Can there be a Protestant version of the doctrine of Purgatory?
Is Universalist the same as Pluralist?
Recently, I was sent the new book Holy Hell: A Case Against Eternal Damnation by Derek Ryan Kubilus, published by Eerdmans Press. Since getting every book I receive into the Future Christian Podcast isn’t realistic, I figured I could start writing some posts about the books.
Kubilus’ book is very much in the vein of Rob Bell’s Love Wins or anything of that ilk, though offers a bit more analysis of original languages and textual meanings. Having heard many a “fire and brimstone” preaching in my youth, I always appreciate a more nuanced approach to these passages. Definitely not an academic work, this is a book meant for the average person in the pews. A few things stood out to me from the book.
No singular biblical message…or is there?
First, Kubilus makes the admirable point that “we have this perceived need to conflate what every book of the Bible says with every other book, as if there is some single, undergirding theological framework that all the biblical authors are using.”1 Sure, great, I agree. I use to hear very often in my Baptist days the idea that there are “66 books, one message, blah, blah, blah…” But, later on, Kubilus states, “The entire arc of the biblical narrative is about a God who refuses to abandon us to our own prisons.”2 Yes, I agree with this “undergirding theological framework” more than others—but though he doesn’t call it as such, but Kubilus is still creating an “undergirding theological framework.”
Is there a hell, or not?
Next, Kubilus examines some of the words translated as “hell” in the original biblical languages, such as Sheol, Hades, Gehenna, etc. For instance, he writes about how when Jesus spoke of “hell,” he was talking about a specific place just outside of the city, a place that’s now a park in modern Israel.3 Many who have run in “liberal/progressive” Christian circles have heard this before—that Jesus was talking metaphorically about a dump outside of then Jerusalem. Essentially, keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll end up in the dump yourself. Yet, Kubilus then adds later, “Hell is, for lack of a better word, purgatory.”4 Purgatory or “hell,” which is it? Is Gehenna a contextual metaphor of ancient Israel? Or is it a supernatural, metaphysical destination?5
Pluralism vs. Universalism
Finally, and this is the most intriguing yet ultimately most frustrating section of the book, Kubilus has a chapter comparing and contrasting universalism vs. pluralism, where Kubilus takes care to not conflate the two, emphasizing that he is a universalist—not a pluralist. He writes that universalists are often understood to mean “the abolition of all circles, the final end of the distinctions that have caused so much… division in the past.6 But, understanding universalism as pluralism can be self-defeating. “Extreme pluralists like to think that they are promoting diversity and the recognition of beauty in every religious tradition, but in order to do so, they inadvertently erase a lot of what makes some of those religious beautiful in the first place.”7
Kubilus highlights the story of the blind men examining an elephant, each feeling different pieces and assuming that their section entails the entirely of what makes an elephant. Yet, he astutely points out that the story assumes an omniscient narrator, one who can theoretically see the whole scene play out. In this vein, he notes that “pluralism becomes a religion all its own, when it is promoted not as a cultural tool but as an overarching ideology, an ultimate truth above all truths.”8 To this, Kubilus boldly proclaims, “that all religions are the same” or that what we pick doesn’t really matter is perhaps the least “progressive thing to say.”9
At this point of the book, I was very much engaged, as this is one of my biggest frustrations with progressive/liberal Christianity, the watering down of all distinctions and minimizing of truth claims to the point that Christianity just becomes a Moralistic Therapeutic Deism that really has no significance or depth.10 And, in what sounds very Barthian to me, Kubilus writes, it is not the tradition that saves; it is the Christ who inspired the tradition.”11 Yet, Kubilus seems to contradict himself yet again.
Is it worth influencing a person’s post-death destiny?
The underlying theme of the book is arguing for a Protestant version of Purgatory, a “Holy Hell” that can reform and transform humanity’s sin and brokenness. Yet, even though he acknowledges such a “hell” might be painful and difficult, he simply is content to let people enter into that suffering someday, assuaged by the idea that such suffering will only be for a time. He encourages churches to act as if “hell were not object.”12 Yet, clearly it is—if only for a duration of time.
And, this is where to me Kubilus contradicts himself on the pluralism/universalism front. He writes, “one of the most popular critiques of universalism is that it would destroy the practice of evangelism. After all, why would we work hard to save the lost if no one is truly lost in the first place? Well, yeah. That’s exactly right.”13 Remember, Kubilus has just finished lamenting the the minimizing of distinctions and stories of religion and especially Christianity. Yet, in saying we need not worry about telling others the story of Jesus—is not Kubilus himself creating a sort of pluralism where nothing really matters? After all, people will find redemption eventually, even perhaps the devil, why try so hard on this side of death?
This point is especially frustrating to me as he writes earlier in the book about how if evangelicals really believed in a literal hell, they’d be working day and night trying to keep everyone from this horrific eternal punishment. Yet, despite openly admitting he thinks most humans will have to endure some amount of suffering after death, Kubilus thinks in unessential to try to convince/convert others toward the way of Jesus in order that they might avoid some or all of this suffering??? This feels like a deviation from the basic idea of doing no harm—or helping people avoid harm.
Final thoughts
Kubilus’ book is an interesting and at times engaging read. While I am intrigued by his assertion that Protestants should hold to a doctrine of Purgatory, I do sort of wonder if this book will cause more confusion than clarity, especially considering it being written (in my estimation) with non-theologically trained lay people in mind. Not deep enough for an academic setting, this book would likely be best served in pastoral study group populated by well-read and theologically-informed persons. Though I wonder if these persons would ultimately be as dissatisfied as me in noticing these contradictions.
Kubilus, Holy Hell, 40.
75.
41.
115.
I should pause here and give Kubilus or the editors credit for a clever title, for here it becomes obvious the play on words in the title “Holy Hell,” that Kubilus is arguing for a Protestant purgatory—suffering that makes humans better—hence, holy “hell.”
128.
129.
133.
133.
See Andrew Root’s Faith Formation in a Secular Age.
134.
161.
172.