Ok. I’m an 87 y/o newbie and not used to the hornet’s nest I stepped on. I’m gonna respond to you and a few others on some of the comments that jarred me a little. First, Jesus is both man and God simultaneously. He took on the problem of sin as a man by sacrificing Himself on a cross for all of us sinners. Those of us who truly believe that he is the Son of God and believe that he takes our personal sins upon Himself become sinless in the eyes of God and can thus “pass muster” at the judgement.
Second, I’m gonna take a mulligan on my comment that God banishes sinners away from his presence and love forever and they are doomed to ponder their life choices while separated from God and each other until the end of time. Someone commented that speculation was sick and vile. I’m reminded that somewhere in the Bible it says that that “the wages of Sin is Death” so let’s just leave it at that. If you die unrepentant and without Jesus to vouch for you, you are Dead, Kaput and without hope.
Notice we don’t agree with each other any more than we agree with you. …just a lot of different ideas by different people who have thought about this stuff a lot. …and yeah it is a sore point for many.
Yep. 100% man 100% God. Part of the Nicea 325 AD definition of Christianity.
Over and over again, Jesus said, “Your sins are forgiven, so go and sin no more.” Jesus did not say “I am going to do a human sacrifice of myself and magically get you an indulgence for all your sins.”
Likewise brave soldiers fought died for the freedoms of our country. This doesn’t mean human sacrifice black magic any more than the Bible means any such thing when it says Jesus died for our sins.
Those who believe Jesus is the Son of God believe Jesus is the Son of God. And those who believe in black magic and human sacrifice believe in black magic and human sacrifice. No. Disagreeing with you on one of your beliefs does not mean they do not believe something else that you may believe. It does not logically follow. Frankly, I think those who truly believe in God will trust in the wisdom and knowledge of God rather than in their own supposed “knowledge” or in the dogma of their religion.
But what does that mean? I certainly don’t think it means that if babies die, it is because they sinned in their cribs. I think it is referring to the death of the spirit and all that stuff about hell follows from this. But then doesn’t “wages of sin” means that sin is what does this to people rather than God? And since sin is something WE do, then doesn’t it follow that hell is something we do to ourselves?
I think it is pretty clear that repentance is what Jesus was looking for in people.
Our hope is that everyone will repent (when their time comes for this), turn to Christ, and be saved. I think God wants this to be the case, as that is why His only begotten Son came amongst us.
I am also aware that each one of us may decide not to repent, So the Gospel warns us against such a perverse outlook, because we would be cut of from God if we rejected God’s Grace.
It is because of this possibility that we are told to repent and have faith in God, as our many faults may overcome us. Hell is indeed the ultimate end of our sins and perverse choices, and God wants us to avoid this.
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Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
231
The tiny, frail, broken, helpless, afflicted, confused, ignorant, hopeless, graceless, terrified, twisted little creatures that we all are and become more so in some of those regards at least if we live long enough just have to wake up in glory. Jesus saves.
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Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
232
Ah go on Chuck. I’m a mere boy 20 years your junior. Jesus vouches for everyone. That’s His day job. I’d bung you a like but you’d think I agree : )
One view of Hell that may make sense to you is that it is a self-induced state of being where our unhealthy attachments prevent us from seeing God in his full glory, which is ever present and open to all those who want it. This has been a tradition in The Eastern Church for a very long time, which itself subscribes to no one doctrine on this subject, but it has also been formulated by great Western thinkers such as George MacDonald and C. S. Lewis; something interesting to note is that Lewis, much like Saint Gregory of Nyssa, saw it possible that the dead can open the gates of Hell from the inside, which have already been penetrated by Christ, if they so choose to let Him in.
Although nothing said here will actually change post-death reality, I see no harm in expressing an opinion or wish on the topic.
In my opinion, there is only heaven after death. It’ll only be hell for those who don’t want to be there or are unable or unwilling to regret and express remorse.
In my view: post-death existence will provide:
a place and opportunity for joy. gratitude, and service’
a place and opportunity for undergoing repair; and
a recycle bin.
One of the motivating “arguments” for revision of one’s eschatology is a conviction that God is or can go anywhere, including “Hell”.
A second motivating “argument” for revision is the conviction that, when all is said and done, God wins. If that’s your conviction, as it is mine, does an eternal existence of evil beings–human and demonic–make sense? Not to me, it doesn’t.
The words of Jesus are the lens through which I read scripture and this is where we find eternal torment. I have not seen good reason to be dismissive of what Jesus says about this. But I don’t agree with calling this disagreement heresy. Eternal conscious torment is not in the creed of Nicea 325 AD, and you find other options in the thinking of the church fathers.
