Eschatology Series (Part One: Exegesis of Passages that Argue Against a New Heaven and New Earth)

This series of articles is simply a lot of pair-a-phrasing of Middleton’s work New Heavens and New Earth. I want readers to get his main points without necessarily having to read the whole book. Rather, I’ve tried to distill his most pertinent points for the purposes of discussing our eschatology and Revelation.

“New Heavens and New Earth”

-The picture of opening or splitting the sky/heaven is a dominant image in 2 Peter 3

2 Peter 3:10-12

“…the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed. Since all things are to be dissolved in this way….the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire.”

The Day of the Lord will involve two destructive elements: the passing away of the heavens and the dissolution of the elements.

“Although many Christians throughout history have read 2 Peter 3 as if it describes the annihilation of the entire cosmos, this does not make sense of the fact that the earth is not destroyed in verse 10…the earth is not ‘burned up’ (as pre-NIV English translations had it). Rather, ‘the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed’ (NRSV); or, to be more literal, ‘the earth and the works in it will be found.’” (pg. 190)

Elements (stoicheia) cannot mean the earth since it still exists in the passage. The same verb lyo (to be “loosed, undone, dissolved”) “is applied both to the heavens and to the elements”. So the heavens and the elements seem to be connected. One option of the meaning of stoicheia is the melting of the earth as in Platonic or Stoic thought, which would include earth, air, fire, and water. But since the earth still exists in the passage, this seems dubious.

Another interpretation is connecting the elements and the heavens, which the passage seems to do. This would mean Peter is referring to the elements as the heavenly bodies (sun, moon, and stars), or to take Peter to mean the angelic powers in the heavens. Often, in ancient thought, these two interpretations are compatible with each other.

Some scholars have connected the judgement of Sodom and Gomorrah to this passage since this was “a standard image for judgement in Second Temple Jewish literature.” (192) Consider Isaiah 12:1-22 “which portrays the say of YHWH (vs. 6) against Babylon by the hands of the Medes (v. 17), accompanied by the darkening of the sun, moon, and stars (v. 10) and the shaking of heaven and earth (v. 13), states that the outcome of this judgement is that ‘Babylon, the glory of the kingdoms…will be like Sodom and Gomorrah when God overthrew them’ (v. 19).”

Or Isaiah 34:1-17 “which begins with the judgement of the ‘host of heaven’ and the picture of the sky rolling up as a scroll (v. 4), and then focuses on the earth, specifically Edom (vv. 5-10), utilizes classic images of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.” God’s judgement “descends from heaven to the earth (v. 5), but also the result is that the land turns to ‘sulfur’ and ‘burning pitch,’ characterized by perpetual burning (vv. 9-10). The reference to sulfur and burning is a clear reflection of Genesis 19:24, and the perpetual nature of Sodom’s destruction became a standard trope in Second Temple Jewish literature.”

In these images God destroys the “demonic forces in the heavens” and strips away the “upper layer of the cosmos in order to expose the earth to divine judgement.” So stoicheia could be ambiguously referring to both heavenly bodies and corrupt powers in the heavens. 2 Peter 3 “fits the Sodom and Gomorrah judgement tradition…” The powers of the heavens “seems to refer to false gods” (193).

A fourth possible interpretation of stoichea is “elementary teachings” found in other parts of the New Testament like Hebrews 5:12. Here stoichea refers to the basic elements of the faith. Colossians 2:8 uses stoichea in the sense of false teaching, philosophy according to human tradition, and 2:20 says that those in Christ have died to the stoichea of the world, rules from which Christians have been freed. This passage is even sometimes translated as “elemental spirits” or “elemental powers”. Galatians 4:3 and verses 8-9 refers to stoichea as the law and false gods respectively. Since 2 Peter is focused on false teaching some scholars believe this is a valid interpretation of “elements”. The letter is especially concerned with false teaching, such as those who distort Paul (3:15-16). This also means that Peter considers his eschatology compatible with Paul’s, such as Paul’s liberation of creation from its bondage to futility.

Heurisko

Now what about the works of the earth being “found” (heurisko) (2 Peter 3:10)? This word occurs seven times in the Septuagint of Genesis 18:26-32, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and refers to the righteous people being “found” in Sodom. The verb also appears when Jesus talks about the coming of the Son of Man in Matthew 24: “Blessed is the slave whom the master will find at work when he arrives.” 2 Peter 3:14 says to be found (heurisko) “by him at peace, without spot or blemish.” Peter, like Jesus, was challenging his readers to be ready, to have righteous behavior, for when the Lord comes. Because God will expose all the works of the earth. We want to be “found” on the day of judgement.

