“He descended into hell.”

This phrase, “he descended into hell,” is the subject of several questions I receive when we confess the Apostles’ Creed as a part of our Sunday morning worship at Faith (see the introduction to this post). Part of the confusion stems from the fact that the phrase is, well, shocking. The picture of Jesus walking about in a fiery chasm deep below the earth’s surface is almost impossible to resist upon first hearing the statement!

It should be admitted that this phrase is not as old as the other articles that come together to make up the Apostles’ Creed. The “descent into hell” phrase did not become an accepted part of the creed until the late fourth century. In addition, the phrase does not come directly from Scripture as a quote, although it can be somewhat discerned in 1 Peter 3.18-22 and Ephesians 4.9 (see below).

So, what does this article mean? I think that it is best to summarize the meaning as this: Jesus died a real death to secure a real victory.

A real death. What the creed means by affirming that Jesus’ death was a real death is to affirm that His death was not a simulated or totally unique death, that He somehow died differently than we die. You can hear this emphasis in the Apostles’ Creed if you consider the phrases together: Jesus was crucified, Jesus died, Jesus was buried, . . . and Jesus descended into hell. The authors of the creed actually emphasize that the first three things were not faked or somehow only spiritual and, therefore, were compelled to use the phrase, “he descended into hell,” as a stamp or repetition that drives home the real death of Jesus. His was a real death, a true separation of body and spirit (Ecclesiastes 12.7).

One of the ways we see this idea behind the creed’s statement more clearly is by learning another language! If we understand Greek, we then come to understand that when the Apostles’ Creed mentions hell, it does not use the word, gehenna. Let me explain. The New Testament word for the real, physical location for hell, the place of final retribution, is gehenna. But the Apostles’ Creed is not referring to gehenna, but to sheol (in Hebrew) or hades (in Greek). Sheol and hades are not always understood in the Bible in exactly the same way, however, we can summarize that these terms most often refer to the state of death rather than the location after death. This is why in the Old Testament the word sheol is translated most often with the word, grave. The emphasis on sheol and hades is not location, but state of existence, an existence of disembodied life. Death is, after all, defined in the Bible as a separation of body and soul (again, Ecclesiastes 12.7). Furthermore, J. I. Packer echoes this view when he says that the word descent refers not to location (hell is down, heaven is up), but to worth or value, for the state of death is less noble than the state of life.

What we must see in this article is that what happens to everyone who dies, really happened to Jesus too! In His death, he entered the deepest humiliation of human existence by experiencing death to its fullest completion. He did not fake His death. It was not an apparition that died. There was not a stunt-double who died in His place. He was not in some unconscious, comatose state for three days. He was not death-like from exhaustion after hanging on the cross. Jesus died a real death!

At Faith, we are not alone in understanding the authors of the Apostles’ Creed in this way. Look at what the seventeenth century Westminster Larger Catechism says: “Christ’s humiliation after his death consisted in his being buried, and continuing in the state of the dead, and under the power of death till the third day; which has been otherwise expressed in these words, He descended into hell (Q. 50).” Understood this way, the Apostles’ Creed truly affirms a very important doctrinal truth.

A real victory. Because Jesus died a real death, we can confidently assert that His victory over sin and death was not hollow. When we read 1 Corinthians 15, the Bible’s longest teaching on the resurrection, we see how important it was for Paul that Christians understand the resurrection to follow a real death. If the death was not real, the resurrection was anything but a resurrection! Indeed, if Jesus’ death was different from my death, how is it that my resurrection will be anything like His resurrection? Yet, to be sure, this is exactly what the Bible affirms when it says that His resurrection is the firstfruits of my  own resurrection (1 Corinthians 15.20, 23). If the death of Jesus was not real, then it would never account for the very real death that is the result of Adam’s sin; Paul says, “for as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive (1 Corinthians 15.22).” The victory of being a recipient of God’s covenant promises, that is, a Christian, comes about through the victory of Jesus over the punishment of death. If He doesn’t “swallow up “death (1 Corinthians 15.54; Isaiah 25.8), then there will be no victory to be had at all!

As much as the creed teaches us that we must affirm the real death and, related to this, the real victory of Jesus, it seems appropriate to quickly note some of the things we do not mean at Faith when we confess the Apostles’ Creed.

