Chapter 13
Ephesians 4:8–10, the Apostles' Creed, and Further Biblical Evidence for the Descent

Introduction

In Chapters 11 and 12, we built a detailed case from 1 Peter 3:18–4:6 that Christ descended to the realm of the dead and preached the gospel to those held there. We also showed why the alternative interpretations of that passage fail to account for the full range of the text's language. But 1 Peter is not the only place in the New Testament that points to Christ's descent. In this chapter, we turn to a set of additional passages that reinforce and expand the biblical picture of what Christ did between His death and resurrection. The passages we will examine are Ephesians 4:8–10, Colossians 2:15, Romans 10:6–7, Acts 2:24–31, and Matthew 12:40. We will also examine the famous clause in the Apostles' Creed—"He descended into hell"—and its history, meaning, and theological significance.

My thesis in this chapter is straightforward: Ephesians 4:8–10, along with several other New Testament texts and the witness of the Apostles' Creed, provides additional evidence that Christ descended to the realm of the dead. When we read these passages alongside the 1 Peter texts we explored in Chapters 11 and 12, the cumulative biblical case for Christ's soteriologically significant descent becomes very strong. This was not a minor doctrine floating at the edges of early Christian belief. It was central. And it matters enormously for our larger argument about postmortem salvation, because if Christ Himself went to the dead with saving purpose, then the idea that death permanently and irrevocably seals a person's eternal destiny becomes very hard to maintain.

Let me say up front: no single passage we examine in this chapter, taken all by itself, constitutes a slam-dunk proof for the descent. Scholars disagree about the meaning of each text, and I will present those disagreements fairly. But the power of the evidence lies in its cumulative weight. When we see passage after passage pointing in the same direction—when we see the New Testament repeatedly placing Christ in the realm of the dead, conquering the powers that hold people captive there, and establishing His lordship over both the living and the dead—the overall picture becomes very difficult to ignore. Let's begin with the most important of these additional passages.

Ephesians 4:8–10: "He Descended to the Lower Parts of the Earth"

The Text

The passage reads as follows in the ESV:

Therefore it says, "When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men." (In saying, "He ascended," what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) (Ephesians 4:8–10, ESV)

The broader context of Ephesians 4 is Paul's discussion of the unity of the body of Christ and the spiritual gifts that Christ has given to the church. In verse 7, Paul writes that "grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift." He then quotes Psalm 68:18 to support this point, and in verses 9–10 he offers a parenthetical comment explaining the quotation. It is this parenthetical remark—especially the reference to Christ's "descent"—that has generated centuries of debate.

Most scholars agree about the basic meaning of verse 8. Paul is quoting Psalm 68:18 and applying it to Christ. The imagery is drawn from the ancient world's practice of the triumphal procession. In the Roman world, when a general or emperor won a great military victory, he would celebrate with a triumphal parade through the city. The conquered enemies would be led in chains behind him, and the victor would distribute gifts—plunder and spoils—to his own soldiers and people.¹ Paul takes this image and applies it to Jesus. Christ ascended on high—to heaven—after winning a great victory. He led captives in His train and distributed gifts to His people. The gifts, as Paul explains in the verses that follow (vv. 11–13), are the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers that Christ has given to the church.

So far, so good. The real debate begins in verses 9–10, where Paul offers his interpretive comment. He reasons that if Christ "ascended," then He must first have "descended." But descended where? And when? These are the two key questions that interpreters must answer.

Three Interpretations of "the Lower Regions"

The phrase translated "the lower regions, the earth" in the ESV is in Greek ta katōtera merē tēs gēs (τὰ κατώτερα μέρη τῆς γῆς). There are three major interpretations of this phrase, and which one a scholar chooses determines how they understand the entire passage.

The incarnation view, following John Calvin, has been popular among many modern commentators. The logic is simple: Christ came from heaven to earth (the incarnation), and then He ascended from earth back to heaven (the ascension). On this reading, the "descent" is not about what happened between Christ's death and resurrection at all—it is about the incarnation itself.²

I believe this reading faces a serious problem, and the problem comes from the cultural world of the first-century Mediterranean. As James Beilby notes, the Ephesians, like the vast majority of people in the first-century world, held a three-tiered cosmology. There were three levels: the heavens above (where God and the angels dwell), the earth in the middle (where living humans dwell), and the underworld below (the realm of the dead).³ In that kind of cosmological framework, saying someone "descended to the lower regions of the earth" would naturally mean they went below the earth—to the underworld. As Frank Thielman argues, "It is extremely unlikely that Paul would use the phrase [descended to the lower, earthly regions] in such a cultural environment and expect his readers to understand by it anything other than a descent to the realm of the dead."⁴

The word katōtera (κατώτερα) is a comparative form meaning "lower." If Paul simply meant "the earth" as a whole (in contrast to heaven), we might expect him to use the simple word for "earth" (gē) without the added comparative adjective "lower." The use of the comparative "lower" suggests he is talking about a place that is lower than something else—and in the three-tiered cosmology, that place is the underworld beneath the earth, not the earth itself.⁵

