Back to Origen

Will Satan be saved? The great 3rd century theologian Origen seems to have thought so, and some of the early church writers agreed with him. But Christian theology crystallized around the opposite view: the Devil is everlastingly damned to an everlasting Hell, and Dante put it in a famous nutshell with the inscription over the gate to his Inferno--Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

In Rome last week the question of Satan's salvation was once again warming theological tempers. Author-Philosopher Giovanni Papini, whose Life of Christ (1921) made him famous and who was converted to Roman Catholicism while writing it, made the Devil the subject of his latest (and 40th) book, Il Diavolo. And he decided that there was hope for him.

"Theological treatises," wrote Papini, "will continue to say no to the doctrine of a total and final reconciliation [between God and the Devil], but the heart, which 'has reasons which reason knows not of,' will go on yearning for and expecting the answer to be yes." If the answer is yes, Hell will also have to close down eventually, and Papini's heart has its reasons for this, too. "Many Christians . . . think that a God who is truly a father cannot torture his children eternally . . . that, at the end of time, that is, the present world, mercy will have to prevail over justice. If this were not so, we must think that Christ's own Father is not a perfect Christian."

Such offbeat opinions from an ordinary author would not be noticed in Vatican circles, at least for years, but Papini's eminence and identification with the Church were enough to draw down upon his book some sharp looks and wry faces. "Shocking and silly," said a Vatican spokesman. "We know little about Hell, but the little we know is precise because it was the Lord himself who told us. First, Hell exists. Second, there is 'unquenchable fire' (Mark 9: 42). Third, it is 'everlasting punishment' (Matthew 25: 46).

"The doctrine of Hell is not a matter of opinion, but a well-defined fact and an established principle. This law is not susceptible of modification like human laws. Therefore, a Christian is not authorized to speculate on the subject."

But 72-year-old Author Papini only sits and smiles from the great velvet armchair in his little villa in Florence where he spends his days, partially paralyzed and all but blind. "My relations with the Devil," he says, "are very ancient. They go back at least 50 years . . . The Devil, who plays an important part in the life of men, is unknown. It seems to me important that men should know him intimately." To the suggestion that he is in grievous error and may be ordered to withdraw the book, he points out that he is not engaged in defining doctrine.

"There is a great difference," he says, "between a theologian who establishes a doctrine and a Christian who wants to hope."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.