St. Gregory of Nyssa Apocatastasis and Later Church Theologians.

The Fate of the Unworthy and the Unbaptized.

This ascent is not possible for those who are unworthy. They are spiritually blind and will be left outside of true life and bliss forever. They are driven off to the outer darkness and they carry with them the stench of their flesh which they nourished by their constant surrender to sensual passions. This is the result only of sins which have not been effaced by repentance, but confession is potent only on earth, and in hell it is ineffectual. Gregory devotes particular attention to unbaptized souls which have not been sealed and which "do not bear any mark of the Lord." "It is only natural that such a soul will wander and circle aimlessly in the air. No one will look for it since it does not bear the mark of the Lord. It will long for rest and refuge but it will never find them. It will grieve in vain and its repentance will be fruitless."

In Gregory's conception, the sinner's torment consists primarily in the nakedness and hunger which result form the deprivation of the hope of bliss. The sinner is also consumed by an inexhaustible fire, the "furnace of hell" and the "untiring worm." This is the "outer darkness." These images are all symbolic but they also express a certain spiritual reality, for they indicate the continuation of man's earthly path and his process of purification. Gregory considers the fire of hell as a fire of baptism and renewal. "There is a purifying power in both fire and water," and whoever fails to purify himself through the water of the sacrament "will necessarily be purged by fire."

The Possibility of the Eventual Salvation of the Impure and Unrepentant.

Salvation can be attained even in the afterlife and the path of impure and unrepentant souls can lead to their eventual healing and purification from evil. All traces of past life are burned away in the fire. This process is not accomplished by means of external force because even in the purifying torments of hell man remains free. Repentance is awakened by the fire, and the soul, which had been held captive by material things, suddenly sees and realizes the vanity of everything it had wanted for itself, and it mourns and repents. The soul, Gregory writes, "clearly recognizes the distinction between virtue and vice through its inability to participate in the Divinity." Movement toward God is natural for the soul and when the soul turns away from evil it sees God, Who "calls to Himself everything which comes into being through His grace."

In other words, after the soul crosses the threshold of death, the deceitful nature of sin is revealed to it. The soul is shaken by this discovery and "with absolute necessity" it turns in a new direction. The will to evil, which had previously been strong in it, becomes weak and is soon exhausted. Gregory does not believe that the created will's movement toward sin can be eternal. He considers it highly unlikely that the will can maintain this insanity, especially when it is freed, even if only partially, from the fetters of the flesh. It seems to him that this is contradictory to the very nature of man, who has been created in the image of God. "The passionate desire for that which is foreign to it cannot remain in our nature forever. Everything which is not proper to us, which was not part of our natures at the beginning, will surfeit everyone and become a burden. Only that which is related to us and natural for us will always be desired and beloved."

"Evil is not so powerful," Gregory writes, "that it can overcome good. The foolishness of our nature is not higher or more en during than the Divine Wisdom. Furthermore, it is impossible for that which is inconstant and changing to be better and more resistant than that which is immutable and has always been firmly established in good."

This explains why the free movement of the will with which this process begins is "necessary." The turn of the will away from evil makes purification possible. The fire can burn out sin, "impurities," "material tumors," and "the remainder of fleshly contamination. Gregory compares this purification to the excision of a wart or callus, but even this image is insufficient. Purification is a separation which is ordered by God. God in His love irresistibly draws to Himself everything which has been created in His image. Movement toward God is natural and easy only for the pure. Impure souls must be forced to this movement, which is agonizing for them. The soul which has been ensnared by its passion for the material things of this earth "suffers constantly and undergoes violent tension. God draws the soul to Himself because it is His own property. Whatever is foreign to the soul, or whatever has grown into its substance, has to be scraped away by force and this causes the soul unendurable agony."

The duration and intensity of this torment is determined by the "quantity of healing" needed for purification to be achieved. "The agony will be measured by the amount of evil in each individual." From this it follows that the torment ultimately comes to an end because the "amount of evil" or the "amount of unpurged matter" in the soul of a sinner cannot be infinite, since infiniteness is not a property of evil. Sooner or later the fire will destroy every impurity and vice. This process of healing "by fire and bitter medicines" may seem protracted and "commensurate with eternity" but nevertheless its duration is limited to time.

