Chapter 25 — Does “All” Really Mean All?

Romans 5:18 · 1 Corinthians 15:22 · Colossians 1:20 · 1 Timothy 2:4–6 · Philippians 2:10–11

A. The Question on the Table

Paul writes one of the boldest sentences in Scripture. “As one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men” (Romans 5:18). Read it again. The same word, “all,” governs both halves. If the first “all” means every human being who ever lived, then the second “all” means the same. And if it does, then every person condemned in Adam will be given life in Christ.

Traditionalists say no. They say the second “all” is smaller than the first. It means “all who believe,” or “all kinds of people,” or “all the elect.” The word “all” (Greek pas, “every, all”) is flexible, they argue. Context limits it. And the context of the New Testament limits these salvation texts to those who exercise faith.

James De Young gives the case for limitation at length. In Exposing Universalism, chapters 9 through 11, he walks through every “all” text universalists cite and argues that each one says less than it seems to.¹ His key claim is that the “all” in the salvation texts is always narrowed by context. Not every person will be justified. Only those who receive grace by faith will be.

I want to take this seriously. De Young is right that the word “all” can be limited by context. When Paul says “I have become all things to all people” (1 Corinthians 9:22), no one thinks he means every human on earth. Context matters. The question is whether the context of these salvation texts actually limits the “all” in the way De Young claims, or whether the limitation is imported from outside.

B. The Full Text in Context

Five New Testament passages form the backbone of the universalist “all” case. Each uses the word “all” (Greek pas or its forms, including panta, “all things”) in a sentence about salvation, reconciliation, or the final submission of creation to Christ. Let me lay them out together before we examine the arguments.

Several things stand out when you read them side by side. First, these are not scattered proof texts. They are Pauline, and they come from the heart of Paul’s theology. Romans 5 sits inside his great argument about sin and grace. First Corinthians 15 is his chapter on the resurrection. Colossians 1 is his hymn to the supremacy of Christ. First Timothy 2 is his instruction on prayer for all people. Philippians 2 is his hymn to the exalted Christ. These are central Pauline texts, not marginal ones.³

Second, the word “all” in most of these texts is doing heavy structural work. In Romans 5:18 and 1 Corinthians 15:22, it appears in a tightly built parallel: one side describes what Adam did to all, the other describes what Christ does to all. The whole argument depends on the two “alls” being the same group.⁴

Third, Colossians 1:20 ties the scope of reconciliation to the scope of creation. The same “all things” (Greek ta panta) created in verse 16 are reconciled in verse 20. If the creation “all” means everything without remainder, then the reconciliation “all” means the same.

Fourth, 1 Timothy 2:4–6 ties God’s desire to save “all people” directly to the ransom Christ paid “for all.” If the ransom is universal in scope, the saving will is universal in scope.

Fifth, Philippians 2:10–11 uses the language of worship, not just submission. The confession is made “to the glory of God the Father.” That final phrase does real work. In Paul’s thought, what glorifies the Father is genuine praise, not forced lip service.

One more thing to notice. Each text sits inside an argument that runs in one direction: outward. Romans 5:15 says “much more.” Colossians 1:16–20 expands from thrones and dominions to heaven and earth. First Timothy 2 ties prayer for “all people” to God’s desire for “all people” to a ransom “for all.” The texts press outward. They do not pull inward.⁵

With the texts before us, let me examine the case for reading them at full scope.

C. The Heart of the Case

1. The Parallel Demands Symmetry

Start with the strongest text. Romans 5:18 is built on a one-to-one parallel. Paul lines up two halves: Adam’s trespass, Christ’s righteous act. Condemnation for all men, justification for all men. The word “all” (Greek pantas anthrōpous, “all people”) appears in both clauses without any restriction added to the second.⁶

Thomas Talbott puts the logic sharply. Paul identified a single reference class—every sinful descendant of Adam—and then made two parallel statements about its members. The first “all” determines the scope of the second. The same pattern appears in Romans 11:32 (“God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all”) and in 1 Corinthians 15:22 (“as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ”). In each case, the grammatical evidence is decisive: the very ones condemned are the very ones who receive mercy.⁷

De Young’s move is to say that Romans 5:17 narrows the second “all.” Verse 17 speaks of “those who receive the abundance of grace.” He reads the receiving as the act of faith, and imports that condition into verse 18.⁸ But that reading runs into a problem. It breaks the very parallel Paul is building.

