Yep, this conversation is over. It’s unclear if you’re simply being dishonest or content on ignoring everything other’s say. You claim the soul is eternal, I respond by showing Matthew 10:28 says that the soul is destroyed in hell, and your response is … that the soul is eternal. What a painful discussion this has been.
1 Like
Rude again. Thats not a behaviour of a christian. I answered you theres an eternal death.Hense the verse you posted is speaking of an eternal death in hell.
Nope. Nothing in the English language or the Bible supports any such thing. Nobody says “eternal punishment” when they mean annihilation or oblivion. And everything else Jesus says supports a miserable eternal existence rather than spiritual euthanasia.
With that said, however, I certainly do believe that the death and self-destruction we get from sin does imply diminishing awareness. So even if what Jesus says clearly states an eternal misery, I think the idea that this represents an effective eventual end to the existence of everything we think of as life and existence as a person is reasonable. In other words, there can be a great deal of truth to both descriptions. But the point here is that this is no escape but only the inevitable logical consequences of the self-destructive nature of sin.
LOL. So I explain to you how you completely misread that verse, and your response is just … “Nope”? Let’s try again:
…
The “eternal punishment” in Matthew 25:46 is getting annihilated. This is obvious if you just read past the first half of the verse, because “eternal punishment” is contrasted with “eternal life”. The opposite of permanent life is not living permanently in torment, it’s permanent death. Paul outright says that eternal annihilation is what the eternal punishment is.
2 Thessalonians 1:9: They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might
…
Hopefully that will help. Notice how being “destroyed” is a one time, eternal thing. There is no miserable existence in the afterlife, because Matthew 10:28 says that the souls and bodies of the wicked are destroyed. That means they cease to exist. In John 3:16, Jesus just says they “Perish”.
Whatever you say.
All you have to do is ponder on eternity and how it changes everything.
Life is never equated with mere existence in the Bible.
Jesus said in Luke 9:60 “Let the dead bury their own dead.” showing that just because people are walking around existing doesn’t mean they are really alive.
It is wrong to equate “eternal life” with eternal existence, and that is what you are doing in order to make the contrast absurdly transform the words “eternal punishment” into annihilation and oblivion, as the Jehovah Witnesses do.
When Jesus speaks of bringing more abundant life, He is not talking about an extension to the length of ones existence. It is about having that which makes existence worthwhile. Life is growth, learning, and new experiences. Why in the world would anyone even want just more time for more of the same old, same old. In almost every exploration of long life we see in tv shows and films, the person is looking for a way to die. Simply existing longer is not a good thing.
I certainly hope it will help you. Everlasting destruction is a destruction that goes on forever. That fits my description better than yours. So your rewrite is an alteration of what Paul said rather than faithful to Paul’s words.
And no, destruction is not always a one time time thing, but something which can last a long time even forever and thus Matthew 10:28 and John 3:16 cannot change the fact that Jesus says this goes on forever – not only by calling it “eternal punishment” in Matthew 25, but in a direct portrayal in the story of Lazarus and the rich man in Luke 16. The rich man he says is in agony after death and can get no relief, and that is in fact the whole point of the story that there is no end or way out of this predicament.
Like I said, the best that you can do is suggest as I have that in the process of destruction there is a diminishing awareness and so it is very much like an end to anything they would consider real existence. But the words of Jesus strongly suggest that something does remain forever in death and torment.
If you would like a physics example, there is the example of something going into a black hole which because of time dilation is a destruction which lasts forever. On the other hand, from the point of view of the one going into the black hole, it all happens very fast. So you can say, it is all a matter of POV. And it is my suggestion that hell is the same, and that there is some truth to both descriptions. With diminishing awareness, the one in hell may not experience as much as we may assume, and yet we who watch can see it going on forever.
Huh? Say what? Really? Life is being alive. Having eternal life, or being alive forever, is what “eternal punishment” is being contrasted with. That is simply what the words are saying. The idea that they mean something else is later doctrine.
Jesus said in Luke 9:60 “Let the dead bury their own dead.” showing that just because people are walking around existing doesn’t mean they are really alive.
???
Umm, dude, Jesus is referring to an absurdity. He’s telling his disciples that they can’t wait to bury their own dead before they follow Jesus, they must do so immediately, even if that means their dead will remain unburied.
Everlasting destruction is a destruction that goes on forever.
Everlasting destruction means you are destroyed forever.
And no, destruction is not always a one time time thing, but something which can last a long time even forever and thus Matthew 10:28 and John 3:16 cannot change the fact that Jesus says this goes on forever
Both of these texts outright say the wicked are annihilated. John says they simply “perish”. Matthew says that body and soul are destroyed. You still fail to realize that equating perishing, or ceasing to be, with eternal torment, is a later cultural conception. It can’t be found in the Bible. You continue projecting later definitions of clear annihilation terminology onto the Bible.
1 Like
Nice! I’m normally the only one in circles that believe that scripture shows that we are destroyed, both body and soul, in hell. While those who are saved are given eternal life.
