Eternal punishment
14 Aug '09 14:292 editsOriginally posted by duecer======================================
From coffman's commentary: This maxim seems to have been triggered in Mark's mind by the mention of fire in the previous verses. And what is the meaning? If we understand "fire" as a reference to the persecutions and tribulations that invariably beset the Christian pilgrimage, it means that none shall be saved except through the endurance of the world's scorn uperstition that this is a reference to all souls passing through the fires of purgatory!
From coffman's commentary: This maxim seems to have been triggered in Mark's mind by the mention of fire in the previous verses. And what is the meaning? If we understand "fire" as a reference to the persecutions and tribulations that invariably beset the Christian pilgrimage, it means that none shall be saved except through the endurance of the world's scorn and opposition.
Paul expressed this thought as "All that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Timothy 3:12). Of course, this is a difficult verse, and all kinds of notions have been advocated as the meaning of it. Certainly, we may set aside the superstition that this is a reference to all souls passing through the fires of purgatory!
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That is interesting. I am always opened to hear a reasonable commentory.
And I will also include for consideration the footnote to Mark 9:49 in the Recovery Version.
www.recoveryversion.org
"For everyone will be salted with fire" (Mark 9:49)
" This is the refining fire (Mal. 3:2), the purifying, purging fire, as in 1 Cor. 3:13,14 (cf. Isa. 33:14), which, as a dispensational punishment in the kingdom age, will purge the believers who commit sin and are unrepentant in this age (see note 43[5]). Even in this age God purges the believers through trials as if by fire (1 Pet. 1:7; 4:12,17). Dispensational punishment by fire in the coming age is in the same principle as God's chastisement through sufferings as if by fire in this age."
My note: Dispensational punishment of believers during the coming millennial kingdom is not the Catholic "purgatory" in which some people are being punished in fire after death but can be redeemed out by "endulgances" paid to the Catholic hierarchical priestly system.
If you would like to discuss this more with me, you may choose to take it over to the thread Dispensational Punishment of Christians. But that's up to you.
I agree that it is a difficult passage.
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