bcbsr

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I think justice, true justice is simply just. Every crime is punished according to the severity/duration of my crime. But for all eternity being punished?
I'm sure God has a plan. One not written in the bible or any human book.
I believe hell is real, but the term eternity is smthg we humans cannot grasp.
It.might be such a long time that it seems forever.
But i'm pretty sure after many eternities in hell, their inhabitants will one by one repent u until the last one (satan) is saved.
Just me...
If a crime is committed, repentance doesn't satisfy the demands of justice. If you murder someone and later apologize for it, just justice say, "Oh, that's OK you can go now". No. And as for grace, it's the nature of the gospel that one has only this life to believe and be saved. Repentance unto life is only available now.

Now as for the eternal nature of hell, true it could be argued that a person's temporal sins in the present may not deserve eternal punishment to satisfy justice. But consider even our own prison system. If a person commits a crime in prison, doesn't that add on to their sentence? So if a person is in hell, does that stop him from sinning? Are the people in hell sinlessly perfect? Can't imagine so. Does torment make people into better people. Contrary to even the Catholic pugatorial idea, it doesn't.

Rev 16:9-11 They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom was plunged into darkness. Men gnawed their tongues in agony and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done.

Consequently in hell people are still going to sin and add to their sentence, which is an unending cycle.
 
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YahEli

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2 Peter 2:17
"...to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever."

/darkness/ referring to the lake of fire
The OT tells about the wicked -as to shall never see light.
Why reserve a location for that long if the people get to leave -before for ever?
I agree with everything you quoted, but still it is my belief that it is a kind of a boogyman.
Difference it is real compared to a boogyman but not unlimited in time as we suppose.
"forever" is a term NOT for human comprehension because nobody lives more than 120years.
A 5000 year old tree would seem like forever to us.
This boogyman serves to scare people. So that if they do not adore and serve God out of free choice and love, they would at least have the Fear of God.
"For the beginning of wisdom is the Fear of
God"
 
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YahEli

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If a crime is committed, repentance doesn't satisfy the demands of justice. If you murder someone and later apologize for it, just justice say, "Oh, that's OK you can go now". No. And as for grace, it's the nature of the gospel that one has only this life to believe and be saved. Repentance unto life is only available now.

Now as for the eternal nature of hell, true it could be argued that a person's temporal sins in the present may not deserve eternal punishment to satisfy justice. But consider even our own prison system. If a person commits a crime in prison, doesn't that add on to their sentence? So if a person is in hell, does that stop him from sinning? Are the people in hell sinlessly perfect? Can't imagine so. Does torment make people into better people. Contrary to even the Catholic pugatorial idea, it doesn't.

Rev 16:9-11 They were seared by the intense heat and they cursed the name of God, who had control over these plagues, but they refused to repent and glorify him. The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom was plunged into darkness. Men gnawed their tongues in agony and cursed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, but they refused to repent of what they had done.

Consequently in hell people are still going to sin and add to their sentence, which is an unending cycle.
Yes ur right usually they will blaspheme more and more if they are punished.
But that happens on relatively "shorter eternal time". Equivalent to the first few thousand years in hell. Yes they will curse more and more.
The.book of enoch which i love states that the imprisonnement in hell is for 10000 years.
I've been only 1year and half in prison (drug law very severe in my country}), and believe me if there was a new term that represents something mooore than eternity, i would have chosen it to describe how how i felt it.
What about those who have 10 or 20 years?
Human life sentense? Would he feel it like eternity? Its his whoooole ****** life.
What about 10 000 years... How would they feel like.
Also another book which i respect a lot "talking with angels, Gitta Mallasz" also states that at some point even satan will be delivered. To believe or not is not the point. Just having phylosophical thoughts
 
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~Anastasia~

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The sufferings of those who hate God will last forever. But not because God wants to punish them or because He hates them. God is love.

The problem is that they hate God. Their torments are caused by who they have become and because they set themselves against love.

