The Evangelical Universalist Forum

SNIPPETS FROM MY HARD COPY UR LIBRARY

#201 – BIBLE THREATENINGS EXPLAINED – John Wesley Hanson
tentmaker.org/books/BibleThr … ained.html
“Passages of Scripture Sometimes Quoted to Prove Endless Punishment
Shown to Teach Consequences of Limited Duration, showing that Christian universalism,
or ultimate reconciliation is the true Biblical doctrine.”

Arguably, this is the most helpful link on the internet for people who want to believe that the Bible,
(literally, not interpretively) translated, teaches universal salvation, not eternal torment, or even annihilation.

#202 - AIÓN – AIÓNIOS – (“shown to denote limited duration”) John Wesley Hanson
tentmaker.org/books/Aion_lim.html

“THE VOCABULARY OF THE GREEK TESTAMENT (edited by James Hope Moulton and George Milligan) is helpful. Concerning aionios we read, “In general, the word depicts that of which the horizon is not in view . . .” (p.16). If the horizon of the extermination spoken of by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 1:9 is simply not in view, then we can see that what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:22 can truly occur. The same all who are dying in Adam, which includes some who incur eonian extermination, can indeed eventually be vivified in Christ.
The Bible, in fact, does not speak of judgment and condemnation, death and destruction, hades and Gehenna, or any of these serious consequences of sin, as unending. It may refer to them as not having the end in view, but none of these fearful works of God can keep Him from achieving His will (1Tim.2:4); reconciling all through the blood of Christ’s cross (Col.1:20, and becoming All in all (1 Cor.15:28).”
Dean Hough

#203 - AN ANALYTICAL STUDY OF WORDS – Louis Abbott
tentmaker.org/books/asw/index.html

Regarding the words translated “forever and ever.”
“There are several analogous expressions in the Scriptures which should show the meaning of the words under discussion. In Ex. 26:33 (LXX), tou hagiou ton hagion, “in the holy of the holies.” This is similar to the “eon of the eons” of Eph. 3:21. In IKings 8:6 (LXX) we see, eis ta hagia ton hagion, for “the holies of the holies" - similar to “eons of the eons.” The “holy of the holies” and “holies of the holies” refer to the tabernacle. Psalm 44:7 says, ho thronos sou ho theos, eis ton aiona tou aionos, “Thy throne, O God, is for the eon of eon”-similar to Heb. 1:8. Daniel 7:18: “until eon of the eons” and similar to that of Eph. 3:21, where a singular is followed by a plural, “eon of the eons.” In these expressions we see the eons corresponding to the holies in the tabernacle.
While there are many different teachings on the types in the Tabernacle of Moses, it should not be too difficult to see that there were at least five divisions: (1) without the camp; (2) in the camp; (3) in the court; (4) in the holy place; and (5) in the holy of holies. These may be likened to the five eons we find in the Scriptures (past eons, present eon, future eons). The last eon is called the “eon of the eons,” because it, like the “holy of holies,” is the climax of the others. In Hebrews chapter 9, the Greek text of Nestle reads (margin v. 25), eis ta hagia ton hagion, “into the holies of the holies,” and (v. 3), hagia hagion, “holies of holies.” Just as the two holy places in the tabernacle are called the holies of holies, so the last two eons are often called the eons of the eons.

#203 continued
As the tabernacle illustrated man’s approach to God, it corresponds closely with the eonian times, which also brings man to God. The “holy of holies” was a single holy place. The “eon of eons,” a single eon. It was the pre-eminence of the “holy of holies,” in relation to the other holy places, which caused it to be so designated. So the pre-eminence of the “eon of the eons” lies in its being the fruitage and harvest of previous eons. The same is true of the “holies of the holies” of Heb. 9:25. They may be likened to the “eons of the eons” of Rev. 11:15; 22:5.”