Parry responds that the Greek word “receive” (Greek lambanō) is being used here in its passive sense: to receive as a recipient, not to actively take. The reference in verse 17 is not to anything people do to get saved. It points to God making us recipients of grace, and it places no limits on the universal statements in verses 18–19.⁹ Hurd and Beauchemin press the same point. In several New Testament passages, people “receive” things they neither sought nor wanted, such as a just reward for disobedience (Hebrews 2:2) or a greater judgment (Luke 20:47).¹⁰

Paul’s point in the whole passage is the comparison between Adam and Christ. The comparison has a direction. It moves from lesser to greater. “But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift… abounded for many” (Romans 5:15). The argument is “much more.” Grace does more, not less, than sin.¹¹

Hurd asks the obvious question. If the first “all” means every person condemned in Adam, but the second “all” means only some, then Paul is saying sin reaches everyone but grace reaches fewer. That is the opposite of “much more.”¹² De Boer draws the same conclusion: unless the universalism of these verses is taken at face value, “‘how much more’ is turned into ‘how much less,’ for death is then given the last word over the vast majority of human beings.”¹³

The same logic applies to 1 Corinthians 15:22. “As in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” De Young argues that “all” in the second half means only believers.¹⁴ But Paul does not add the word “believers.” He says “all.” And he does not stop there. Look at the climax. Verse 28: “When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.” That phrase (Greek panta en pasin, “all things in all”) is as universal as language can be. Death itself is destroyed. Every enemy is put under Christ’s feet. And God fills everything.¹⁵

2. “All Things… in Heaven and on Earth”

Colossians 1:20 makes the scope even harder to limit. Paul says God chose “through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.” The phrase “all things” (Greek ta panta) carries a definite article. It means the totality. And its scope is defined four verses earlier.¹⁷

In Colossians 1:16 Paul writes, “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.” The same “all things” created in verse 16 are reconciled in verse 20. The scope of reconciliation matches the scope of creation.

The traditionalist response here is to say that “reconcile” might mean “pacify by conquest” rather than “save.” I address that fully in Chapter 29. The short answer is that the word “reconcile” (Greek apokatallassō, “to restore to friendship”) means the mending of a relationship, not the crushing of an enemy. And the means is “the blood of his cross,” which is the language of atonement, not military conquest. Talbott puts it simply: one could hardly ask for a more specific statement; Paul applied the concept of reconciliation, which is explicitly a redemptive concept, to all things without remainder.¹⁸

Parry adds a point that bears directly on the counterargument. Some point to Colossians 2:15, where Christ defeats the hostile powers at the cross, and argue that the cross brings defeat, not salvation. But as Parry observes, defeat and reconciliation are not opposites in this context. The powers had to be defeated in their hostility before they could be reconciled. Their defeat opens the way for their restoration, not their destruction.¹⁹

3. God’s Desire and the Scope of the Ransom

First Timothy 2:4–6 joins two universal claims. God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (v. 4). And Christ “gave himself as a ransom for all” (v. 6). The same “all” appears in both places.²⁰

De Young argues that God’s desire can be thwarted by free will. God wants all saved, yes, but human choice can defeat his purpose.²¹ I agree that faith is required. This book has argued from the start that salvation comes through personal faith in Christ (see Chapter 2). The question is not whether faith matters. The question is whether God, who desires all to be saved and who paid the ransom for all, is able to bring all people to faith.

Paul does not present God’s saving will as a mere wish. He pairs it with action. The ransom is already made. Notice the word “ransom” (Greek antilutron, “the price paid in exchange”). Christ paid the ransom “for all.” If it covers all, but most are never released, then the ransom was wasted for the majority. That sits badly with a God who does nothing in vain.²²

Hronich points out that Paul’s language here is not about desire alone. He calls for prayers for all people (v. 1), grounds that call in God’s desire for all to be saved (v. 4), and anchors both in the ransom paid for all (v. 6). Paul is calling for prayers for actual people, not classes of people. The word “all” means what it says.²³

De Young frames the problem as a standoff between God’s will and human freedom. He writes that God created human beings in his image, and that image includes the will, the capacity to choose against God’s preferred will. Adam and Eve witness to this choice.²¹ I accept that freedom is real (see Chapter 26). But De Young’s picture has a problem. A God who wants all saved and who gave himself for all but then fails to save most of them is a God whose purposes are frustrated on a massive scale. Paul’s God is not a God who hopes for the best and watches his plans crumble. Paul’s God “works all things according to the counsel of his will” (Ephesians 1:11).