Humans are not disposable. We were created in the image of God, so we have firstly the dignity of free choice (to love God or to hate Him) and we have a spirit that will continue to exist from the point of our creation. God will not wipe us out. And He will not force us to love Him. What we do with those truths can indeed torment us, but the hell some experience will be by their own choice and of their own making, in a sense. There will be no basis for blaming God.
 
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fhansen

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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?
The church has historically taught that it's up to us. Existence, itself, is an absolute good. So, in regard to that we have no right to reject it. But will we exist in a happy state of being if we choose to refuse love, to reject goodness, to oppose God?
 
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Der Alte

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Luk 1:50
And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.
Heb 10:28
He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
Heb 6:2
Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment
Heb 10:29 refers to a punishment worse than "death without mercy."
Hebrews 10:26-29
(26) For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,
(27) But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.
(28) He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
(29) Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?
 
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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?

Is Hell about being merciful? No, it's about justice and punishment, not mercy. God holds out mercy, grace and love to all until death. But when His mercy is spurned and His undeserved love and grace despised, there remains only wrath, and judgment, and punishment.

Why is hell eternal? In part, because our sin is always committed against an infinite Being, the Source of All Things, who is God. Our sin, too, is far more dire, far more evil, than we often realize it is. We are so comfortable with sin: It is our daily companion; it is practiced and celebrated all around us in the culture; it seems to us to be right and wise, even, at times. Why, then, we wonder, does God get so bent out of shape about it? Why does He bring such terrible, eternal wrath to bear upon our sin? The problem, of course, isn't that God is too strong in His hatred and punishment of sin, but that we are far, far, far too weak in our hatred of it. We catch a glimpse, though, of just how truly vile, how deeply wicked, our sin is by the great and awful punishment God enacts upon it. If our sin warrants the horrendous punishment of hell, it must be unspeakably atrocious! I think, though, that very few can admit this. Better to think God has slipped up, that He has failed to be as merciful as He should be, or that hell doesn't even really exist, than to turn and see our sin for the incredible evil that it truly is.
 
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SkyWriting

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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?

They only suffer to the extent that they torment themselves.
There is no punishment other than the opportunity lost to be with their Creator.
And God exists outside of time, so there is no time spent there.
 
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hedrick

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Read the last few verses in Isaiah 66. The scene is on the new earth.
Read also Daniel 12:2.
The just will have to look upon the wicked that their worm/gnawing, eating, torment, soul, conscience -or such never dies.
In Is 66 they are eating the dead bodies. There's no suggestion of living people being tormented. Daniel talks about shame and contempt but not torture.

There are many ideas about what happens. There's at least some evidence for both annihilation and universalism. However everyone agrees that there will be judgement, and we'll all have to confront what we did. Those who didn't live well will surely feel shame and contempt, whether they end up in hell or are ultimately forgiven.
 
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martymonster

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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?

The short answer is, he didn't. He has a plan, and everything is going along exactly as it should.
 
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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?

Let's start with what the Bible says about hell...

We have one word in English: hell. There are actually four words used in Hebrew and Koine Greek, and it is good that we start from the start, and that is to know what scripture is saying with a little more dimension than the language we speak affords.

Gehenna: English "Gehenna" represents the Greek Geenna (Γέεννα) found in the New Testament, a phonetic transcription of Aramaic Gēhannā (ܓܝܗܢܐ),[4] equivalent to the Hebrew Ge Hinnom, literally "Valley of Hinnom".

Sheol: Hebrew. A place of darkness to which all the dead go, both the righteous and the unrighteous, regardless of the moral choices made in life, a place of stillness and darkness cut off from life and from God. Also known as the pit, or grave.

Hades: Koine Greek. The place (state) of departed souls:—grave, hell. The imagery understood by 1st century readers would have been colored with the pagan understanding of the realm of the underworld as it was known in both Greek and Roman mythology.

