Hell

Der Alte · Aug 6, 2016

My previous post.

A number of logical fallacies, argument from silence. Putting one's self in the place of God, "If I was God and I wanted to warn people about hell, here is how I would write it.[ . . . ] I didn't find it written exactly that way so it must not be true." Lack of evidence is not evidence of lack.

Lazarus Short said:
Putting words in my mouth again, a violation of manners in any forum, IMHO. I do not lack evidence, but you will never admit it. Clever sidestepping, an arrogant and overbearing attitude, these are your methods. I cite Scripture, you cite the Talmud. All can see who is lost here.

You would be well advised to not throw around personal comments such as "an arrogant and overbearing attitude, these are your methods." I suggest you read the forum rules, [here]. I will not mention this to you again.
.....Here is what you said

"[God] did not hint at sending His people to Hell as a solution. For every proof text a damnationist can show me, I can dig up several places where God could have mentioned Hell, but did not. Given what I have seen and read so far, I know I am not wrong."

..... This does not say exactly what I posted but it means the same thing. From your POV this probably appears to be correct but when a native Hebrew speaking Jew read the Hebrew T'nakh did they see hell in the scriptures? And when Jesus taught about "fiery torment in hades,""eternal punishment,""hell where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched,""furnace where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth" did that contradict or support the Jewish belief in hell?
.....Wait let me guess the early Christian belief in hell had nothing to do with the then existing Jewish belief in hell, it all came from Babylon and Egypt 1000+ years before.

Radrook · Aug 6, 2016

Lazarus Short said:
It may be more tolerable for the pagan Hatuey in the Judgment than for the Christian Spaniards who roasted him.

Amen!

BTW
Hatuey was originally from the island of Hispaniola from which he fled from the Spaniards to nearby Cuba and organized armed resistance after informing the Cuban Tainos concerning his horrible experiences.

“They tell us, these tyrants, that they adore a God of peace and equality, and yet they usurp our land and make us their slaves. They speak to us of an immortal soul and of their eternal rewards and punishments, and yet they rob our belongings, seduce our women, violate our daughters. Incapable of matching us in valor, these cowards cover themselves with iron that our weapons cannot break…”

The Taínos of western and central Cuba could not believe the horrendous message brought by Hatuey, and few joined him.

Here is how his final conversation with the priest is recounted on this website.

Chief Hatuey

On February 2, 1512, Hatuey was tied to a stake at the Spanish camp, where he was burned alive. Just before lighting the fire, a priest offered him spiritual comfort, showing him the cross and asking him to accept Jesus and go to heaven. “Are there people like you in heaven?” he asked. “There are many like me in heaven,” answered the priest. Hatuey answered that he wanted nothing to do with a God that would allow such cruelty to be unleashed in his name.
http://historyofcuba.com/history/oriente/hatuey.htm

Der Alte · Aug 6, 2016

Lazarus Short said:
Yes, as Jesus Himself said, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, but I cannot find that the weeping/gnashing result from anything other than a loss of expected rewards. Further, I have decided that the reason there are not more Christians is...Christians.

This might sound reasonable if all Jesus said was "wailing and gnashing of teeth" but Jesus said much more. Jesus also said,

• "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" and
• "cast into a fiery furnace where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth,” Matthew 13:42, 50
• “better for him [a person who offends a little one] that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Matthew 18:6
• “it had been good for him [the one who betrays Jesus] if he had not been born.” Matthew 26:24

In two verses Matt. 18:6 and 26:24, see above, Jesus teaches that there is a fate worse than death or nonexistence. A fate worse than death is also mentioned in Heb 10:28-31.

Hebrews 10:28-31 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.

Der Alte · Aug 6, 2016

..duplicate

Radrook · Aug 6, 2016

Der Alter said:
This might sound reasonable if all Jesus said was "wailing and gnashing of teeth" but Jesus said much more. Jesus also said,

• "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" and
• "cast into a fiery furnace where there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth,” Matthew 13:42, 50
• “better for him [a person who offends a little one] that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Matthew 18:6
• “it had been good for him [the one who betrays Jesus] if he had not been born.” Matthew 26:24
In two verses Matt. 18:6 and 26:24, see above, Jesus teaches that there is a fate worse than death or nonexistence. A fate worse than death is also mentioned in Heb 10:28-31.