The burial view—that Christ descended into the grave—is in some ways a middle position. It acknowledges that the language points to something beneath the earth rather than simply to the earth, but it stops short of identifying the destination as Hades. On this view, the passage merely affirms the reality of Christ's death: He truly died and was buried. This view has the advantage of keeping the interpretation closely tied to what we know happened historically, but it struggles to explain why Paul would use such loaded language—"the lower regions of the earth"—to say something as simple as "He was buried." As Murray Harris observes, this view is "more or less equivalent to the ancient doctrine of the Descensus ad Inferos, except that no activity (such as preaching to the imprisoned spirits) is required of Christ during the triduum."⁶

The descent-to-Hades view, I believe, is the most natural reading in its first-century context. And here is something I find very significant: this was also the overwhelming consensus of the early church. Ladislaus Boros, in his important study The Mystery of Death, provides a remarkable list of interpreters who understood Paul's phrase katabasis eis ta katōtera tēs gēs (Ephesians 4:9) as a descensus ad inferos—a descent to the underworld. The list includes Chrysostom (c. 347–407), Theodoret (c. 393–458), Oecumenius (sixth century), Tertullian (c. 160–220), Victorinus (c. 304), Ambrosiaster (c. 475), Jerome (c. 342–420), Pelagius (c. 400), along with a long line of later interpreters including Bengel, Meyer, Westcott, and Robinson.⁷ This is not a fringe interpretation. It was the dominant reading for much of church history.

David Burnfield makes an important observation in Patristic Universalism that I think is worth highlighting. He notes that even very traditional sources acknowledge the descent-to-Hades reading as a valid interpretation of Ephesians 4:9. The Bible Knowledge Commentary—a solidly conservative, traditional resource—agrees that one of the legitimate ways to interpret this verse is that Christ descended into Hades.⁸ Burnfield also cites the well-respected New Testament scholar Marvin Vincent, who defines "the lower parts of the earth" as "the underworld. The reference is to Christ's descent into Hades."⁹ This matters because one sometimes hears the claim that "nothing in the Bible supports the idea that Christ descended into Hades." But as Burnfield points out, even commentators who prefer other interpretations admit that the descent-to-Hades reading is a legitimate option. The claim that the Bible says nothing about Christ's descent simply does not hold up.¹⁰

Psalm 68:18 and Paul's Modification

One of the most fascinating features of this passage is the way Paul quotes Psalm 68:18. The Psalm in the Hebrew (Masoretic Text) reads: "When you ascended on high, you led captives in your train; you received gifts from men" (Psalm 68:18). But Paul's quotation in Ephesians 4:8 changes "received gifts" to "gave gifts to men." This is a significant change! In the original Psalm, the victorious king receives tribute from the conquered; in Paul's quotation, the victorious Christ gives gifts to His people.

What accounts for this change? Scholars have proposed several explanations. One of the most widely discussed is the influence of an Aramaic interpretive tradition (a Targum) connected to Psalm 68. The Targum of Psalm 68:19 applies the verse to Moses, who "ascended" Mount Sinai and "took captive" the words of the Torah—that is, he received the Law—and then brought it down and gave it as a gift to the people of Israel.¹¹ If Paul was aware of this targumic tradition, it would explain his shift from "received" to "gave." Just as Moses ascended Sinai, received the Torah, and gave it to Israel, so Christ ascended to heaven and gave gifts (the Holy Spirit and spiritually gifted leaders) to the church.¹²

John Stott offers a simpler explanation. He notes that in the ancient world, receiving tribute and distributing gifts were two sides of the same coin. After every conquest, there was both a receiving of plunder from the defeated and a distributing of gifts to the victor's own people. What the conqueror took from his captives, he gave away to his soldiers.¹³ Paul simply highlights the gift-giving side of the triumphal procession rather than the tribute-receiving side.

The original context of Psalm 68 is also important. The Psalm is a victory hymn celebrating God's mighty acts on behalf of His people. God went victoriously before Israel after the exodus (v. 7), the mountains trembled, and kings were scattered (vv. 11–14). Then, desiring Mount Zion as His dwelling place, God left Sinai for Zion (vv. 16–17), ascending the mount and leading captives in His train.¹⁴ Paul takes this vivid imagery of God's triumphant march to His capital and applies it to Christ. Just as God ascended Zion in triumph, Christ ascended to heaven in triumph after His death and resurrection. And just as God led captives, Christ led captives.

But who are the captives? This brings us to another important question.

"He Led Captives": Who Are They?