Gregory maintains a clear distinction between the terms αιωνιος from αιων and αιδιος from αει. He never applies the second term to the torments and he never applies the first term to bliss or the Divinity. Αει designates that which is superior to time or outside of time. It cannot be measured by the ages and it does not move within time." This is the sphere of the Divinity. Creation, however, abides within time and "can be measured by the passing of the centuries.” Αιων designates temporality, that which occurs within time. This distinction in terminology is the explanation for an apparent contradiction in Gregory's thought. He demonstrates that the torment of fire is only temporary by citing passages from Scripture which describe it as "eternal." This refers to the eternity of time and the totality of the temporal state. However, this is not the same as the state which is superior to time. There is no foundation for considering that Gregory believed that the "eternal" torment foretold in Scripture is limited to unrepentant sinners only. Gregory would not accept even this restricted conception of damnation because for him the finiteness of the process of purification is a basic truth. It must end, no matter who is forced to undergo it. Other commentaries on this problem have not been conclusive.

Gregory's basic premise is that everything which has been created is finite. Time, which is the sphere of death (because dying is a process of change and can take place only in time), is also the sphere of purification, the purification of man for eternity through death. The body is purged through dissolution into its original elements and the soul is also purified and grows to maturity in the mysterious ways and dwelling places. When time is fulfilled it will end, the Lord will come, and the resurrection and judgment will be at hand. This will be the first restoration.

The End of Time and the Universal Resurrection.

Time will end when the internal measure of the universe has reached its limit. Further origination will be impossible and the passage of time will be unnecessary. "When our race has completed in an orderly fashion the full cycle of time," Gregory writes, "this current streaming onward as generation, succession will cease." The significance of the forward motion of time is in the succession of human generations, in which the "fullness of humanity," which has been predetermined by God, is realized. "It is necessary for reason to foresee an end to the multiplication of souls because otherwise there will be an endless stream of births into nature which will have no end." Measure and limitation are part of the perfection of nature. "When the birth of men has ended, then time will end, and in this way the renewal of the universe will be accomplished." This is not merely exhaustion or the natural end to that which had a natural beginning. This is fulfillment, the realization of completeness, and the reunification of this fullness.

The seven days of temporal creation will end and the eighth day will come, "the great day of the future age." A new life will begin, "continuous and indestructible, and it will never be altered by birth or death." Christ will come again and the universal resurrection will be accomplished. The Lord comes for the sake of this resurrection and "to restore the dead to incorruptibility." He comes in glory, born by hosts of angels who bow to Him as their King. "All the higher order of creation will worship Him" and "all the angels will rejoice that men have again been summoned to their original state of grace." This summons is the universal resurrection, the renewal and gathering together of the whole of creation. "All creation, both the higher and the lower orders, will join together in their rejoicing."

This universal gathering will begin with the resurrection of the dead. It is our bodies which will rise up, for the soul never dies even though the body disintegrates. The soul will not arise, but it will return. "The soul will again return from its invisible state of dispersion to a state which is visible and has a focus." This is the restoration of the entire man, the "return of that which had been separated to an indivisible union." The bodies of all men will be restored to their original beauty and there will be no physical difference between the virtuous and the wicked. This does not mean that there will be no distinction between the purified and the unpurified, but this difference will exist only in their internal natures and fates. That which awaits men in the afterlife is purification, the renewal and restoration of the body, and the resurrection of all. But for some souls the path to purification will have to continue even beyond this.

Gregory's Doctrine of Apocatastasis.

There is a certain inconsistency in Gregory's doctrine, which is apparently the result of his acceptance of certain features of Origenism and his rejection of others. In Gregory's conception the universal resurrection is a restoration, the "restoration of the image of God to its original condition." Through this men are again led into paradise. However, even at this restoration impurity is still in existence. It is only the mortality born of sin that has been brought to an end. Not every soul has been fully healed and purified, and yet it is the soul which contains the image of God. In Gregory's system true apocatastasis, universal restoration, is separated from the universal resurrection and delayed until some future time. This is both unexpected and contradictory, since according to this very system time has already ended and there can be no further succession or development. The whole of humanity has not yet been led into paradise. The just have been admitted into heaven but the impure souls cannot yet enter because paradise is achieved only through absolute purity. If the universal restoration is expected to take place at the end of time, this restoration cannot logically be separated into parts or stages, for this division would abrogate the integrity and completeness we would expect in a mode of existence that is outside of time.

