortuorum venisse sancta scriptura dixisset, non nominato inferno ejusque doloribus: miror si quisquam ad inferos eum descendisse asserere auderet. Sed quia evidentia testimonia et infernum commemorant et dolores; nulla caussa occurrit, cur illo credatur venisse Salvator, nisi ut ab ejus doloribus salvos faceret. August. epist. 164. op. tom. 2. pag. 576. hell and pains, I see no cause why our Saviour should be believed to have come thither, but that he should deliver men from the pains thereof." And "therefore what benefit he brought unto those just men that were in the bosom of Abraham when he did descend into hell, I have not yet found." Thus far St. Augustine. For the better understanding of this, we are to call unto mind that saying of the philosophers', that "they who do not learn rightly to understand words, use to be deceived in the things themselves." It will not be amiss therefore, to consider somewhat of the name of hell, that the nature of the word being rightly understood, we may the better conceive the truth of the thing that is signified thereby; carrying always in remembrance that necessary rule delivered by Severus, bishop of Antioch, in his exposition upon Job, chapter thirty-eight, verse twentyeight, that "it' is fit we should understand names according to the quality of the matters subject, and not regulate the truth according to the abuse of words." We are to know then first of our English word hell, that the original thereof is by divers men delivered diversly. Some derive it from the Hebrew word Sheol, either subtracting the first letter, or including it in the aspiration. For "this letter S," saith Priscian, "hath such an affinity with the aspiration, that the Boeotians in some words were wont to write H for S, saying Muha for Musa.” Others bring it from the Greek word λos, which signifieth a lake: others from the English hole, as signifying h Unde illis justis qui in sinu Abrahæ erant, cum ille in inferna descenderet, nondum quid contulisset inveni; a quibus eum secundum beatificam præsentiam suæ divinitatis nunquam video recessisse. August. ep. 164. op. tom. 2. pag. 576. *Αριστα λέγεται παρὰ τοῖς φιλοσόφοις, τὸ τοὺς μὴ μανθάνοντας ὀρθῶς ἀκούειν ὀνομάτων, κακῶς χρῆσθαι καὶ τοῖς πράγμασι, Plutarch. in lib. de Iside et Osiride. * Ος ἂν τὰ ὀνόματα εἰδῇ, εἴσεται καὶ τὰ πράγματα. Plato, in Cratylo. · Πλὴν καὶ τὰ ὀνόματα προσήκει νοεῖν πρὸς τὴν τῶν ὑποκειμένων πραγμάτων ποιότητα, καὶ οὐ πρὸς τὴν κατάχρησιν τῶν λέξεων τ' ἀληθῆ Kavovičev. Sever. in Catena Græca in Job, pag. 491 edit. Venet. m Adeo autem cognatio est huic literæ, id est S, cum aspiratione; quod pro ea in quibusdam dictionibus solebant Boeoti pro S, H scribere, Muha pro Musa dicentes. Priscian, lib. 1. as noting the place that Some say, that in the old a pit-hole; others from hale, haleth or draweth men unto it. Saxon or German, hell signifyeth deep, whether it be high or low. But the derivation given by Verstegan", is the most probable, from being helled over, that is to say, hidden or covered. For in the old German tongue, from whence our English was extracted, hilo signifyeth to hide; and hiluh, in Otfridus Wissenburgensis, is hidden. And in this country, with them that retain the ancient language which their forefathers brought with them out of England, to hell the head is as much as to cover the head; and he that covereth the house with tile or slate, is from thence commonly called a hellier. So that in the original propriety of the word, our hell doth exactly answer the Greek ᾅδης, which denoteth τὸν ἀϊδή τόπον, the place which is unseen or removed from the sight of man. We are in the second place therefore to observe, that the term of hell, beside the vulgar acception, wherein it signifieth that which is called the place of torment, is, in the ecclesiastical use of the word, extended more largely to express the Greek word Hades, and the Latin Inferi, and whatsoever is contained under them. Concerning which St. Augustine giveth this note: "The name of hell is variously put in Scriptures, and in many meanings, according as the sense of the things which are entreated of doth require." And Master Casaubon, who understood the property of the Greek and Latin words as well as any, this other: "They' who think that Hades. is properly the state of the damned, be no less deceived n Rich. Versteg. restitution of English antiquities, chap. 7. • Vid. Goldasti animadvers. in Winsbekii Paræneses, pag. 400. P Luke, chap. 16. ver. 28. 