There are two main options for identifying the "captives" that Christ led in His triumphal procession. The first option is that the captives are the spiritual powers—the hostile forces of evil, sin, and death—that Christ defeated through His death and resurrection. On this reading, the imagery is of Christ parading His defeated enemies behind Him, just as a Roman general would parade conquered enemies in chains. This reading connects naturally with Colossians 2:15, which we will examine shortly, where Paul says Christ "disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, triumphing over them."¹⁵

The second option is that the captives are the souls of the righteous dead whom Christ liberated from Hades. On this reading, Christ descended to the underworld, defeated the powers holding the dead captive, and then ascended to heaven, bringing the liberated souls with Him. George Hurd, in The Triumph of Mercy, argues for this reading. He understands the passage as telling us that "when Christ descended into the lower parts of the earth, He released those who were in captivity and ascended with them on high, that He might fill all things."¹⁶

Hurd draws attention to the original Psalm 68:18 in the King James Version, which reads: "Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive: thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them." That last phrase—"for the rebellious also"—is striking. If the Psalm envisions God receiving gifts or distributing blessings even for the rebellious, then when Paul applies this Psalm to Christ, the implication is that Christ's victory extends even to those who were once disobedient.¹⁷

Hurd also cites several early church fathers who understood the passage in this way. Athanasius (296–373), Bishop of Alexandria, wrote: "While the devil thought to kill one, he is deprived of all, cast out of Hades and sitting by the gates, sees all the fettered beings led forth by the courage of the Savior." Gregory Nazianzen (330–390) wrote that Christ loosed "by His blood all who groan under Tartarean chains," and declared that "today salvation has been brought to the universe... the gates of Hades are thrown open."¹⁸

I think both elements are probably present in the passage. Christ triumphed over the spiritual powers and liberated those they held captive. The defeat of the powers and the freeing of the captives are two sides of the same coin—you cannot free the prisoners without first defeating the prison guard. Colossians 2:15 emphasizes the first element (the defeat of the powers), and the descent tradition emphasizes the second (the liberation of the dead), but both are aspects of Christ's comprehensive victory.

Beilby's Caution and My Response

I should note that James Beilby, whose work Postmortem Opportunity is one of the most important treatments of this subject, urges caution about using Ephesians 4:8–10 as direct evidence for postmortem opportunity. He acknowledges that the descent-to-Hades interpretation is plausible—"I believe it does [suggest a descent into Hades], but acknowledge that this is contentious"—but points out that the overall purpose of the passage is christological rather than soteriological.¹⁹ Paul's point in Ephesians 4 is about the lordship of Christ over the whole creation—the heavens, the earth, and the realm of the dead—not about offering salvation to the dead per se. Beilby also notes that the "captives" are most plausibly a reference to Christ's victory over spiritual powers and over death, not a direct reference to preaching the gospel in Hades.²⁰

Beilby's caution is well taken, and I appreciate his intellectual honesty. But I think we need to see this passage in the context of the broader biblical witness. Beilby is right that Ephesians 4:8–10, by itself, does not prove postmortem opportunity. But it does establish something enormously important: Christ's lordship extends to the realm of the dead. Christ was there. He went there. He conquered there. When we combine this with the explicit testimony of 1 Peter 3:18–4:6 that Christ preached to the dead (as argued in Chapters 11–12), the christological point and the soteriological point come together. Christ's lordship over the dead is not an empty, passive rule. It is an active, saving lordship—He is, after all, a Savior, and that is what Saviors do. As Beilby himself notes, there are "echoes of Philippians 2:10" in Ephesians 4—"that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth."²¹ Christ's lordship reaches the dead, and it reaches them with saving purpose.

Related Passages: Building the Cumulative Case

Colossians 2:15 — Christ's Victory Over the Powers

The text reads:

He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him. (Colossians 2:15, ESV)

This verse does not explicitly mention a descent to Hades, but it is closely connected to the descent tradition in early Christianity. The imagery is military: Christ has "disarmed" (apekdusamenos, ἀπεκδυσάμενος) the hostile spiritual powers—the "rulers and authorities" (tas archas kai tas exousias, τὰς ἀρχὰς καὶ τὰς ἐξουσίας)—and made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them. The language of "triumphing" (thriambeusas, θριαμβεύσας) is the same triumphal procession imagery we saw in Ephesians 4:8.²²

In the early church, this victory over the spiritual powers was regularly connected to Christ's descent. The logic was that the hostile powers held the dead captive in Hades, and by descending there, Christ invaded their territory, stripped them of their power, and set the captives free. This is the "harrowing of hell" tradition—the idea that Christ's descent was an act of divine conquest, storming the gates of Hades and liberating its prisoners. As William Harrison notes, some interpreters connect Colossians 2:15 to Ephesians 4:8–10 to form a picture of Christ descending beneath the earth, disarming the hostile powers, and then ascending in triumph with the liberated captives in His train.²³

Robin Parry, writing as Gregory MacDonald in The Evangelical Universalist, observes that the defeat and subjection of the spiritual powers is a recurring theme in Paul's letters, appearing in Ephesians 1:21–22, Colossians 1:15–20, Colossians 2:15, and 1 Corinthians 15:24–28. He argues that this subjection is best understood not as annihilation but as restoration—Christ renders the powers harmless, re-establishing the divine order of creation. The subjection of all things under Christ's feet is "so that God may be all in all" (1 Corinthians 15:28).²⁴ While the full discussion of these "universal reconciliation" passages belongs to Chapter 14, the point here is that Christ's victory over the powers—celebrated in Colossians 2:15—is part of the same larger picture of Christ's comprehensive triumph that includes His descent to the realm of the dead.