De Young also appeals to 1 Timothy 4:10, which calls God “the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.” He suggests “especially” (Greek malista) might mean “namely,” narrowing the “all” to believers only.²⁴ But the most natural reading of “especially” is a subset within a larger group. God is the Savior of all, and believers enjoy that salvation in a special or present way. The word does not erase the larger group. It highlights a smaller one within it. You cannot limit Christ’s saving work to only “those who believe” without explicitly denying that he is “the Savior of all people.”²⁵

4. The Genuinely Limited “Alls” Are Marked by Context

Here is the concession De Young deserves. He is right that “all” does not always mean every person. When Luke says “all the country of Judea” went out to John the Baptist (Mark 1:5), no one thinks every last person went. The word “all” is genuinely flexible. I do not dispute that.²⁶

But here is what matters. In every case where “all” means less than every person, the context itself supplies the restriction. Mark 1:5 is talking about Judea; the geographic limit is right there. The reader does not have to import a restriction from outside the passage.²⁷

Now look at the salvation texts. Where is the limiting marker? Romans 5:18 says “all men” on both sides and supplies no restriction to the second. First Corinthians 15:22 says “all” on both sides with no qualifier. Colossians 1:20 says “all things, whether on earth or in heaven,” which is language of expansion, not limitation.²⁸

Talbott makes this precise. A popular strategy among critics is to find instances elsewhere in the New Testament where “all” does not literally mean every person, and then conclude that the salvation texts must be limited too. But this misidentifies the reference class. In Romans 5:18, Paul fixed his reference class with great care: every sinful descendant of Adam. The same “all” who receive condemnation are the same “all” who receive justification. You cannot restrict the second without first showing that Paul intended a different group, and the parallel says he did not.²⁹

Burnfield exposes the inconsistency that runs through the traditionalist handling of “all.” When “all” refers to sinners, it means everyone without exception. When “all” refers to those who turn to the Lord, it suddenly means only the elect. The word has not changed. Only the theological pressure has.³⁰

5. Confession That Is Worship, Not Defeat

Philippians 2:10–11 raises its own question. Paul says that “every knee should bow” and “every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” De Young reads this as forced submission, not free worship. “All do not lovingly submit to Jesus Christ or to God,” he writes. “They are forced to submit to a conquering sovereign. Such is not saving faith.”³¹

But pay close attention to three things. First, the “should” in Philippians 2:10 is an aorist subjunctive. As Beilby and others note, it does not mean “they ought to bow but might not.” It means “they shall bow.” The parallel texts in Isaiah 45 and Romans 14 have no sense of “they should but won’t.” They say every knee will bow.³²

Second, the confession is made “to the glory of God the Father.” That phrase matters. In Paul’s thought, what glorifies God is genuine worship, not forced lip service. Compare 1 Corinthians 12:3: “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except in the Holy Spirit.” If the confession of Christ as Lord requires the Holy Spirit, then the universal confession is given by the Spirit. And a Spirit-given confession is worship, not the grudging submission of a prisoner of war.³³

Third, Parry points to the word translated “confess” (Greek exomologeomai). Throughout the Septuagint Psalms, this word is used for the joyful and voluntary praise of God. There are no examples in Paul of an involuntary confession of Christ’s Lordship. The word almost always means “praise.”³⁴ Hronich adds a related observation. The Greek word for “bow” in Philippians 2:10 is kamptō, which in the New Testament is used for religious veneration (Romans 11:4; 14:11; Ephesians 3:14). When Paul wants to describe forced bowing, he uses a different word: sunkamptō (Romans 11:10), which means to bend down by compulsory force. He did not use the forced-bowing word here.³⁵

Paul is quoting Isaiah 45:23, where God says, “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.” In Isaiah, this is a promise of universal reign, and it is good news. The passage begins with God asking the nations to “turn to me and be saved” (Isaiah 45:22). That is an invitation, not a command to forced subjection.³⁶

I will not pretend this settles the question on its own. The “enemies as footstool” imagery is real, and Chapter 29 deals with it more fully. But the specific phrase “to the glory of God the Father” tilts the language toward glad worship. Scripture never says that the torment of the damned glorifies the Father. It says that the praise of the redeemed does.³⁷

