The Worm That Shall Not Die
Exploring the words of Christ through the eyes of Jonah
“And if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than with two feet to be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into hell, ‘where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched.’” (Mark 9:44-48)
The moral of this story is anything that’s causing you to sin is better to let go of than to allow it to drag you to hell, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. Remember this. Now, the question is what is the worm that shall not die, and why is it paired with the imagery of unquenchable fire. In Mark 9, Jesus is actually quoting Isaiah 66:24, which reads “And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.” This isn’t just some random verse in the book of Isaiah that Jesus chose to quote here. Isaiah 66:24 is the final verse in the book of Isaiah, and when we consider the chiastic structure of Isaiah, we will understand that this message reflects the beginning of the book, which is ultimately what sets the theme for the book as a whole. Why is the worm that shall not die and the unquenchable fire such an important symbol here that Jesus decided to repeat it three times?
The book of Isaiah opens with condemnations against Israel and a promise of future redemption, and this is also what the book ends with. Isaiah’s name is Hebrew for “God saves,” so it makes sense that throughout the book we see God save Judah across numerous occasions. God saves Judah when Aram and Israel pressure her. There’s the Assyrian siege against Jerusalem which God disrupts and He saves Judah from Babylonian exile. Despite God’s continuous grace, however, the book ends in the same place it starts – with condemnations. Despite the whittling down of all external oppression against God’s people there remains the source of all these issues, which is the corrupted heart of man. Of course, these condemnations don’t go without the appropriate promises of grace which God never fails to provide, and that’s really what Isaiah 66 is all about. Isaiah 66 describes God redeeming His people, and through doing so ushering in the gentiles to the feast of mount Zion – that is, the eschatological/church age. That is, until verse 24 which leaves us with the haunting reality that despite God’s attempts to solve even the very heart of evil itself, which is the wicked heart of man, we can still make a choice in our hearts to deny Him access. This refusal to co operate with God is what started when Adam refused to enjoy the sabbath and spiritually remained in the 6th day in Genesis 3 and is what culminates in the prideful cry of 666 in Revelation 13.
That being said, why is it that the symbols used to describe this refusal of man to cooperate with the transfigurative plan of God in creation a worm that shall not die and unquenchable fire? The unquenchable fire is a symbol used countlessly in both scripture and the Church Fathers to describe the presence of God, and there is another place in scripture we see these two symbols placed next to each other. This is in Jonah 4, where Jonah is sitting under a tree grown by God to protect him from the hot east sun (consider hot east sun as symbolically equivalent to fire – the sun rising in the east is used all throughout scripture and Christian tradition as a symbol for the coming of the presence of God). The story of Jonah is a symbolic journey through the cosmos, particularly the cosmos as presented in the bible. The bible presents us with a tripartite cosmography. We have earth, and then the celestial heaven, and then the heaven of heavens (cf. Gen. 1, 1 Kg 8:27, Neh 9:6, etc.). This tripartite structure is represented to us countless times, e.g. the tripartite structure of the ark of Noah, the courtyard-Holy Place-Holy of Holies structure of the tabernacle and temple, etc. In many cases we also see a fourth piece of this puzzle, which is cosmically presented in the bible as the waters below. This is the meaningless wilderness, the grave below the earth, sheol. In between each of these sections we see a veil which signifies the movement from one sphere into the next – this is made symbolically very obvious in the tabernacle and temple.