#204 – A MESSAGE FROM GARY AMIRAULT (owner of the TENTMAKER website)
tentmaker.org/
lovewins.us/
what-the-hell-is-hell.com/

"Bible scholars and church historians are acknowledging that early Christians were taught by Jesus and the apostles that ALL mankind would ultimately be saved. Discover how the heathen concept of Hell crept into the church and then on to the pages of many Bible translations.
Tentmaker Ministries website contains hundreds of articles and books explaining how this happened and its horrible effect on mankind. We also make available many other resources for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry.
Experience your heavenly Father’s unfailing love for you. Be set free from the fear that you or a loved one may be eternally damned to Hell.”
Gary Amirault, Tentmaker Ministries

#205 - UNIVERSAL SALVATION UNIVERSITY
richardwaynegarganta.com/universalsalvation.htm

An excellent website expounding Christian Biblical Universal Salvation

#206 - Great snippets… Please let me share one as well: It’s from a book titled Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
“At the Last Judgment Christ will say to us, “Come, you also! Come, drunkards! Come, weaklings! Come, children of shame!” And he will say to us: “Vile beings, you who are in the image of the beast and bear his mark, but come all the same, you as well.” And the wise and prudent will say, “Lord, why do you welcome them?” And he will say: “If I welcome them, you wise men, if I welcome them, you prudent men, it is because not one of them has ever been judged worthy.” And he will stretch out his arms, and we will fall at his feet, and we will cry out sobbing, and then we will understand all, we will understand the Gospel of grace! Lord, your kingdom come!”— Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Also I want to include a quote from Heinrich Heines, a German poet and journalist who lived during the 18th and 19th century. I came across his name while I was reading the biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. What he says is a statement of complete faith and trust and the most succinct of all that God is about that I’ve ever found.
“God will save me, that’s His Job”
Love you
Rick Coyne

#207 - FIFTEEN BOMBS THAT SANK MY THEOLOGICAL SHIP - V.E. JACOBSON

saviourofall.org/Writings/fifteenbombs.html

#208 - Dr. Edwin Abbott, headmaster of the City of London School, wrote in his Cambridge Sermons -
QUOTE: “An argument was introduced by Augustine, and since his day incessantly repeated, that if aionios kolasis does not mean “endless punishment,” then there is no security for the believer that aionios zoe means “endless life,” and that he will enjoy the promise of endless happiness. But Matt. 25:46 shows the “eonian chastisement” and “eonian life” are of the same duration-lasting during the eons, and when the eons end, as Scripture states they will (1 Cor. 10:11; Heb. 9:26), the time called “eonian” is past and the life called “eonian” is finished, but life continues beyond the eons, as Paul teaches at 1 Cor. 15:26: “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” (all death including the second death which is the lake of fire). That is, the last, the final one in order. How will it be destroyed? First Corinthians 15:22 gives the answer: “For as IN ADAM ALL are dying, even so IN CHRIST ALL shall be made alive.” Death is destroyed when ALL have been made alive, IN CHRIST.”
– Dr. Edwin Abbott

Note God’s wording
In Christ all shall be made alive
not
All who are in Christ shall be made alive

A.E. KNOCH

One of the great Christian Biblical Universal Salvationists of the last century was A.E. Knoch, author of the book ALL IN ALL.
My attitude towards the frequent warnings by believers in eternal torment or annihilation is summed up beautifully by his response.
A critic who believed in eternal torment said, “Knoch and his colleagues will yet have to answer to God for so defiantly opposing the plain teachings of God’s holy word."

In reply A.E. Knoch wrote:

"Let me assure our brother, beloved by the Lord, that we fully expect to answer to God for all our acts, and will rejoice to see all that is not of God destroyed by the fiery test of that day. But such threats do not alarm us in the least. We know a God of transcendent grace.

The character of the God you worship will determine your ways and your words. We trust it will be so with us also, for we would delight to be like Him. Hence, we do not threaten you with His wrath, but commend you to His grace.

Perhaps no sin can be so great as to distort His words and defame His character. But His grace is superbly sufficient, His love is lavish in its long-suffering. It never lapses, but looks longingly for the reconciliation which is the justification and crown of all His ways with His creatures.