Hebrews 10:28-31 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.

Please note that the word "hell" is a translation of the word Gehenna which refers to the Valley of Hinnon outside the walls of Jerusalem where trash and refuse were dumped. Worms or maggots which consumed whatever landed at the edge were visible .

True, those who incurred the death sentence under the Law of Moses were expected to be executed. But isn't that how it is today. If you incur a death sentence in the USA, aren't you expected to be executed?

What Jesus meant when referring to the firey furnace is explained here:
http://tentmaker.org/FAQ/furnaceoffire.htm

Fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God?
Yes it is. But the only way to do so is to practice unrepentant sin.
Otherwise you will be showered with eternal life and blessings.
Sounds fair to me.

Well, suffering is definitely worse than death.
God did say that God is not mocked because a man reaps what he sows.
So the trick is to sow what does not result in reaping suffering worse than death. In short, cause and effect serve as punishment for the wicked. Historical examples are very abundant.

Gal 6:7
… 7Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return. 8The one who sows to please his flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; but the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life

Der Alte · Aug 6, 2016

Radrook said:
Please note that the word "hell" is a translation of the word Gehenna which refers to the Valley of Hinnon outside the walls of Jerusalem where trash and refuse were dumped. Worms or maggots which consumed whatever landed at the edge were visible .
True, those who incurred the death sentence under the Law of Moses were expected to be executed. But isn't that how it is today. If you incur a death sentence in the USA, aren't you expected to be executed? . . ..

The traditional explanation that a burning rubbish heap in the Valley of Hinnom south of Jerusalem gave rise to the idea of a fiery Gehenna of judgment is attributed to Rabbi David Kimhi's commentary on Psalm 27:13 (ca. A.D. 1200). He maintained that in this loathsome valley fires were kept burning perpetually to consume the filth and cadavers thrown into it. However, Strack and Billerbeck state that there is neither archaeological nor literary evidence in support of this claim, in either the earlier intertestamental or the later rabbinic sources (Hermann L. Strack and Paul Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud and Midrasch, 5 vols. [Munich: Beck, 1922-56], 4:2:1030). Also a more recent author holds a similar view (Lloyd R. Bailey, "Gehenna: The Topography of Hell," Biblical Archeologist 49 [1986]: 189.
Source, Bibliotheca Sacra / July–September 1992
http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted...BSac-NT/Scharen-GenenaSyn-Pt1-BS.htm[/indent]
Note there is no “archaeological nor literary evidence in support of this claim, [that Gehenna was ever used as a garbage dump] in either the earlier intertestamental or the later rabbinic sources” If Gehenna was ever used as a garbage dump there should be broken pottery, tools, utensils, bones, etc. but there is no such evidence.

“Gehenna is presented as diametrically opposed to ‘life’: it is better to enter life than to go to Gehenna. . .It is common practice, both in scholarly and less technical works, to associate the description of Gehenna with the supposedly contemporary garbage dump in the valley of Hinnom. This association often leads scholars to emphasize the destructive aspects of the judgment here depicted: fire burns until the object is completely consumed. Two particular problems may be noted in connection with this approach. First,

there is no convincing evidence in the primary sources for the existence of a fiery rubbish dump in this location (in any case, a thorough investigation would be appreciated). Secondly, the significant background to this passage more probably lies in Jesus’ allusion to Isaiah 66:24.”
(“The Duration of Divine Judgment in the New Testament” in The Reader Must Understand edited by K. Brower and M. W. Ellion, p. 223, emphasis mine)
G. R. Beasley-Murray in Jesus and the Kingdom of God:
“Ge-Hinnom (Aramaic Ge-hinnam, hence the Greek Geenna), ‘The Valley of Hinnom,’ lay south of Jerusalem, immediately outside its walls. The notion, still referred to by some commentators, that the city’s rubbish was burned in this valley, has no further basis than a statement by the Jewish scholar Kimchi (sic) made about A.D. 1200; it is not attested in any ancient source.” (p. 376n.92)
http://www.btdf.org/forums/topic/20113-the-burning-garbage-dump-of-gehenna-is-a-myth/

Butch5 · Aug 6, 2016

Der Alter said:
The only Christians shown to be observing Jewish customs are Jewish Christians. Paul was a Jew and he continued to observes the feasts, etc. There is not one single verse in the NT commanding former pagan gentiles Christians to observe days, months, feasts etc. How could gentile Christians in Rome, Corinth, Corinthians, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae etc. when there is no record that they ever had the OT?

