That is a very Anglican way to look at it @bwallac2335 After all, that is what the 39 Articles say: Article VIII: Of the Three Creeds The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of holy Scripture
I think it makes sense to consider "what did the formulators of the Creed mean by what they wrote" in determining if someone actually holds to the creed(s). For instance, I could probably hold to certain Islamic or Mormon documents/creeds if I reinterpreted them to fit my Christian religious beliefs. Article VIII: Of the Three Creeds The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of holy Scripture Article VIII doesn't say: The Three Creeds, Nicene Creed, Athanasius's Creed, and that which is commonly called the Apostles' Creed, ought thoroughly to be received and believed: for they may be proved by most certain warrants of Holy Scripture by reinterpreting them to fit our own views that do not align with the views of those who wrote the creed(s). I believe the Anglican Church holds to the creeds/councils not because we reinterpreted them to fit our Protestant beliefs, but because our beliefs are the same as the people who wrote them.
To be fair I disagree with your universalism but I think the charges being laid against you as unjust. From my understanding of the councils we can only hope for universalism but cant proclaim it dogmatically
That's a fine sentiment to express, after previously stating that you were looking to the belief/intent of Athanasius (rather than to Scripture)! Now that you're on the right track: John 3:18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. John 3:3 Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” One cannot simply bypass these words of Jesus because they don't agree with your preferred interpretation of things. There are scriptures that universalists look to, but every one of them can be explained differently based on context. The words of Jesus that I have repeated above simply cannot be explained away, because the context shows no other explanation. One may dredge up the teachings of a few isolated early churchmen, such as Origen and his mentor, Clement of Alexandria, but since we look to scripture as our primary source and since we realized that men can err, the words of Jesus still trump any pro-universalist early church teaching.
I guess I just do not understand the point you are making and so will bow out of the discussion, as I'm not trying to raise anyone's heckles
This is really disappointing, Rexlion. If you want to attribute words to me, at the very least do me the courtesy of quoting me correctly. What I said was: Please don't misquote me
Fair enough. You're in good company. C.S. Lewis, Karl Barth, even Martin Luther have expressed hope in universal salvation.
Even in the early church, a belief in universalism was far from 'universal'. Cyprian is said to have written the following: "An Ever-Burning Gehenna Will Burn Up The Condemned, and A Punishment Devouring With Living Flames; Nor Will There Be Any Source Whence At Any Time They May Have Either Respite Or End To Their Torments. Souls With Their Bodies Will Be Reserved In Infinite Tortures For Suffering." Here are some comments from Justin Martyr: "For the prophets have proclaimed two advents of His: the one, that which is already past, when He came as a dishonoured and suffering Man; but the second, when, according to prophecy, He shall come from heaven with glory, accompanied by His angelic host, when also He shall raise the bodies of all men who have lived, and shall clothe those of the worthy with immortality, And shall send those of the Wicked, endued with eternal sensibility, Into Everlasting Fire with the wicked devils." "For among us the prince of the wicked spirits is called The Serpent, and Satan, and the devil, as you can learn by looking into our writings. And that he would be sent into the Fire with his host, And the men who follow him, and would be punished for an endless duration, Christ foretold." "And we say that the same thing will be done, but at the hand of Christ, And upon the wicked in the same bodies united again to their spirits which are now to undergo Everlasting Punishment; and not only, as Plato said, for a period of a thousand years. And if any one say that this is incredible or impossible, this error of ours is one which concerns ourselves only, and no other person, so long as you cannot convict us of doing any harm." Irenaeus: "Thus also the Punishment of those who do not believe the Word of God, and despise his advent, and are turned away backwards, is increased; being not merely Temporal, But Eternal. For to whomever the Lord shall say, “Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire” [Mt 25:41], these will be damned forever!" Clement of Rome: ''After we have gone out of the world, no further power of confessing or repenting will belong to us.'' ''If we do the will of Christ, we shall obtain rest, but if not, if we neglect his commandments, nothing will rescue us from eternal punishment.'' Hippolytus: "And to the Lovers Of Iniquity shall be given Eternal Punishment. And the Fire which is Un-quenchable and without end awaits these latter, and a certain fiery worm which dieth not, and which does not waste the body, But continues bursting forth from the body with unending pain. No sleep will give them rest; no night will soothe them; No death will deliver them from punishment; no voice of interceding friends will profit them." "...A Lake Of Unquenchable Fire, into which we suppose no one has ever yet been cast; for it is prepared against the day determined by God, in which one sentence of righteous judgment shall be justly applied to all. And The Unrighteous, and those who believed not God, who have honoured as God the vain works of the hands of men, idols fashioned (by themselves), Shall Be Sentenced To This Endless Punishment." Chrysostom: "This is no small subject of enquiry which we propose, but