Dead Are Judged According to Their Works

Revelation 20:11; 11. A great white throne] Emblematic of purity and justice.

Revelation 20:11; Him that sat on it] Christ our Lord, the Great Eternal Judge, "For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son." (John 5:22.)

Revelation 20:11; The earth and the heaven fled away] This is truly the end of the earth and of the atmospheric heaven which surrounds it. This is the day when there shall be new earth—a celestial sphere— "For all old things shall pass away, and all things shall become new, even the heaven and the earth, and all the fulness thereof, both men and beasts, the fowls of the air, and the fishes of the sea; And not one hair, neither mote, shall be lost, for it is the workmanship of mine hand." (D&C 29:24-25.)

Revelation 20:12; 12. The dead, small and great, stand before God] Essentially this is the judgment of the wicked dead. True all men, both the righteous and the wicked, shall be present; all shall hear the decrees; "we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ," Paul says. "For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God." (Romans 14:10-12.)

Revelation 20:12; This is the day of which Jacob wrote: "And it shall come to pass that when all men shall have passed from this first death unto life, insomuch as they have become immortal, they must appear before the judgment-seat of the Holy One of Israel; and then cometh the judgment, and then must they be judge according to the holy judgment of God." (2 Nephi 9:15.)

Revelation 20:12; And it is the day of which the Lord himself says: "Before the earth shall pass away, Michael, mine archangel, shall sound his trump, and then shall all the dead awake, for their graves shall be opened, and they shall come forth—yea, even all. And the righteous shall be gathered on my right hand unto eternal life; and the wicked on my left hand will I be ashamed to own before the Father; Wherefore I will say unto them—Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." (D&C 29:26-28.)

Revelation 20:12; But, at this late date, the judgment of the righteous dead is in fact a thing of the past. It long antedates this formal occasion when all men shall stand before the judgment bar to hear confirmed what has already been established.

Revelation 20:12; The godfearing and the righteous from Adam to Christ were with our Lord in his resurrection; they came forth with him in the day he burst the bands of death; and they all then received their reward of eternal life. Of this group, speaking in about 148 B.C.—that is, "of those that have been, and who are, and who shall be, even until the resurrection of Christ"—Abinadi says: "All the prophets, and all those that have believed in their words, or all those that have kept the commandments of God" shall come forth with Christ. "These are they that have died before Christ came," he says. "They are raised to dwell with God who has redeemed them; thus they have eternal life through Christ, who has broken the bands of death." (Mosiah 15:21-25.) Numbered with this group, by way of illustration, are Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of whom the scripture saith: "They have entered into their exaltation, according to the promises, and sit upon thrones, and are not angels but are gods." (D&C 132:37.)

Revelation 20:12; When Christ comes again, hosts of others of high spiritual caliber shall come forth with celestial bodies to inherit eternal life. John has in fact just seen these faithful saints upon their "thrones" and described them as living and reigning "with Christ a thousand years." (Revelation 20:4.) And of course, during the millennium the righteous, having attained "the age of a tree, . . . shall be changed in the twinkling of an eye, and shall be caught up, and his rest shall be glorious" (D&C 101:30-31), whereas "the sinner being an hundred years old shall be accursed." (Isaiah 65:20.)

Revelation 20:12; Thus when the Great God sits upon the white throne, the righteous having been judged, having received eternal life, having entered into a glorious rest, having lived and reigned during the millennium, and having been judged by those appointed so to do—all these shall now stand before the bar of the Great Jehovah to have that judgment confirmed. But the wicked and ungodly shall then be judged according to the deeds done in the flesh; they shall be judged, not by the Lord's agents—not for instance by the Twelve who shall judge the faithful in the house of Israel, "and none else" (D&C 29:12)—but by the Lord Jesus Christ himself. He it is who shall assign them their places in the lesser mansions that are prepared. In the first resurrection there are many judges; in the second, one alone, him to whom the Father hath committed all judgment.

Revelation 20:12; Degrees of glory] See Commentary I, pp. 727-730; Commentary II, pp. 397-400.

Revelation 20:12; The books were opened] What books? The Standard Works of the Church, the holy scriptures wherein the law of the Lord is recorded and the instruction given as to how men should walk in this mortal probation; also, the records of the Church wherein are recorded the faith and good works of the saints—the records of their baptism, celestial marriage, tithe paying, missionary service, and their acts of devotion and worship.

Revelation 20:12; The book of life] What is it? Figuratively, it is our own life, and being, the record of our acts transcribed in our souls, an account of our obedience or disobedience written in our bodies. Literally, it is the record kept in heaven of the names and righteous deeds of the faithful. (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed., p. 97.)

Revelation 20:12; Judged out of . . . the books, according to their works] In presenting the doctrine of salvation for the dead, the Prophet Joseph Smith quoted Revelation 20:12, and then said: "You will discover in this quotation that the books were opened; and another book was opened, which was the book of life; but the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works; consequently, the books spoken of must be the books which contained the record of their works, and refer to the records which are kept on the earth. And the book which was the book of life is the record which is kept in heaven; the principle agreeing precisely with the doctrine which is commanded you in the revelation contained in the letter which I wrote to you previous to my leaving my place—that in all your recordings it may be recorded in heaven." Then he spoke of binding and sealing on earth and in heaven and explained: "Or, in other words, taking a different view of the translation, whatsoever you record on earth shall be recorded in heaven, and whatsoever you do not record on earth shall not be recorded in heaven; for out of the books shall your dead be judged, according to their own works." (D&C 128:7-8.)

Revelation 20:12; 13. There shall be an end to death and an end to hell. "Jesus Christ . . . hath abolished death" (2 Timothy 1:10); he gained the victory over the grave; and every living soul shall come forth in the resurrection. And when the wicked and ungodly come forth out of hell to be judged according to their works and receive their inheritance in a telestial kingdom, hell itself ends (D&C 76:81-106); it no longer exists; all of its captive spirits are freed from their prison. Thus Jacob says: "O how great the goodness of our God, who prepareth a way for our escape from the grasp of this awful monster; yea, that monster, death and hell, which I call the death of the body, and also the death of the spirit. And because of the way of deliverance of our God, the Holy One of Israel, this death, of which I have spoken, which is the temporal, shall deliver up its dead; which death is the grave. And this death of which I have spoken, which is the spiritual death, shall deliver up its dead; which spiritual death is hell; wherefore, death and hell must deliver up their dead, and hell must deliver up its captive spirits, and the grave must deliver up its captive bodies, and the bodies and the spirits of men will be restored one to the other; and it is by the power of the resurrection of the Holy One of Israel." (2 Nephi 9:10-12.)

Revelation 20:12; Paradise] See Commentary I, pp. 823-825.

Revelation 20:13; 13. "After death and hell have delivered up the bodies and captive spirits which were in them, then, as John foresaw, 'death and hell were cast into the lake of fire.' (Revelation 20:14.) This lake of fire, a figure symbolic of eternal anguish and wo, is also called hell, but is a hell reserved exclusively for the devil and his angels which includes the sons of perdition. (D&C 29:38; 88:113; 2 Peter 2:4.)

Revelation 20:13; "Thus, for those who are heirs of some salvation, which includes all except the sons of perdition (D&C 76:44), hell has an end, but for those who have wholly given themselves over to satanic purposes there is no redemption from the consuming fires and torment of conscience. They go on forever in the hell that is prepared for them." (Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed., p. 351.)

Revelation 20:13; Second death] See Revelation 21:8.

Revelation 20:15; 15. See Revelation 21:8.