In Origen's system this does not involve a contradiction be cause for him the "resurrection of the dead" is not the final restoration or the ultimate fate of the universe. It is only a point of transition in the continuing flow of the ages. For Origen the fate of the body is not resolved at the universal resurrection because the resurrection is followed by further stages of existence in future ages. Origen does not separate the fate of the soul from the fate of the body.

Gregory accepts certain features of Origen's doctrine, although the basic significance of their eschatologies is different. Ac cording to Gregory's system time has ended and the last things have been accomplished but suddenly it turns out that not everything has been brought to completion. The ultimate fate of all men should be realized simultaneously, but for Gregory this is not the case. In Gregory's conception the bodies of all men are purged and become radiant in unison. How can such a body remain incorruptible if it is reunited with a soul which has not yet been purified but which is still moribund and decaying? The strength of Divine life cannot be active in such a soul but the body without a soul will remain dead. Origen's system, on the other hand, maintains a distinction between the bodies of the righteous and the bodies of sinners, which is in accordance with his conception of the gradual overcoming of corporeal nature.

There are two possibilities. If the last resurrection is truly the restoration of the universe or, in the words of Gregory, a "catholic resurrection," then time and development have absolutely ended. Any souls which may remain unpurified are condemned to torment for eternity, the true eternity, which is superior to the limitations of human time. This idea was later developed by Maximus the Confessor. The other possibility, which is set forth by Origen, is that the general resurrection is not the ultimate restoration. The features of Origen's system which Gregory adapts are logically incompatible with his own premises. Furthermore, Origen's conception is contradictory and cannot be defended. Gregory's attempt to achieve a synthesis between Origen's system and the eschatology of Methodius of Olympus, from whom he borrows his doctrine of the resurrection, is unsuccessful.

At the resurrection the body grows forth from the earth as if it were a new plant. Gregory compares this resurrection with the germination of seeds, the blossoming of trees, and the development of the human embryo. All of these analogies had long been a part of Christian tradition. "In the words of the Apostle," Gregory writes, "the mystery of the resurrection can be understood as the same type of wonderful development that we observe in seeds." "Seeds" and "ears of grain" are among Gregory's favorite images. He distinguishes two stages in their growth. Their development originates in a state that is indeterminate because "at first the seed is without form but once it is established by the ineffable artistry of God, ii takes on form and develops and becomes dense." For this reason there is nothing exceptional about the growth of the seed of the dead body or its restoration to its previous form and "entire material state." Since every germination is achieved through dissolution and death, all growth is a resurrection and a victory over death.

Resurrection is made possible by the connection of the soul and the body in an individual organic unity but it is actually achieved only through the power of God. It is He Who authorizes the birth, renewal, and life of all nature. Resurrection is a miracle worked by the omnipotence of the Divinity but it is a miracle which is in accord with the basic laws of nature. It is one more manifestation of the general mystery of life. Resurrection is the fulfillment and ultimate realization of nature. The bodies which are resurrected are the very bodies which have died. Otherwise this would not be resurrection but a new creation. The resurrected bodies are composed of their former elements which have been gathered from everywhere by virtue of the life-giving power of the soul. "In this way the different elements are gathered by the power of the soul, which weaves them together to form the chain of the body."

Resurrection is not merely a return to our former life or our previous mode of existence. This would be a great misfortune and the soul would lose all hope of true resurrection. Resurrection is the restoration of the entire man. It is a renewal and a trans formation to something better and more complete. However, it is one and the same body which makes this transition. Not only the unity of the subject, but also the identity of the substratum are maintained. This does not contradict the truth of the renewal and transformation. "The veil of the body, after it has been destroyed by death, will be recomposed and rewoven from the very same material elements, not into its previous coarse and imperfect state, but in such a way that the fibers of its being will be light and airy. It will be restored into the superior state of the great beauty which it had desired." That which returns to life is that which was interred in the grave, but it will be different. All earthly life is a continuing process of change and renewal. "Human nature is like a constantly flowing stream," Gregory writes, and yet this does not turn individual men into an indefinite "crowd of people."