1 Like
Love requires acceptance of the other person’s choices rather than forcing your own choices upon them. So as unhappy as it is to watch them make a misery of their existence you have to accept that – neither to force them to do as you would nor euthanizing them just to make yourself feel better.
But I suppose there will always be those who will use kidnapping and starvation to force people to change their religion or even to lobotomize them as better than the choices they think are wrong. Such is the distorted idea that some people have of what love is.
Can we all at least agree that when it comes to Hell in the NT there isn’t all that much that is ‘pretty clear’ other than the fact that the writers don’t want us to go there?
As far as I am concerned, the imagery and language is ambiguous: it could refer to a place absent of God’s presence and love forever; it could refer to eternal conscious torment; it could refer to total annihilation. I’ve no problem where a Christian lands on the issue so long as they have thought through all the implications of their position.
Personally, I have sympathies for annihilation theory, but at present remain unconvinced. Though, come the New Creation, should I be surprised to find that I was wrong about hell, well, I’m cool with that too.
5 Likes
They’re figurative because that’s what they are. They are not literal one way or the other. For a start, how would Jesus have known? They are applied historically under the majority assumption of the immortal soul. Divested of that they easily support the minority view of annihilation.
Both are wrong of course. A false dichotomy.
As for eternity, it changes everything. It takes a while for head space to allow for cognitive dissonance, but it’ll do it.
Edward Fudge has some great books and videos on this subject for anyone interested. The rethinking hell podcast does as well. Though they do tend to be more geared towards a YEC mindset they are great at this particular subject of hell.
2 Likes
NT writers? Maybe. Jesus? No. I am one of these people who believe Jesus actually existed and that He really said those things quoted in the gospels.
I don’t find Jesus’ words to be all that ambiguous. But that does not mean they are not metaphorical or that they should be taken strictly literal. He portrays the negative consequences which we refer to as hell quite clearly as eternal conscious torment not annihilation, and the closest we can get to annihilation is diminishing awareness.
I certainly believe that we get from God that which makes continued existence worthwhile. That is certainly part of the problem with hell, but no I do not think that is all of it, for the simple fact that this is not the hell I see in the world. People are not universally tormented by an absence of God in their life. At most I see a consensus that eternal existence is likely to be more of burden and torment than a good thing and that is where I see an absence of God playing a role eventually. But everything I read in the Bible and in the world points to a much more direct consequence of sin – that this is bad and hellish all by itself and not just because God won’t like you because of it. In fact, I don’t even buy into that theological rhetoric. This “Ew sinners” attitude of the Pharisees was precisely where Jesus differed from them. So it is not just an absence of God we have to fear.
But the biggest problem I have with annihilationism is that this is a completely empty threat to me. I do not believe in all this religious stuff because I am afraid of nonexistence. That accusation by atheists is total baloney in my case! Quite the contrary, oblivion sound WONDERFUL! For me, being able to simply escape in this way just sounds too good to be true. The only way any of this Bible, God, and religious stuff makes any sense to me whatsoever is if we accept the simple truth that we can NEVER escape from who we are. Everything rests on that fundamental premise.
I don’t think universalism is correct, but I think that is more supportable and sensible than annihilationsism.
Incorrect. The only thing I continue to do is read what Jesus said in the Bible rather than pretending that He didn’t or coming up with made up nonsense that this was somehow added to the Bible and that Jesus didn’t really say “eternal punishment” or ignore this story Jesus told of the rich man suffering conscious torment after death.
3 Likes
What do you do with “hell being destroyed in the lake of fire”? (Revelation 20:14)
Hell is destroyed . The eternal death remains
Actually it’s hades destroyed in the lake of fire. It’s hades destroyed in hell. The grave is destroyed, not hell.
2 Likes
What translation are you using? My Bible reads as follows…
14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire; 15 and if any one’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
I cannot find what you quote anywhere, not even in the Jehovah Witness Bible. Every single translation says “thrown” or “cast” into the lake of fire. The word “destroyed” is not in any of them. Gosh adding to this book is specifically warned against with quite dire consequences.
Yeah but even if the word “destroyed” were in verse 14, it would not make the case for annihilationism. This demonstrates how far on a limb people go for this. Sweet sweet sweet oblivion. Too sweet.
1 Like
What i mean by hell is destroyed is that hell is basically not existance for us believers.
https://biblehub.com/greek/86.htm
That’s hades.
https://biblehub.com/greek/1067.htm
That’s hell.
Hades and hell are not the same place according to scripture.
This is a fun subject to discuss. Over the next few weeks I definitely want to share why I believe it’s crystal clear that the word of god teaches that in hell the unbeliever is destroyed in both body and soul.
Even the harder and symbolic language of revelation about eternal torment can be traced back through biblical patterns and metaphors to show it means destruction.
1 Like
Ah… found the quote finally. It’s from the Watchtower magazine.
1 Like