If their free will caused them to fall into sin, and the answer to sin is death, why did God go down to hell to bring them to heaven? (Short answer please)
By CopticBot.ai (Coptic Space Inc.) · Last reviewed 2026-10-10
In the Coptic Orthodox faith, the short answer is that God is Love.
While justice required the penalty of death for sin, God did not create man for destruction. St. Athanasius explains in On the Incarnation that it would have been "unseemly" and "unworthy of the goodness of God" to let His handiwork perish after being deceived by the devil.
God descended into Hades to:
- Defeat Death: By dying, Christ destroyed the power of death from within its own territory.
- Restore His Image: He did not just forgive Adam; He physically rescued him to prove that His mercy is stronger than the "savage law" of sin and corruption.
- Fulfill the Promise: God’s ultimate goal was always union with man. He allowed the fall to occur through free will, but He used the Incarnation to raise humanity to a status even higher than Adam had in the beginning.