PMW 2025-015 by Geehardus Vos

Gentry note:
I have recently edited several of Geerhardus Vos’ important eschatological articles and chapters in a new book: Reformed Eschatology in the Writings of Gerhardus Vos. Bill Boney and I have brought them up to date in terms of style and layout, making them easier to read for a 21st century Christian. This is a small section touching on the important issues of the two ages, which is a concept I will be explicating in a new book later this year. This material is found in our edited book on pages 10–16.

Paul’s Distinction from the Old Testament

In distinction from the OT point of view, the structure of Paul’s eschatology appears antithetical. It places the end under the control of one principle with the sway of which an opposite principle of equally comprehensive rule and of primordial origin is contrasted. This is done so as to make the two, when taken together, yield a bisection of universal history. By giving the soteric movement this cosmical setting it claims for it the significance of a central world-process, around the core of which all happenings in the course of time group themselves. By this one stroke order is brought into the disconnected multitudinousness of events.

The eschatology, without losing touch with history, nevertheless, owing to the large sweep of its historical reach, becomes philosophico-theological. It no longer forms one item in the sum total of revealed teaching. Rather, it draws within its circle as correlated and eschatologically-complexioned parts practically all of the fundamental tenets of Pauline Christianity. Here this can only be briefly premised. It will have to be shown by detailed investigation at subsequent points. It will appear throughout that to unfold the Apostle’s eschatology means to set forth his theology as a whole. Through a conceptual retroversion, the end will be seen to give birth to the beginning in the emergence of truth.

Reformed Eschatology in the Writings of Geerhardus Vos
Ed. by Ken Gentry and Bill Boney
This is a collection of several key eschatological studies by the renowned Reformed theologian Geehardus Vos. We have modernized Vos’ grammar and syntax and updated his layout style according to modern publishing conventions (shorter sentences and paragraphs). We did this without changing any of Vos’ arguments.

For more information on this new Vos work or to order it, see:
https://www.kennethgentry.com/reformed-eschatology-in-the-writings-of-geerhardus-vos/

What we are here concerned with more immediately is the specific terminology in which this mode of thought has come to express itself. In 1 Corinthians 15:45–47, the presence of this antithetical orientation is clearly seen in the correspondence of the two names for Christ, “the eschatos (“last”) Adam” and “the deuteros (“second”) Man,” the opposite to the former no less than to the latter being “the protos (“first”) Man.” Eschatos here bears a technical meaning. It designates not so much the Adam that belongs to the order of the eschata. Rather, he is pointedly the One who is the last in contrast with one other who is the first: it is antithetical no less than deuteros. As backward of “the protos” there was no other, so beyond “the eschatos” there can be none further. Typologically, the same principle finds expression in Romans 5:14: “who is a figure (type) of him that was to come.”

“Two Ages” or “Two Worlds”?

More comprehensively the antithetical structure appears in the distinction between the two ages or worlds. The only passage in Paul where this contrast is explicitly drawn is Ephesians 1:21: “far above … every name that is named, not only in this world [or “age,” aion], but also in that which is to come.” There are, however, quite a number of other passages where, although only “this age” (ho aion houtos) appears, the other member of the contrast is nevertheless present by implication. We find this in Romans 12:2; 1 Corinthians 1:20; 2:6, 8; 3:18; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Galatians 1:4; Ephesians 2:2; 1 Timothy 6:17; and Titus 2:12.

In Ephesians 1:21 there is a special reason for naming both terms. This is because the supremacy of the name of Christ above all other names was to be affirmed without restriction either as to time or sphere. The other passages deal with some feature or element within the pre-eschatological period, so that there was no need of naming the opposite. Still, apart from this, Paul might have in certain connections spoken of the “coming aeon” by itself. But the less formal, more expressive phrase “kingdom of God” was naturally preferred in such cases, just as we more easily speak of “heaven” or “eternity” than of “the future age” (cp. 1 Cor. 6:9–10; 15:50; Gal. 5:21; Eph. 5:5; 1 Thess. 2:12; 2 Thess. 1:5; 2 Tim. 4:18).

In Paul, explicit reference to “the coming aeon” is scarce. But this should not be counted against the familiarity of Paul with the correlated contrast nor against the importance of the part played by it in his eschatological scheme. There is no evidence that the term aion had per se an evil flavor, which would have rendered it unfit to the Apostle’s mind for association with the perfect future life. Ephesians 1:21 proves the contrary. And yet it cannot be denied that as a rule the phrases “this age” and “this world” were apt to call up evil associations. Such is plainly the case in 1 Corinthians 1:20 and 2:6–8. In both of these instances the evil implied or expressed has a peculiar noetic reference. In 2 Corinthians 4:4 Satan is called outright “the god of this aion.” According to Galatians 1:4, Christ gave Himself for our sins that He might rescue us out of this present “evil aion.” In 2 Timothy 4:10, Demas is said to have forsaken Paul, because he loved this aion. In Romans 12:2, the Apostle warns his readers not to assume or bear “the schema [“form”]” of this aion. Rather, they are to let themselves be transformed in the opposite direction. The degradation of the concept of aion in these cases is probably a reflex of the evil meaning of kosmos. Other passages like 1 Timothy 6:17 and Titus 2:12 are more neutral from an ethical point of view.

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Two Problems with This Terminology

There are two problems connected with this terminology, being to some extent interdependent. The first problem concerns the antiquity and origin of the contrast in general; the second concerns the relation of aion to kosmos.

