speratus said: After burial, Christ, true God and true man, descended into hell, conquered the devil, and proclaimed His victory to the damned spirits in prison as part of their punishment.
I don't understand how Berkhof and the others can deny Christ's physical descent into hell. In the Apostle's Creed, we confess, "Jesus Christ... was crucified, dead, and buried: he descended into hell." Does the Reformed Church reject the Apostle's Creed?
As is typical, the answer is because this is nowhere to be found in Scripture, even though some man-made document you make your source of truth states it to be so. The issue is what does "he descended into hell" (taken from the later versions of the Apostle's Creed, and a few other Confessions and Catechisms mean? The majority of the Reformers understood that phrase to mean that Christ was put into the grave (hades) and not that He actually went to "hell", i.e., the abode of the spirits of the damned. Such a view is fraught with problems which contradict other doctrines which are far more perspicuous and held to be true.
One of the more interesting and I believe excellent explanations of this phrase was written by Herman Hoeksema in his 3-volume set, The Triple Knowledge: an Exposition of the Heidelberg Catechism, on "Lord's Day 16". I have attached this section as a Word.doc. If there is anyone who wants to read this but can't open it, send me a PM and I'll e-mail you a copy as a ".pdf" file.
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