Paul started his churches with Jews. When he went into a new town he went to the Synagogue and preached first.

Is Jesus our Passover or not? Is Jesus the first fruits or not?

This is irrelevant. Jesus said He wouldn't eat the passover with them again until He ate it in the kingdom.

Is that a command to gentile Christians to annually kill and lamb and celebrate the Passover although our Passover was slain once for all time?

Yet again, I didn't say there was a command.

Agreed. When was Torah taken to gentile Christians in Rome, Corinth, Corinthians, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae etc. so they could obey all 613 commandments in the T'nakh

We're not talking about the Mosaic Law.

I suggest you get your information from credible sources rather than believing everything you read on the internet. There was no Catholic church with a pope in charge until 1075 when the bishop of Rome unilaterally issued 27 Dictatus Papae [Dictates of the Pope] and usurped authority over the church.[/quote]

Another straw man. No Catholic church "With a pope." I didn't say anything about a pope.

http://www.unamsanctamcatholicam.com/history/79-history/215-revisiting-dictatus-papae.html
And Christmas was observed about 800+ years before that.

Encyclopedia Britannica-Christmas
The great church adopted Christmas much later than Epiphany; and before the 5th century there was no general consensus of opinion as to when it should come in the calendar, whether on the 6th of January, or the 25th of March, or the 25th of December. The earliest identification of the 25th of December with the birthday of Christ is in a passage of Theophilus of Antioch (A.D. 171—183),

Read more: CHRISTMAS (i.e. the Ma... - Online Information article about CHRISTMAS (i.e. the Ma... http://encyclopedia.jrank.org/CHR_CLI/CHRISTMAS_ie_the_Mass_of_Christ.html#ixzz4GW3z9rpC

And you questioned my sources? I'm looking at the Bible and the writings of the early Christians them selves, not an encyclopedia. The earliest identification doesn't equate to celebrating Christmas. Tell me where in the Bible do you see Christians celebrating Christmas?

Der Alte · Aug 6, 2016

Butch5 said:
Paul started his churches with Jews. When he went into a new town he went to the Synagogue and preached first.

And your point is?

This is irrelevant. Jesus said He wouldn't eat the passover with them again until He ate it in the kingdom.

Jesus was a Jew and His disciples were Jews. Still no requirement for gentile Christians to observe the Passover

Yet again, I didn't say there was a command.

Why would gentile Christians do something they were not commanded to do? There is no record that the OT was taken or taught to gentiles Christians in Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae and other gentile places mentioned in the NT?

We're not talking about the Mosaic Law.

What to you is "Mosaic law?"

Another straw man. No Catholic church "With a pope." I didn't say anything about a pope.

There was no "Catholic church" until there was a pope.

And you questioned my sources? I'm looking at the Bible and the writings of the early Christians them selves, not an encyclopedia. The earliest identification doesn't equate to celebrating Christmas. Tell me where in the Bible do you see Christians celebrating Christmas

?

Irrelevant! The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence! I'm still waiting for any evidence of any kind that anything in the church's observance of the birth of Jesus is related to anything pagan. I'm not talking about a bunch of nonsense about trees, Santa Clause, etc. The church is not responsible for the world coopting and commercializing Christmas or any other Christian observance.
..... In case you are not aware Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. I'm sure you have heard of Him. The circumstance of His birth are recorded in Matthew 1 and 2.