The Johannine writings do not employ “this aion” or “the coming aion” for the purpose of eschatological contrast. Wherever aion occurs in them either in the purely-temporal or in the eternity-sense, the associations are thoroughly favorable; the pronoun “this” is not prefixed to it. The standing phrase is eis ton aiona, “until eternity.” This receives sufficient explanation from the older Scriptural time-use of ‘olam (“age”) and the plural ‘olamim (“ages”). On the other hand, for the evil member of the antithesis the word kosmos, ho kosmos houtos (“this world”) finds characteristic employment with John.

Now this word kosmos with Paul also occasionally occurs synonymously with ho aion houtos (“this age”). So we find it in Romans 3:6; 1 Corinthians 1:20–21; 2:12; 3:19; 11:32; 2 Corinthians 7:10; and Philippians 2:15. That the word kosmos had evil coloring when used in ethico-religious connections appears most clearly from the fact of its never being transferred to the state to come. Thus, ho kosmos ekeinos (“that age”) is neither Johannine nor Pauline. Jesus in his speech to the Jews shows conscious avoidance of it in John 8:23: “Ye are of this world; I am not of this world,” instead of “I am of that world.” This does not, of course, prevent either John or Paul the ethically-neutral use of “world” as a comprehensive quantitative designation of the lower creation. For Paul, see Romans 1:8; 5:12; 1 Corinthians 4:9 (7:31); 14:10; Ephesians 1:4; Col. 1:6; and 1 Timothy 6:7. For John, see John 1:9–10; 3:19; 6:14; 8:26; 9:5; 10:36; 11:27; 13:1; 16:21; 17:5, 24; 18:37; 21:25; 1 John 2:2; 4:1, 3, 9; and 2 John 7.

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The usage of both terms in Paul leaves the impression that the antithesis is not of the Apostle’s own coining. He may have accentuated the evil aspect of “the present age” more than was done previously. But he certainly did not frame as altogether new either the phrase itself nor its close association with ho kosmos. In the Jewish writing 4 Ezra, scarcely a generation later than Paul, it is said “that God made two aions” (7:50). Further, the present age and the future age are contrasted in a number of passages. The same appears in the Apocalypse of Baruch (of approximately the same period). God revealed to Abraham “this aion” but not “the coming aion.” To these may be joined, as a Jewish witness for the way of speaking, Eleazar from Modiim (somewhat later than Jochanan). He enumerates among the six good gifts bestowed upon Israel the coming aion and the new world.

These Jewish authorities would certainly not have borrowed a phrase of this kind from Paul nor from the vocabulary of Christian eschatology in general. So that, even if earlier indubitable instances of occurrence could not be quoted, the ones just mentioned will suffice to prove the Pauline usage a derived one. Dalman, who is on the whole disinclined to carry the phrases farther back than is absolutely necessary, here also has critical suspicions. Yet he is compelled to admit: “the existence of the phrases ‘this aion,’ ‘the future aion’ is at any rate established for the close of the first post-Christian century.”

Jesus and the World-Age

Ascending backwards from Paul to the speech of Jesus in the Synoptical Gospels, we find the distinction between the two ages both explicitly drawn and assumed by implication. The explicit contrast occurs in Matthew 12:32; Mark 10:30; and Luke 20:34ff:

“And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.” (Matt. 12:32).

“He shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.” (Mark 10:30)

“And Jesus answering said unto them, The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage: but they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage: neither can they die any more: for they are equal unto the angels; and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection.” (Luke 20:34–36)

This distinction is used in a semi-explicit fashion in Luke 16:8, where as the contrast to “the children of this age (or world)” appears “the children of light.” Impliedly the antithesis seems to be present in Matthew 13:22, where we read: “the care [Mark has “cares,” Mark 4:19] of the age (or world).” In Matthew 13:39–40, 49; 24:3; and 28:20 we have “the end sunteleia of the age (or world).

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Dalman concludes that from a comparison of these parallels the occurrence of the phrase in the speech of Jesus cannot with any degree of certainty be inferred. And, moreover, even should Jesus have actually employed it, it must have been for his mode of speaking of no significance. The inference of later intrusion of such a phrase from the mere fact of absence or variation in one or more parallel Gospel-texts seems precarious. After all, condensation no less than amplification on the writer’s part may possibly account for the facts. But even if with Dalman one were to call in doubt the presence of the phrase in the eschatological vocabulary of Jesus, its employment by the Evangelists, or by the antecedent bearers of the Gospel-tradition, would nonetheless retain considerable significance. For that the Evangelists or the tradition did not all borrow this phraseology from Paul seems certain. At their time of repeating or committing to writing, therefore, the terminology must have been in the air. And this time was not so very far removed from the time of Paul or even of Jesus.

In regard to the coloring of the contrast in the Gospel-passages, we note that in certain instances it is chronological. See Matthew 12:32: “it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this aion, neither in that to come.” In Mark 10:29–30, “this aion” and “the aion to come” are the two time-installments for restitution, the latter of which, to be sure, far surpasses the former. But in Luke 20:34ff, it is implied that the children of “this aion” are ethico-religiously inferior, because unworthy to obtain the other aion.

From the point of view of inherent distinctiveness, “the children of this ain in their generation” are in Luke 16:8 set over against “the children of the light.” The “light” here is certainly not a mere figurative characterization, but points to the element pervasive of the future aion(or world). “The care (cares) of this aion” in Matthew 13:22 and Mark 4:19 seem to reflect an unfavorable estimate of the influence and tendency of the aion(or world) with which some of the hearers of the gospel are preoccupied. On the other hand, the five passages in Matthew containing the phrase sunteleia tou aionos obviously take aion in a strictly chronological sense without admixture of a depreciating judgment.