Then
one of the criminals who were hanged blasphemed Him, saying, “If You are the
Christ, save Yourself and us.” But the other, answering, rebuked
him, saying, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same
condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds;
but this Man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me
when You come into Your kingdom.” And Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to
you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:39-43)
Reading the above segment from Luke, it would appear
undeniable that Jesus and one of the criminals would be in ‘Paradise’ on the day of their respective
deaths. It is my serious contention that the Greek text should not have
been translated this way, but I believe that it would first be profitable to consider
the meaning of ‘Paradise’.
In 2nd Corinthians 12:1-4 Paul described
visions and revelations he received, where one can easily see a suggestion
that ‘Paradise’ was in ‘the third
heaven’ (or was synonymous with ‘the
third heaven’). I believe there are misconceptions about that particular
passage – one of which is that ‘third
heaven’ and Heaven are the same place – but these are dealt with later in
the essay (see Part 5 (x)).
However, with regards to this discussion of Luke 23:43,
I believe I ought to divulge some reasons for my reluctance to say that ‘Paradise’ is synonymous with Heaven. This hesitancy is based upon my assumption
that Old Testament references to the Garden of Eden would also fall under this
category of ‘Paradise’. The Greek παράδεισος (paradeisos)
can also mean ‘garden’.
It seems to me that Paradise is a place
intended for man’s enjoyment but, more importantly, a place over which he rules.
Then
the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep
it. (Genesis 2:15)
Expulsion from Eden did not prohibit man from ever
ruling Paradise again. Through the ‘Man
Christ Jesus’, mankind would have its dominion restored.
What
is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him? For
You have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have
crowned him with glory and honour. You have made him to have dominion over the
works of Your hands; You have put all things
under his feet, all sheep and oxen— even the beasts of the field, the
birds of the air, and the fish of the sea that pass through the paths of
the seas. (Psalm 8:4-8)
After quoting this Psalm the author of Hebrews says the
following:
For
in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him. But now
we do not yet see all things put under him. (Hebrews 2:8)
I would therefore tentatively suggest that the Bible’s
theme of man’s restored pre-eminence over creation, which will be realised
through the coming King, Christ Jesus, could also summarise the history and
prophecy of Paradise. In other words, I believe that Paradise
will be restored to this earth, and man (in the form of the Messiah and His
co-heirs) will rule over it.
The three New Testament references to Paradise (Luke 23:43; 2nd
Corinthians 12:4; Revelation 2:7) are therefore, I believe, references to a
place that is still future: ‘Paradise restored’. Obviously Luke 23:43 is
understood as a ‘Paradise’ that
existed on the day of the death of the Lord Jesus and the criminal, which will
be discussed in a moment. 2nd Corinthians 12:4 is left to a later
part of this document where I hope to explain why Paul’s visions were
visions of the future.
This leaves Revelation 2:7:
He
who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who
overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of
the Paradise of God.
The above verse – a clear reference to a ‘Paradise’ of the future – is reflected
in Revelation 22:2, 14 when ‘a new heaven
and a new earth’ are established. Though the word Paradise is not mentioned in those verses, ‘the tree of life’ is. There is throughout Revelation chapter twenty
two the clear impression that the Jesus Christ (‘the Lamb’) is still ruling; the chapter seems to be describing the ultimate
redemption of the Paradise that was
lost at the beginning of Genesis.
I would suggest then that Paradise is to be biblically understood as a place over which man
rules as God intended, whether that be the original Garden of Eden, the future
earthly Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ and His co-heirs, or its ultimate
realisation in the final new heaven and new earth. The first and last mentions
of Paradise in the Bible would
support this view.
Passages like Luke chapter twenty three and 2nd
Corinthians chapter twelve should do the same.
But if Jesus promised a dying man that he would be in ‘Paradise’
on the very day that they both died, then something is
wrong with my view, which seems all the more likely when we read the English
translations!
Before my suggestion about Paradise is discarded, however, we must consider how Jesus could have been in such a
place on the day of His crucifixion. For a start, this
Paradise could not have been in Heaven. Following His resurrection three
days later,
Jesus
said to [Mary Magdalene], “Do not cling to Me, for I have not yet ascended
to My Father; but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I am ascending to My
Father and your Father, and to
My God and your God.’” (John 20:17)
This confirms that Jesus and the criminal were not in
Heaven that day. Jesus would not ascend to the Father until His ascension.