Radrook · Aug 6, 2016

Der Alter said:
The traditional explanation that a burning rubbish heap in the Valley of Hinnom south of Jerusalem gave rise to the idea of a fiery Gehenna of judgment is attributed to Rabbi David Kimhi's commentary on Psalm 27:13 (ca. A.D. 1200). He maintained that in this loathsome valley fires were kept burning perpetually to consume the filth and cadavers thrown into it. However, Strack and Billerbeck state that there is neither archaeological nor literary evidence in support of this claim, in either the earlier intertestamental or the later rabbinic sources (Hermann L. Strack and Paul Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud and Midrasch, 5 vols. [Munich: Beck, 1922-56], 4:2:1030). Also a more recent author holds a similar view (Lloyd R. Bailey, "Gehenna: The Topography of Hell," Biblical Archeologist 49 [1986]: 189.
Source, Bibliotheca Sacra / July–September 1992
http://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted...BSac-NT/Scharen-GenenaSyn-Pt1-BS.htm[/indent]
Note there is no “archaeological nor literary evidence in support of this claim, [that Gehenna was ever used as a garbage dump] in either the earlier intertestamental or the later rabbinic sources” If Gehenna was ever used as a garbage dump there should be broken pottery, tools, utensils, bones, etc. but there is no such evidence.

“Gehenna is presented as diametrically opposed to ‘life’: it is better to enter life than to go to Gehenna. . .It is common practice, both in scholarly and less technical works, to associate the description of Gehenna with the supposedly contemporary garbage dump in the valley of Hinnom. This association often leads scholars to emphasize the destructive aspects of the judgment here depicted: fire burns until the object is completely consumed. Two particular problems may be noted in connection with this approach. First,

there is no convincing evidence in the primary sources for the existence of a fiery rubbish dump in this location (in any case, a thorough investigation would be appreciated). Secondly, the significant background to this passage more probably lies in Jesus’ allusion to Isaiah 66:24.”
(“The Duration of Divine Judgment in the New Testament” in The Reader Must Understand edited by K. Brower and M. W. Ellion, p. 223, emphasis mine)
G. R. Beasley-Murray in Jesus and the Kingdom of God:
“Ge-Hinnom (Aramaic Ge-hinnam, hence the Greek Geenna), ‘The Valley of Hinnom,’ lay south of Jerusalem, immediately outside its walls. The notion, still referred to by some commentators, that the city’s rubbish was burned in this valley, has no further basis than a statement by the Jewish scholar Kimchi (sic) made about A.D. 1200; it is not attested in any ancient source.” (p. 376n.92)
http://www.btdf.org/forums/topic/20113-the-burning-garbage-dump-of-gehenna-is-a-myth/

Yes, I am familiar with that article and had read it before. However, I choose to disagree with it and agree with this one:

Focus Online
Spiritual edification of thoughtful disciples of Jesus
The Hinnom Valley and Jesus’ Teaching on Final Punishment

Archaeologists Ronny Reich and Eli Shukron have discovered (and documented from other excavations) in the area outside of the first century walls a layer of debris from 6-10 meters thick in the area where the Kidron and the Hinnom come together (“The Jerusalem City-Dump in the Late Second Temple Period” ZDPV 119 (2003) 12-18). The association between an actual place and the state of eternal punishment in fire only makes sense if the two bore some similarities. In our time, if we compared something to Death Valley (located in eastern California) we would hardly understand this as a figure of paradise. Jesus’ use of this valley as a reference to final punishment offers a clear inference confirming that in His own day the Hinnom Valley was a place of filth and fire. This is what allowed it in the first century and beyond to serve as a suitable figure of eternal punishment in fire.

http://focusmagazine.org/the-hinnom-valley-and-jesus-teaching-on-final-punishment.php

Here are other reliable sources that agree:

So What Is "Gehenna" Hell ?

