David Bentley Hart on Hell

[a-lily-of-peace]

I addressed all that in my post. What you mentioned is only one view. I highlighted in red the many references to eternal, unending "hell" which I quoted from three Jewish sources the Jewish Encyclopedia,. the Encyclopedia Judaica and the Talmud with links.

I believe the one about the followers of Jesus descending to Gehenna and being judged from generation to generation is definitely wrong.

 

[Mark Quayle]

For me, the scriptures are more ambiguous on this subject than has traditionally been claimed. However, there are historical exceptions, particularly among early Greek speaking Christians.

What is alarming is that some Christians seem to take delight in the future prospect that some will endure unending torment. One would expect that any mention of hell would be coupled with great sadness and a constant prayer that all would be saved. I'm sure some meet that condition, but surprisingly some don't. At any rate, may God's wish that all be saved be fulfilled.

God completely trouncing his enemies gives me joy.

We know that the judge of all the earth will do what is right. We know that his justice is thorough, and precise. We know that what ends up in the LOF is the husk of humanity. There will be nothing to them to commend them to you. Consider that we ourselves in Heaven will only be what we are because we are IN HIM. Maybe this is a pretty good way to think of it --We are vessels --not the contents. Take the contents out and the vessel is nothing.

We know that God is altogether righteous. Thank God for his mercy.

 

[Mark Quayle]

My opinion, but I think the misinterpretation of that word is why some Greek speaking Christians understood hell to be remedial and an undetermined period of time (age) instead of eternal as the Latin speaking church seems to have taken it.

FWIW, even the smallest sin is infinite --committed against the infinite God.

 

[Eloy Craft]

A moment without beginning or end means time without duration. What would that be like? Paradoxical That's eternity

 

[lismore]

Hello All. One flaw in the universalist message might be that eternal life is seen as eternal, eternal punishment is seen as not eternal. God Bless

 

[SkyWriting]

For a good number of Christians, hell isn’t just a tragic shadow cast across one of an otherwise ravishing vista’s remoter corners; rather, it’s one of the landscape’s most conspicuous and delectable details.

I know whereof I speak. I’ve published many books, often willfully provocative, and have vexed my share of critics. But only recently, in releasing a book challenging the historical validity, biblical origins, philosophical cogency and moral sanity of the standard Christian teaching on the matter of eternal damnation, have I ever inspired reactions so truculent, uninhibited and (frankly) demented.

Opinion | Why Do People Believe in Hell? (Published 2020)

What do we think about this?

Not surprising. Eternal Damnation! is the centerpiece of the least reasonable of people who choose to latch onto ONE SPECIFIC truth as the only thing they can depend on. The last thing these particular people want is to consider an alternate view to anything.

My view of eternal damnation is quite simple. In the spirit realm, time doesn't exist.
So anything there is "eternal." So the scripture is correct. But the framework for understanding it is not common.

 

[Jaxxi]

For a good number of Christians, hell isn’t just a tragic shadow cast across one of an otherwise ravishing vista’s remoter corners; rather, it’s one of the landscape’s most conspicuous and delectable details.

I know whereof I speak. I’ve published many books, often willfully provocative, and have vexed my share of critics. But only recently, in releasing a book challenging the historical validity, biblical origins, philosophical cogency and moral sanity of the standard Christian teaching on the matter of eternal damnation, have I ever inspired reactions so truculent, uninhibited and (frankly) demented.

Opinion | Why Do People Believe in Hell? (Published 2020)

What do we think about this?

I think personally that you cannot call yourself a Christian if you do not believe in hell as a place of eternal damnation. Jesus told us about hell. To doubt that Jesus was telling us the truth is to call Jesus a liar and no Christian on earth would dare do such a thing. There are far too many testimonies of people visibly disturbed by being shown in the spirit hell itself and they all describe what is in other Biblically related books about hell. Satan is real. Demons are real. In the third realm of heaven is paradise and sheol separated by a chasm called 'Styx'. You do not have to believe it. It does not care who believes in it or not. It would prefer you didn't believe it. It is in the OT and the NT and to reject the truth of the Bible is the spirit of Antichrist lying and deceiving. Just because a book is published does not make it true. The Bible is much more than just a published book. It is the most popular book in the world and has been since it was handwritten over and over again by scribes since 200 B.C. The Holy Bible is the most printed book in all of world history. This book was first printed in the Latin language in 1455 at the Gutenberg Printing Press, invented by Johannes Gutenberg and is situated in Mainz, Germany. That hardly competes with something printed a couple years ago. The Bible has stood the test of time and that is not because it is full of lies.

 

[public hermit]

God completely trouncing his enemies gives me joy.

I don't think you mean that you find joy in the suffering of those in hell, and yet that is an appropriate conclusion, isn't it?

We know that what ends up in the LOF is the husk of humanity

Perhaps hell removes the husk and leaves what God created. Does God create just to destroy? Is sin, or the human will, so powerful that God can do nothing with his own creation? I'm not so sure.

 

[Dorothy Mae]

For a good number of Christians, hell isn’t just a tragic shadow cast across one of an otherwise ravishing vista’s remoter corners; rather, it’s one of the landscape’s most conspicuous and delectable details.

I know whereof I speak. I’ve published many books, often willfully provocative, and have vexed my share of critics. But only recently, in releasing a book challenging the historical validity, biblical origins, philosophical cogency and moral sanity of the standard Christian teaching on the matter of eternal damnation, have I ever inspired reactions so truculent, uninhibited and (frankly) demented.

Opinion | Why Do People Believe in Hell? (Published 2020)

What do we think about this?

