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unsaved sinner will suffer "destruction" or will "perish", we are speaking of him as a
person, not a collection of organic minerals, and it is in this sense that the word is used in
the Scriptures.
It is further objected that "the soul" cannot be destroyed, and that therefore the
unsaved sinner will continue in a miserable state of existence in eternal fire. We have no
need to plunge into an examination of the meaning or attributes of the soul, for one plain
statement of Scripture will sufficiently answer this objection.
"Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear Him
which is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna"(Matt. 10: 28).
Here the word "destroy" is apollumi, the same word which is used in John 3: 16. If
we bow before the authority of the inspired Word, strictly speaking, there is therefore
nothing more to be said. We can however supplement and illustrate a little before
passing to the alternative, "Eternal life". Here are some of the ways in which apollumi is
used in Matthew.
"Herod will seek the young child to destroy Him" (Matt. 2: 13).
Had Herod accomplished his fell purpose, would the advocate of the doctrine we are
refuting have found any consolation in the theory of the indestructibility of matter? or
that the same word translated "destroy" can also be used of a "lost sheep"?
"If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee; for it is profitable for
thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast
into Gehenna" (Matt. 5: 29).
Would anyone, could anyone, attempt to console a person who had lost his eyes by
urging the argument that nothing can really be destroyed?
Need we go on? The word is used of drowning (Matt. 8: 25); of leather bottles
splitting (Matt. 9: 17), of sheep being lost (Matt. 10: 6); of loss of life, soul or reward
(Matt. 10: 38, 42), and of the destruction of a person by death (Matt. 21: 41; 22: 7;
26: 52; 27: 20). What is true of the testimony of usage in Matthew, is true of the
other Gospels, and the rest of the N.T. Nearly every word in either Greek or English has
secondary meanings, but it betrays poverty of argument, and a prepossession, to fasten
upon the secondary meaning when some doctrinal teaching is at stake.
It is noteworthy that when the apostle Paul refers to the incident, in the book of
Numbers, where Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, he too uses the word
apollumi:
"Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of
serpents" (I Cor. 10: 9).
So also, he uses the word in I Cor. 15: 18 of all who have fallen asleep in Christ, "if so
be that the dead rise not". Jude also in referring to the book of Numbers, when he speaks
of the rebellion of Korah and his company, uses this same Greek word (Jude 11).