Gehenna is strictly "the valley of Hinnom" (Joshua 15:8; Nehemiah 11:30); "the valley of the children of Hinnom" (2 Kings 23:10); "the valley of the son of Hinnom" (2 Chronicles 28:3); "the valley of dead bodies," or Tophet, where malefactors' dead bodies were cast, South of the city (Jeremiah 31:40). A deep narrow glen South of Jerusalem, where, after Ahaz introduced the worship of the fire gods, the sun, Baal, Moloch, the Jews under Manasseh made their children to pass through the fire (2 Chronicles 33:6), and offered them as burnt-offerings (Jeremiah 7:31; 19:2-6). So the godly Josiah defiled the valley, making it a receptacle of carcass and criminals' corpses, in which worms were continually gendering. A perpetual fire was kept to consume this putrefying matter; hence it became the image of that awful place where all that are unfit for the holy city are cast out a prey to the ever gnawing "worm" of conscience from within and the "unquenchable fire" of torments from without. (Source: Fausset's Bible Dictionary)

VALLEY OF HINNOM

[HE N nahm]-a deep, narrow ravine south of Jerusalem. At the HIGH PLACES of Baal in the Valley of Hinnom, parents sacrificed their children as a burnt offering to the pagan god Molech (2 Kings 23:10). Ahaz and Manasseh, kings of Judah, were both guilty of this awful wickedness (2 Chron 28:3; 33:6). But good King Josiah destroyed the pagan altars to remove this temptation from the Hebrew people. The prophet Jeremiah foretold that God would judge this awful abomination of human sacrifice and would cause such a destruction that "the Valley of the Son of Hinnom" would become known as "the Valley of Slaughter" (Jer 7:31-32; 19:2,6; 32:35). The place was also called "Tophet." Apparently, the Valley of Hinnom was used as the garbage dump for the city of Jerusalem. Refuse, waste materials, and dead animals were burned here. Fires continually smoldered, and smoke from the burning debris rose day and night. Source: Nelson's Illustrated Bible Dictionary.

So any inhabitant of Jerusalem and indeed Judea would have immeditely understood what Jesus meant when he spoke of "Gehenna". It had been the place where human sacrifices had once taken place, but had ultimately become one of, if not the city's waste incinerator.

http://judianity.info/going-to-hell-gehenna.html

Actually Jesus was quoting from Isaiah 66

Our Messiah was quoting from Isaiah 66:

Isaiah 66:24
24 "And they shall go forth and look
Upon the corpses of the men
Who have transgressed against Me.
For their worm does not die,
And their fire is not quenched.
They shall be an abhorrence to all flesh."
NKJV

Don't forget though, that in Matthew 10:28-19 which we read above, that people are destroyed in Hell. Isaiah 66:24 shows us that they look upon the burning corpses or dead bodies of those who have transgressed, so he too appears to show that "hell" or Gehenna fire isn't a place of eternal torture, but simply a place where dead bodies are cremated.

We must be careful not to read into scripture, simply because, often without knowing it, we bring a lot of the cultural baggage of Greek mythology about "hades" with us and interpret scripture in this context.

Butch5 · Aug 7, 2016

Der Alter said:
And your point is?

The point is that most of the churches were started with Jews so they would have plenty of knowledge of the OT.

Jesus was a Jew and His disciples were Jews. Still no requirement for gentile Christians to observe the Passover

Never said there was

Why would gentile Christians do something they were not commanded to do? There is no record that the OT was taken or taught to gentiles Christians in Rome, Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae and other gentile places mentioned in the NT?

Christians do stuff their not commanded to do often. The Bible of the early church was the Septuagint. Jesus and the apostle quoted from it often. Do you suppose they got together and just sat there and looked at each other?

[/quote]What to you is "Mosaic law?"[/quote] It's the Laws Moses gave to the Jews. However, as I pointed out, God said, 'these are my feasts'.

There was no "Catholic church" until there was a pope.

Hmm...

Irrelevant! The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence! I'm still waiting for any evidence of any kind that anything in the church's observance of the birth of Jesus is related to anything pagan. I'm not talking about a bunch of nonsense about trees, Santa Clause, etc. The church is not responsible for the world coopting and commercializing Christmas or any other Christian observance.
..... In case you are not aware Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. I'm sure you have heard of Him. The circumstance of His birth are recorded in Matthew 1 and 2.

You keep saying the world is co-opting things. It's not the world. Every year millions of Christians decorate their homes with trees, lights, wreaths, etc. They exchange gifts, etc. These are all things that were practiced by the pagans in the worship of their gods BEFORE there was a Christmas

Der Alte · Aug 7, 2016

Butch5 said:
The point is that most of the churches were started with Jews so they would have plenty of knowledge of the OT.

