Christian Universalist Quotes Compilation (from various historical scholars)

As the great prophet Isaiah himself echoed in the past:

“so He will sprinkle many nations, and kings will shut their mouths because of Him. For what they were not told, they will see, and what they have not heard, they will understand.” (Isaiah 52:15)

“He changes everything.”

Abraham Lincoln said, “God destroys His enemies by making them His friends”.

Lincoln also said regarding ‘salvation’,

“It’s either everybody or nobody”.

Few people know that Abe was a Christian Universalist too!

St. Jerome too echoed this truth about 400 years after Christ that “All God’s enemies perish; not that they cease to exist but that they cease to be enemies”.

“for we do surely die, and are as water which is running down to the earth, which is not gathered, and God doth not accept a person, and hath devised devices in that the outcast is not outcast by Him.” – The wise woman of Tekoa (2 Samuel 14:14)

“for for this also to dead men was good news (Gospel) proclaimed, that they may be judged, indeed, according to men in the flesh, and may live according to God in the spirit.” – The verse which proves that the Gospel is preached to the dead; by Apostle Peter (1 Peter 4:6)

“For the wicked there are punishments, not perpetural, however, lest the immortality prepared for them should be a disadvantage, but they are to be purified for a brief period according to the amount of malice in their works. They shall therefore suffer punishment for a short space, but immortal blessedness having no end awaits them…the penalties to be inflicted for their many and grave sins are very far surpassed by the magnitude of the mercy to be showed to them.” –Diodore of Tarsus, 320-394 A.D.

“And God showed great kindness to man, in this, that He did not suffer him to continue being in sin forever; but as it were, by a kind of banishement, cast him out of paradise in order that, having punishment expiated within an appointed time, and having been disciplined, he should afterwards be recalled…just as a vessel, when one being fashioned it has some flaw, is remoulded or remade that it may become new and entire; so also it happens to man by death. For he is broken up by force, that in the resurrection he may be found whole; I mean spotless, righteous and immortal.” –Theophilus of Antioch (168 A.D.)

“Wherefore also he drove him out of paradise and removed him far from the tree of life, not because He envied him the tree of life, as some dare assert, but because He pitied him and desired that he should not be immortal and the evil interminable and irremediable.” St.Iraneaus of Lyons – the first Greek father & author of the infamous treatise, “Against Heresies”.(182 A.D.)

“These, if they will, may go Christ’s way, but if not let them go their way. In another place perhaps they shall be baptized with fire, that last baptism, which is not only painful, but enduring also; which eats up, as if it were hay, all defiled matter, and consumes all vanity and vice. –Gregory of Nazianzeu, Bishop of Constantinople.” (330 to 390 A.D.) Oracles 39:19

“The Word seems to me to lay down the doctrine of the perfect obliteration of wickedness, for if God shall be in all things that are, obviously wickedness shall not be in them. For it is necessary that at some time evil should be removed utterly and entirely from the realm of being.”—St. Macrina the Blessed

Saint Macrina was the sister of the holy hierarchs Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa, and was born in Cappadocia at the beginning of the fourth century. Her mother, Emilia, saw an angel in a dream, naming her unborn child Thekla, in honor of the holy Protomartyr Thekla. St Emilia (January 1) fulfilled the will of God and named her daughter Thekla. Another daughter was named Macrina, in honor of a grandmother, who suffered during the time of persecution under the emperor Maximian Galerius.

She died a virgin and her life was remarkable especially noting that she was a “miracle-worker” (wonderworker) used by God to perform miracles (history records thus).

After the death of her mother, St Macrina guided the sisters of the monastery. She enjoyed the deep respect of all who knew her. Strictness towards herself and temperance in everything were characteristic of the saint all her life. She slept on boards and had no possessions. St Macrina was granted the gift of wonderworking. There was an instance (told by the sisters of the monastery to St Gregory of Nyssa after the death of St Macrina), when she healed a girl of an eye-affliction. Through the prayers of the saint, there was no shortage of wheat at her monastery in times of famine.