I think it is worth pausing to appreciate just how sweeping Paul's language is here. The "rulers and authorities" that Christ disarmed are not minor players. They are the cosmic forces that, in Paul's theology, stand behind the brokenness of the world—the powers of sin, death, and corruption that hold creation in bondage. Christ's victory over them is total and public. Paul says He made a "public spectacle" of them—the Greek word edeigmatisen (ἐδειγμάτισεν) conveys the idea of a public display or exhibition, like a conquered king being paraded through the streets in humiliation. This is the language of complete, irreversible defeat. And if these powers are the same forces that hold the dead captive in Hades—as the early church fathers widely believed—then their defeat at the cross has direct implications for the dead. The prison guards have been stripped of their weapons. The gates of the prison have been thrown open. Whatever power death once had to keep people permanently separated from God has been broken.

Romans 10:6–7 — "Who Will Descend into the Abyss?"

In Romans 10:6–7, Paul writes:

But the righteousness based on faith says, "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?'" (that is, to bring Christ down) "or 'Who will descend into the abyss?'" (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). (Romans 10:6–7, ESV)

Paul is here adapting language from Deuteronomy 30:12–13, where Moses tells Israel that the commandment of God is not far away—one does not need to ascend to heaven or cross the sea to find it. Paul applies this language to the gospel of Christ. The righteousness of faith does not require us to ascend to heaven (to bring Christ down) or to descend into the "abyss" (abyssos, ἄβυσσος)—that is, to bring Christ up from the dead.

What is striking here is Paul's substitution. In the original Deuteronomy passage, Moses asks, "Who will cross the sea to get it?" But Paul changes "the sea" to "the abyss" (abyssos). In the Greek Old Testament, abyssos is frequently associated with the realm of the dead, the deep, the underworld.²⁵ By making this substitution and then adding the parenthetical gloss "that is, to bring Christ up from the dead," Paul reveals his assumption that Christ was in the abyss—the realm of the dead—before His resurrection. As Beilby notes, this passage, along with the others cited by early Christians, provides further evidence for "the presence of Christ in Hades."²⁶

Now, I want to be careful here. Stephen Jonathan, in Grace beyond the Grave, rightly notes that some scholars argue Paul is not making a point about the descent at all—he is simply saying that the gospel is near and accessible; one does not need to undertake impossible journeys to find Christ.²⁷ That is certainly the primary rhetorical point of the passage. But the way Paul frames his argument assumes that Christ was in the abyss. The logic only works if Christ really was "down there" at some point—otherwise the parallel between heaven (where Christ now is) and the abyss (from which Christ was raised) breaks down. So while this passage is not primarily about the descent, it casually presupposes it—and that is significant. It tells us that Christ's having been in the realm of the dead was simply part of the background of Paul's thinking, a piece of theological furniture that he could refer to without needing to argue for it.

Acts 2:24–31 — Peter's Pentecost Sermon

At the very first Christian sermon on the day of Pentecost, Peter made the descent a central part of his proclamation. The passage reads:

God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him, "I saw the Lord always before me, for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken; therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced; my flesh also will dwell in hope. For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your Holy One see corruption. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will make me full of gladness with your presence." Brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. (Acts 2:24–31, ESV)

This is one of the clearest passages in the entire New Testament regarding Christ and Hades. Peter quotes Psalm 16:8–11, in which David expresses confidence that God will not "abandon my soul to Hades" or let His "Holy One see corruption." Peter then explicitly says that David "foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption" (v. 31).

Peter also says that God "loosed the pangs of death" (lusas tas ōdinas tou thanatou, λύσας τὰς ὠδῖνας τοῦ θανάτου) because "it was not possible for him to be held by it" (v. 24). Death could not hold Christ. There is a vivid metaphor here: death is portrayed as a prison that tried to hold Christ captive, but death's grip was broken. Christ burst free. This connects beautifully with the Ephesians 4 imagery of Christ leading captives in His triumphal procession—He Himself was death's prisoner, and He broke free, leading others out with Him.

This passage was among the most frequently cited texts in the early church's discussions of the descent. Beilby notes that "early Christians appealed to a number of scriptural texts as evidence of the descent of Christ to Hades, most significantly, Acts 2:24–32, where Peter quotes from Psalm 16:8–11."²⁹ Even Augustine, who opposed the idea of postmortem salvation, accepted the reality of the descent and supported it by citing Psalm 16:10 and Acts 2:24.³⁰

What makes this passage especially powerful is its setting. This is the very first Christian sermon. It is Peter's proclamation on the day of Pentecost—the birthday of the church, if you will. And in this inaugural address, Peter places Christ's descent to Hades at the center of his message about the resurrection. He does not treat it as an obscure theological detail. He treats it as part of the basic proclamation of the gospel. Christ died, Christ went to Hades, God did not abandon Him there, and God raised Him up. The descent is not a late addition to Christian theology; it is woven into the very fabric of the earliest Christian preaching.

