Expert: Cooper P. Abrams III - 3/11/2010

Question
what is your understanding about the "spirits in prison" in the context of 1 Peter 3:19?

Answer
Hi Joel,
   Many people have asked the same question.  Sorry to be so slow I have been away travel at a conference.
   Some have taught that Jesus went into hell between His death and resurrection. However, the New Testament does not teach this and the teaching comes from a misunderstanding of several passages of Scripture. We will look at these passages in order to present a proper interpretation.
Acts 2:27. The verse says, "Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." This is a prophetic statement by David, and referred to by Peter when he preached to the Jews on the Day of Pentecost. The reference is to Christ, saying that God would not "leave His soul in Hades." The word translated "leave" is the Greek word egkataleipw which means to "forsake or abandon." Thus David is saying that God would not forsake Him or abandon Him to Hades. Hades is not Hell, or "Gehenna," (the Lake of Fire) and the final abode of the unsaved but the temporary abode of the unsaved dead who are awaiting the final judgment (Rev. 20:11-15). The word "hades" also is used to refer to the grave and/or to death. (See 1 Cor. 15:55)

The passage literally means that God would not allow Christ's body and spirit to remain separated by death as explained in Acts. 2:31. (Let the Bible interpret itself) It does not mean that Christ went to the Lake of Fire or to "Hades," the temporary abode of the lost. David was simply stating that God would resurrect Him after His death. The point of Peter using this Old Testament prophecy was to show the Jews present on the day of Pentecost that Jesus was the promised Messiah and that as David prophesied He arose from the grave.

Luke 23:43 records that Jesus said to the thief on the cross, "Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise." Thus Jesus said He would be in Paradise that day. Paradise is a biblical term and a synonym for heaven and the abode of saved persons in the presence of God. It was also called (See Luke 16:19f)

1 Peter 3:18-20, is another verse improperly used to teach that Jesus went into hell. "For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water."

Some say that the passage is saying that Jesus after his death went and preached salvation to the "spirits in prison" meaning the unsaved who died in Noah's flood and are now in Hades. However, there are several reasons that this is not the correct interpretation. First, Hebrews 9:27, "And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment." This verse precludes that anyone is given a second chance after death. At death, where a man will spend eternity is determined by whether he is saved or lost. No where in the Bible is man said to be given a second chance to be saved.

2 Peter 2:5 says that Noah preached righteousness to the anti-deluvians. The message of righteousness he preached was that one was to have faith in the coming promised Savior of the world. "And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly." Noah preached the promise God made in Genesis 3:15 that One would come who would undone the work of Satan. "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."
These sinful people who were destroyed in the Flood did not ignorantly reject God because the Bible says Noah preached righteousness to them. Noah was not preaching that a man could be saved by being righteous, but that by the coming Redeemer, man could be saved and become righteous by faith. Hebrews 11:7 states this saying, "By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith." Therefore it was Noah...not Christ that actually preached to the people who died in the flood and Noah preached to them before they died. Noah preached Christ to them and they rejected Him...why then should they be given special consideration and given a second chance. Clearly they were not. Those in the spirit prison were there because they refused to repent and believe in the coming Savior and are eternally condemned as are all men who die rejecting God.

Further, verse 20 begins with "which" which explains who the spirits were in prison and when they were preached to. It says God was long suffering in the days of Noah...meaning that Noah for 120 years preached righteousness by faith to the people and they rejected the message. It says only eight souls believed God and were saved.

The bottom line is that none of these passages teach Christ went to hell between His death and resurrection. It says He went to heaven.

If you have further questions or comments please write.

Cooper P Abrams III
Romans 12:1-2
http://bible-truth.org
     "Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong. Let all your things be done with charity"  (1 Corinthians 16:13-14 )