We have the teachings that the disciples sent to the gentile churches the epistles of Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians etc. but what we don't have any is record that the OT was ever taken or taught to gentile Christians in the places named in the NT.

Never said there was

So gentile Christians were never required to observe Passover or any other ceremony, feast, festival etc. recorded in the OT.

Christians do stuff their not commanded to do often. The Bible of the early church was the Septuagint. Jesus and the apostle quoted from it often. Do you suppose they got together and just sat there and looked at each other?

But other than the quotes in the gospels and epistles there is no record that the OT was ever taken or taught to gentile Christians in the places named in the NT. Gentile Christians could not follow what they did not have.

It's the Laws Moses gave to the Jews. However, as I pointed out, God said, 'these are my feasts'.

See reply immediately above.

You keep saying the world is co-opting things. It's not the world. Every year millions of Christians decorate their homes with trees, lights, wreaths, etc. They exchange gifts, etc. These are all things that were practiced by the pagans in the worship of their gods BEFORE there was a Christmas

Can you point me to any official church writing which refers to Santa Claus, giving presents, etc? I have been a Christian since Johnson was president and went to church for about 2 decades before that and I have never seen anything pagan as part of any church worship service. No Santa Clause, no presents, no Christmas trees, etc. What people do in their homes is their business. And just FYI I am not aware of any pagan whatever which used trees decorated or not for any purpose. That proof text you are probably thinking about in the OT is not about decorated trees.

Der Alte · Aug 7, 2016

Radrook said:
Yes, I am familiar with that article and had read it before. However, I choose to disagree with it and agree with this one:

I don't know if you noticed but I quoted from four different sources, which you have chosen to ignore because you found one source which supports your assumptions/presuppositions. One of these authors, George R. Beasley-Murray was one of my professors.

1. Hermann L. Strack and Paul Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud and Midrasch, 5 vols. [Munich: Beck, 1922-56], 4:2:1030).
2. Lloyd R. Bailey, "Gehenna: The Topography of Hell," Biblical Archeologist 49 [1986]: 189.
3. K. Brower and M. W. Ellion, editors, “The Duration of Divine Judgment in the New Testament” in The Reader Must Understand , p. 223
4. G. R. Beasley-Murray in Jesus and the kingdom of God, 1988, p. 376n.92

Here are other reliable sources that agree:

They might have been reliable 100+ years ago, Nelson's was written in 1897 and Faussett, 1878 and of course did not have the benefit of 20th century archaeological studies cited above.

Actually Jesus was quoting from Isaiah 66

Yes he was but Isaiah 66 does not mention Gehenna. Gehenna represented "hell" very early on, in Jewish belief after "children were sacrificed to the pagan deity Moloch" there,. source, Gehenna-Jewish Encyclopedia. And the Gehenna article mentions nothing about the valley being a burning dump for trash, bodies or anything else.

Radrook · Aug 7, 2016

Der Alter said:
I don't know if you noticed but I quoted from four different sources, which you have chosen to ignore because you found one source which supports your assumptions/presuppositions. One of these authors, George R. Beasley-Murray was one of my professors.

1. Hermann L. Strack and Paul Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud and Midrasch, 5 vols. [Munich: Beck, 1922-56], 4:2:1030).
2. Lloyd R. Bailey, "Gehenna: The Topography of Hell," Biblical Archeologist 49 [1986]: 189.
3. K. Brower and M. W. Ellion, editors, “The Duration of Divine Judgment in the New Testament” in The Reader Must Understand , p. 223
4. G. R. Beasley-Murray in Jesus and the kingdom of God, 1988, p. 376n.92

They might have been reliable 100+ years ago, Nelson's was written in 1897 and Faussett, 1878 and of course did not have the benefit of 20th century archaeological studies cited above.

Yes he was but Isaiah 66 does not mention Gehenna. Gehenna represented "hell" very early on, in Jewish belief after "children were sacrificed to the pagan deity Moloch" there,. source, Gehenna-Jewish Encyclopedia. And the Gehenna article mentions nothing about the valley being a burning dump for trash, bodies or anything else.

