Thursday, January 2, 2020

Matthew Y. Emerson on 1 Peter 3:19


With respect to 1 Pet 3:19, while rejecting the interpretation that Jesus is preaching to the spirits in Hades, Baptist Matthew Emerson wrote the following about why many of his fellow Protestants have conflicting interpretations of this passage:

One wonders if the modern evangelical notion of “gospel,” focused almost exclusively on the salvation of individual souls rather than on Christ’s holistic work in his death and resurrection, is to blame for this consternation over 1 Pet 3:19. If we define the gospel first and foremost as what Christ did, namely that he died, remained dead, and rose in such a way that he atoned for the sins of those who believe and achieved victory over all earthly and heavenly powers, then it is not such a problem that Christ “preached the gospel” to the spirits. In fact, he did preach the gospel—the good news that he has atoned for sin and thereby vanquished the powers of evil in his work. (Matthew Y. Emerson, "He Descended to the Dead": An Evangelical Theology of Holy Saturday [Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2019], 63 n. 143)

Latter-day Saint Scripture allows for both the preaching of the gospel including a proclamation of Jesus’ victory as part-and-parcel of the preaching to the dead, particularly D&C 138, a vision received by Joseph F. Smith. In this text, we read of how the dead were awaiting Jesus’ atonement which would bring about their redemption from death itself, and such is part of Christ’s “everlasting gospel” (vv. 16, 19), and in v. 23, we read:

And the saints rejoiced in their redemption, and bowed the knee and acknowledged the Son of God as their Redeemer and Deliverer from death and the chains of hell.

Latter-day Saints, due to our acceptance of modern revelation and rejection of the false Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura, does not have to engage in such "either-or" approaches to biblical texts and doctrinal issues; for us, it is "both-and." On this central issue, see


On 1 Pet 3:19 and the verb κηρυσσω, and whether it means "to preach [the gospel]" or merely "to proclaim," see:

Responding to critics of Latter-day Saint theology about the meaning of κηρύσσω in 1 Peter 3:19