• The descent into hell does not affirm that Jesus went someplace after his death on the cross, before His resurrection, and performed some ministry. If He did so, logically, He would only have only half of His human nature since His body remained in the tomb and His spirit had been committed to God (Luke 23.46, Psalm 31.5, Acts 7.59; John 19.30; and Acts 7.59). This can only mean that His spirit was placed under God’s care and that He would, Himself, have been entirely passive during these three days.
• The descent into hell does not affirm that Jesus, after assuming His glorified body, entered the physical place called, hell. Some commentators find proof for a physical change of location in Ephesians 4.9. Here, Paul describes the incarnation of Jesus as a descent “into the lower regions, the earth.” These commentators say that while  Paul certainly refers to the to the incarnation of Jesus (Psalms 139.15), he also refers to a descent including the uttermost lower region, that is, hell. Then passages like 1 Peter 3.19, in which Jesus is said to have “proclaimed to the spirits in prison,” are called in to support the view that Jesus went to the physical location of hell. While the Bible testifies that hell is a real, physical place (Psalm 49.14-15; 16.8-11; Acts 2.27; Proverbs 7.27; 9.18; Ecclesiastes 9.10; Luke 16.23, 28; Job 24.19; Matthew 11.23-24; Isaiah 14.15; Matthew 16.18), it is a place reserved for the ungodly, for those who do not meet God’s righteous judgment. Conversely, Jesus actually satisfied the Father’s judgment and finished His own work on the cross.
• Related to the above, the descent into hell does not affirm that Jesus, in His glorified body, went to the physical location of hell in order to preach a message of salvation. That is, 1 Peter 3.18-22 does not teach that Jesus performed a gospel preaching ministry in the place of eternal damnation that mirrored His ministry of gospel proclamation on earth. This “second chance” ministry simply has no warrant in Scripture. In fact, it would seem that Hebrews 9.27-28 is expressly written to oppose this view when it says, “just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.” We are called to energetically proclaim the gospel in this age precisely because the age to come will be filled with torment and sorrow for those who refuse Christ as their Savior.
• The descent into hell does not affirm that Jesus entered a unique, physical location that is distinct from the hell and heaven of the Bible. This view, popularized within Roman Catholic theology, teaches that Jesus, upon His death, in a disembodied state, entered not hell but a pre-heaven place known as the Limbus Patrum, the “limbo of the fathers,” or paradise, or  the Abraham’s bosom of Luke 16.23. This middle-place of provisional blessing, or pre-heaven  located between physical hell and physical heaven, is simply nowhere taught in the Bible. When paradise is used in the Bible, it refers to heaven and not to a unique, pre-heaven holding ground of some sort (Revelation 2.7; Luke 23.43; 2 Corinthians 12.3). Furthermore, the writer of Hebrews is very firm that God has a means of drawing those Old Testament saints to glory, without a Limbus Patrum, even before the “founder of their salvation” suffered on earth (Hebrews 2.10).
• Developing upon this theme, the descent into hell does not affirm that Jesus, in a disembodied state or His glorified body, entered a unique, physical location to perform some kind of ministry. This view grows largely from the connection between the afterlife of Jesus and a kind of preaching ministry in 1 Peter 3.18-22 (and 1 Peter 4.4-6). Believers of the Middle Ages saw in these passages proof that, after His death on the cross, Jesus ministered to captive souls of Old Testament saints who died before Jesus’ death on the cross. This view requires the belief in the Limbus Patrum or “Abraham’s bosom” for those who would go on to heaven (see above), as well as some kind of Hades or place of pre-hell for those who would ultimately go on to eternal damnation. It is to these places that Jesus was said to descend in order to perform a ministry not to altar the course of his disembodied hearers, but to proclaim to them His accomplishment on the cross. As stated above, we do not believe that these provisional locations are taught in Holy Scripture and so we do not find this view to be compatible with the phrase, He descended into hell. Those who do hold to this afterlife ministry of Jesus does include some Evangelicals like J. I. Packer and Leon Morris, the Protestant Reformer Peter Martyr, many within Lutheran and Anglican traditions, and the current Pope, Joseph Ratzinger. Specifically, this view maintains that Jesus declared to disembodied souls in either the Limbus Patrum (Ratzinger, Peter Martyr, many Anglicans) or Hades (Packer, Morris, and many Lutherans), a message of victory and triumph procured on the cross. While not a preaching ministry per se, this view informs the “harrowing of hell” taught in the Middle Ages in which Jesus is said to have divided the disembodied spirits in preparation for their eternal abode. However, we may reply that on the cross, Jesus said to the penitent thief that this very day (“today”) he would be with Jesus in heaven (Luke 23.43); He mentions no delay for a proclamation ministry. Nor is it easy to affirm what purpose Jesus would have in proclaiming His triumph to those destined to eternal damnation nor to those secure in the glory of God. The error of this view really stems from trying to reconcile three difficult passages: 1 Peter 3.19, 1 Peter 4.6, and Ephesians 4.9. In short, when we confess the Apostles’ Creed we are not affirming that Jesus performed a ministry among disembodied souls.

One might insist that, if there are so  many ways to misread the Apostles’ Creed, why use it in corporate worship at all?! Or, to put it more irenically, why not simply edit-out the phrase, “he descended into hell?” This argument is made by Michael Williams of Covenant Seminary (see “He Descended Into Hell? An Issue of Confessional Integrity”) as well as Wayne Grudem of Phoenix Seminary (see “He Did Not Descend Into Hell: A Plea for Following Scripture Instead of the Apostles’ Creed”). Aside from these two esteemed theologians, a great majority of Reformed pastors and teachers happily affirm the Apostles’ Creed for a few good reasons.

1. First, no confessional statement should be affirmed without understanding what it means. Hopefully, this article points us in this direction by highlighting the things that we do not mean when we use this creed. More information is available in Daniel Hyde’s little book, In Defense of the Descent, but the short restatement at the beginning of the article,Jesus died a real death to secure a real victory, should help to crystallize what we mean by “he descended into hell.”
2. Second, the Apostles’ Creed has formed an integral part of Protestant life for many centuries not just in terms of corporate confession (which is important), but in terms of theological instruction. In fact, the Lord’s Prayer, the Ten Commandments, and the Apostles’ Creed have formed the backbone of church instruction over the ages. This constituted Sunday school! It is none other than J. I. Packer, along with Gary Parrett, who make this express point in Grounded in the Gospel: Building Believers the Old-Fashioned Way. We would not like to give this creedal statement up when keeping it allows us to participate in the life of the universal church.
3. When we truly believe that Jesus experienced the forsakenness of His Father (Matthew 27.46; Mark 15.34) we are assured in our belief that this forsakenness will never encompass us. Jesus turns to the beginning of Psalm 22 while on the cross and, because of that death, the end of Psalm 22 is open to us; “the afflicted shall eat and be satisfied” and “His righteousness” will be proclaimed! When our dying Savior directs us to Psalm 22 we know that our eternal security is secure, that His work was done on my behalf so that, though I might at times succumb to the fear of slavery, through Him I have received the Spirit of adoption (Romans 8.15).

There is so much more to say on the topic of Jesus’ descent, but let us know that, in Christ, His death accomplished for me what my works could never accomplish for me!