Jesus talked more about hell than any other person in the Bible. He was entirely convinced of its existence and vigorously warned us. Seems reasonable his followers would accept his authoritative knowledge on the matter. Do you consider yourself more knowledge than Jesus on this subject? (Remember he visited the place.)

 

[a-lily-of-peace]

I do believe in God’s judgement and I don’t feel any need to argue against hell because for whatever word it is, it’s clear that Jesus talks about Hades/Sheol, Gehenna, and the Lake of Fire, but at the same time I sympathise with the idea that there seems to be a bit too much of a focus to the extent that “Repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand” gets translated as “Repent, or else you will go to hell” and Christianity being treated as more “anti-hell” than “pro-life” as in the literal Resurrection Life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I am not a perfect beatified saint but the few glimpses I have had of the Kingdom of Heaven, the moving of the Holy Spirit, the genuine hope and longing for life, the raising of what was sown in this corruptible to the incorruptible, is directly related, I believe, to how little interest I have in taking about hell.

 

[East of Eden]

I think DBH makes this same point in teh NYT article.

Did Karl Barth say something like: hell is eternal but it is valid to hope that it is empty?

-
Yet Jesus said broad is the road to destruction and narrow the road to life, few will find it. He compared His Second Coming to the time of Noah, when people were largely unprepared. I wish it were otherwise but as Christ-followers we have to right to disregard His teachings.

 

[East of Eden]

Something that occurred to me recently was that for a human soul a trillion years is so close to infinity as makes no difference.

In other words even though "aionos" may not mean literal infinite duration, a punishment of a trillion years is still a very, very, very, verrrrry long time.

And why would their punishment end if the entire time their rebellion against God continues?

 

[Saint Steven]

-
Yet Jesus said broad is the road to destruction and narrow the road to life, few will find it. He compared His Second Coming to the time of Noah, when people were largely unprepared. I wish it were otherwise but as Christ-followers we have to right to disregard His teachings.

Since you wish it were otherwise, there is some hope that you will come to understand it. What do you make of this? Those who believe are a subset of all people that will be saved.

1 Timothy 4:10
That is why we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe.

 

[ViaCrucis]

I think DBH makes this same point in teh NYT article.

Did Karl Barth say something like: hell is eternal but it is valid to hope that it is empty?

I don't know about Barth, but Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote a whole book about just that.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Light of the East]

"We think" he disagrees with Jesus regarding Gehenna in Matthew 5:22, 18:8, 9, 25:41; Mark 9:43, 48; Luke 12:5, where the fire is not quenched and never goes out.

Except that is not what Gehenna means. But never mind that. You just go ahead and translate it anyway you want to rather than think of it like a first-century Jew would think.

 

[Light of the East]

We're still left with Jesus' own use of Gehenna (the perpetually burning city dump south of Jerusalem) in Matthew 5:22, 18:8, 9, 25:41; Mark 9:43, 48; Luke 12:5, where the fire is not quenched and never goes out.
.

Right. It means the garbage dump of Jerusalem. That is how a first century Jew listening to Jesus would have understood it. The Jewish religion in the first century had NO CONCEPT of an eternal, burning hell. You are thinking like a deluded 21st century Christian rather than a first century Jew. They didn't believe in a hell of eternal burning fire because no such belief existed.

(I don't know why I'm even bothering here)

 

[Light of the East]

This DBH guy is supposed to be Orthodox but I do not trust what I believe is actually a neo orthodoxy of his great intellect. Every year we focus on the Last Judgment ( it is always in focus of course) as we enter into Great Lent:

Sunday of the Last Judgment - OrthodoxWiki

I just want to add that Hart also seems to preach a dogma of universalism which is why I am skeptical about what he says about hell. His book on universalism came up as a strong secondary topic in an Orthodox forum I frequent.

Universal Salvation

So you believe that Father John Behr, a pratristics scholar and professor at St. Vladamir's is also a "neo-orthodox?" Or perhaps you will just come right out and say that St. Gregory Nyssa, St. Isaac of Syria, and a host of other Fathers are just plain old heretics???

 

[Light of the East]

Nothing delectable about Hell, in fact, the absolute horror of that reality is virtually beyond human comprehension. However, the reality of it is backed up by the ultimate authority - God - and no degree of mental gymnastics can overturn, negate, or result in the slightest alteration of His will and His word.

Except that in the original Greek autographs, IT AIN'T THERE!!! What we have, compliments of Augustine and Jerome, who both MANGLED the Greek language, is an eternal hell of fire that neither the Jews of the first century nor the Greeks knew anything about.

Do yourself a favor and do some research into where these terms came from and what the original Greek texts say.

 

[Light of the East]

God completely trouncing his enemies gives me joy.

We know that the judge of all the earth will do what is right. We know that his justice is thorough, and precise. We know that what ends up in the LOF is the husk of humanity. There will be nothing to them to commend them to you. Consider that we ourselves in Heaven will only be what we are because we are IN HIM. Maybe this is a pretty good way to think of it --We are vessels --not the contents. Take the contents out and the vessel is nothing.

We know that God is altogether righteous. Thank God for his mercy.

People who take joy in the suffering of others are sadists. People who take joy in the suffering of the wicked do not have the heart of Christ.

I would do some soul-searching if I were you.

 

[Light of the East]

FWIW, even the smallest sin is infinite --committed against the infinite God.

Nonsense. Do you know where that thinking comes from? It is Medieval feudalism in which the idea was brought forth that the importance of a king made a crime against that king of landowner more grievous than if committed against a fellow serf.

Furthermore, in hellist thinking, all sins deserve eternal torment, which eliminates the gradiation of sins and the corresponding punishment for them. All sins are not equal, therefore the consequence for them cannot be the same in a proper establishment of justice.