No I hadn't noticed that you had quoted from so many articles but that is irrelevant to the reason why I choose to believe that the valley was still in a smoldering condition of some kind during Jesus' day.

You see, the reason I give more credence to the article which states that Jesus was referring to a situation which existed in that geographical location at the time is because otherwise his reference to it as a place where the fire doesn't die and the worms are present would seem weird t those who lived at the time and who beheld nothing of the sort in the Valley Of Hinnon. As the article points out, I f you make a reference to Death Valley in the USA as a place of intense heat where vegetation is extremely sparse and the people see it as nothing of the sort, obviously your reference would fall on deaf ears. In fact, they would consider you daft.

That is the main reason. The article also agrees with you yours in that the valley was indeed employed once to sacrifice children to Moloch. However, that it was once employed that way would not justify referring to it as being that way in the present tense as Jesus referred to it unless it was still being used as a dump or incinerator of some sort in his day.

There is evidence however that the southwest shoulder of this valley (Ketef Hinnom) was a burial location with numerous burial chambers that were reused by generations of families from as early as the seventh until the fifth century BC. The use of this area for tombs continued into the first centuries BC and AD. By 70 AD, the area was not only a burial site but also a place for cremation of the dead with the arrival of the Tenth Roman Legion, who were the only group known to practice cremation in this region
Gabriel Barkay, "The Riches of Ketef Hinnom." Biblical Archaeological Review 35:4-5 (2005): 22–35, 122–26.

Lazarus Short · Aug 8, 2016

Der Alter gave me some food for thought the other day in Post #101, when he used the terms, "Argument from Silence" and "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack." I suppose they were the "A number of logical fallacies," he led with. Hmmm, that sounds good on the face of it, but having dug a little deeper, I find that the phrase/concept of "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack." applies in an open system where there may or may not be more evidence to find, or not find. Our universe of discussion, or a least the Universe I used to pursue my Question (Where did our ideas of Hell come from?) was the text of the AV/KJV. Now if I had merely countered the typical Proof Texts so often bandied about, that Lack of Evidence argument might have applied. However, I read and considered every Book, every Chapter, and every Verse of the KJV. I have combed the Universe of Question, dug into word meanings, and found no evidence of the damnationist Hell. This conclusion cannot be discounted or dismissed by invoking "Argument from Silence" and "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack," as if they were magic talismans. Given this silence, the burden of proof must shift to the damnationist side.

Der Alte · Aug 8, 2016

Radrook said:
No I hadn't noticed that you had quoted from so many articles but that is irrelevant to the reason why I choose to believe that the valley was still in a smoldering condition of some kind during Jesus' day.
You see, the reason I give more credence to the article which states that Jesus was referring to a situation which existed in that geographical location at the time is because otherwise his reference to it as a place where the fire doesn't die and the worms are present would seem weird t those who lived at the time and who beheld nothing of the sort in the Valley Of Hinnon. As the article points out, I f you make a reference to Death Valley in the USA as a place of intense heat where vegetation is extremely sparse and the people see it as nothing of the sort, obviously your reference would fall on deaf ears. In fact, they would consider you daft.

That reply sounds reasonable if we ignore the fact that I quoted from the Jewish Encyclopedia and the Talmud. I quote again for your edification.

Jewish Encyclopedia, Gehenna
The place where children were sacrificed to the god Moloch was originally 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). For this reason 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)

From the time that Jewish children were sacrificed to the pagan deity Moloch in the valley of Hinnom [Heb. Gehinnom, Gk. Gehenna] the valley was believed to be accursed and Gehinnom came to be the word that represented "hell."
From the Jewish Encyclopedia,

"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 to Isa. Xxxiii. 11

Like it or not these beliefs were held by Jews before and during the time of Jesus. Gehenna meant "hell" to the Jews not a burning garbage dump for which there is no written evidence in the OT, during the intertestamental period or in the NT.