So, as we close with the absolute certainty of a reconciliation between us, we anticipate it on our part and throw all enmity aside. We are conciliated no matter what you do. While your words and ways have seemed to us to be offensively unlike His, this only gives greater ground for grace. This of itself justifies them, for grace must have a foil.

We close, then, with a prayer for such an outpouring of His grace on your own head as will force you to feel the affection which is found in Him for all the creatures of His hand and heart." (End quote) A.E. Knoch

SOONER OR LATER GOD ALL IN ALL - Anthony J. Borrello

“As hostile and objectionable our dear brethren may be, there are answers and explanations for every argument and/or insinuation presented against the undeniable fact, That God indeed is a God ‘Who will have all men to be saved, and come into a knowledge of the truth (1Tim. 2:4). As greatly as man and their religious attempt to fight this utterly dynamic evangel (good news), God shall eventually be All in all (1Cor. 15:28)."

“But God is in no hurry. He has specific eons, and administrations within the eons, to fulfill His universal purpose and intention of universal reconciliation. All came out of Christ, including Adam. Consequently all shall be restored by and through Christ, ‘yet each in his own class’ (1Cor. 15:23).”

When clouds of confusion gather regarding God’s plan for mankind, and despair come showering down upon our studies, turn to God’s word originally rendered, then, like a searchlight in the darkness of night, His love, and His light of understanding will surely beam forth. God will not allow any to be eternally lost. He is a loving Creator, working out His purpose for the universe, Who will get love from all in return, so that He can and will be ‘ALL in all,’ to all, ‘later.’”

GOD’S PLAN FOR THE AGES OF TIME
THE EONS OF THE BIBLE WITH CONCORDANCE
saviourofall.org/Tracts/Eons2.html

ABRAHAM LINCOLN QUOTE
Quoted from A SOUTHERN UNIVERSALIST CHURCH HISTORY
“I used to think that it took the smartest kind of man to preach and defend Universalism; I now think entirely differently. It is the easiest faith to preach that I have ever heard. There is more proof in its favor than in any other doctrine I have ever heard. I have a suit in court here tomorrow and if I had as much proof in its favor as there is in Universalism, I would go home, and leave my student to take charge of it, and I should feel perfectly certain that he would gain it.” Abraham Lincoln

According to Google quotes Abraham Lincoln also said, “The best way to destroy an enemy is to make them your friend.”
God always does things “the best way.”

ANOTHER QUOTE FOR THOSE WHO DON’T THINK LINCOLN’S ARGUMENTS WOULD HAVE BEEN BASED ON THE BIBLE: Mr. Lincoln’s deep knowledge of the scriptures could not have come without regularly reading them. As Lincoln scholar Paul Angle noted: “There was one book which left its mark on much of what he wrote. That was the Bible. Upon a familiarity which extended back to his youth he could always depend.” Historian Michael Nelson wrote: “Lincoln was consumed by religion as a subject, as well as by the Bible, a book that all of his biographers agree he had read and studied assiduously since his youth.
”Quoted from William J. Wolf, A Study of the Religion of Abraham Lincoln

ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST
Four Views of the Salvation of Our God
By Charles Slagle
Copyright © 1998, Charles Slagle. All rights reserved
Published by
Tentmaker Ministries and Publications, Inc.
118 Walnut
Hermann, MO. 65041
tentmaker.org
info@tentmaker.org
573-486-3825

If you have been devastated by spiritual abuse or fear of God’s hopeless abandonment, this book will change your life.
ABSOLUTE ASSURANCE IN JESUS CHRIST
richardwaynegarganta.com/4Vi … vation.htm

AGNOSTIC

I would rather live out my life as an agnostic, trying to treat other people the same way that I would like to treated by them and hope for the best after I die, than to put my trust in a book that teaches that God will allow anyone to choose themselves into an inescapable state of everlasting suffering. Rodger Tutt
godfire.net/eby/circularity.html

