My wife recently made the claim that holiness is the opposite of death, a thought I hadn’t had. Those who study biblical Hebrew and the word kodesh (= holy) know that the primary meaning resides in “separateness.” The connection my wife discovered was that “death was separation from this life unto ultimate death” and so “holiness is the separation from this life unto ultimate life.” Let’s start from a largely secular view, a scientific view, and work towards the robust nature of Christian theology.

The 2nd law of thermodynamics entails the ultimate end of the universe (entropy) to be death, or, more specifically, the heat deprivation of the universe also called the heat death of the universe. We fit into this picture as passing agents briefly here for but a moment–this is especially poignant when we see how short our life spans are compared to the putative time period of the universe. Thus, we are alive for a moment, and then our crumbled bodies transform into dust, but all identity and all personality is obliterated. In the final analysis, even if there were a endless database with all human personalities and consciencenesses preserved–sounds like a nightmare–at the end of the universe, there would be no energy with which to maintain it. Therefore, there is no gospel, no good news, for the scientist, the atheist, the godless; there is only darkness and nothingness at the end of that story. When we die, we are separated into the darkness–and the universe will be complete darkness when there is no energy left, an empty canvas–of ultimate death, joined by the entire universe. In the end, it is not a powerful Presence; there is only annihilation of all things that comprised meaning during the life of this universe. To quote a famous one-liner, “Do you hear that sound, that is the sound of inevitability.”

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty says the creatures in Revelation 4:8, and in the OT, Isaiah had a similar vision: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, all the earth is full of His glory. Said more closely to the original Hebrew, Holy, holy, holy is Yahweh Tseva’ot, which means LORD of the heavenly hosts of armies. The confusion around the idea of ‘holy’ or ‘holiness’ is that its primary meaning is thought to be “moral purity.” The notion of impurity, however, only arises after sin enters the word. Unquestionably, the entry of sin might have laid emphasis on Yahweh’s moral purity, but the idea of corruptible morality is only a matter of thought after He creates. As the ultimate Life-Giver, and as the Source of Life, as the Nicenae-Constantinopolitan creed codified so long ago, Yahweh does not abide in a place of Life; no, indeed, He is Life. As Jesus taught after Lazarus died but before Jesus brought him back to life, “I am the resurrection and the Life.” The construction in the Greek, ego eimi, is designed to lay emphasis, which might go something like this, “I myself surely am the resurrection and the life.” All this tells us that the idea of “holy” applied to Yahweh means that He is unique, utterly separate from all else.

Like most words, their meanings are construed from a litany of contexts that, combined, gives us a strict denotation. There is no meaning without contexts. Connotations get attached based on certain selective contexts, but my point is that the main denotation is constructed from the word’s main contextual uses. Holiness in the above contexts is when ultimate Life will do battle with ultimate death, which is why Yahweh is portrayed as the Warlord over armies (Isaiah) or Warlord over the Apocalypse (Revelation). The radical separation of Yahweh from death, since He is the Source of Life, can result in no other outcome but battle, victory, and the elimination of all corruption. To go a bit more simpler but to pull in a giant theme that makes Yahweh clearly God, Yahweh’s holiness resides in His ability to create anything at all, and then sustain it, without becoming it or having His life-source-resources diminished in any way. Scripture tells us that Christ has boundless riches and life in Himself (Ephesians 3:8; John 5:26), and at one point Yahweh asks suffering Job, do you know where I keep the snow (Job 38:22), suggesting the marvel of Yahweh’s ability to produce something rather than just there being nothing.

To summarize, holiness means separate unto life, and it is entirely fitting that Yahweh’s holiness gets touted in texts where the line between life-and-death is thinest, when war, death, and slaughter are near. When evil exists, whose end is ultimate death (Scripture calls it the second death), the inexorable outcome is conflict when ultimate Life abides. The story of the universe is either holiness remains (ultimate life) or annihilation comes (ultimate death); either Holy Presence or profane emptiness. For all these reasons, my wife is right, holiness’ opposite is death. We will either be separated unto life or unto death. The universe, who, according to Scripture eagerly waits on the revealing of the sons and daughters of God, will likewise be freed from its slavery to futility (entropy).

Dr. Scalise