A fascinating discussion of the Harrowing of Hell, Christ’s descent into Hell after his death on the Cross. For those with ears to hear, listen and understand.
[I]t was through the sin of Adam and Eve that death entered into the world. This also was no accident or mere punitive provision. Human beings are not bodies that happen to have souls, nor are we souls that happen to have bodies; we are body-soul composites, our essence is comprised not of one with the other as an appendage but of both body and soul together. As such, the body and soul affect and impact each other intimately and intrinsically. In “The Screwtape Letters,” C.S. Lewis succinctly phrased it thus, writing in the character of the titular experienced senior demon: “[F]or they [being humans] constantly forget, what you must always remember, that they are animals and that whatever their bodies do affects their souls.”
The concept is well-seeded throughout the history of Christian thought and theology. When Adam and Eve sinned, the effects of that sin necessarily impacted both body and soul. The early Christian thinker and writer Augustine of Hippo explained that sin corrupted human nature and disordered both body and soul; death, he posited, was not simply a punishment for sin, nor even merely a necessary consequence of sin, although it is both, but was also a remedy: death separated the body from the soul and, while this experience is a frightening and even painful one, separating as it does the two fundamental aspects of our essence as humans, it allows both body and soul to be perfected and healed of the wounds and scars wrought by sin, so that we might spend eternity with the triune God in Heaven.
The 13th century Dominican philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas refined this concept in his exhaustive “Summa Theologiae,” clarifying that original sin (that is, the sin of Adam and Eve) violated original justice, in which the body-soul composite existed perfectly. That body-soul composite could not continue to exist as it had previously, since its existence would no longer be perfect. Thus, death was more than just a punishment for sin, it was also a means of expunging its damage, allowing both body and soul to be separated from one another and purged of the effects of sin so that they might be reunited in a state of perfection in Heaven.
When we contemplate Christ’s passion and death in particular, we often lay great emphasis on the passion, on the flagellation, the crowning with thorns, the carrying of the cross, and the crucifixion itself. Death is, to us, simply what comes next. Of course Christ died — who wouldn’t after such gruesome and grueling torture? But we must also recognize the gravity of Christ’s death; we take death almost for granted, but Christ had no need of death: what imperfection was there in His body-soul composite upon this earth that needed rectifying? What was His sin against original justice? He had no imperfection, nothing in need of repair, no sin, no injustice. Certainly, we must believe that, were He not executed upon the ignominious cross, Christ would not have been subject to death.
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