When man is resurrected he will not be any particular age nor will he be every age all at once. The concept of age will become invalid at the resurrection because it was not part of our original nature. "In our original life there was probably no old age, or child hood, or suffering from various diseases, or any other deformity or imperfection of the body because it is not proper to God to create anything like that. All of these violated us when we were invaded by sin." These things will not be a part of our resurrection but neither will they prevent it. It is only our true nature that will be resurrected and not the vices and passions which have infected it. We will be renewed and liberated from this heritage and all the traces of our former lives of evil and sin. At the resurrection we will be transformed into a state of incorruptibility and immortality because resurrection is victory over death. The ears of grain will ripen to their maturity and be fruitful, and they will reach out to the heights of heaven.

Nothing that is connected with disease, the infirmity of old age, or ugliness will survive at the resurrection, neither wrinkles, nor deformity, nor immaturity. Resurrected bodies will not preserve their former organs and members which were made necessary by the demands of sinful life on earth. Death will purify our bodies of everything that is "superfluous or unnecessary for our enjoyment of our future life." This is especially true of the organs which we need to nourish ourselves and to perform the other functions of animal life or which are connected with the cycles of all material growth. Humanity will no longer be distinguished by sex. All the unrefined matter of our bodies will be overcome and the heaviness of the flesh will disappear. The body will become light and will naturally move upward. All of the attributes of the body: its color, form, features, and everything else "will be transformed into something Divine." Our bodies will lose their impermeability and their accidental distinctions will be effaced.

This is what Gregory is referring to when he says that we will all assume a single appearance at the resurrection. He writes: "We will all become the single body of Christ and we will all take on a single form and aspect because the radiance of the image of the Divinity will shine equally in all." This means that our appearance will be defined from within. "It is not the elements which will distinguish the appearance of each but the particularities of sin and virtue." Thus, the appearance of everyone will not be the same. The resurrection is the reinstitution of our original condition. It is not only the return to but also the gathering together of everything that was part of our previous life. It is not only apocatastasis, a restoration, but also recapitulatio, a summing up.

Gregory's conception of the final restoration is not the same as Origen's because Gregory did not believe in the pre-existence of the soul. For him the restoration is not a return to the past but the realization of something which had never existed and the accomplishment of that which had not been fulfilled. It is completion, not oblivion. This is especially true for the body. In Gregory's conception the body is not replaced but it is transformed and in this way it truly fulfills its function as the mirror of the soul.

The resurrection is followed by the Last Judgment of the entire universe. The Son of God will come again because He is the Judge and the Father judges through Him. "Everything the Only-Begotten decrees at the Last Judgment is also the work of the Father" but it is the Son Who sits in judgment because through His own experience He can truly measure the circumstances and difficulties of human life. He will judge everyone, "whether they had great experience of the good and evil of human life or whether they had hardly begun to know it and had died in immaturity."

This is more a judgment of Divine love than of Divine justice. All of its sentences are properly merited, however, and are equal to that which each man deserves. Christ is the "Justice of God and He revealed this Justice to men." In a certain sense each man will be the judge of himself. Each man will awaken at the resurrection and will remember his past life and give it a true evaluation, so that everyone who appears to be judged will be fully aware of his good deeds and his faults. The judgment is a mirror in which all men will be reflected.

The full glory of the Son, which is equal to the glory of the Father, will be revealed at the Last Judgment. This judgment will be universal and "the whole human race, from the first creature to the full completeness of all who were ever brought into being," will gather together and stand before the royal throne of the Son. The devil and his angels will also be brought to Him for judgment. "Then," writes Gregory, "the instigator of the rebellion, who dreamed of usurping the dignity of the Lord, will appear before the eyes of all as a beaten slave, and he will be dragged to punishment by the angels. All of his servants and the accomplices of his malice will be subjected to the punishment which is fitting for them." The ultimate deceit will be revealed and the true and only King will appear and both those who are victorious and those who are conquered will recognize Him and sing Him songs of praise.

