23 JULY 1887, Page 14

DESTRUCTION, NOT ANNIHILATION.

[To THE EDITOR OE THE "SrscrATes."]

SIR,—The reviewer of Prebendary Row on " Future Retribu- tion," in the Spectator for July 16th, observes :—" We cannot say that the various words which imply destruction, and which are applied to the impenitent, are at all obviously intended to express annihilation, seeing that the same words occur where they obviously do not express annihilation [bat only moral death]." In confirmation of all but the last words of this statement (those placed within brackets), I would call attention to the fact that one of these words—viz., OweBpoc—is used by St. Paul only, among New-Testament writers, in four of his Epistles,-1 Con v., 5 ; 1 These. v., 3 ; 2 These. i., 9 ; 1 Tim. vi., 9. Prebendary Row quotes and comments on three of these references, but omits the first, in which the Apostle enjoins the members of the Church in Corinth to deliver a heinously guilty brother to Satan " for (the) destruction of the flesh (as D'AeOPOE rtc sepsis), that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." Is not this a cardinal reference in favour of the assumption—to use no more positive term—that destruction is not identical with annihilation P The omission of this reference is the more noteworthy, as the writer has quoted the next verse but one preceding (at p. 192, chap. 9, "New-Testament Terminology.")—I am, Sir, &a.,