Her famous brother, St. Basil the great had this to say regarding the common belief held by masses of Christians at that time:

St. Basil the Great (c. 329-379) in his De Asceticis wrote: “The mass of men (Christians) say that there is to be an end of punishment to those who are punished.”

St. Macrina shared her universalism through Christ together with her other infamous brother, St. Gregory of Nyssa (the Cappadocian father) who plainly ‘revealed’ the ‘secret’ that even “Satan” will be destroyed, restored & healed. Here it is:

Want more of devil being healed?

“Our Lord is the One who delivers man [all men], and who heals the inventor of evil himself. — Gregory of Nyssa (332-398 A.D.), leading theologian of the Eastern Church

“In the end and consummation of the Universe all are to be restored into their original harmonious state, and we all shall be made one body and be united once more into a perfect man and the prayer of our Savior shall be fulfilled that all may be one. “– St. Jerome (again), 331-420

“For it is evident that God will in truth be all in all when there shall be no evil in existence, when every created being is at harmony with iteself and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord; when every creature shall have been made one body.” –Gregory of Nyssa, 335-390

“The wicked who have committed evil the whole period of their lives shall be punished till they learn that, by continuing in sin, they only continue in misery. And when, by this means, they shall have been brought to fear God, and to regard Him with good will, they shall obtain the enjoyment of His grace.”– Theodore of Mopsuestia (the ‘best’ theologian from the ancient Antiochian School), 350-428

“We can set no limits to the agency of the Redeemer to redeem, to rescue, to discipline in his work, and so will he continue to operate after this life.” –Clement of Alexandria (the teacher of Origen & a revered saint in the eastern orthodox churches). He is often referred to as the Second Greek father (talking about the ‘authority’ in Greek).

“Do not suppose that the soul is punished for endless eons (apeirou aionas) in Tartarus. Very properly, the soul is not punished to gratify the revenge of the divinity, but for the sake of healing. But we say that the soul is punished for an aionion period (aionios) calling its life and its allotted period of punishment, its aeon.” — Olnmpiodorus (AD 550)

“That in the world (age) to come, those who have done evil all their life long, will be made worthy of the sweetness of the Divine bounty. For never would Christ have said, “You will never get out until you have paid the last penny” unless it were possible for us to get cleansed when we paid the debt.” –Peter Chrysologus, 435

“I know that most persons understand by the story of Nineveh and its king, the ultimate forgiveness of the devil and all rational creatures. ” St. Jerome (again…)

Want more of St.Jerome?

“”In the end or consummation of things, all shall be restored to their original state, and be again united in one body. We cannot be ignorant that Christ’s blood benefited the angels and those who are in hell; though we know not the manner in which it produced such effects. The apostate angels shall become such as they were created; and man, who has been cast out of paradise, shall be restored thither again. And this shall be accomplished in such a way, that all shall be united together by mutual charity, so that the members will delight in each other, and rejoice in each other’s promotion. The apostate angels, and the prince of this world, though now ungovernable, plunging themselves into the depths of sin, shall, in the end, embrace the happy dominion of Christ and His saints.” – COMMENTARY ON THE NEW TESTAMENT – Jerome (347-420 A.D.)

Want more of devil being healed?

“Our Lord is the One who delivers man [all men], and who heals the inventor of evil himself. — Gregory of Nyssa (332-398 A.D.), leading theologian of the Eastern Church

How about the “black dwarf” who single handedly “proved the Truth of Trinity” against the false teachings of Arianism?
That’s why this next guy is called the “Father of orthodoxy”.

