In
Robert Sungenis’s book, Not By Faith Alone, we read the following in a
footnote:
The Church also holds as dogma that the souls of most Old Testament
saints were released from “Sheol” (Hebrew: שׁאול) or “Hades” (Greek: αδης) when Christ
visited this realm immediately after his death, in accord with the statement in
the Apostles Creed “he descended into hell.” The descent into Sheol or Hades corresponds
to other Scriptures which refer to the conscious abode of the dead, both
righteous and unrighteous, before the resurrection of Christ, e.g., “he went and
preached to the spirits in prison” (1Pt 3:19); “the gospel was preached even to
those who are now dead” (1Pt 4:6); “the heart of the earth” (Mt 12:40); “Abraham’s
bosom” (Lk 16:22-26); “the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God...and
live” (Jn 5:25); “the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to
life” (Mt 27:52-53); “he also descended to the lower, earthly regions” (Ep
4:9); “you and your sons will be with me” (1Sm 28:19); “consign to the earth below...with
those who go down to the pit” (Ez 32:18ff); “he leads down to Hades” (Tb 13:2);
“the dominion of Hades” (Ws 1:14; 2:1; 16:13). These interpretations were
upheld at the Council of Rome (745 AD; Denz. 587); the Council of Toledo (625
AD; Denz. 485). See Catholic Catechism, ¶¶631-635. (Robert A. Sungenis, Not
By Faith Alone: The Biblical Evidence for the Catholic Doctrine of
Justification [2d ed.; State Line, Pa.: Catholic Apologetics International
Publishing Inc., 2009], 64 n. 90)
For
those curious as to the Councils of Toledo and Rome, here are the relevant
entries from Denzinger (I know Latter-day Saints are always interested in discussions
of the descent of Christ into hades):
HONORIUS I: October 27, 625-October 12, 638
485-486: Synod of
TOLEDO, begun December 5, 633
. . .
Trinitarian and Christological Creed
(Chap. 1) In conformity with the
Sacred Scriptures and the teaching that we have received from the holy Fathers,
we confess that the father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit <are> of one
unique divinity and substance; believing the Trinity in a diversity of Persons
and proclaiming unity in the divinity, we neither confuse the Persons nor
separate the substance. We say that the Father <was> neither made nor
generated by anyone; we affirm that the Son <was> not made by the Father
but generated; we truly profess that the Holy Spirit <was> neither
created nor generated but proceeds form the Father and the Son. However, our
Lord Jesus Christ himself, Son of God and creator of all things, was generated
before all ages from the substance of the father, and in the latter times, for
the redemption of the world, he descended from the Father, he who never creased
being with the Father; he truly became incarnate by the Holy Spirit and the
Virgin Mary, the glorious holy Mother of God, and he alone was born from her.
The same Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Holy Trinity, receiving the complete
soul and flesh of man but without sin, remains what he was and assumes what he
was not: equal to the father in regard to divinity, less than the father in
regard to humanity, having in one Person the properties of the two natures; for
in him <are> two natures, God and man, not, however, two sons and two
gods, but the same Person in both natures; he underwent his Passion and death
for our salvation, not in the power of divinity, but in the weakness of
humanity; he descended into hell to free the holy ones being held there, and,
after having conquered the rule and domination of death, he rose again,
ascended then into heaven, and, in the future, he will come to judge the living
and the dead. Cleansed by his death and blood, we have attained remission of
sins in order to be resurrected by him in the last days in that flesh in which
we now live and likewise in the form in which the Lord was resurrected: some
receiving eternal life from him for merits of justice; others, the sentence of
eternal punishment because of their sins.
This is the faith of the Catholic
Church. This is the profession of faith we conserve and hold; and whoever will
guard it with great firmness will have eternal salvation. (Heinrich Denzinger, Compendium
of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals,
ed. Peter Hünermann, Robert Fastiggi, and Anne Englund Nash [43rd ed; San
Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012], 166-67)
587: Synod of
ROME, Session 3, October 25, 745
. . .
Descent of Christ into Hell
587 . . . Clement, who by his stupidity rejects
the decisions of the holy Fathers and all the synodal acts and who introduces
Judaism even for Christians when he preaches that it is licit to assume the
wife of a dead brother and who, moreover, preached that the Lord Jesus Christ,
in descending into hell, delivered from there all the pious and the impious, is
stripped of all priestly function and bound by the chain of anathema. (Ibid.,
204)
