And the goad kicking begins.
When in the face of overwhelming scriptural evidence,
the dishonest heart can only kick against the goads.
When in the face of overwhelming proof that overturns any pet belief,
the dishonest heart can only kick against the goads.
Atlantians,
You said: "You don't believe in Hell if you are an annihilationist."
I said: "That would be incorrect."
You said: "Then words don't have meaning."
Yes.
I now ask: Where in scripture does it say that "hell" means conscious torment for eternity?
The English word "hell" is the term we use in English speaking society to refer to the place where "ever
lasting" punishment and torment occurs.
We use the term for the place of ever-lasting punishment/torment/shame/contempt. The lake of fire.
You said: "Eternal punishment can't be eternal if it is ended with annihilation."
I asked: "Why not, if the punishment handed down is to be destroyed for eternity?"
You replied: "Because the resurrection wouldn't make sense."
I now ask: How so?
Awaking to... then being made non-existent is pointless.
Resurrection unto unmaking is redundant.
It is a pointless resurrection, a pointless judgement.
It is also not what scripture describes.
You further said: "And the word ‘punishment’ (kolasis) implies torment."
I say: It can, but doesn’t have to.
Wrong.
I said "the word
implies torment".
I didn't say it should have been translated that way.
The sense of the term is "punishment" in the 'sense' of torment.
The term implies a sort of continued dis-pleasurable experience.
Let me rephrase: The translation of 'kolasis' into 'punishment' is limited to the semantical domain of the English word 'punishment' wherein 'punishment' is referring to a type of continual unpleasant action. Like a beating, whipping, imprisonment, or the like.
Not a punishment 'sentencing' that could include a myriad of things.
The translation is limited to where 'punishment' means an unpleasant ongoing experience.
Strong’s gives two meanings:
punishment and torment.
Strong's concordance? Or Strong's dictionary?
I have both. A concordance only has a very simple and rudimentary definition.
I also have Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament words.
The New Strong's Complete Dictionary of Bible Words reads:
penal infliction-
unishment, torment.
Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament words reads:
Kolasis, 2 meanings: Chastisement, Punishment. Mathew 25:46;
painful disquietude, torment, 1 john 4:18
The root word 'kolazo' means to curtail, to coerce, to chastise, punish, Acts 4:21; 2 Peter 2:9.
The related word 'kolaphizo' means 'to beat with the fist, buffet, Mt. 26:67; Mk. 14:65; met. to maltreat, treat with excessive force, 1 Cor. 4:11; to punish, 1 pet. 2:20; to buffet, fret, afflict, 2 Cor. 12:7.
The overwhelming clarity of the picture is thus:
'Eternal punishment' means 'an ongoing and never ending experience of unpleasant and deserved affliction and maltreatment'.
Not "never ending non-existence" which is rather oxymoronic.
I checked 21 different versions/translations of Matthew 25:46, and each one translated the word as "punishment" and not "torment".
Duh. That is what the word means. You are not familiar with what I was talking about; instead you thought I was arguing for a mistranslation. Not at all.
You are reading into the term what the English term 'punishment' can mean, not what the Greek term means in the sense it was used with the surrounding context.
Webster’s New World Dictionary gives the following as a meaning of punishment: "a penalty imposed on an offender for a crime or wrongdoing". There is nothing in the meaning of the word that precludes a penalty of annihilation for eternity.
Now you are reading into the translation, part of the semantical domain of the English term.
What sloppy unscholarly eisegetical nonsense!
　
You said: "...shame and everlasting contempt (Dan: 12:2)...One has to be conscious to feel shame."
I said: "But the scripture doesn’t say how long the shame will be felt."
You said: "Yes it does. Dan 12:2 says it will be: Ever-lasting shame."
I now say: Daniel 12:2 doesn’t say that. It only says that the "contempt" for the person will be everlasting.
Wow. This is sad.
Daniel 12:2-3
"2 And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake,
some to everlasting life, and some
to shame and everlasting contempt. 3 And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever."
　
How can one have eternal contempt for something that no longer exists?
It says: many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth
shall awake, some
to everlasting life, and some
to shame and everlasting contempt.
So they are awaking to... non-existence?
No, they awake to shame and everlasting contempt.
You are grasping at straws so desperately you can't hold onto the clear words in front of your face.