Paradise and Heaven, at the time of Jesus’ crucifixion at least, could not have
been in the same place. Would He and the criminal have met in Abraham’s Bosom instead? This would require the assumption that Paradise had been moved there at some
point. It would also require transporting a physical place into a non-physical
spiritual realm; it would require a place of dominion (for that is its nature at the beginning and end of Scripture) being transformed into a
place of rest and waiting. I do not ridicule such a notion but I do find cause
to be suspicious when we must deduce
these doctrines from the Bible, with very little to go on.
Consider the following inference of what happened to Paradise in its original state:
Then
the LORD God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, to know good and
evil. And now, lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and
eat, and live forever”— therefore the LORD God sent him out of the garden of
Eden to till the ground from which he was taken. So He drove out the man; and
He placed cherubim at the east of the garden of Eden, and a flaming sword which
turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life. (Genesis 3:22-24)
As yet, nothing is known about the fate of the Garden
of Eden (Paradise) except that Adam
was driven from it. However, not far into Genesis we learn about the flood that
God used to destroy the earth. Would it not make sense to assume that the
Garden of Eden, and therefore Paradise,
was destroyed, and remains in this state? This, of course, is deduction also
but sticks closer to the biblical data than to make the assumption that Paradise was ‘transported’ into an
ethereal Sheol.
So, with this limited information, what else could Jesus
have meant when He said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in
Paradise’?
The best explanation that I have heard involves less
assumption of ‘what happened’ and more concern with how the phrase was
translated into English. The original
Greek had no punctuation – this is important to remember. If one comma
is moved forward by just one word, then Jesus’ words to the criminal undeniably
take on a new meaning:
Translation a: “Assuredly, I say to you,
today you will be with Me in Paradise”
Translation b: “Assuredly, I say to you
today, you will be with Me in Paradise”
In the first instance the timing of ‘Paradise’ is specific: ‘today’. The criminal would go there on
that very day. In the second instance there is no specific time; all we know is
that it would be in the future.
Can I prove that the latter is what Jesus meant? No,
but neither can the former be proven. The Greek texts give no authorisation for
deciding where the punctuation should go when translating into English. Instead,
the best course of action is surely to interpret the verse according to what we
know to be doctrinally true elsewhere. And it is due to this specific
grammatical ambiguity that we surely cannot employ Luke 23:43 as a proof-text
for ‘going to Heaven when we die’.
Of course, it would help if there were another
occurrence of the expression, ‘I say to
you today’. This would lend more credibility to the suggestion that it was
an expression akin to ‘verily verily I
say unto you’. One verse in Acts may help substantiate this.
Therefore
I testify to you this day
that I am innocent of the blood
of all men. (Acts 20:26)
Paul’s testimony to the Ephesian elders uses what
could be classed as a similar expression. ‘I
testify to you this day’ uses the same Greek word (σήμερον /
sémeron – this
day) as Jesus used with the criminal, ‘I
say unto you today’. Paul was hardly declaring his innocence for that day only but leaving open the possibility that he
may have been guilty the day before! ‘This
day’ clearly belongs to the first half of the statement:
Therefore I
testify to you this day - - - - I am innocent of the blood
NOT
Therefore I
testify to you - - - -this day I am innocent of the blood
Is it not then plausible that the same can be said for
the ‘today’ in Jesus’ statement?
Assuredly, I say to you today - - - you
will be with Me in Paradise
NOT
Assuredly, I say to you - - - today you will be with Me in Paradise
One need only consider familiar vernacular such as ‘I’m
telling you right now’ to see
that this is a credible way to understand Jesus’ words to the criminal.
Finally, one must also consider the request to which
Jesus was responding:
Then
he [the criminal] said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when You come
into Your kingdom.” (Luke 23:42)
The hope of the criminal was entrance into the
Messiah’s kingdom. Once we note Jesus’ immediate response (‘you will be with Me in Paradise’) the
natural interpretation is to view ‘Paradise’
as synonymous to ‘kingdom’, not Heaven. Given that
the establishment of Messiah’s kingdom is yet future (Acts 1:6-7) this supports
the interpretation that the criminal’s ‘afterlife’ experience was not
immediate.
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