4 Varie in scripturis et sub intellectu multiplici, sicut rerum de quibus agitur sensus exigit, nomen ponitur inferorum. Augustin. quæst. super. numer. cap. 29. Qui äony proprie sedem damnatorum esse existimant, non minus hallucinantur, quam illi qui cum legunt apud Latinos scriptores, inferos, de eodem loco interpretantur. Casaub. in Gregor. Nyssen. epist. ad Eustath. Ambros. et Basiliss. not. 116. than they who, when they read Inferos in Latin writers, do interpret it of the same place." The less cause have we to wonder, that hell in the Scripture should be made the place of all the dead in common, and not of the wicked only, as: "Remembers how short my time is: wherefore hast thou made all men in vain? what man is he that liveth, and shall not see death: shall he deliver his soul from the hand of HELL?" and: "HELL' cannot praise thee, death cannot celebrate thee, they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth. The LIVING, the LIVING, he shall praise thee, as I do this day." Where the opposition betwixt hell and the state of life in this world, is to be observed. Now as the common condition of the dead is considerable three manner of ways, either in respect of the body separated from the soul, or of the soul separated from the body, or of the whole man indefinitely considered in this state of separation: so do we find the word Hades, which by the Latins is rendered Infernus or Inferi, and the English hell, to be applied by the ancient Greek interpreters of the old Testament to the common state and place of the body severed from the soul, by the heathen Greeks to the common state and place of the soul severed from the body, and by both of them to the common state of the dead, and the place proportionably correspondent to the state of dissolution. And so the doctors of the Church, speaking in the same language which they learned both from the sacred and the foreign writers, are accordingly found to take the word in these three several significations. Touching the first we are to note, that both the Septuagint in the Old Testament, and the apostles in the New", do use the Greek word "Adns, HADES, and answerably thereunto, the Latin interpreters the word Infernus or Inferi, and the English the word hell, for that which in the Hebrew text is naned NW, SHEOL: on the other side, where in the New Testament the word HADES is s Psalm 89. ver. 47, 48. Esai. chap. 38. ver. 18, 19. "Acts, chap. 2. ver. 27. 1 Cor. chap. 15. ver. 55. used, there the ancient Syriac translation doth puta, Shejul, and the Ethiopian A, Siolo, instead thereof. Now the Hebrew Sheol, and so the Chaldean, Syriac, and Ethiopian words which draw their original from thence, doth properly denote the interior parts of the earth, that lie hidden from our sight, namely whatsoever tendeth downward from the surface of the earth unto the centre thereof. In which respect we see that the Scripture describeth Sheol to be a deep place, and opposeth the depth thereof unto the height of heaven". Again, because the bodies that live upon the surface of the earth, are corrupted within the bowels thereof; "the* dust returning to the earth as it was ;" therefore is the word commonly put for the state and the place wherein dead bodies do rest, and are disposed for corruption. And in this respect we find that the Scripture doth oppose Sheol not only unto heaven, but also unto this "land of the living" wherein we now breathe'; the surface of the earth being the place appointed for the habitation of the living, the other parts ordained to be the chambers of death. Thus they" that are in the graves" are said to "sleep" in the dust of the earth." The Psalmist, in his prophecy of our Saviour's humiliation, termeth it" the dust of death;" which the Chaldean paraphrast expoundeth *ap n'a, the house of the grave; interpreting Sheol after the selfsame manner, in Psalm thirty-one, verse eighteen, and Psalm eighty-nine, verse forty-nine. In the Hebrew dictionary, printed with the Complutensian Bible, in the year one thousand five hundred and fifteen, the word SIN, Sheol, is expounded Infernus sive inferus, aut fovea, vel sepulchrum, hell, the pit, or the grave. R. Mardochai Nathan in his Hebrew concordance giveth no other interpretation of it, but only ap, or, the grave. R. Job. chap. 11. ver. 8. Psalm 139. ver. 8. Amos, chap. 9. ver. 2. y Esai. chap. 38. ver. 10, 11. Job, chap. 34. ver. 15. Ezech. chap. 32. 27. a Dan. chap. 12, ver. 2. |