Question And Answers

by N/A | Category: Question And Answers | Sept 1951

Question.-Is the Paradise of Luke 23.48 the same as the Paradise of 2 Corinthians 12.4?

Answer.-My view is that Paradise in these scriptures does not signify the same place, any more than Eden in Ezekiel 28.13 and Genesis 2.8 describes the same place. Indeed we have, I would judge, another Paradise in Revelation 2.7. Paradise means a garden of trees. In Luke 23.43 it was that part of Hades to which the Lord went at death, called Abraham's bosom in Luke 16.22. That the Lord went to Hades the day He died Acts 2.81 and Psalm 16. clearly show. In Hades there is a great gulf fixed, so that the righteous and the wicked never intermingle. Whilst Hades is down the Paradise of 2 Corinthians 12.4 is up, and is identified with the third heaven.

The Paradise of Luke 23.48 is not the same as the Paradise of 2 Corinthians 12.4. The former is identified with Abraham's bosom in Luke 16. as a place of comfort, cessation from trouble and a place of rest. Sheol (Hebrew), Hades (Greek), had an upper and a lower portion. To the former, at death, Old Testament saints descended, as Jacob said at the sight of Joseph's bloodstained coat, which made him believe Joseph was dead, "I shall go down to Sheol, to my son, mourning" (Genesis 37.85), and it was thither the Lord Jesus went when He expired upon the tree, and there He was joined by the penitent believing malefactor when he died. In contrast to this going "down" to Sheol, where the Lord fulfilled His word to the malefactor, "To-day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise," Paul's words in 2 Corinthians i2. 4 are clear that -the Paradise to which he refers, where he heard unspeakable words was not "down" but "up" - "caught up even to the third heaven" (verse 2), "caught up into Paradise" (verse 4).

I agree with the above, but I suggest that it less important to settle locality (though that seems definite enough from the Scriptures) than to appreciate the condition illustrated by the word; this of itself makes clear the distinction between the Paradise of Luke 23.43, and that of 2 Corinthians 12. 4. The former scripture deals with a temporary condition, awaiting the moment when Christ, in triumphal resurrection, should lead out own; the latter scripture gives a glimpse of the Divine, presence, infintely blessed and abiding.

N/A | Sept 1951
Question And Answers