D. Engagement with Specific Scholars

The scholars divide cleanly on this question. On the limiting side, De Young gives the fullest case, working through every major “all” text and arguing that context, theology, and the role of faith all narrow the scope.³⁸ McClymond supports the same reading. He critiques Robin Parry for reading Romans 5:12–21 “out of context” and notes N. T. Wright’s suggestion that the “all” of Romans 5:18 may refer to “all nations” rather than every individual.³⁹

On the universal-scope side, Talbott provides the philosophical backbone. His treatment of Romans 5:18, 1 Corinthians 15:22, and Romans 11:32 in The Inescapable Love of God is the most sustained argument in print for taking the parallels at face value. Even some who reject universal reconciliation have conceded, as Neal Punt does, that “Romans 5:18 and its immediate context place no limitation on the universalistic scope of the second ‘all men.’” Talbott argues that the critics’ strategy of finding limited uses of “all” elsewhere and importing them here amounts to misidentifying Paul’s reference class and then declaring that “all” is limited in context.⁴⁰

George Hurd provides the most direct reply to De Young. His A Defense of Biblical Universalism is a point-by-point answer, and on the “all” texts he argues that the parallel comparison “as… even so” requires the second group to equal the first in number. To shrink the second group while keeping the first universal is to break the comparison Paul is making.⁴¹ Burnfield makes a similar case, walking through the “all means all” texts in Psalm 22:27, John 12:32, Isaiah 45:22–25, Romans 5, Romans 11:32, and Colossians 1:20, and insisting that the contexts give no limiting signal.⁴²

Robin Parry, writing as Gregory MacDonald in The Evangelical Universalist, reads the “all” of Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 as genuinely universal. He quotes Käsemann’s remark that “all powerful grace is unthinkable without eschatological universalism.” Parry also argues that Philippians 2:10–11 breathtakingly expands the scope of Isaiah 45 to include not only the living but the dead, and not only humans but angelic creatures, using terminology that in Paul’s letters consistently carries saving meaning.⁴³

Andrew Hronich, in Once Loved Always Loved, traces the logic across Ephesians 1:10 as well, where God’s purpose is to “unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” The Greek word here (Greek anakephalaiōsis, “to sum up, to bring to completion”) pictures God drawing all creation together in Christ. Hronich argues that the language of subjection in the Pauline letters is the language of restoration, not annihilation. The cosmos is subject to Christ in the same sense that Christ is subject to the Father.⁴⁴

Among the major commentators, the picture is mixed but not one-sided. Cranfield notes that the “all men” of Romans 5:18 is not to be watered down. Moo acknowledges the force of the parallel but reads verse 17 as limiting the scope. The debate among scholars itself shows that the text is not as easily narrowed as De Young suggests.⁴⁵

I want to say one more thing about the Wright proposal that “all” means “all nations.” It has some merit for Romans 5, where Paul is arguing that grace extends to Gentiles. But it cannot carry across all five passages. Colossians 1:20 is not about Jews and Gentiles. It is about creation and reconciliation. The ethnic reading helps in one passage but does not explain the pattern across five.⁴⁶

E. Counter-Objections

“Made Alive” Means Resurrection to Judgment, Not Salvation

A common response to 1 Corinthians 15:22 is that “made alive” simply means “raised from the dead,” including those raised to judgment. The problem is that “made alive” (Greek zōopoiēthēsontai, “shall be given life”) is a salvation word in Paul. It is the opposite of death. It carries positive, saving connotations throughout the Pauline corpus.⁴⁷

“Reconcile” Can Mean Pacify by Conquest

I deal with this fully in Chapter 29. The short version: the same verb apokatallassō governs both Colossians 1:20 (“reconcile all things”) and 1:22 (“he has now reconciled you”). If it means genuine reconciliation in 1:22, it means the same in 1:20.⁴⁸

“You Are Reading an Outcome into a Desire”

A final pushback on 1 Timothy 2:4: God “desires” all to be saved, but desire does not guarantee outcome. Fair enough. But Paul does not leave it at desire. He pairs it with action. Christ gave himself as a ransom “for all.” The ransom is paid. What remains is whether the payment reaches its recipients. This book argues that a God of perfect love and wisdom will not let the ransom go to waste (see Chapter 26 on freedom and Chapter 28 on how God wins the resistant heart).⁴⁹

F. Conclusion and Pastoral Application

The great “all” texts are not isolated fragments. They form a pattern. Paul returns again and again to the same word, in the same kind of argument, pointing in the same direction. In Adam, all die; in Christ, all shall be made alive. As condemnation came to all, so justification comes to all. All things were created in Christ; all things are reconciled in Christ. God desires all people to be saved; Christ gave himself as a ransom for all. Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess, to the glory of the Father.

