‘HE DESCENDED INTO HELL’
‘And when Joseph had taken the body, he wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and laid it in his own new tomb.’
I. The descent into Hades.—The peace of the grave is only an image of the true, deep, conscious peace of the unseen world into which Christ passed at death. He had fulfilled His dying promise to the penitent robber and He had also fulfilled the prophecy of the Psalmist (Psalms 16:10). St. Paul alludes to the same truth (Ephesians 4:9-10). Finally we have the testimony of St. Peter (1 Peter 3:18-19 and 1 Peter 4:6). We have then abundant proof of the truth of the Article of the Creed, which declares our Lord’s descent into “hell,” i.e. into the unseen world of spirits.
The reasons of this descent
(a) Only by thus visiting the unseen world could he fulfil the conditions of death which are proper to human nature. But being God, He could not be detained.
(b) Further, St. Peter tells us that our Lord descended into Hades to preach to the spirits in prison. We must not understand by this that the place of the departed is a place of gloomy captivity; the word means rather ‘in safe keeping’ or ‘under guard.’ Our Lord went to the souls who were in safe keeping in the invisible mansion of the departed—kept safe under the Hand of God—and preached to them, i.e. preached the Gospel to them; proclaimed the glad tidings that He had come into the world for their salvation; that He had offered the sacrifice of their redemption, and was about to appear before the Father as their Intercessor, in the merits of His own blood. One generation of men, among the penitents of past ages, St. Peter singles out as a type of all,—those who once were disobedient in the days of Noah.
III. A life of growth.—If Christ’s presence is vouchsafed to the faithful departed, then the life beyond the grave is a life of growth in grace. As the knowledge of Christ is more clearly granted to each faithful soul, so each soul rises upwards to perfection. His presence is for ever glorifying the abodes of the faithful departed; and this means that they are ever receiving new graces and advancing to greater heights of holiness. Thus Christ’s work in the unseen world is an abiding work.
—Archdeacon Mackarness.