Redimete Diem!

Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise,
making the most of the time, because the days are evil. (Eph. 5:15-16, ESV)

Notes Regarding the Characters in

Pilgrim's Progress

Lesson #28

Beulah - The word Beulah signifies married; and the prophet, in the passage whence it is quoted, predicted a very flourishing state of religion, which is yet in [the future]: but the author accommodates it to the sweet peace and confidence which tried believers commonly experience towards the close of their lives. This general rule admits indeed of exceptions: but the author, having witnessed many of these encouraging scenes, was willing to animate himself and his afflicted brethren with the hope of similar triumphant joys. ... It is remarkable that the Psalms (which were intended, among other uses, to regulate the devotions and experiences of believers) abound at first with confessions, complaints, fears, and earnest cries of distress or danger; but towards the close become more and more the language of confidence, gratitude and joy, and conclude with unmingled praises and thanksgivings. (Scott, p. 321)

In the immediate view of heavenly [bliss], Paul “desired to depart hence and be with Christ, as far better” than life; and David “fainted for God's salvation”. In the lively exercise of holy affections, the believer grows weary of this sinful world; and longs to have his faith changed for sight, his hope swallowed up in enjoyment, and his love perfected, and secured from all interruption and abatement. Were this frame of mind habitual, it might unfit men for the common concerns of life, which appear very trifling to the soul when employed in delightful admiring contemplation of heavenly glory. (Scott, p. 322)

The Two Men - Perhaps the author here alluded to those pre-intimations of death, that some persons seem to receive: and he appears to have ascribed them to the guardian angels, watching over every believer. Death, and admission into the City, were the only difficulties that awaited the Pilgrims. (Scott, p. 323)

Two men approach and tell them that they must still meet with two more difficulties. We learn that these difficulties are death without and unbelief within. The unbelief within is what makes death distressing to us. The Puritans had a lifelong concern about preparing for death and dying well. Bunyan wrote, “Consider thou must die but once; I mean as to this world, for if thou, when thou goest hence, dost not die well, thou canst not come back again and die better” (Offer, The Works of John Bunyan, 1:686). (Bradley, p. 102

Death - O children of God! death has lost its sting, because the devil’s power over it is destroyed. Then cease to fear dying. Thou knowest what death is: look him in the face, and tell him thou art not afraid of him. Ask grace from God, that by an intimate knowledge and firm belief of thy Master’s death, thou mayest be strengthened for that dread hour. And mark me, if thou so livest, thou mayest be able to think of death with pleasure, and to welcome it when it comes with intense delight. It is sweet to die; to lie upon the breast of Christ, and have one’s soul kissed out of one’s body by the lips of divine affection. (Spurgeon, 4:15)

Death is aptly represented by a deep river without a bridge, separating the believer from his heavenly inheritance: as Jordan flowed between Israel and the promised land. From this river, nature shrinks back, even when faith, hope, and love are in lively exercise; but when these decline, alarm and consternation may unite with reluctance at the thoughts of crossing it. The dreaded pangs that precede the awful separation of those intimate associates, the soul and body; the painful parting with dear friends and every earthly object; the gloomy ideas of the dark, cold, and noisome grave; and the solemn thought of launching into an unseen eternity, render Death the king of terrors. But faith in a crucified, buried, risen and ascended Saviour; experience of his faithfulness and love in times past; hope of an immediate entrance into his presence, where temptation, conflicts, sin and suffering will find no admission; and the desire of perfect knowledge, holiness and felicity, will reconcile the mind of the inevitable stroke, and sometimes give a complete victory over every fear. Yet if faith and hope be weakened, through the recollection of any peculiar misconduct, the withholding of divine light and consolation, or some violent assault of the tempter, even the believer will be peculiarly liable to alarm and distress. His reflecting mind, having been long accustomed to consider the subject in its important nature and consequences, has very different apprehensions of God, of eternity, of judgment, of sin, and of himself, than other men have. Sometimes experienced saints are more desponding in these circumstances than their junior brethren: constitution has considerable effect upon the mind; and some men (like Christian) are in every stage of their profession, more exposed to temptations of a discouraging nature, than to ambition, avarice, or fleshly lusts. It has before been suggested, that the author probably meant to describe the peculiarities of his own experience, in the character of Christian; and he may perhaps here have intimated his apprehension, lest he should not meet death with becoming fortitude. A conscientious life indeed is commonly favoured with a peaceful close, even when forebodings to the contrary have troubled men during their whole lives: and this is so far general, that they best provide for a comfortable death, who most diligently attend to the duties of their station, and the improvement of their talents, from evangelical principles; whereas they who live negligently, and yield to temptation, make, as it were, an assignation with terror to meet them on their death-bed, a season when comfort is more desirable than at any other. The Lord, however, is no man’s debtor: none can claim consolation as their due: and, though a believer’s experience and the testimony of this conscience may evidence the sincerity of his faith and love, yet he must disclaim to the last every other dependence than the righteousness and blood of Christ, and the free mercy of God in him. (Scott, pp. 325-6)

There are souls that welcome him [death], for he opens the prison door, out of which they are to pass into a world of light; out of a prison of flesh, sin, fear, doubt, and bondage, into a celestial freedom in the perfection of holiness; into love, praise, and blissful adoration, without any mixture of sin, any cloud or shadow of defilement, or any thing for ever and ever to mar or change the perfect peace and blessedness of the soul. To such souls, death is but the messenger, to take them before the throne of God in his likeness, to present them without spot, or wrinkle or any such thing. Death is Life to such; it is the being born out of a state of sinfulness, darkness, and wretchedness in fallen humanity, into a condition of purity, light, and happiness, in a city where the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. There is no future terror, of which Death is King, in such a case. Dying is but going home. (Cheever, pp. 462-63)

The temporary distresses of dying believers often arise from bodily disease, which interrupt the free exercise of their intellectual powers. Of this Satan will be sure to take advantage, as far as he is permitted; and will suggest gloomy imaginations, not only to distress them, but to dishearten others by their example. What may in this state be painted before the fancy we cannot tell: but it is generally observed, that such painful conflicts terminate in renewed hope and comfort, frequently by means of the conversation and prayers of Christians and ministers; so that they, who for a time have been most distressed, have at length died most triumphantly. (Scott, p, 327)

Bunyan, in describing the path from the river of death to the gate, has done “what no other devout writer ... has ever done; he has filled what perhaps in most minds is a mere blank, a vacancy or at most a bewilderment and mist of glory, with definite and beatific images, with natural thoughts, and with sympathizing communion of gentle spirits, who form, as it were, an outer porch and perspective of glory, through which the soul passes into uncreated light. Bunyan has thrown a bridge, as it were, for the imagination, over the imagination, over the deep, sudden, open space of an untried spiritual existence; where it finds, ready to receive the soul that leaves the body, ministering spirits, sent forth to minister unto them who are to be heirs of salvation” (Cheever, p. 456). (Bradley, p. 104)

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notes taken from:

Bunyan Characters in the Pilgrim's Progress, vol. 2 by Alexander Whyte, London:Oliphant Anderson and Ferrier, 1902.

Lectures on the Pilgrim’s progress, and on the Life and Times of John Bunyan by George Cheever, NY:Carter & Bros., 1875.

The New Park Street Pulpit, by Charles H. Spurgeon, 6 vols., Grand Rapids:Baker, 1990.

The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan with Explanatory Notes by Thomas Scott, Swengel, PA:Reiner Pub., 1976.

The Pilgrim’s Progress Study Guide by Maureen Bradley, Phillipsburg, NJ:P&R, 1994.

David G. Barker
david.barker@ncpres.org