The spirits in prison is a recurrent minor subject in the writings of Christianity.
New Testament
The subject takes its starting point from a Bible reference:
Early Christian interpretations
According to Augustine the spirits are the unbelieving contemporaries of Noah, to whom the spirit of Christ in Noah, preached, or to whom pre-existent Christ himself preached.
Reformation and Enlightenment views
Unitarians, such as Thomas Belsham, considered that the spirits in prison were simply Gentiles in the prison of ignorance to whom Christ preached through his apostles.
Modern Christian interpretations
identifies five commonly held views on the interpretation of this verse: These views revolve around the identity of the spirits in prison, the time in which the preaching took place, and the content of the preaching.
View 1. Augustinian interpretation
This is also found in Thomas Aquinas; Summa Theologica. A variant of this view is the view of the Rev. Archibald Currie that Christ through Noah preached to "the spirits in prison ;" meaning the eight persons interned in the Ark as in a place of protection.
View 2. Harrowing of Hell
The Anglican Edward Hayes Plumptre, Dean of Wells, in The Spirits in Prison starting from the verse in Peter argued for revival in the belief in the harrowing of Hell and the spirit of Christ preaching to the souls of the dead in Hades while his body was in the grave.
View 3. Proclaiming triumph
This is a variant of the harrowing of Hell idea, except that Christ only proclaims triumph.
Support for the understanding that the spirits in prison are angelic beings and not people is thought to be confirmed by II Peter 2:4–5 and Jude 6, which refer to rebellious angels, punished by God with imprisonment. Just like I Pet. 3, II Pet. 2 also refers to the time of Noah's flood, including the number of people saved in the ark. However, the text in 2 Peter uses a different word for the location of the angels than I Peter does. in 2 Peter 2, the word used is , other wise known as Tartarus. In I Peter 3:19, the word is , meaning prison.
The concept that the dead await a general resurrection and judgment either in blessed rest or in suffering after a particular judgement at death was a common 1st century Jewish belief. A similar concept is taught in the Eastern Orthodox churches, was championed by John Calvin, and is reflected in some Early Church Fathers. In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, this verse is used in conjunction with 1 Peter 4:6 to support the belief that in the three days between Christ's death and resurrection, He visited the spirit world and set in motion the work of teaching the gospel to those who didn't receive it during mortality, providing them the opportunity to repent and accept saving ordinances performed on their behalf in Latter-day Saint temples.
In the Phædrus, Socrates likens the soul of the body to be as imprisoned withal as an oyster is bound to its shell during the discourse on metempsychosis with Phraedrus. Etymology of Phrædrus ; from phærma , philtre spell or enchantment, to effect However, the Greek word psyche mentioned in 1 Peter 3:20 is usually translated by ‘person’ and not by ‘soul’. The latter represents both the inner self and its status after corporal death, whereas in the current verse it is used as a synonim of the Jewish word nephesh, in a holistic sense and without any metaphysical dualism. The word psyche is applied by St Peter uniquely to humans and not for animals.
Etymology
Etymology of Spirits - translated from Greek pneu masin , the 'Invisible Elements' of Time, referencing the continually reincarnated soul Etymology of Prison - translated from Greek phylakē , guarded by, or guardians