I also want to draw attention to the language of Psalm 16:10 that Peter quotes: "You will not abandon my soul to Hades." The Greek verb here is enkatalipō (ἐγκαταλείπω), which means to leave behind, to forsake, to abandon. The promise is intensely personal—God will not forsake the soul of His Holy One in the realm of the dead. There is a tender relational quality to this language. It is the language of a God who goes looking for His lost ones, who does not leave them behind in the dark. And if God would not abandon the soul of Christ in Hades, is it not reasonable to conclude that this same God does not abandon any soul in Hades? As we argued in Chapter 2, the character of God—His unfailing love, His relentless pursuit of the lost—is the foundation for the entire postmortem opportunity thesis. Acts 2:24–31 gives us a concrete picture of that character in action: a God who refuses to leave even the realm of the dead beyond the reach of His saving power.

Matthew 12:40 — "Three Days and Three Nights in the Heart of the Earth"

In Matthew 12:40, Jesus Himself says:

For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. (Matthew 12:40, ESV)

Jesus is responding to the Pharisees' demand for a miraculous sign. He tells them the only sign they will receive is the "sign of Jonah"—and then He explains what that sign is: just as Jonah spent three days in the belly of the great fish, so the Son of Man will spend three days "in the heart of the earth" (en tē kardia tēs gēs, ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ τῆς γῆς).

What does "the heart of the earth" mean? On one reading, it simply means the grave—Jesus will be buried in the earth for three days. But the phrase "heart of the earth" is much more evocative than merely "the ground." In the ancient three-tiered cosmology, the "heart" or deepest interior of the earth is the underworld, the realm of the dead. Beilby lists this verse among the texts that early Christians cited as evidence for the descent: "Matthew 12:40, 'the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.'"³¹

The Jonah parallel is also suggestive. Jonah did not simply "rest" in the belly of the fish. Jonah 2 records his prayer from inside the fish—a prayer full of language about Sheol and the realm of the dead: "Out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice" (Jonah 2:2). Jonah experienced the belly of the fish as a kind of descent into Sheol, a plunge into the realm of death. If Jesus is drawing a deliberate parallel between His experience and Jonah's, it suggests that His time in "the heart of the earth" was analogous to Jonah's experience of Sheol—not merely a passive lying in a tomb but an active journey into the realm of the dead.

Tertullian, one of the greatest early church fathers, explicitly connected Matthew 12:40 to the descent. In A Treatise on the Soul, he wrote that Christ "did not ascend into the heights of heaven before descending into the lower parts of the earth, that He might there make the patriarchs and prophets partakers of Himself."³²

Before we move to the Apostles' Creed, one more New Testament text deserves brief mention: Revelation 1:18. The risen Christ declares to John: "I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades." As Harrison observes, the Greek word for "keys" (kleis, κλεῖς) carries the figurative sense of power and authority—the one who holds the keys has the power to open and shut.⁵⁵ Christ holds the keys of Death and Hades. He has authority over the realm of the dead. And the image of "keys" naturally implies the ability to unlock and release—to set free those who are imprisoned. As Hurd asks: why did Christ obtain the keys of Hades if not to set the captives free?⁵⁶ This image of Christ holding the keys of Hades, combined with the descent passages, paints a vivid picture of a Savior who has invaded the domain of death, defeated its ruler, taken its keys, and now holds sovereign authority to open its gates for whoever He chooses. This is not the picture of a God who is powerless after death or who regards the grave as a permanent, uncrossable boundary.

The Apostles' Creed: "He Descended into Hell"

The Clause and Its History

One of the most familiar statements about Christ's descent comes not from the Bible directly but from the Apostles' Creed: "He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; He descended into hell. The third day He rose again from the dead." This clause—descendit ad inferos (or inferna) in Latin—has been a standard part of Christian confession for many centuries. But it has also been one of the most debated. What does it mean? When was it added to the creed? And should it be kept or removed?

First, a crucial point about translation. The Latin inferos (or inferna) does not mean "hell" in the modern English sense of the final place of punishment for the wicked. It means the underworld, the realm of the dead. In the early church, this was understood as Hades (Greek) or Sheol (Hebrew)—the place where all the dead resided between death and the final judgment. As Beilby explains, "If 'hell' is understood as the final resting place for sinners, Jesus did not descend into hell. The Greek word for hell is gehenna, not Hades. Hades is the place of the dead and therefore it is best to say that Jesus descended into Hades."³³ The unfortunate English translation "He descended into hell" has caused enormous confusion. It would be far more accurate to translate the clause as "He descended to the dead" or "He descended into Hades."

The Late Appearance of the Clause

The clause descendit ad inferos was not part of the earliest versions of the Apostles' Creed. The creed developed from the Old Roman Creed, which was used as a baptismal confession in the early church. The phrase about the descent does not appear in the Old Roman Creed. Its first known appearance is in the version preserved by Tyrannius Rufinus (345–410) around 390, who records it as part of the baptismal confession used in his church in Aquileia. After Rufinus, the phrase does not appear again in any surviving version of the creed until approximately 650.³⁴

This late appearance has been seized upon by critics—most notably Wayne Grudem—as evidence that the descent doctrine does not belong in the creed at all. Let's look at Grudem's argument and then evaluate it.

