Something Strange Is Happening

Holy Saturday 2024

Whenever we pray the ancient “Apostles Creed,” we say something like “He [Christ] descended into hell.” And then we profess faith in Christ’s resurrection from the dead. Is there Scriptural basis for this profession of Christ being in a state or place called hell after His death? First of all, we are not talking about the hell that we all risk by committing serious sin with full knowledge and consent of our wills. That is called, technically, the “hell of the damned.” One does not get out of that hell; it lasts for all eternity. Those who have willed to be there have done so by turning their backs on Christ and His saving mercy and atonement.

No, the place or state called “hell” in the Creed is where God, in His mercy, situates the people who have led a just life, or repented of all their sins, before Christ’s death on the cross won salvation for the just. In Hebrew, this is called “Sheol.” There are many OT references to this state, especially in the psalms. No liturgical praise of God is found there, so Psalm 6 asks “who in Sheol can praise you?” Jesus went to that hell in order to preach to the souls there and announce the hope given to them by His atoning death, as St. Peter writes in his first letter. Remember that Christ was body and soul in His human nature, and pure spirit as the Son of God the Father. Christ’s body died on the cross, but His soul and divinity continued to live.

A very ancient homily from this day, written in Greek, attests to the Church’s reflection on the descent into Sheol of Christ’s soul and divinity. It tells us there is a great silence on earth today, because the King, Christ, is sleeping. Jesus in spirit has “gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep.” He has gone to liberate from Sheol the “captives Adam and Eve.” Christ bore the cross, “the weapon that had won him the victory.” He tells them in words we can read in St. Paul: “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.” He affirms that His free offering of Himself to death was done out of love for them and all their descendants, and that He had become life for the dead. He declares “I slept on the cross and a sword pierced my side for you who slept in paradise and brought forth Eve from your side. My side has healed the pain in yours. My sleep will rouse you from your sleep in hell.” He orders Adam and Eve and all the justified “Rise, let us leave this place. . .the kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity.”

This is a special reason to spend time today in prayers of praise and thanks to the Trinity, whose plan was victory over sin, hell, death, Satan and every other human curse, and who won that victory in a way nobody on earth would have predicted: by dying on the cross and then rising to new life, a new life that He wants to share with us forever.