Throughout the book of Jonah we see him flee from the presence of God, towards the west (where the sun sets – where meaning dies) and then gradually make his way back up to the presence of God, passing through three veils on his journey. His first veil is the fish, which admits him into the symbolic courtyard. His second veil is the city, Nineveh which leads him into the symbolic holy place, and his final veil is the tree which God planted to protect him from the Holy of Holies, which is God’s unveiled presence shining down on the earth, glorifying the righteous and burning the wicked. As a side note, it is interesting to consider that his final veil was a plant in the context of the first veil given to mankind on their way OUT of God’s presence in Genesis 3 was also a plant. Consider the conversation held between Jonah and God in Jonah 4 now in the context of what Jesus was saying in Mark 9. Jesus was saying that if there is anything in you causing you to sin – that is, reject the plan of God – to cut it off lest it causes you to be destroyed by the inevitable unfolding of God’s plans. Now also consider this in the context of Isaiah which reveals to us that, ultimately, what separates us from the will of God is primarily the corruption of our own heart. This is precisely what we see Jonah confronting as he sits under the tree, his final shade from the all-consuming fire, that is God (Heb. 12:29). God gives Jonah one final chance to let go of his resentments and bitterness and accept the will of God before God can make Himself fully present to Jonah. Similar to the book of Isaiah, the story of Jonah ends with an ambiguous tone towards this final choice. I think this is intentional, and is honestly a good prima facie argument, from scripture, contra universalism. Even until his final moment, Jonah faces the possibility that he can choose to not be saved; just as in Isaiah, even at the final promise of redemption, when the veil is taken off of creation (Is. 25:7) there remains this possibility of un-salvation. Before we continue, it should be made clear that because Jonah is canonized by the Church we do know how the story ends, but that does not negate the scriptural point being made by these two texts.
In the story of Jonah it is at this final call to accept and glory in the will of God that we see the final veil between God and Jonah is destroyed, exposing Jonah to the unquenchable heat of God’s presence rising in the eastern sun. What is the veil destroyed by? A worm. Why? That is because the worm is a symbol of Jesus Christ, and the book of Jonah is a symbol of Jesus’ redemptive work in creation (Mt. 12:39), fulfilling all the prophecies of Isaiah. In Matthew 27, shortly before dying, Jesus cries out Psalm 22 “Father, Father, why have you forsaken me?” What do we see a couple verses later in Psalm 22 other than verse 6 saying “I am not a man, but a worm.” Jesus Christ is the worm that shall not die, just as God’s presence is the unquenchable fire. Job 25:6 calls man rottenness and the son of man a worm. “Son of man” is a high priestly title in the old testament (think of the vision of Daniel where the son of man performs the high priestly day of atonement). The job of priests in Leviticus 6:26 is to eat of the sin offering (Lev. 4:16). This is in order that they may assimilate into their very being the sin and death of the congregation, in order that they, as Priests may bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement for them before the LORD (Lev. 10:17). Eating is one of the fundamental means by which we join something to ourselves. Think about it, eating is literally just your body metabolizing something into becoming a part of your body. What do worms eat? Rottenness. Worms consume dead flesh and transform it into new, life-bearing soil. This is precisely what Jesus Christ did as the high priest of high priests, by symbolically becoming a worm and consuming our rottenness, assimilating all of mankind into his very being to bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement for them before the LORD (Lev. 10:17). It is through this that we, who once were but dead, rottenness, are transformed into fertile soil bringing forth righteous fruits.
When Jesus was crucified, which was the final unity of God with all of humanity (because at that moment Christ united Himself to not just those alive, but also those in the grave), we see something very striking happen. The veil between the holy place and the holy of holies is torn in two. The holy of holies was the presence of God on earth in the old covenant, so this was Christ symbolically opening this presence up over all of creation, and interestingly enough, is precisely what the worm did for Jonah in Jonah 4. Veils exist in order to reveal something eschatological, veils are not an end to themselves. This is the same reason that iconography is not idolatry, it is because the icons are not objects of veneration in and of themselves, but they represent something greater. The primordial veil over creation is the firmament which was created on day 2 in Genesis 1. Throughout the entire creation narrative this is the only thing which was not called good by God. This is not because it is evil, but rather because it is not eschatological. When a veil becomes evil is when we take it as an end in and of itself and refuse to continue following the path towards God’s presence which He is calling us to take. Hell is the eternal realization of this choice and is symbolized by the worm, who is Jesus, destroying our veils, exposing us to the presence of God. This is why hell in the bible is described as both outer darkness, and eternal fire; also described by the Fathers as isolation from God but also the direct presence of God. Hell is the contradictory attempt to choose to sit behind a veil, even though that veil is destroyed by the worm the second it is created. It is the paradoxical refusal of rotting flesh to be transformed by the body of the worm which has taken it upon itself into beautiful life-sustaining soil.
It is the worm that shall not die, and that worm is Jesus Christ.