Grudem's Objection

Wayne Grudem has argued that not only did Christ not preach the gospel to the dead, He did not even descend into the realm of the dead at all. Grudem's primary evidence is the absence of descendit ad inferos from the earliest versions of the creed. He makes a big deal of this late appearance, arguing that the phrase "never belonged there in the first place and that, on biblical and historical grounds, deserves to be removed [from the Creed]." He further claims that Rufinus himself understood the phrase not as an affirmation of Christ's descent into Hades but merely as a statement that Christ was "buried." Grudem concludes: "But this means that until A.D. 650 no version of the Creed included this phrase with the intention of saying that 'Christ descended into hell.'"³⁵

Jonathan, in Grace beyond the Grave, is somewhat sympathetic to Grudem's position, acknowledging that the clause has "dubious origins and uncertain scriptural foundations."³⁶ He also provides a fascinating anecdote from Erickson: in the late 1960s, when the chaplain of Wheaton College decided to preach a series on the Apostles' Creed, no one in the theology department was willing to preach on "descended into Hades" because no one believed in it. It was simply omitted from the series.³⁷

First, Grudem's argument that Rufinus is the only early figure to mention the descent in the creed ignores an avalanche of affirmations of Christ's descent in the early church outside the creed. Even Augustine—who agrees with Grudem in opposing postmortem salvation—accepted the reality of the descensus. Augustine writes: "It is established beyond question that the Lord, after he had been put to death in the flesh, 'descended into hell.'" Augustine supports this by quoting Psalm 16:10 and Acts 2:24.³⁸ If even Augustine—no friend of postmortem opportunity—believed in the descent, Grudem's dismissal of it looks out of step with the broad consensus of the early church.

Second, Grudem ignores the fact that Rufinus himself viewed the statement "Christ was buried" as implying the descent. In the very passage Grudem cites, Rufinus writes: "But it should be known that the clause, 'He descended into Hell,' is not added in the Creed of the Roman Church, neither is it in that of the Oriental Churches. It seems to be implied, however, when it is said that He was buried."³⁹ So Rufinus was not denying the descent—he was saying it was already implied in the existing creedal language about Christ's burial!

Third—and this is the most damaging point for Grudem's position—Rufinus offers an unambiguous defense of the descent in his commentary on the Apostles' Creed. He quotes Philippians 2:10 and claims that Christ brought "into subjection to Himself the kingdoms of the nether world." He closes his commentary with the claim that the purpose of Christ's descent into Hades was "the delivery of souls from their captivity in the infernal regions." When an imaginary objector challenges him to provide scriptural evidence for the descent, Rufinus provides exactly that—evidence from Psalm 16:10, 22:15, 30:3, 30:9, 69:2, Luke 7:20, and 1 Peter 3:19–20.⁴⁰ As Beilby concludes, it is "extremely difficult (nigh impossible, really) to doubt that Rufinus accepted the doctrine of the descent into Hades. He was unequivocally not just using the phrase descendit ad infernos as shorthand for 'Jesus was buried.'"⁴¹

Why Was the Clause Added?

But what about the absence of the phrase from early creeds? Doesn't this count against it? I don't think so. Beilby makes an important point: the absence of the descensus in early creeds does not mean it was unimportant to early Christians. There are many important beliefs—even dogmas—that are not present in the earliest creeds. Creation ex nihilo, any developed theory of atonement or justification, and the doctrine of election are obvious examples.⁴² The early baptismal creeds were deliberately minimal—they did not try to include every important belief.

Moreover, Frederic Huidekoper, a historian of early Christian belief, makes a fascinating argument. He claims that the doctrine of the descent was so widely accepted that it did not need to be put in the creed. Creeds, he argues, typically include doctrines that are disputed—they are tools for defining the position of one party against another. But the descent was not disputed. "On the essential features of the present doctrine the Catholics and the heretics were of one mind. It was a point too well settled to admit dispute."⁴³

So why was it finally added in the fourth century? The most plausible explanation, according to Huidekoper and Beilby, is that the clause was added in response to the Apollinarian heresy. The Apollinarians denied that Christ had a fully human soul. The affirmation that Christ "descended into Hades" implied that He had a human soul that could go to Hades—thus refuting Apollinarianism. As Huidekoper explains: "The reason which, in the fourth century, caused the insertion into some of the public and individual confessions of faith of the clause 'He descended into the Underworld' appears to have been, that it was regarded as implying a tenet openly denied by the Apollonarians, namely, that Christ had a human soul."⁴⁴

The Theological Significance of the Creed's Witness

The inclusion of the descent in the Apostles' Creed is theologically significant for several reasons. As R. Zachary Manis observes in Sinners in the Presence of a Loving God, the doctrine "apparently was considered by many in the early church to be among the fundamentals of the faith." Manis notes that the Apostles' Creed is "notable both for its early adoption and its relatively minimal theology"—and yet even in this deliberately brief confession, the descent is included.⁴⁵ If the earliest Christians thought the descent was important enough to be included alongside such foundational truths as Christ's birth, death, resurrection, and ascension, we should take it seriously.