Tartarus: The deep abyss that is used as a dungeon of torment and suffering for the wicked and as the prison for the Titans. As was the case with hades, tartarus was a familiar pagan concept as depicted in Greek and Roman mythology, and the use of it in the New Testament (only once in 2 Peter 2:4) was to use a then modern word, to describe an ancient Hebrew concept.

In fact, if you memorize the meanings of these words, it is very easy to detect which one is used in the original language, even though in English only "hell" is available to be read.

So with that understanding in your grasp... now you can proceed to understand what the Bible says about hell!
 
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Der Alte

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]Have you noticed that "hell," both the word and the concept, come from pagan sources? One clue is the Norse goddess "Hel" and her realm of "Helheim" or "House of Hel."
Nonsense!
…..According to three irrefutable Jewish sources; the Jewish Encyclopedia, Encyclopedia Judaica and the Talmud, quoted below, among the Jews in Israel before and during the time of Jesus there was a belief in a place of everlasting torment of the wicked and they called it both sheol and gehinnom.
…..Disclaimer: There were different groups within Judaism; Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes etc. and there were different beliefs about resurrection, hell etc. That there were other beliefs does not rebut, refute, change or disprove anything in this post.
Jewish Encyclopedia, Gehenna
The place where children were sacrificed to the god Moloch … in the "valley of the son of Hinnom," to the south of Jerusalem (Josh. xv. 8, passim; II Kings xxiii. 10; Jer. ii. 23; vii. 31-32; xix. 6, 13-14). … the valley was deemed to be accursed, and "Gehenna" therefore soon became a figurative equivalent for "hell." Hell, like paradise, was created by God (Sotah 22a);
[Note, this is according to the ancient Jews, long before the Christian era, NOT any supposed bias of Christian translators. DA]

(I)n general …sinners go to hell immediately after their death. The famous teacher Johanan b. Zakkai wept before his death because he did not know whether he would go to paradise or to hell (Ber. 28b). The pious go to paradise, and sinners to hell(B.M. 83b).
But as regards the heretics, etc., and Jeroboam, Nebat's son, hell shall pass away, but they shall not pass away" (R. H. 17a; comp. Shab. 33b). All that descend into Gehenna shall come up again, with the exception of three classes of men: those who have committed adultery, or shamed their neighbors, or vilified them (B. M. 58b).[/i]
… heretics and the Roman oppressors go to Gehenna, and the same fate awaits the Persians, the oppressors of the Babylonian Jews (Ber. 8b). When Nebuchadnezzar descended into hell, [ שׁאול /Sheol]] all its inhabitants were afraid that he was coming to rule over them (Shab. 149a; comp. Isa. xiv. 9-10). The Book of Enoch [x. 6, xci. 9, etal] also says that it is chiefly the heathen who are to be cast into the fiery pool on the Day of Judgment (x. 6, xci. 9, et al). "The Lord, the Almighty, will punish them on the Day of Judgment by putting fire and worms into their flesh, so that they cry out with pain unto all eternity" (Judith xvi. 17). The sinners in Gehenna will be filled with pain when God puts back the souls into the dead bodies on the Day of Judgment, according toIsa. xxxiii. 11 (Sanh. 108b).
Link: Jewish Encyclopedia Online
Note, scripture references are highlighted in blue.
=================
Encyclopedia Judaica:
Gehinnom (Heb. גֵּי בֶן־הִנֹּם, גֵּי בְנֵי הִנֹּם, גֵּיא בֶן־הִנֹּם, גֵּיא הִנֹּם; Gr. Γέεννα; "Valley of Ben-Hinnom, Valley of [the Son (s) of] Hinnom," Gehenna), a valley south of Jerusalem on one of the borders between the territories of Judah and Benjamin, between the Valley of *Rephaim and *En-Rogel (Josh. 15:8; 18:16). It is identified with Wadi er-Rababi.