De Young is a careful reader, and he is right that “all” can be limited by context. But in these passages, the context does not limit it. The context expands it. Paul builds parallels that demand equal scope on both sides. He ties reconciliation to creation so that the reach of salvation matches the reach of God’s handiwork. At every turn, the texts push outward, not inward.⁵⁰

I understand the worry. If “all” means all, then what about faith? This book does not erase it. Salvation is still through personal faith in Christ. The claim is not that faith is unnecessary. The claim is that God, by his grace and wisdom, will bring every person to that faith, freely and genuinely, in this life or the next (see Chapter 26 and Chapter 27).

The parallels are the heart of the positive case. They are Paul at his most daring. And they are not stray sentences. They sit inside his deepest arguments about sin and grace, death and resurrection, creation and new creation. When Paul reaches for the word “all,” he means it. The hope of this book follows where his argument leads.

And the hope is breathtaking. Not all kinds of people. Not all the elect. All. Every person condemned in Adam. Every creature made by the Father’s hand. Every tongue that can form the word “Lord.” The ransom was paid for all. And the God who paid it does not waste a single drop of the blood of his Son.⁵¹

That is where the “all” texts lead. They lead to a grace that is not eclipsed but fulfilled, in every life, in every age, in every corner of the creation Christ made and Christ redeems.

Notes

↑ 1. De Young, Exposing Universalism, chs. 9–11 (“The Appeal to Texts with ‘All’ and ‘Whole’”). De Young organizes these chapters around the universalist appeal to Scripture, arguing that every major “all” text is limited by context.

↑ 2. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9, “A Survey of Convincing Texts from the Apostle Paul in Romans,” section (b) on Romans 5.

↑ 3. The five passages are drawn from four separate Pauline letters (Romans, 1 Corinthians, Colossians, 1 Timothy, Philippians), spanning different periods of Paul’s ministry and different audiences, which makes the consistency of the “all” language especially striking.

↑ 4. On the Adam–Christ typology and the structural role of the parallel, see C. E. B. Cranfield, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1975), 1:289–90; Douglas Moo, The Epistle to the Romans, New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 343–44.

↑ 5. The outward movement is a feature of Paul’s cosmic Christology. In each case, Paul begins with a specific situation and expands to a universal claim about what Christ has done for “all.”

↑ 6. The Greek reads: hōs di’ henos paraptōmatos eis pantas anthrōpous eis katakrima, houtōs kai di’ henos dikaiōmatos eis pantas anthrōpous eis dikaiōsin zōēs. The identical phrase pantas anthrōpous (“all people”) appears in both clauses without any qualifier or restriction.

↑ 7. Thomas Talbott, The Inescapable Love of God, 2nd ed. (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2014), ch. 5. Talbott writes: “In each of these texts, we encounter a contrast between two universal statements, and in each case the first ‘all’ determines the scope of the second. Accordingly, when Paul asserted in Romans 5:18 that Christ’s one ‘act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all,’ he evidently had in mind every descendant of Adam who stands under the judgment of condemnation.” The same point applies to Romans 11:32 and 1 Corinthians 15:22.

↑ 8. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9: “Here the ‘all’ and the ‘many’ in the context are defined as ‘those who receive.’” He reads Romans 5:17 as controlling the meaning of “all” in 5:18.

↑ 9. Robin Parry (Gregory MacDonald), The Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed. (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2026), 85–86. Parry writes: “Lambanō here is being used in the passive sense of ‘receive’ and not in the active sense of ‘take.’ The reference in v. 17 is not to anything people do to get saved. It refers to God’s making us recipients of grace and it places no limits on the universal statements in vv. 18–19, for those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace could eventually be everyone.” See also Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5, who argues that Moo’s appeal to 5:17 to restrict 5:18 attributes to Paul a fallacious inference.