The Eastern Orthodox tradition has maintained a particularly rich understanding of the descent. The central Orthodox icon of the resurrection does not depict Christ emerging from a tomb (as most Western depictions do) but rather depicts Christ standing in Hades, lifting Adam and Eve from their caskets, delivering them from imprisonment. The Paschal troparion proclaims that Christ conquered death "by trampling down death by death."⁴⁶ In this tradition, the descent is not a minor footnote to Christ's work—it is the very heart of the victory of the resurrection. Christ invaded the domain of death itself and conquered it from within.

The Early Church Fathers and the Descent

Before we draw our conclusions, I want to briefly highlight just how widespread the belief in Christ's descent was in the early church. (Chapters 24 and 25 will provide a much more detailed treatment of the patristic evidence.) The full-scale examination of the early church fathers' views belongs to those later chapters, but a representative sampling will show just how mainstream this belief was.

Beilby identifies three motifs that the early church used to express the significance of Christ's descent to Hades: "(1) he defeated the spiritual powers that kept the dead captive in Hades, (2) he preached to the dead, and (3) some of those to which he preached in Hades were released from the underworld." The defeat of the powers and the preaching to the dead were seen as the necessary preconditions for the release of those held captive.⁴⁷

This belief was not limited to one branch of Christianity. Huidekoper argues that "in the second and third centuries, every branch and division of Christians, so far as their records enable us to judge, believed that Christ preached to the departed; and this belief dates back to our earliest reliable sources of information."⁴⁸ As we saw in Chapter 11, Archbishop Hilarion Alfeyev confirms that "the teaching on Christ's descent is an inseparable part of the dogmatic tradition of the church" reflected in "the New Testament, the works of the early Christian apologists, fathers and teachers of the church... as well as in the baptismal creeds, eucharistic services, and liturgical texts."⁴⁹

A brief list of early witnesses includes:

The Odes of Solomon (c. 100 CE), one of the earliest Christian texts outside the New Testament, describes Christ descending to Sheol and the dead running to Him crying, "Son of God, have pity on us... May we also be saved with You, because You are our Savior."⁵⁰

Irenaeus (c. 130–200), in Against Heresies 4.27.2, states that "the Lord descended into the regions beneath the earth, preaching his advent there also, and [declaring] the remission of sins received by those who believe in him."⁵¹

Hippolytus of Rome (170–235), in his Treatise on Christ and Anti-Christ, writes that Christ was "reckoned among the dead, preaching the Gospel to the souls of the saints, (and) by death overcoming death."⁵²

Tertullian (160–220), in A Treatise on the Soul, states that Christ descended to "the lower parts of the earth, that He might there make the patriarchs and prophets partakers of Himself."⁵³

These are just a few examples. The early church spoke with remarkable unanimity on the basic fact of the descent, even as they debated its scope and significance. (For the full treatment of the patristic evidence, see Chapters 24 and 25.)

Connecting the Threads: How These Texts Reinforce 1 Peter 3–4

Now let me step back and ask: what do all of these passages, taken together, tell us?

In Chapters 11 and 12, we established the case from 1 Peter 3:18–4:6 that Christ descended to the realm of the dead and preached the gospel to those held there. We showed that this is the most natural reading of the text, and we showed why the alternative interpretations fail to adequately account for the passage's language. But a critic might argue that 1 Peter is a single, difficult, contested passage, and that building a major theological conclusion on one difficult text is unwise.

That objection has some force when 1 Peter stands alone. But the point of this chapter is that 1 Peter does not stand alone. Look at what we have found:

This is not one difficult passage. This is a pattern—a recurring witness across multiple authors, multiple genres, and multiple contexts. Paul, Peter, Jesus Himself, and the earliest Christian communities all point in the same direction: between His death and resurrection, Christ went to the realm of the dead. And when we add the consistent testimony of the early church fathers—who overwhelmingly affirmed that Christ not only went there but preached there—the cumulative case becomes very strong indeed.

I want to emphasize the word cumulative here. Individual passages can be debated. Ephesians 4:9 might refer to the incarnation. Romans 10:7 is not primarily about the descent. Matthew 12:40 might just mean the grave. Taken one at a time, each text can be read in a way that avoids the descent. But when every one of these passages can be read—and in many cases most naturally reads—as a reference to Christ's descent to the realm of the dead, at some point we have to ask: what is more likely? That all of these passages, across multiple authors, coincidentally use language that sounds like they are talking about a descent but really are not? Or that the New Testament writers shared a common belief that Christ really did descend to the realm of the dead?

I believe the second option is far more plausible. And when we combine this cumulative biblical witness with the 1 Peter texts, which explicitly tell us that Christ preached to the dead and that "the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does" (1 Peter 4:6)—the picture becomes clear. Christ's descent was not merely a theological abstraction or a christological footnote. It was a saving event. Christ went to the dead with saving purpose.