Thus, the burning imagery may not be literal but refer to human sinfulness, and found may mean standing the test: “The fire of judgment might then be compared to a ‘foundry,’ where metals are melted down and reshaped into useful products.” (194) In 1 Peter we have a similar idea in 1:7, where heurisko is also used. Malachi 3-4 uses this imagery in reference to the Levitical priesthood, which one early source connects with 2 Peter 3: “You know that the day of judgement is already coming like a burning oven, and some of the heavens will melt, as will the whole earth, like lead melting due to its fire, and then hidden and manifest works of men will appear.” (2 Clement 16:3)

Water is also used in 2 Peter 3 to talk of judgement at Christ’s return to cleans the world of evil. (195) The Sodom and Gomorrah reference seems to be implicit whereas the flood reference is explicit. In 2 Peter 3:6 it says that the earth “perished”. Of course the earth was not obliterated by the flood, but “the evil deeds of corrupt humanity were judged and the earth was cleansed to allow for a new beginning by Noah and his family. The same is true of the judgement that is to come, since ‘the present heavens and earth have been reserved for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the godless’ (3:7). Note that both the heavens and the earth have been ‘reserved for fire,’ yet it is not the earth, but rather the godless, that will be destroyed (on the contrary, the earth will be ‘found’)…Hence, after ‘the present heavens and earth’ pass through the Sodom-and-Gomorrah-like judgement on the day of the Lord, the ‘new heavens and a new earth’ that Peter says we are waiting for (3:13) are not a replacement for a world that is annihilated; rather, this is a transformed cosmos, ‘where righteousness is at home.’”

Paul also talks about the judgement of the deeds of believers by fire in 1 Corinthians 3:10-15. Here some “work will survive, with resulting reward (v. 14), while the work of others will be ‘burned up,’ with the result that ‘the builder will be saved, but only as through fire’ (v. 15). Even here the fire of judgement is ultimately for salvation.” (196) Here some scholars have argued that it ought to be translated saved by fire rather than through fire. The fire of judgement is for salvation, and the “day of judgement” may or may not be referring to the afterlife, but rather the fires of testing in this life.

Hebrews 12:26-29

-          Seems “to contrast the created order (heaven and earth) with the (uncreated) kingdom that we are waiting for.” (200)

There is the Sinai appearance of God, which involved a physical shaking of the earth contrasting with a future shaking of not only the earth but of heaven. This future shaking will be universal.

The word used for “removal” in 12:27 is metathesis which can also mean “change” or “transformation”: “The same noun is used in Hebrews 7:12, along with the related verb metatithemi, to describe the changes that accompany the shift from the old covenant to the new one.” (202) The same word is used of Enoch being “taken up” in 11:5.

Paul also uses the language of “shaking” in 1 Corinthians 15 to describe the “corruptiple, perishable, mortal human body (a body that can be ‘shaken,’ to use the terminology of Hebrews) to the future resurrection body, which will be incorruptible, imperishable, and immortal (one which is ‘unshakable’)…” Paul compares the body to a seed, while the resurrection body is a plant, meaning there is continuity between the two bodies. He uses the verb allaso to say that we will be “changed”. God will put off “the perishable cosmos” (203) and replace it with “more permanent clothing (a new heaven and new earth)”. Last, Paul states that “death will be swallowed up in victory” (15:53-54). The “corrupt life of the old humanity” will give way to the “new humanity renewed in the image of God…” What Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 is consonant with Hebrews 12. It is a change/transformation of the corruptible to the incorruptible.

Heaven and Earth Will “Pass Away” (Matt. 24:35) and Revelation 20-21

Jesus states “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” Now we can read this as the obliteration of the cosmos, or we can read it as the apostle John does in Revelation: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away” (Revelation 21:1). For John, “the world as we know it will be gone, to be superseded by a new cosmos.” (205) This is not obliteration and replacement but radical transformation. In 2 Corinthians 5:17, Paul uses the same wording in the sense of our transformation when we are in Christ; this is not the obliteration of a person, but their transformation.

Your Eschatology:

-The new heavens and new earth are not a replacement for a destroyed earth and cosmos, but a transformed cosmos “where righteousness is at home.” (Middleton, Heaven and Earth, pg. 195)

-The new re-made world is not discontinuous with the old; in other words, a completely new creation. There is no end to the space-time universe, but rather “renovation after radical judgement” (198)

-Romans 8 describes creation as liberated from its bondage to futility. Liberated, not destroyed. Our corrupt bodies and humanity will give way to a new clothing of a new humanity renewed in the image of God. This resurrection body will be like putting on new clothes, imperishable clothes. It is a change/transformation of the corruptible to the incorruptible.