Gregory devotes relatively little attention to the Last Judgment. The few depictions he has left of this terrible day are striking but they are intended more for edification than for serious consideration as dogma. The focal point of Gregory's eschatology is not the judgment because for him the judgment is not the final resolution of the fate of the universe. It is only a preliminary summation of history and a mirror of the past. The judgment is simply the beginning of the eighth day, which will continue beyond this process. Only the resurrection and the appearance of Christ in His glory are ultimate. The Son's judgment is more the revelation of the activity of humanity than its resolution and it accomplishes little that is new. The bliss of just souls has already been determined by the resurrection and the torment of sinners has begun even before the resurrection and will continue beyond the judgment. The greatest significance of the Last Judgment lies in man's expectation of it because this conception motivates us in our efforts on earth to achieve religious and moral perfection. "The coming Judgment is a threat for us in our weak ness. This magnification of our sorrows makes us fear punishment and teaches us to avoid evil." "We make our description of this severe court as convincing as possible only in order to teach the necessity of leading a good and charitable life." Gregory has borrowed much of his doctrine of the Last Judgment from Origen.

Gregory sets forth a doctrine of a "universal restoration." "Participation in bliss awaits everyone," he writes. Some men achieve this through their actions in life on earth, whereas others must pass through the fire of purification. In the end, however, "after many ages evil will disappear and nothing will remain except good. This will be the completion of the return of all intellectual creatures to the original state in which they were first created, when there was as yet no evil." Eventually "evil will disappear from existence and it will again become nonexistence." Not a trace of evil will remain, and then "the beauty of our similarity to God, in which we were formed at the beginning, will again shine forth."

"There was a time," Gregory writes, "when all intellectual natures formed a single union and, by fulfilling the commandments of God, they brought themselves into agreement with the harmony which the Source had established through His activity. But after sin had intruded among the first men, who until then, together with the angelic forces, had made up a single assembly, the Divine harmony of this union was destroyed. Something had made men susceptible to deceit and this caused them to fall. Man was deprived of communion with the angels, so that through the fall their intellectual harmony was abrogated. After this it became necessary for the fallen one to labor and sweat in order to fight to liberate himself from the power which had gained dominion over him at the fall. Man must rise again and he receives as a reward for his victory over the enemy the right to participate in the Divine assembly." In this assembly human and angelic natures will again be united and form a "Divine host."

This will be a great and universal feast and nothing will interrupt the unity of intellectual creation. Both the lower and the higher orders will rejoice in universal gladness and all will worship and praise the Father through the Son in unanimity. All veils will be raised and a common joy and glory will shine forth in all. This final restoration will include everyone: all people, the entire race of men, and the whole of human nature. Moreover, it will encompass even evil spirits and the "inventor of evil" himself will finally be joined to the triumphant gathering. He also will be saved because during the three days of his death the Lord healed all three vessels of evil: demonic natures, the female sex, and the male sex. Evil will finally be driven out "even from the race of the snake, in which the nature of evil first found a source for itself."

Gregory's doctrine of the universal restoration of everything to its original state is based on the teaching of Origen. Their common point of departure is that Good is omnipotent because it alone has true existence and is the only foundation and goal of everything that exists. "There is always an immutable Divine harmony in everything," Gregory writes. "Your indignation and the dissatisfaction with which you observe the necessary chain of the sequence of things are in vain, since you do not know the goal to which each individual thing in the ordering of the universe is directed. It is necessary for everything to follow a certain order and succession, in accordance with the true Wisdom of the One Who directs all, as it comes into harmony with Divine nature."

Gregory understands the opposition of good and evil as the opposition between being and will, between that which is necessary and that which is accidental. There is no evil. It does not exist but only occurs or happens occasionally. It is necessary for that which occurs to have an end, for "that which has not always been will not always be." That which originates can subsist eternally only if there is an eternal will for it to do so and only through that which itself exists eternally. It can exist only by participating in the One Who truly is and by communion in the eternal Good. Creation can be maintained in this way but this is not possible for evil because evil is not from God. It is the "absence of good" or nongood, and this is the same as non-existence. In Gregory's reasoning: "Since it is not proper for evil to exist without being willed, and since the eternal will is from God, evil will eventually be completely destroyed because there will be no place for it to exist." Gregory follows Origen in his reference to the Gospels: "God will be all in all." "By this Scripture teaches us that evil will be completely destroyed because if God is in all being, it is evident that He is not in evil being or sin." God is in everyone and for this reason no one can be excluded from the whole. "God is in everything" means that all are in God and partake in the Good.