Writer Somerset Maugham, after his parents’ deaths, spent a few stultifying years in his uncle’s vicarage. Later, in his teens at a boarding-school, having lost his belief in the existence of God said: “The whole horrible structure, based not on the love of God, but on the fear of eternal hell, tumbled down like a house of cards.” Quote source: The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham by Selina Hastings

We are so constituted that we believe the most incredible things; and, once they are engraved upon the memory, woe to him who would endeavor to erase them. Goethe

There is a germ of religion in human nature so strong that whenever an order of men can persuade the people by flattery or terror that they have salvation at their disposal, there can be no end to fraud, violence or usurpation. John Adams

AION – AIONIOS

HOW ETERNITY SLIPPED IN
thetencommandmentsministry.us/mi … e_eternity

In the first three chapters of Ephesians, (a key book regarding God’s plan for man relative to the fullness of the times) aion is used seven times. And out of those seven, the KJV has chosen five different English words (“ages,” “course,” “end,” “eternal,” and “world.”) to translate this one word.

And to add to this confusion, it translates the Greek word genea (generation), a totally different word, twice as “ages.”

Talk about confusion compounded!

Is it any wonder the church has been blinded from God’s truth about the purpose of His judgments and His eonian plan to save all fallen creatures?!

Simply put, the Scriptures do not take up the philosophical concept of eternity, but rather speak of eons and that which pertains to them. Of course God’s glory exceeds the eons, but His glory is reflected by His Son during the eons as they are presented in Scripture.

  • Gerry Beauchemin

No two words in the history of man have been so torturing as aion and aionion. No two words in the history of man, mishandled by man, have contributed more to the physical, emotional and spiritual harm of so many, than these. You may think I must be exaggerating. But I am not. It is the mistranslation of these two words that has foisted the false and destructive doctrine of eternal torment upon the church and the world.

Mistranslation of the Greek words “aion” and “aionion” is a master stroke of diabolical genius. No other words erroneously translated, could more effectively pervert man’s image of God and cause such widespread confusion. The following work by Joseph E. Kirk is offered in the hope that the serious seeker after scriptural truth will be aided in their quest.
CHART OF GOD’S PLAN FOR THE AGES OF TIME
THE EONS OF THE BIBLE WITH CONCORDANCE
saviourofall.org/Tracts/Eons2.html

Also see
AN ANALYTICAL STUDY OF WORDS
tentmaker.org/books/asw/index.html
(especially note the quotes by the many Greek scholars in chapters three and twelve)

AIÓN – AIÓNIOS
tentmaker.org/books/Aion_lim.html
See the first item under APPENDIX
AIDIOS – AN IMPORTANT WORD CONSIDERED

A SNIPPET FROM THE GREEK WORD AION – AIONIOS TRANSLATED EVERLASTING – ETERNAL IN THE HOLY BIBLE SHOWN TO DENOTE LIMITED DURATION – JOHN WESLEY HANSON

“The word aidios (not aionios) was in universal use among the non-Christian Greek Jews of our Savior’s day, to convey the idea of eternal duration, and was used by them to teach endless punishment.

Jesus never allowed himself to use it in connection with punishment, nor did any of His disciples but one, and he but once, and then carefully and expressly limited its meaning. Can demonstration go further than this to show that Jesus carefully avoided the phraseology by which His contemporaries described the doctrine of endless punishment? Jesus never adopted the language of His day on this subject. Their language was aidios timoria, endless torment. His language was aionion kolasin, age-lasting correction. They described unending ruin, He, discipline, resulting in reformation.”
AIÓN – AIÓNIOS
tentmaker.org/books/Aion_lim.html
See the first item under APPENDIX
AIDIOS – AN IMPORTANT WORD CONSIDERED