The verse clearly says they awake to the judgement wherein they are sent ever-lastingly "to" shame and contempt. Or are shamed in everlasting contempt.
Regardless, the same conclusion is reached: It is
ever-lasting for that person.
You said: "... tormented day and night forever (Rev. 20:10), etc. depict a state of consciousness not a state of death. "
I said: "As I stated previously, there is not a single scripture - at least in the KJV - that says that anyone - with the possible exception of Satan- will spend eternity in conscious torment."
"10 and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur
where the beast and the false prophet were, and
they will be tormented day and night forever and ever."
Right off the bat you are wrong.
The verse says "they". The Devil, the False Prophet, and the Beast.
Next set of verses:
"Revelation of John 20-11 Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. From his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. 12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Then another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, according to what they had done. 13 And the sea gave up the dead who were in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them, and
they were judged, each one of them, according to what they had done. 14 Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. 15 And
if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
You said: "You are simply mistaken. And the KJV has nothing to do with it. Nothing in the KJV is so far different or mistranslated that the NASB, ESV, or NIV would read so differently as to present a different doctrine."
I now say: "The NASB, ESV, and NIV also add the beast and false prophet to the "forever and ever" torment, whereas the KJV doesn’t.
rstrats:
Ahem: (King James Version)
"Rev. 20:10 And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever."
Are you actually reading anything you are talking about?
Seriously.
But nowhere do any of these versions/translations assign eternal conscious torment to anyone else.
Really?
Rev. 20:
"10 and the devil who had deceived them was thrown
into the lake of fire and sulfur
where the beast and the false prophet were, and
they will be tormented day and night forever and ever."
"15 And
if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire."
I just don’t understand why you want to believe that the fate of the unsaved is to spend eternity in conscious torment when there is no clear scripture to support that belief.
Because the scripture clearly supports this belief.
I don’t understand why you try to read into scripture something that makes the loving supreme being of the Bible into a heartless monster.
The problem is not scripture. The problem is you are hiding the truth, even suppressing the truth, in unrighteousness.
You are blinded by your emotions and are kicking against the goad of God's Holy wrath.
Who are you to question Him, oh man?
The issue is not scripture.
It is what you don't want scripture to say, even though it does.
I simply do not understand what there is that makes them want to do that when there is no need to. Why do you want to believe that a loving supreme being will horribly torture a person for eternity because during their fleeting few years of life they didn’t satisfy certain requirements?
Emotional appeal.
I believe it because it is true, not because "I want to".
I believe a lot of things I don't want to.
Including the sad fact that people can deceive themselves intentionally, as you have.
I just don’t understand why you wouldn’t rather believe that a loving supreme being will wipe the person mercifully out of existence
Because its not true.
because for some reason they didn’t or couldn’t meet these requirements and didn’t develop or have the potential to develop the right character needed to spend eternity with this supreme being.
We
can't meet any 'requirements' of God. We are wholly wicked enemies of God deserving His wrath.
Salvation is by Grace Through Faith,
alone, not by works so no man may boast.
Not by 'meeting requirements'.
That is the point of the Gospel.
You promote a works-based salvation that defies the purpose of God in election. You are denying that very gospel.
No-one is suggesting that God is sentimental, simply that He is just, and infinite punishment for finite sins is not justice!
You are assuming the unbeliever does not continue to sin in hell.
You are also assuming that defying and hating a holy God, even for a moment, is not a sin of infinite weight.
Yet, we are far more than momentary sinners. We are eternal hateful enemies of God.
Guilty of Cosmic Treason; we Cosmic Traitors despise Him in our thoughts, words, and deeds daily in our depravity.
Yet Christ, while we were yet sinners, died for those unGodly ones whom He has called, and paid our sins in His body on that tree. Receiving in Himself the eternal weight of our wickedness. God shaming God; cloaking us in His righteousness.
Yes, he is holy, and sinners can't stand before Him.. that doesn't mean that he desires them to be tormented forever. If people choose to reject eternal life, then they cannot live for ever, tormented or otherwise.
The phrase "Eternal life" has little to do with being alive and everything to do with the sort of life you are experiencing for eternity.
It is an idiom for salvation from sins, eternity living in the purpose you as a human were originally made for, and the like.