rather about things which are of the first necessity and which all men enquire about; Namely, whether Hell Fire have any end. For that it hath no end Christ indeed declared when He said, "Their fire shall not be quenched, and their worm shall not die." "There are many men, who form good hopes not by abstaining from their sins, but by thinking that hell is not so terrible as it is said to be, but milder than what is threatened, and temporary, not eternal; and about this they philosophize much. But I could show from many reasons, and conclude from the very expressions concerning hell, that it is not only not milder, but much more terrible than is threatened. But I do not now intend to discourse concerning these things. For the fear even from bare words is sufficient, though we do not fully unfold their meaning. But that it is not temporary, hear Paul now saying, concerning those who know not God, and who do not believe in the Gospel, that “they shall suffer punishment, even eternal destruction.” How then is that temporary which is everlasting?" Hilary of Poitiers: "Thus there will be given No Rest to the pagans nor will the onset of death bring the peace they desire. Instead, their bodies are destined to suffer eternally because their punishment of eternal fire will be physical. What they endure, along with everything else destined for eternity, will have no end. If pagans are given a body destined for eternity in order to suffer the fire of judgment, how great is the impiety of those saints who doubt the glory of eternity since eternal punishment is certain for sinners." Basil of Caesarea: "If we cannot conceive of an end to that life, how are we to suppose there will be and end to Eternal Punishment? The qualification Of “Eternal” is ascribed equally to both of them. “For these are going,” He says, “into Eternal Punishment; the just, however, into Eternal Life.” (Mt. 25:46) If we profess these things we must recognize that the “he shall be flogged with many stripes” and the “he shall be flogged with few stripes” refer not to an end but to a distinction of punishment." Augustine: "It is in vain, then, that some, indeed very many, make moan over the eternal punishment, and perpetual, unintermitted torments of the lost, and say they do not believe it shall be so; not, indeed, that they directly oppose themselves to Holy Scripture, but, at the suggestion of their own feelings, they soften down everything that seems hard, and give a milder turn to statements which they think are rather designed to terrify than to be received as literally true."
With the likes of those individuals whom I've quoted, "prevalent" might be overly charitable, don't you think? I just quoted a good portion of the "heavy hitters" of the early church. Augustine was no slouch, was he? Augustine says the universalists of his day were in denial and 'softening" the word of God by giving it a more likeable interpretation. Seems more like the prevalent belief in the early church was that damnation will be never-ending.
You have a very restrictive idea of what constitutes the early church, basically only those who agree with you. The fact that Augustine, an avowed anti-universalist, still admitted that in the fourth and fifth centuries the doctrine of Universalism was upheld by the vast majority of Christians, is the best testimony of all in the popularity of the doctrine.
Apokatastasis, the belief that everyone will be saved, was condemned as a heresy at the Fifth Ecumenical Council. And it's incompatible with numerous passages in the 1662 Book of Common Prayer.
Two things: "Origenism", without further definition or detail, was anathematized at the the fifth council, not Apocatastasis; and Even if it were anathematized, Apocatastasis does not mean universalism.
How does it not? Please go into detail if you can, as I am genuinely curious in a distinction if it can be made.
How do "some, indeed very many" suddenly become "a vast majority"? Or does Augustine actually use the phrase "vast majority" elsewhere? To illustrate: I might say there are very many children in the US. That doesn't mean children comprise the vast majority of the population.
Rexlion, right. If the early church truly did have "vast majority" consist of adherents of universalism, then making Apocatastasis a heresy simply could never receive majority support at the 5th ecumenical council. We can say that at most a notable minority accepted apocastasis. But the majority was alarmed enough about its contradiction of Scripture and the gospel. Thus it became a heresy and untenable position to hold in the church, from that point on.
Apocatostasis is translated as restitution or reconstitution, and refers to a restoration to the original condition, i.e. prior to the Fall. Universalism, as it was used in the early church, refers to the belief that God's desire, as expressed in John 3:16-17 and 1 Timothy 2:3-6, to save all people and reconcile them to God (along with 1 Peter 3:18-20 and 4:6, Colossians 1:20, Jeremiah 18:5-10, Ezekiel 33:12-16, etc.), was accomplished by Jesus' atoning work on the cross and His resurrection from the dead, either by receiving forgiveness of sins in this life, or by having sins purged through the just and cleansing fire of God's punishment in hell. Ultimately, though, God's will will be done and all will be saved by grace through faith in Christ. The two ideas have often been conflated by anti-universalists and there were/are some universalists who have apocatostasis as a feature in their theologies, but the two are distinct and it is possible to believe in one without the other.
Augustine didn't speak English so we have to look at the original Latin. When Augustine described the Universalists as “indeed very many” (immo quam plurimi), what he meant is that they were a “vast majority” (Ramelli, Christian Doctrine, 11). The Latin word plurimi, from the adjective plurimus, justifies this interpretation.