↑ 10. Hurd, A Defense of Biblical Universalism, ch. on the “all” texts, section on Romans 5:17. Hurd explains that lambanō has both an active and a passive sense and cites Hebrews 2:2 and Luke 20:47 as examples of people “receiving” things they did not seek. Gerry Beauchemin, Hope Beyond Hell, ch. on Romans 5, makes the same point.

↑ 11. The “much more” (pollō mallon) appears in Romans 5:15 and 5:17. It governs the entire comparison: grace exceeds the trespass, the free gift exceeds the one sin, life exceeds condemnation.

↑ 12. Hurd, A Defense of Biblical Universalism, ch. on the “all” texts. Hurd asks: if more remain in death in Adam than are made alive in Christ, how can grace be said to have “super-abounded” over sin? The opposite would be true.

↑ 13. Martinus C. de Boer, The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1988), 175. Quoted in Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 89. Käsemann similarly concludes that “all powerful grace is unthinkable without eschatological universalism” (cited in de Boer, ch. 5, n. 89).

↑ 14. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9. He cites 1 Corinthians 15:1–2, 11, 14, and 17 as references to faith within the context of verse 22 and argues that “all” is restricted to those who exercise faith.

↑ 15. The sequence in 1 Corinthians 15:23–28 traces a progression: Christ’s resurrection (the firstfruits), then the resurrection of believers, then the end, when every authority is destroyed, death is abolished, and God is “all in all” (panta en pasin). The climax is not the salvation of some but the filling of all things by God. Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 90–92, argues that Paul’s only focus in the chapter is the fate of Christians, and the universalist claim of 15:22 is drawn out by implication, not explicit development. See also Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5, who argues that nothing in the context justifies restricting the second “all” to believers.

↑ 16. Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5. Talbott writes: “The grammatical evidence here seems utterly decisive; you can reject it only if you are prepared to reject what is right there before your eyes.” He also shows that John Murray’s attempt to use 1 Corinthians 15:22 to restrict Romans 5:18 commits a fallacious inference: Murray assumes without argument that some of those who die in Adam will never belong to Christ, which is the very question at issue.

↑ 17. The phrase ta panta with the definite article functions as a near-technical term for the totality of creation. See BDAG, pas, 2.a: “the whole, all.” On the structural unity of the Colossians 1:15–20 hymn, see Peter T. O’Brien, Colossians, Philemon, Word Biblical Commentary (Waco, TX: Word, 1982), 32–42.

↑ 18. Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5: Paul “applied the concept of reconciliation, which is explicitly a redemptive concept, not only to all human beings, but to all the spiritual principalities and dominions as well.” See also the verb apokatallassō, a strengthened form of katallassō, “to exchange enmity for friendship.” The means specified in Colossians 1:20 is “the blood of his cross,” atonement language, not military-conquest language. For full treatment, see Chapter 29.

↑ 19. Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 53–54. Parry argues that it is “hardly plausible to interpret the reconciliation of the principalities and powers in 1:20 in terms of their eschatological punishment. 1:20 clearly refers to their deliverance. That this is effected through their defeat at Calvary is no problem for the universalist.” See also N. T. Wright, The Epistles of Paul to the Colossians and to Philemon, Tyndale New Testament Commentary; and Stig Hillert, Limited and Universal Salvation, who argues there is “no basis for interpreting the ei–clause as a condition or a warning” in Colossians 1:21–23.

↑ 20. The word antilutron (“ransom-price”) appears in the New Testament only here. It is a compound of anti (“in exchange for”) and lutron (“ransom”), intensifying the idea of a payment made in the place of another. The phrase is antilutron hyper pantōn, “a ransom for all.”

↑ 21. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9, “Can God’s Wish Be Thwarted? Yes.”

↑ 22. The question is whether God’s saving will is a mere preference or an active purpose. The verb thelei (“desires, wills”) in 1 Timothy 2:4 carries more force than a casual wish. When Paul uses the same verb of God’s action elsewhere (1 Corinthians 12:18), it describes effective action. On the wasted-ransom metaphor, see Burnfield, Patristic Universalism, ch. on “all means all.”

