THE teaching of Christian Science is gradually correcting the fallacies held by mortals on what many of them have been wont to speak of as the judgment day. A theory held by not a few is that sometime in the future—probably the remote future —the Almighty will sit in judgment on all mankind for their thoughts and deeds while on earth, and decide upon the place whither they will have to go—heaven or hell—perhaps there to spend the remainder of eternity.
Some hold that the determining factor will be whether one, while on earth, had accepted Christ Jesus as the Saviour, in the sense of believing that Jesus' so-called death on the cross had, in a substitutionary manner, atoned for the believer's sins. This, the doctrine of vicarious sacrifice, has to many been an impossible theory to accept; for they have felt that it does away with the righteous judgment to be expected of an all—wise God.
Christian Science does not teach its students to regard the judgment day in the way just indicated. It holds that to get a correct view of this question we must first obtain a correct understanding of the nature of God and man, and also of what is called mortal man. What, then, does Christian Science tell of God and man? It declares that God is perfect Mind, infinite good, and that the real man is God's image, reflection, or likeness—therefore perfect. And what does Christian Science tell of mortal man? It declares that mortal man, so called, is a false concept of the real or spiritual man—an entirely illusory concept. Thus, the student of Christian Science is never in doubt as to the perfect nature of God and spiritual man, and of the utterly unreal nature of a mortal or material sense of man.