As a punishment I quite agree. The only rational meaning I see in punishment is for behavior modification and thus if it lasts forever then it is a complete failure. However as natural logical consequences of our choices is completely different matter. Life is full of very harsh permanent consequences. Step off a tall building and there is no taking that back – the consequences are extreme and permanent. Therefore natural logical consequences which are harsh and permanent is what life teaches us about reality and pretending otherwise is to indulge in delusion and fantasy.
It is a wise observation of many atheists that we are all mostly atheist, for the number of gods and religious teachings we don’t believe in greatly outnumber the number we do believe in. So there are many versions of God I would never believe in, including many to be found with the Christians spectrum of belief. Likewise there are many version of hell I would never believe in either. Though most of the things which bother me and have rejected are other things than the three words you have focused on, “eternal conscious torment.” But let’s take a look at these words… and their combination…
eternal - This is a word which Jesus has used Himself (…or Aramaic equivalent to the Greek used by the gospel writers). The alternative to something being eternal is that nothing we do has any consequences which cannot be escaped. This sounds like something itching ears would seek to hear – wishful thinking. And it doesn’t agree with what I see of people and life. Sin is addictive and escaping it seems to be exception rather than the rule, for which the word miracle is apt.
conscious - This is not a word which Jesus has used, but it does fit what He describes in parables He tells.
torment - Various words are used including κόλασιν (translated as punishment or torment), weeping and gnashing of teeth, fire, darkness, and others.
eternal torment - its in the words of Jesus, Matthew 25:46
conscious torment - the parable where Jesus describes a conscious experience (Luke 16) is definitely about the torment which a person experiences. Its not proof but very suggestive.
eternal conscious - the same parable is about not being able to escape, but since sin does seem to diminish consciousness perhaps conscious torment does not remain undiminished forever.
I would rate the possibilities as follows (percent of how much I can support)
Eternal diminishing conscious torment as something we do to ourselves 100%
Diminishing conscious torment which eventually results in nonexistence. 90%
Eternal conscious torment as something we do to ourselves 90%
Universalism - God will somehow manage to get through to everyone 80%
Atheism and no existence after death and thus no torment at all 70%
Eternal conscious torment as something God does to people 20%
annihilationism - God destroys the souls/spirits of some people 0%
Atheism is an option for me and I would go for that rather than the last two. I will never believe in a torturer God, but my difficulties with annihilationism are even more profound – yanking the rug out from the reasons I believe in any of this religious stuff. Even supposing there is a torturer God, the creature would not have my support but only my condemnation. I would rather be the victim of such a devil-god than be one of its craven servants. But annihilationism? If we could escape it all by simply ceasing to exist then atheism is by far the more rational way of doing that. It just seems a bit too easy for me. That is the basis for believing in any of this religious stuff - thinking that we cannot escape from ourselves and the choices we made. Why the heck would we need to invent a magic man in the sky to make it all go away? That is just way too twisted for me.
And Matthew 10:28? I don’t think that is talking about God as some soul destroying monster. The one to fear most is not God. God is not our greatest threat and enemy. We are our greatest enemy. We are the one who can destroy our own spirit in hell. The proper fear of God is not because He is like some gunman criminal threating us with a big gun using fear to make us do what He wants as if cowardice were some kind of virtue – that sounds more like the devil to me.
Have you been able to check out the podcast hosted by Chris Date titled “Rethinking Hell?” I still think it’s the best podcast on this subject since it has around 400+ hours of discussions and debates solely on this topic. They also still have a fairly active Facebook group.
I’m in the same boat. I see absolutely no reason to believe in eternal conscious torment. The only two beliefs that make any since and that seems to be able to be supported by scripture is annhilationism and universalism. I lean mostly towards conditional immortality since it says “ be afraid of he ( god ) who can destroy both body and soul in hell ) and how we all face two outcomes. Eternal life or eternal punishment and how hell is the lake of fire which is the second death, implying dying a second time. Death is natural. We all die once. Through the grace of God through Jesus Christ some of us or all of us will receive eternal life. I lean towards some of us and not everyone. So I think some simply don’t receive eternal life and so once they die a second time, they are dead forever with no hope of resurrection.
But in the same way that the symbolic verses of places like worm that never dies, or endless smoke and revelation hellfire scenes can be interpreted through the Old Testament showing how it’s just hyperbolic war speech, perhaps that symbolism is carried over even more strongly to everyone being refined and remade in Christ just like all of creation.
But after listening to hundreds of hours of podcasts, and reading several books including a handful by universalist, the one that is most convincing to me is annhilationism. But I’ll continue to study universalism and annhilationism nonetheless.