The Soteriological Significance: Why This Matters for Postmortem Salvation

Some scholars—including Beilby, whose work I respect enormously—would urge caution at this point. They would say: even if we grant the descent, and even if we grant that Christ preached in Hades, we cannot necessarily build a general doctrine of postmortem opportunity for all people in all times from a unique, one-time event in redemptive history. Christ's descent may have been a one-time rescue mission—a special case, not a general principle.⁵⁴

This is a fair concern, and I will address it more fully in later chapters when we integrate the various lines of evidence (see especially Chapters 31–34). But for now, let me offer two brief responses.

First, the early church did not treat the descent as a mere one-time event with no ongoing implications. Many early fathers understood the descent as revealing something about God's character—that God pursues sinners even beyond the grave, that His love does not stop at death's door. If the God revealed in Christ is the kind of God who would invade the realm of the dead to save people there, then it is entirely reasonable to think that this same God continues to reach out to the dead in the intermediate state. The descent reveals the kind of God we are dealing with—one who will go to any lengths to save.

Second, 1 Peter 4:6 explicitly generalizes the principle. Peter does not say "the gospel was preached to a specific group of Old Testament saints." He says "the gospel was preached to those who are dead"—using a general statement—"that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does." The purpose clause makes it clear that this preaching was soteriological—it was aimed at enabling the dead to "live in the spirit the way God does." As argued in Chapter 11, this is the strongest biblical evidence we have for an ongoing postmortem offer of the gospel.

Third, consider what the descent tells us about the scope of Christ's saving work. Paul says in Ephesians 4:10 that Christ ascended "that he might fill all things" (hina plērōsē ta panta, ἵνα πληρώσῃ τὰ πάντα). The purpose of Christ's descent and ascent—the full arc of His downward and upward movement—is to fill all things with His presence and lordship. This is not the language of a limited rescue mission. This is the language of cosmic completion. Christ went down to the lowest place and up to the highest place so that no corner of creation—no realm, no state, no condition—would be outside the reach of His saving presence. If Christ descended to Hades precisely so that He could "fill all things," then the idea that death permanently seals anyone beyond His reach contradicts the very purpose Paul assigns to the descent.

Beilby notes the connection between Ephesians 4:10 and Philippians 2:10—"that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth." The three realms—heaven, earth, and under the earth—correspond exactly to the three tiers of the ancient cosmology. Christ's lordship extends to all three. His name is to be confessed in all three. And if every knee will bow and every tongue will confess—including those "under the earth," that is, those in the realm of the dead—then the dead will have an encounter with Christ. (The full treatment of Philippians 2:9–11 belongs to Chapter 14, where we will explore whether this confession is willing or coerced.) The descent passages establish that Christ's presence and lordship penetrate even into the realm of the dead, and that this penetration has saving significance.

The descent passages examined in this chapter do not, by themselves, prove postmortem opportunity. But they establish the framework within which postmortem opportunity makes sense. They show us that death does not place anyone beyond the reach of Christ. They show us that Christ's lordship and saving power extend to the realm of the dead. They show us that the earliest Christians believed this. And they provide the larger biblical context that makes the postmortem opportunity reading of 1 Peter 3:18–4:6 not only possible but natural.

Conclusion

We have covered a lot of ground in this chapter. Let me summarize what we have found.

Ephesians 4:8–10 most naturally reads—in its first-century cultural context and in light of the overwhelming majority of early church interpretation—as a reference to Christ's descent into Hades. Paul's quotation and modification of Psalm 68:18 presents Christ as a triumphant conqueror who descended to the underworld, defeated the hostile powers, led captives in His train, and ascended to heaven in victory. While some scholars read the passage as referring to the incarnation or the burial, the descent-to-Hades reading remains a fully legitimate interpretation acknowledged even by very conservative commentators.

The related passages—Colossians 2:15, Romans 10:6–7, Acts 2:24–31, and Matthew 12:40—each add their own contribution to the picture. Colossians 2:15 celebrates Christ's victory over the spiritual powers. Romans 10:7 casually assumes Christ was in the abyss. Acts 2:24–31 explicitly places Christ's soul in Hades. Matthew 12:40 records Jesus' own statement about being in "the heart of the earth." Together, these texts form a web of evidence that cannot be easily dismissed.

The Apostles' Creed—despite the late addition of the descendit clause—reflects a belief that was ancient, widespread, and deeply rooted in the early church. Grudem's attempt to remove the clause fails because it ignores the overwhelming patristic evidence for the descent, misrepresents Rufinus's actual position, and confuses the absence of a formal creedal statement with the absence of the belief itself.

Most importantly, these passages do not stand alone. They reinforce and amplify the testimony of 1 Peter 3:18–4:6, which we examined in Chapters 11 and 12. The cumulative witness of the New Testament is that Christ descended to the realm of the dead between His death and resurrection, and that this descent had soteriological significance—it was a saving event, not merely a christological footnote.

For those of us who believe in the possibility of postmortem salvation, these passages are enormously important. They show us that Christ's saving reach extends beyond the grave. They show us that death could not hold Him—and if death could not hold Christ, then death cannot permanently separate any person from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 8:38–39; see Chapter 2 for the full treatment of this text). The God who descended to Hades is a God who will stop at nothing to save. And that, I believe, is very good news indeed.