↑ 23. Andrew Hronich, Once Loved Always Loved: The Logic of Apokatastasis (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2023), ch. on 1 Timothy 2. Hronich notes that Paul calls for prayers for actual people, not classes of people, and that 1 Timothy 2:5–6 obliterates any attempt to narrow the “all”: Christ is mediator between God and every individual man, not every kind of man. See also I. Howard Marshall, who argues that Paul maintains his focus on all people while specifically calling for prayers for rulers, since rulers facilitate an environment for godly living, not because they are the only group in view.

↑ 24. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9. He suggests that malista in 1 Timothy 4:10 could mean “namely, I mean,” narrowing the group.

↑ 25. BDAG defines malista as “most of all, above all, especially, particularly” and gives its basic function as marking a subset within a larger group. See also James Beilby, Postmortem Opportunity: A Biblical and Theological Assessment of Salvation after Death (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2021), ch. 11, who argues that one “cannot limit Christ’s atoning work to only ‘those who believe’ without explicitly denying that Christ is ‘the Savior of all people.’”

↑ 26. This is a concession that must be made honestly. The word pas has a wide range in Greek. In Acts 2:5, “every” (pantos) does not mean literally every nation. Context always matters.

↑ 27. This is the distinguishing test: is the limitation internal to the passage or external? In cases where “all” is genuinely limited, the limiting marker is right there in the context. In the salvation texts, it is not.

↑ 28. Burnfield, Patristic Universalism, ch. on “all means all.” Burnfield surveys six major passages and argues that none carries an internal limiting marker.

↑ 29. Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5. Talbott traces the strategy of Moo and Boettner: first misidentify a reference class, then argue that “all” is “limited in context” because it does not refer to every member of the misidentified class. The strategy fails because Paul identified his reference class with precision: every descendant of Adam who stands under condemnation. The same group is justified in Christ.

↑ 30. Burnfield, Patristic Universalism, ch. 4, “All Means All.” Burnfield gives Psalm 22:27 as an example. John Gill defines “all” there as the elect alone. But in Romans 3:23 (“all have sinned”), Gill defines the same word as every person. Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5, tells a similar story about a Calvinist pastor who would exclaim “not just some things, but all things!” when reading Romans 8:28, yet would never read the second half of Romans 5:18 the same way. The criterion for when “all” means all appears to depend entirely on the theological conclusion the interpreter wants to reach.

↑ 31. De Young, Exposing Universalism, ch. 9, “Jesus Rules As Conqueror of Some, Not As Savior.”

↑ 32. James Beilby, Postmortem Opportunity, ch. 11. Beilby notes that “the ‘should’ in Philippians 2 is aorist subjunctive and should not be understood as ‘you ought to bow (but might not)’ but ‘you shall bow.’” Neither Isaiah 45 nor Romans 14 possess any sense of “they should bow but will not.” John Chrysostom takes the reference to “in heaven and on earth and under the earth” as meaning “the whole world, and angels, and men, and demons.”

↑ 33. The phrase eis doxan theou patros (“to the glory of God the Father”) in Philippians 2:11 is purpose language: the confession has the end (eis) of glorifying the Father. In Pauline usage, the glory of God is served by genuine worship, not by the torment or forced submission of enemies. Cf. Romans 15:9.

↑ 34. Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 105. Parry argues that “the terminology Paul uses is suggestive of salvation rather than forced submission. All creatures confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Elsewhere in Paul’s letters when he speaks of confessing Jesus as Lord it is always in a context of salvation.” The word exomologeomai “is a word almost always meaning ‘praise.’ Throughout the LXX version of the Psalms it is used of the joyful and voluntary praise of God.” See also Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5, who notes that Paul “chose a verb that throughout the Septuagint implies not only confession, but the offer of praise and thanksgiving.”

↑ 35. Andrew Hronich, Once Loved Always Loved, ch. on Philippians 2:5–11. Hronich points out that kamptō is used in the New Testament for religious veneration (Romans 11:4; 14:11; Ephesians 3:14), while sunkamptō in Romans 11:10 “signifies . . . to bend down by compulsory force.” Paul chose the worship word, not the coercion word. See also George Hunsinger, who writes that “the divine/human Jesus, worshiped at first by only a tiny community, will one day be confessed by all the world. . . . The universalistic note here is as remarkable as the distinctions by which it is expressed.”

↑ 36. Isaiah 45:22–24 (ESV). The context is a salvation oracle. Burnfield, Patristic Universalism, ch. 4, argues that in Isaiah 45 God asks the nations to turn and be saved, which implies willing response. Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 104–5, notes that Paul’s use of Isaiah 45:23 in Romans 14:11 serves the point that God accepts all believers equally, and the bowing and praising are the language of conversion, not condemnation.

