Christ Himself is and will be the King of the New Heavens and the New Earth, and neither Hell nor Hades will be a parallel kingdom that never ends just as every judgment in the Old Testament lasted only as much as was necessary for humility and repentance. Metropolitan Hilarion begins this chapter by investigating what “all in all” means in the Scriptures. Our experience of this earth is ruled by passions, various human rulers and tyrants, and the incessant demonic influences, all of which will not last in the Kingdom of God. Metropolitan Hilarion does not offer us a historical background of Origen’s apokatastasis and writings. He could have selected many passages from Ss. Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzen, or Isaac the Syrian that would sway in favor of a scripturally rooted and Orthodox understanding of apokatastasis (restoration, reversal), not an heretical or pagan, platonic one. Many Orthodox, as well as other Christian scholars recently have argued that no ecclesial authorities considered his theology heretical during his lifetime, neither Rufinus or Jerome, but certain characters who were jealousy of Origen. But the scriptures do contain the teaching of “the restoration of all things” (Acts 3) and it is a well-known patristic term. Among most of eastern fathers, death is the primary problem and enemy of humanity, the source of sins, fears, brutality, and corruption. For the East, the resurrection dissolves this death. Western theology has tended to emphasize sinfulness and sins as well as the crucifixion first. In 1 Corinthians 15-22-28, Paul writes with a “universal” theme in mind that would lean toward Origen’s apokatastasis, but the use of the phrasing of “final transfiguration” for each individual person is not found. Metropolitan Hilarion presents several key scriptural passages that seem to speak in favor of or against universal salvation. What may surprise many Christians is that these passages can be read as either condemning that teaching or supporting it, as many church fathers have done. It may be saying that only the “righteous” receive the “final victory” or it may be saying that the righteous conquer with Christ and even the wicked are put into submission and finally bow down to God. John the Apostle at Patmos writes in the Book of Revelation 21 that the righteous and the wicked will worship the Lamb; all humanity participates in worshiping Christ in His Glory. When all bow their knee before God, He doesn’t need reluctant worshippers. The Apostle Paul teaches that “when all things are subdued to him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.” No human person has a choice about worshipping Christ Jesus. In Revelation 21, John inserts a positive statement about the unrepentant “kings of the earth” that was probably borrowed from the Septuagint passages of Isaiah 60, Psalms 2 and 88. It says that “the nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. Its gates will never be shut by day – and there will be no night there.” Nothing “unclean” or sinful enters God’s kingdom is clear. These unrepentant and wicked people are also said to enter through the lake of fire and at the same they bring gifts and worship Christ, the Lamb. If Christ sanctified all outside the city on earth with his cross, likewise it would seem logical that his Light and Fire will cleanse all outside the heavenly city of Jerusalem. The Old Testament and the New Testament Scriptures together give us good reasons or foundations to interpret God the Father as giving sinners "corrective punishment or “chastisement” (kolasis) that would heal sinners in need of change; also, Metropolitan Hilarion has already mentioned in preceding chapters about how sin and corruption is “foreign” to the human body and soul, and that it requires precise healing. Apokatastasis can mean to restore from an illness. Gregory of Nyssa teaches that God will “become all, and instead of all, to us, distributing himself proportionately to every need of that existence.” Christ the Lamb is every blessing and good for creation. Nothing earthly will ever be able to become that source of life for us, not even the earthly sun and its light since God will be our Light. Isaac the Syrian teaches that God rewards our ascetical struggles by giving us different degrees of His Light when we enter His Kingdom without passing through any fiery trials. The idea of blessing is rooted in Old Testament prophecies where we find that God may bless all people. Orthodoxy does not teach that God changes in his love toward us, as Marcion taught in the early Church, a heresy condemned as Marcionism. God does not act kind in the New Testament to the nations, but He becomes angry in the Old Testament against the Gentiles and Hebrews. Like the Old Testament typology, in the future there will be people who were perfected in this life and enter the promise land, the imperfect who struggled to and hoped to find that promised life, and the wicked who are chastised by fire and their cities and idols are destroyed. It does not seem fitting to believe that God acts kind toward us now in this age, but He will become angry or loving people to the point of torture at the Last Judgment without a limit, since the Old Testament is filled with phrases and ideas that show exactly how God cannot bear to let “anger” and “judgment” last forever. Isaac the Syrian describes the new creation in his Ascetical Homily 58 as “the contemplation of divine beauty” by our noetic eyes. The powerful connection between seeing, loving, and salvation calls into question traditional understandings of free will. If all could see God’s beauty and love revealed, how could our nous depart from Him again to pick from the tree of good and evil? Just as a young couple are mutually enamored, just as if someone had a spiritually uplifting moment of clarity when they see an icon for the first time, so too God’s Divine Beauty may be overpowering to the viewer. That the Kingdom of Heaven will overcome all is our victory, and that all will worship the Holy Trinity in transfigured light is at least our eschatological hope.