Unbelievers who live immorally (4:3) and who say evil things about Christians (4:4) will one day have to face God. This gives believers great relief and confidence—they will receive justice. God will judge everyone, both the living and the dead. And judgment may come at any moment. That is why the Good News was preached even to those who have died. These words have caused debate among scholars, resulting in four main views:
1. Some tie this verse back to 3:18-20 and Christ’s proclamation of salvation to the unbelievers who lived before he came. But an understanding of a “second chance” after death in this verse argues against everything else in Scripture, and would be unhelpful to Peter’s readers who were being encouraged to persevere in suffering.
2. Others look back also to 3:18-20, but say that Christ was preaching salvation to those Old Testament people who had believed in God in the time before Christ preached on earth, offering them the gift he brought—eternal life.
3. Still others say that this verse refers to the gospel proclaimed by the apostles to those on the earth who were physically alive but spiritually dead.
4. Most likely, however, Peter was referring to those dead at that time of his writing who had heard and accepted the gospel. Many people in the early church had concerns about life after death. In Thessalonica, Christians worried that loved ones who died before Christ’s return might never see Christ (
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18). They wondered if those who died would be able to experience the promised eternal life. Peter explained that these believers, although their bodies were punished with death—that is, they died physically as everyone dies physically—will still one day live in the spirit as God does.
Peter’s readers needed to be reminded that the dead (both the faithful and their oppressors) would be raised from the dead—the faithful to eternal reward, the unfaithful to eternal punishment. God’s judgment will be perfectly fair, Peter pointed out, because even those dead from ages past had heard the gospel. The Good News was first announced when Jesus Christ preached on the earth, but it has been operating since before the creation of the world (
Ephesians 1:4), and it eternally affects all people, the dead as well as the living.
Life Application New Testament Commentary.
Linear Mode
