VII. Wesley’s Snaith—Innate Immortality Not “Biblical Idea”

Dr. NORMAN H. SNAITH, ^{7070) NORMAN H. SNAITH (1898-), Methodist, was trained at Mansfield College, Oxford. After a series of pastorates he taught for years at Wesley College, Leeds. He is author of about twenty-four books.} Of Wesley College, Leeds, England, writing as “a Methodist for Methodists,” likewise denies man’s inherent immortality—that is, that man is constitutionally unable to die, which, of course, is the meaning of “immortal.” This notion, he declares, is “not a Biblical idea at all.” In writing of the Old Testament, in one of his books, he says:CFF2 822.1

“We find two passages only which speak of a resurrection life beyond the grave, and none at all of any immortality of the soul, which is not a Biblical idea at all.” ^{7171) Norman H. Snaith, The Distinctive Ideas of the Old Testament, (Copyright 1946, W. L. Jenkins. The Westminster Press. Used by permission.) p. 112. (Italcs supplied.}CFF2 822.2

1. NO INDEPENDENT SURVIVAL DISCLOSED IN BIBLE

In chapter 17 of I Believe In... (1949), which first appeared in the Methodist Recorder as one in a series of articles on the Nicene Creed, Dr. Snaith says, significantly, concerning “Life After Death“: “The creeds all speak of a resurrection and not of a survival.” ^{7272) Norman H. Snaith, 1 Believe In... (1957 ed.), p. 115.}CFF2 822.3

He notes that the earliest “Christian thinkers kept so very clear of the Greek doctrine of the immortality of the soul.” ^{7373) Ibid., p. 120.} Then he says pointedly:CFF2 822.4

“I find nowhere in the Bible any doctrine of the necessary survival of the individual, that is, of the immortality of the soul in the sense that there is a part of every man which can never die.” ^{7474) Ibid.}CFF2 822.5

2. ALL WHO CLING TO SIN TO BE DESTROYED

After referring to man’s sovereign freedom and power of choice and the fateful results of that choice, Dr. Snaith says concerning the destiny of the incorrigibly wicked:CFF2 822.6

“If he [“the sinner”] does not repent, then he dies. God has given to man this freedom to choose, and it is a real freedom. It is, in fact, a freedom —to live or to die. And not even God can have it both ways.” ^{7575) Ibid:, p. 121.}CFF2 822.7

He then adds: “It seems to me that it is nothing but muddled, sentimental thinking to say that if one man is lost, then God is defeated. God’s victory is a victory over sin. Sin will at the last be destroyed, and with it all that cling to it.” ^{7676) Ibid. (Italics supplied.)}CFF2 822.8

3. NO “IMMORTAL SOUL” THAT “SURVIVES DEATH.”

A year later, in the American journal Interpretation, Dr. Snaith summed up a scholarly article entitled “Life After Death-The Biblical Doctrine of Immortality” in these explicit words:CFF2 823.1

“Neither here nor anywhere else in the Bible is there any suggestion of an immortal soul which survives death. Nothing survives unless it be raised up by God, and the condition is that the man must be ‘in Christ’ and so ‘born of the spirit.’” ^{7777) Norman H. Snaith, “Life After Death-the Biblical Doctrine of Immortality,” Interpretation, I (July, 1947), p. 324.}CFF2 823.2