Gregory manages to avoid one of the difficulties of Origen's system. In Gregory's conception time is not merely the falling out of eternity or the environment for sinful and fallen men. Nor does Gregory concede that creation had pre-existence or is eternal. On the contrary, creation is realized for the first time only within the process of history. This gives a completely new significance to the conception of apocatastasis, the restoration, and establishes a positive value for the course of human history. This principle is undermined, however, by Gregory's insistence that nothing created has any essential value and that God is the only worthy goal of our contemplation and striving. This premise leads Gregory to conclude that we will ultimately achieve a state of oblivion. "The memory of that which existed after our original state of prosperity and of that which caused man to sink into evil will be effaced by that which will be effected when time runs out. Our memory of this condition will come to an end when it is completed. Our final restoration in Jesus Christ will efface our memory of evil." However, without the memory of evil there will be no remembrance of our struggle against it and our victory over it.

Gregory openly or by implication proposes that creation will find its ultimate completeness only in God. Creatures will be oblivious of themselves and of everything which is not similar to God. All that men will see in one another will be God, and a single image of God will be in everyone. This doctrine contains elements of historical docetism and is connected with Gregory's underestimation of the human will. This is why Gregory denies the permanent existence of evil. Man's will cannot fail to yield when ultimate Good is revealed to it because even in opposition the will is weak. Furthermore, in Gregory's conception the will is determined by reason, which can be mistaken only when it is deceived and cannot persist once its error is revealed. According to Gregory, a clear vision of the truth will necessarily turn the will towards that truth.

Gregory's doctrine of the necessary movement of the free will is an attempt to unite the concepts of human freedom and necessity. This is the basic concern of his eschatology. The will is subordinate to the law of the basic goodness of all nature and the eschatological process is defined as the gradual elimination of the consequences of evil. This is the significance of the fire of purification. Gregory's doctrine shows the influence of the traditions of the school of Alexandria, and it is very different from the teaching of Basil the Great. It should be noted that certain features of Origenism are also present in the system of Gregory the Theologian, who accepts the idea of baptism through the purifying fire but does not support the doctrine of the general restoration.

Gregory's Doctrine of Apocatastasis and Later Church Theologians.

The contemporaries of Gregory of Nyssa did not respond to his eschatology. It was first evaluated by Barsanuphius, who died about 550. He considered that Gregory was an uncritical disciple of Origen. Gregory's theology was later examined by Maximus the Confessor, who interpreted his doctrine of the universal restoration as the turn of every soul to the contemplation of God, which is the realization of the "totality of the faculties of the soul." "It is fitting that just as all nature will, at the appointed time, be made incorruptible through the resurrection of the flesh, so also will the damaged faculties of the soul efface the flawed images contained within it in the course of the ages. The soul will reach the boundary of the ages without having found peace, and it will finally come to God, Who is without limit. Thus it will recognize the Good but not yet participate in it. It will return to itself all of its faculties and it will be restored to its original state. It will then become clear that the Creator is not the author of sin." Maximus distinguished between επιγνωσις, the knowledge of Divine truth, and μεθεξις, participation in the Divinity, which requires a definite movement of the will. Gregory's conception differs from this because Gregory makes no distinction between the consciousness of Good and the inclination of the will towards it.

Maximus' interpretation did not satisfy his contemporaries. Several decades later Patriarch Herman suggested that the elements of Origenism in Gregory's theology were interpolations. Although his theory is unacceptable because of the organic integrity of Gregory's system, his views were seconded by Patriarch Photius and are representative of the way Gregory was understood in the eighth and ninth centuries. The reticence of Justinian in his epistle on Gregory to Mennas, Patriarch of Constantinople, as well as the silence of the fathers of the Fifth Ecumenical Council, can be explained by the circumstances in which they were writing. They were primarily concerned with refuting those Origenist doctrines which stemmed from Origen's premises of the pre-existence of souls and the originally pure spiritual nature of all creatures, which were rejected by Gregory. It is with this in mind that the fathers of the council pronounced their anathema on "those who accept the pre-existence of the soul and the apocatastasis that is connected with it." Because of Gregory's generally accepted authority and sanctity, the sixth century opponents of Origenism were disposed to remain silent about those of his views which were, if not coincident with, at least reminiscent of the "impious, impure, and criminal teachings of Origen." However, Gregory's Origenism was not entirely with out effect on his authority, and he was read and cited less frequently than the other "chosen fathers."

Source:
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