“While the devil thought to kill One [Christ], he is deprived of all those cast out of hades, and he [the devil] sitting by the gates, sees all fettered beings led forth by the courage of the Saviour”.–Athanasius, the Great Father of Orthodoxy

Here is Jerome (again) on a similar matter:

“Our Lord descends, and was shut up in the eternal (aionion, more correctly, age-during) bars, in order that He might set free all who had been shut up… The Lord descended to the place of punishment and torment, in which was the rich man, in order to liberate the prisoners.” –Jerome

Didymus the blind saw more with no eyes than we with both eyes…

“In the liberation of all no one remains a captive! At the time of the Lord’s passion the devil alone was injured by losing all the of the captives he was keeping. –Didymus, 370 AD

on a similar note…

“While the devil imagined that he got a hold of Christ, he really lost all of those he was keeping.” –St. Chrysostom, 398 AD

How can I not quote Origen of Alexandria? (the next Greek father after Clement)… Note: he is often called (the ‘best’ theologian from the rival Alexandrian school to the other powerful one at Antioch):

“Stronger than all the evils in the soul is the Word, and the healing power that dwells in him, and this healing He applies, according to the will of God, to everyman. The consummation of all things is the destruction of evil…to quote Zephaniah: “My determination to gather the nations, that I am assemble the kings, to pour upon them mine indignation, even say all my fierce anger, for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy. For then will I turn to the people a pure language that they may all call upon the name of the Lord, to serve Him with one consent”…Consider carefully the promise, that all shall call upon the Name of the Lord, and serve him with one consent.” — Origen (185 to 254 A.D.) He founded a school at Caesarea, and is considered by historians to be one of the great theologians and exegete of the Eastern Church.

“Mankind, being reclaimed from their sins, are to be subjected to Christ in the fullness of the dispensation instituted for the salvation of all.” -–Didymus the Blind (again)

From the “Father of Church History” himself:

“The Son “breaking in pieces” His enemies is for the sake of remolding them, as a potter his own work; as Jeremiah 18;6 says: i.e., to restore them once again to their former state.” — Eusebius of Caesarea (265 to 340 A.D). Bishop of Caesarea

From the great Ambrose himself who converted the ‘heretic’, St. Augustine of Hippo:

“Our Savior has appointed two kinds of resurrection in the Apocalypse. ‘Blessed is he that hath part in the first resurrection,’ for such come to grace without the judgment. As for those who do not come to the first, but are reserved unto the second resurrection, these shall be disciplined until their appointed times, between the first and the second resurrection.” — Ambrose, Bishop of Milan (340-397 A.D.)

The best quote of Clement of Alexandria:

“He, indeed, saves all; but some [He saves], converting them by punishments; others, however, who follow voluntarily [He saves] with dignity of honour; so “that every knee should bow to Him, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth;” Philippians 2:10 that is, angels, men, and souls that before His advent have departed from this temporal life.”

Back to the bible:

“And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.” — Apostle John, the one who leaned on Christ’s breast & probably heard the very heartbeat of God Himself. (1 John 4:14)

How can I miss apostle Paul?

“For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we have set our trust in the living God, Who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe.” — Saul of Tarsus, later became known as Apostle Paul. (1 Timothy 4:10)

Our final quote by “God Himself” on the destruction of “hell” itself. (Sheol in Hebrew, Hades in Greek, grave in english).

From the “King James Version” (their best translated verse in my opinion) with a little correction from “grave” to be replaced with “hell”:

“I will ransom them from the power of  Hell (Sheol in Hebrew/Hades in Greek); I will redeem them from Death: O Death, I will be thy plagues; O Hell, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from Mine Eyes.” (Hosea 13:14)

The phrase “repentance shall be hid from Mine Eyes” means that God Will not “pity” the “destruction” of both “Hell” and “Death” meaning they will eventually “cease to exist”! (Correlate with the verses in 1 Corinthians 15 below):

“The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” (1 Corinthians 15:26)

“So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your sting? O Hell, where is your victory?” (1 Corinthians 15:54 – 55)

Icing on the cake; by God Himself when He came in flesh (Lord Jesus Christ):

“And I, if I be lifted up from the earth (Resurrected to heaven), I will draw all men unto me (He will save all men).” – by the mouth of our Blessed Saviour, Lord Jesus Christ Himself (John 12:32)