↑ 37. Revelation 5:13 envisions “every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea” offering praise to the Lamb, which matches the scope of the Philippians hymn. See Ephesians 1:6, 12, 14, where God’s plan is “to the praise of his glory.”

↑ 38. De Young, Exposing Universalism, chs. 9–11. He organizes his treatment around five categories of universalist appeal: texts with “all” and “whole,” texts about God’s sovereignty, texts about immortality and the end of death, texts about the scope of the ransom, and texts about confession.

↑ 39. McClymond, The Devil’s Redemption, 2:962. McClymond critiques Parry for reading Romans 5:12–21 “out of context” and notes Wright’s suggestion that “all” may refer to “all nations.”

↑ 40. Talbott, Inescapable Love, ch. 5. Neal Punt’s concession is cited by Talbott and noted in Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed. See also Larry Lacy, who conceded that “taken apart from the context of other aspects of Paul’s teaching . . . the most reasonable interpretation” of Romans 5:18 “would be that Paul was therein teaching universal salvation.”

↑ 41. Hurd, A Defense of Biblical Universalism, ch. on the “all” texts. Hurd argues that the “as . . . even so” parallel requires the second group to equal the first, and any reading that makes the second “all” smaller collapses the comparison.

↑ 42. Burnfield, Patristic Universalism, ch. on “all means all.” Burnfield walks through six major passages and insists the contexts give no limiting signal.

↑ 43. Parry, Evangelical Universalist, 3rd ed., 85–89 (Romans 5), 90–92 (1 Corinthians 15), 104–5 (Philippians 2). Käsemann’s remark is cited in de Boer, Defeat of Death, ch. 5, n. 89. Parry writes that Paul’s expansion of Isaiah 45 in Philippians 2:10–11 to include beings “in heaven and on earth and under the earth” is breathtaking in its universalistic scope, encompassing not only the living but the dead, and not only humans but angelic creatures.

↑ 44. Hronich, Once Loved Always Loved, ch. on Ephesians 1:7–10. The Greek anakephalaiōsis in Ephesians 1:10 is used in Aristotle and other rhetorical texts to indicate “drawing together” and “summing up” an argument. Paul views God’s purpose as the drawing together and uniting of all creation in Christ. Hronich argues that the language of subjection in 1 Corinthians 15:20–28 emphasizes “the reestablishment of God’s rule and cosmic peace,” and that “the cosmos is subject to Christ in the same sense that Christ is subject to the Father.”

↑ 45. Cranfield, Romans, International Critical Commentary, 1:289, warns against watering down pantas anthrōpous. Moo, Romans, NICNT, 343–44, acknowledges the force of the parallel but resolves the tension by reading “all” as “all who are in Christ.” When careful scholars disagree about whether the scope is limited, the limitation is not self-evident.

↑ 46. Wright’s “all nations” reading is developed in The Climax of the Covenant (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992) and Paul and the Faithfulness of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2013), ch. 9. It has exegetical force in Romans, where Paul is arguing against Jewish exclusivism, but does not explain the universal language of Colossians 1:20 or 1 Timothy 2:4, which are not about ethnic categories.

↑ 47. The verb zōopoieō (“to make alive, to give life”) is a salvation word in Paul. See John 6:63; Romans 8:11; 2 Corinthians 3:6. BDAG, zōopoieō, defines it as “to cause to live, make alive.”

↑ 48. The identical verb apokatallassō governs both Colossians 1:20 and 1:22. If it means genuine reconciliation in 1:22, it means the same in 1:20. For full treatment, see Chapter 29.

↑ 49. See Chapter 26 on how God wins a free “yes” without coercion, and Chapter 28 on optimal grace. The universalism this book defends does not claim faith is unnecessary. It claims God is able to bring every person to faith, freely and genuinely.

↑ 50. Hurd, A Defense of Biblical Universalism, ch. on the “all” texts. Hurd’s line throughout is that “in the end, the Traditionalist position depends upon things not found in the text.” The limiting reading requires the interpreter to add a restriction that the texts themselves do not contain.

↑ 51. On the sufficiency and scope of the cross, see Chapter 4. On the final consummation and the cumulative case, see Chapter 40.