“In THE VOCABULARY OF THE GREEK TESTAMENT (edited by James Hope Moulton and George Milligan) Concerning aionios we read, “In general, the word depicts that of which the horizon is not in view . . .” (p.16). If the horizon of the extermination spoken of by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 1:9 is simply not in view, then we can see that what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:22 can truly occur. The same all who are dying in Adam, which includes some who incur eonian extermination, can indeed eventually be vivified in Christ. The Bible, in fact, does not speak of judgment and condemnation, death and destruction, hades and Gehenna, or any of these serious consequences of sin, as unending. It may refer to them as not having the end in view, but none of these fearful works of God can keep Him from achieving His will (1Tim.2:4); reconciling all through the blood of Christ’s cross (Col.1:20, and becoming All in all (1 Cor.15:28).”.
Dean Hough

THE GREAT REVELATION OR GOD’S LOVE, PURPOSE AND PLAN – JOHN H. PATON

“Some say that if it can be proved that the punishment of the wicked will have an end, the same argument will prove that the life of the righteous will also end. But this is too much to take for granted on such a premise. Aionios does not of itself indicate either the limited or unlimited duration of anything, but its duration in each case depends on the nature of that to which it is applied.

CHRIST TRIUMPHANT – THOMAS ALLIN

It is true that aionios may be applied as an epithet to things that are endless, but the idea of endlessness in all such cases comes not from the epithet, but only because it is inherent in the object to which the epithet is applied, as in the case of God.

‘This is life eternal’ should be ‘the life of the ages,’ i.e. peculiar to those ages in which the scheme of salvation is being worked out. The ‘eternal covenant’ is the ‘covenant of the ages,’ the covenant peculiar to the ages of redemption. The ‘eternal purpose’ is really the purpose of ‘the ages,’ i.e. developed and worked out in ‘the ages.’

We who teach the larger hope believe that not in this brief life only, but through future ages, Christ’s work shall go on till the last straying sheep shall have been found by the Good Shepherd. Then, at the expiry of these ages ‘cometh the end’ when Christ shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, and God shall be All in all (1Cor. 15:28).

GOD’S PLAN FOR THE AGES OF TIME
THE EONS OF THE BIBLE WITH CONCORDANCE
saviourofall.org/Tracts/Eons2.html

AIONIOS

Although there are at least fifteen translations that translate aion/aionios literally instead of interpretively, the most popular versions are translated interpretively.

Why did God allow the most popular versions of His written word to be interpretively translated instead of literally translated?

In my opinion the reason is the same reason why God allows all other evils to temporarily prevail, and that is because He is eventually going to make it better for everyone that He did so.

Probably, God could not have allowed a better foil of contrast of evil versus good than to let His written word be mistranslated. Against the black background of the theological false doctrines of never ending suffering or annihilation God will paint His glorious masterpiece of universal transformation using the paint brushes of His love that can never fail, and His grace that cannot be defeated.

WHAT MOST OF THE EARLY CHRISTIANS BELIEVED
And they were reading the Bible in its original language!

Universalism:
The Prevailing Doctrine Of the Christian Church During Its First Five-Hundred Years
tentmaker.org/books/Prevailing.html
And they were reading the Bible in its original language!

Greek scholar William Barclay wrote concerning kolasis aionion (age-during corrective chastisement) in Matthew 25:46
“The Greek word for punishment is kolasis, which was not originally an ethical word at all. It originally meant the pruning of trees to make them grow better. There is no instance in Greek secular literature where kolasis does not mean remedial punishment. It is a simple fact that in Greek kolasis always means remedial punishment. God’s punishment is always for man’s cure.”

Also see what other Greek scholars say about it
An Analytical Study of Words
tentmaker.org/books/asw/Chapter11.html

Fifteen literally translated (not interpretively translated) Bibles that reveal what God will do with the sinners in Matthew 25:46
Concordant Literal, Young’s literal, Wilson’s Emphatic Diaglott, Rotherham’s Emphasized, Scarlett’s, J.W. Hanson’s New Covenant, Twentieth Century, Ferrar Fenton, The Western New Testament, Weymouth’s (unedited), Clementson’s, The New Testament of our Lord and Savior Jesus Anointed, The Restoration of Original Sacred Name Bible, Bullinger’s Companion Bible margins, Jonathan Mitchell’s translation (2010).