Can someone help me out here? I have been thinking recently about the language in the Apostles' Creed. Did Christ actually go to Hell after dying upon the cross? If so, how could He tell the man on the other cross that he would be with Him that day in Heaven? If someone could point me in the right direction on this I would greatly appreciate it.

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"Peace if possible, truth at all costs." (Martin Luther)

David G. Suggs Jr.
New Covenant, PCA
Anderson, South Carolina

Danny Hyde has a good article on this in the last Confessional Presbyterian Journal.

In short, the Protestant church has come to different conclusions on this matter. The Lutherans generally take a view that Christ went to hell but only to declare his triumph on his way to heaven (so they take the "preaching to the souls in prison" 1Pet.3:19). A short side trip, IOW.

The Reformed view has generally taken "hell" to mean 1) enduring the wrath of God while on the cross; and 2) remaining "under the power of death" for a season (the 3-days), because the term "hell" was also an older synonym for "grave/sheol", that is the place of the dead, and not just a reference to the prison of the damned.

No doubt, there are others who really do think Christ went down to hell, but as you note, that fails the test of Christ's response to the thief.

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Rev. Bruce G. Buchanan
ChainOLakes Presbyterian Church, CentralLake, MI


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I have been reading Philip Schaff's "Creeds of Christendom." He says that this particular phrase was added to the creed later on as there were several versions of it.

"the original Roman creed, as given by Rufinus in Latin (about A.D. 390), and by Marcellus in Greek (A.D. 336–341), and the received form of the Apostles' Creed, which came into general use in the seventh or eighth century."

The phrase "descended into hell" was one of the phrases added later on according to Schaff. These are Schaff's notes on that particular phrase.

"From the Aquilejan Creed: 'Descendit ad inferna,' or, as the Athanasian Creed has it, 'ad inferos,' to the inhabitants of the spirit-world. Some Eastern (Arian) creeds: κατέβη εἰς τὸν ᾅδην (also εἰς τὰ καταχθόνια, or εἰς τὰ κατώτατα). Augustine says (Ep. 99, al. 164, § 3) that unbelievers only deny 'fuisse apud inferos Christum.' Venantius Fortunatus, A.D. 570, who had Rufinus before him, inserted the clause in his creed. Rufinus himself, however, misunderstood it by making it to mean the same as buried (§ 18: 'vis verbi eadem videtur esse in eo quod sepultus dicitur')."

I hope you read Latin and Greek, because I can't.

So I really didn't answer your question but I thought this was good information.

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John Lanier
Elder in Training
Reformed Baptist Church
Topeka, KS