Heck, the doctrine of the Trinity was born in the Old Testament – and rabbis recognized that. Second Temple Judaism understood that there were “two powers in heaven”, a Yahweh who was always in Heaven, remote, and a Yahweh Who at times can be found on Earth in the form of a man. They made this distinction because there are passages where both are in action at the same time in the same passage, also because the “Angel of Yahweh” is called “Elohim”, “God”, and in other places is identified as being Yahweh, and most of the time the Angel of Yahweh is depicted as in human form.
This was really not radical at all. What goes a little farther is that some rabbis noticed that there are similar instances where “the Spirit of Yahweh” is mentioned, so the conclusion would be the same; this never developed into a “Three Powers” doctrine because of two things: first, the Christians changed the playing field because Jesus as Yahweh made a lot of sense given the Yahweh Who walked on Earth in human form; second, the Temple was destroyed and Jews were banned from living in Jerusalem. Yes, Alexandria was still there as a focus of Jewish life, but the shock of losing the Temple and the holy city shook everything up, plus a lot of Alexandrian Jews apparently turned Christian.
So when Gentile Christians started applying Greek philosophy to the Gospel and thus coming up with heresy after heresy, the Jewish backbone of the church already grasped that Yahweh was triune, a view that had spread to educated Christians fairly quickly – and thus long before any councils spoke on the matter, Christianity was trinitarian.
Yeah, but that’s just icing on the cake!
The main difference is that “hell” as defined in an English dictionary is actually not in the scriptures and was not mentioned by Jesus. Our understanding of Hell is an inheritance from Greek mythology and a few other pagan encrustations that culminated in Dante’s Divine Comedy and woodcuts of Satan as a red-garbed figure – a depiction that derives from northern European sources – torturing sinners. Jesus’ imagery of gehenna doesn’t fit our view of Hell, nor does the image of hades as also used in the New Testament.
It boils down to this: our understanding of the Trinity is easier to find in the scriptures than is our understanding of Hell because the former can be traced to the Old Testament but the latter has aspects imported from exterior sources.
Expecting that misunderstands the scriptures, since they don’t major in propositional truth statements; many things are left to be deduced. Jesus never declared Himself God in a propositional statement, but He went around saying it indirectly and acting like that’s Who He thought He was!
Though I don’t see those facts as necessarily pointing towards the trinity, I do agree that it does showcase god manifesting himself separately on earth. A sort of incarnation or manifestation factor.
That depends on the variety of annihilationism; some hold that torment lasts long enough to match the sins of the person, and then the torment ends because the person does.
It is a really great video, enough so I’m including it for anyone who might want to check it out but hasn’t yet.
I have to agree with that – double predestination doesn’t seem to fit with universalism!
= - = + = - = † = - = + = - =
But our very existence is something God has provided for us – so this would turn out to ba an argument for annihilationism.
= - = + = - = † = - = + = - =
Link doesn’t seem to work any longer.
Heh – I ran into this:
“If I were Creator of the world. . . .”
and answered it automatically before seeing the warning not to. I finished it with, “We would be so screwed”.
More seriously, I think the article fails to grapple with the arguments that Parry made in the earlier video as well as with the exegetical issue with Greek “ainios”.
This comes up against the matter of Greek αἰώνιον (eye-OWN-ee-own), which means “agewise”. I haven’t looked into it but I suspect we are suffering from the same problem Augustine tripped over with his original sin goof: bad translation into Latin, and from there propagated forward.
So this should read “age-wise destruction”, and the question then becomes what would terminate this particular sort of age? Some annihilationists would say that the age ends once the torment has matched an individual’s sins (unsatisfying since in John Jesus says that judgment now is on the basis of a person’s attitude to the light); some universalists would say the same thing while others would say that torment lasts until the person finally surrenders to Christ.
Given how stubborn some people can be, the millions of years of torment posited by some Roman Catholics of Purgatory seem reasonable – and indeed that would make Purgatory a better name than “hell”.
The universalists I described above have no problem with that, they just hold that some people need a bit longer to get there.
That only excludes the sort of universalism that holds that people are saved “by default”, which rules out the need for surrendering to Christ. One might wonder if uninterrupted torment would bring people to Christ, but if the point is surrender I suppose it might.
= - = + = - = † = - = + = - =
So true!
Though that reminds me of an argument for universalism that I overheard about three years back: that victims should never be punished no matter what their victimization drove them to. I thought of a variety of responses but kept my mouth shut.
I’ve worked with enough criminals to know that there are many who straddle the line and many who cross back and forth. The stark schism Ani posits is not viable.
Almost certainly.
Amen!
To the contrary, we are to forgive in the same way as we hope to be forgiven: completely.
That leaves the matter in God’s hands.
I don’t think anyone is denying there are such people, only that there is a stark and uncrossable dividing line.