…..During the time of the Monarchy, Gehinnom, at a place called Topheth, was the site of a cult which involved the burning of children (II Kings 23:10; Jer. 7:31; 32:35 et al.
Jeremiah repeatedly condemned this cult and predicted that on its account Topheth and the Valley of the Son of Hinnom would be called the Valley of the "Slaughter" (Jer. 19:5–6).
In Judaism the name Gehinnom is generally used as an appellation of the place of torment reserved for the wicked after death. The New Testament used the Greek form Gehenna in the same sense.
Gehinnom
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Talmud -Tractate Rosh Hashanah Chapter 1.
The school of Hillel says: . . . but as for Minim, [followers of Jesus] informers and disbelievers, who deny the Torah, or Resurrection, or separate themselves from the congregation, or who inspire their fellowmen with dread of them, or who sin and cause others to sin, as did Jeroboam the son of Nebat and his followers, they all descend to Gehenna, and are judged there from generation to generation, as it is said [Isa. lxvi. 24]: "And they shall go forth and look upon the carcases of the men who have transgressed against Me; for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched." Even when Gehenna will be destroyed, they will not be consumed, as it is written[Psalms, xlix. 15]: "And their forms wasteth away in the nether world," which the sages comment upon to mean that their forms shall endure even when the grave is no more. Concerning them Hannah says [I Sam. ii. 10]: "The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces."
Link: Tract Rosh Hashana: Chapter I.
When Jesus taught about e.g.,
• “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:” Matthew 25:41
• "these shall go away into eternal punishment, Matthew 25:46"
• "the fire of hell where the fire is not quenched and the worm does not die, Mark 9:43-48"
• "cast into a fiery furnace where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth,” Matthew 13:42, Matthew 13:50
• “But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.” Matthew 18:6
• “And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.” Matthew 7:23
• “woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born. ” Matthew 26:24
• “But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodom, than for that city.” Luke 10:12
These teachings tacitly reaffirmed and sanctioned the existing Jewish view of eternal hell, outlined above. In Matt. 18:6, 26:24 and Luk 10:12, see above, Jesus teaches that there is a punishmen than death or nonexistence. A punishment worse than death without mercy is also mentioned in Hebrews 10:28-31.
Heb 10:28 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people.
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
Jesus is quoted as using the word death 17 times in the gospels, if He wanted to say eternal death in Matt 25:46, there is no reason Jesus would that is what He would have said but He didn’t, He said “eternal punishment.” The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection, they knew that everybody died; rich, poor, young, old, good, bad, men, women, children, infants and knew that it had nothing to do with punishment and was permanent. When Jesus taught “eternal punishment” they would not have understood it as merely death, it would have meant something worse to them.
…..Concerning “punishment” one early church father wrote,

“‘Then these reap no advantage from their punishment, as it seems: moreover, I would say that they are not punished unless they are conscious of the punishment.” Justin Martyr [A.D. 110-165.] Dialogue with Trypho Chapter 4
…..Jesus undoubtedly knew what the Jews, believed about hell. If the Jews were wrong, why would Jesus teach “eternal punishment,” etc. to Jews who believed, "The Lord, the Almighty, will punish them on the Day of Judgment by putting fire and worms into their flesh, so that they cry out with pain unto all eternity," which only reinforced those beliefs.
 
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John Bowen

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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?
God never created hell souls created hell . Just like people are creating a hell on earth in Paris right now . Just like they have done for thousands of years in the middle east . The Creator gives souls along long time to turn around and if they don't they are sent to the lake of fire where they are dissolved . You can read about NDE where people committed suicide and they what they experienced . One woman said Jesus came to her and asked her " Is this what you really want " and she came back to tell her story. People engaging in riots , wars , murders , rapes , terrorist acts are feeding their energy to demons in hell keeping it going . The demons take over their minds and they act out ..
 
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Why did God create a place like hell to put "damned souls and spirits" in it? Isnt it more merciful to control/alt/delete those souls from creation instead of punishing them and making them suffer forever?
He didn’t. No benevolent omnipotent god would.
 
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