There is evidence however that the southwest shoulder of this valley (Ketef Hinnom) was a burial location with numerous burial chambers that were reused by generations of families from as early as the seventh until the fifth century BC. The use of this area for tombs continued into the first centuries BC and AD. By 70 AD, the area was not only a burial site but also a place for cremation of the dead with the arrival of the Tenth Roman Legion, who were the only group known to practice cremation in this region
Gabriel Barkay, "The Riches of Ketef Hinnom."Biblical Archaeological Review 35:4-5 (2005): 22–35, 122–26.

This quote does not support your argument. The Hinnom valley was not used for burning garbage or bodies until 70 AD, thirty years after the time of Jesus. The Romans not the Jews did the cremating.

That is the main reason. The article also agrees with you yours in that the valley was indeed employed once to sacrifice children to Moloch. However, that it was once employed that way would not justify referring to it as being that way in the present tense as Jesus referred to it unless it was still being used as a dump or incinerator of some sort in his day.

Your conclusion is wrong see my quote from the Jewish Encyclopedia, above.

Der Alte · Aug 8, 2016

Lazarus Short said:
Der Alter gave me some food for thought the other day in Post #101, when he used the terms, "Argument from Silence" and "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack." I suppose they were the "A number of logical fallacies," he led with. Hmmm, that sounds good on the face of it, but having dug a little deeper, I find that the phrase/concept of "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack." applies in an open system where there may or may not be more evidence to find, or not find. Our universe of discussion, or a least the Universe I used to pursue my Question (Where did our ideas of Hell come from?) was the text of the AV/KJV. Now if I had merely countered the typical Proof Texts so often bandied about, that Lack of Evidence argument might have applied. However, I read and considered every Book, every Chapter, and every Verse of the KJV. I have combed the Universe of Question, dug into word meanings, and found no evidence of the damnationist Hell. This conclusion cannot be discounted or dismissed by invoking "Argument from Silence" and "Lack of Evidence is Not Evidence of Lack," as if they were magic talismans. Given this silence, the burden of proof must shift to the damnationist side.

If you have something to say about one of my posts, quote the post and say it to me. Don't make vague allusions to something I posted.

Der Alte · Aug 8, 2016

Radrook said:
Yes, I am familiar with that article and had read it before. However, I choose to disagree with it and agree with this one:
Focus Online
Spiritual edification of thoughtful disciples of Jesus

The Hinnom Valley and Jesus’ Teaching on Final Punishment
Archaeologists Ronny Reich and Eli Shukron have discovered (and documented from other excavations) in the area outside of the first century walls a layer of debris from 6-10 meters thick in

the area where the Kidron and the Hinnom come together

Click to expand...

(“The Jerusalem City-Dump in the Late Second Temple Period” ZDPV 119 (2003) 12-18). The association between an actual place and the state of eternal punishment in fire only makes sense if the two bore some similarities. In our time, if we compared something to Death Valley (located in eastern

California) we would hardly understand this as a figure of paradise. Jesus’ use of this valley as a reference to final punishment offers a clear inference confirming that in His own day the Hinnom Valley was a place of filth and fire. This is what allowed it in the first century and beyond to serve as a suitable figure of eternal punishment in fire.

http://focusmagazine.org/the-hinnom-valley-and-jesus-teaching-on-final-punishment.php

The above is an "article" you quoted 2nd hand and which you referred to as reliable. Now let's read what the article actually says. The first hand article is accompanied by photographs and detailed analysis of the garbage found in the Kidron valley and says nothing about the valley of Hinnom.

Abstract
Miqweh of Second Temple Period. ......Jerusalem City-Dump in the Late Second Temple Period, ZDPV, 119/1 (2003),
The chance discovery of an Early Roman city dump (1st century CE) in Jerusalem has yielded for the first time ever quantitative data on garbage components that introduce us to the mundane daily life Jerusalemites led and the kind of animals that were featured in their diet. Most of the garbage consists of pottery shards, all common tableware, while prestige objects are entirely absent. Other significant garbage components include numerous fragments of cooking ovens, wall plaster, animal bones and plant remains. Of the pottery vessels, cooking pots are the most abundant type. Most of the refuse turns out to be “household garbage” originating in the domestic areas of the city, while large numbers of cooking pots may point to the presence of pilgrims. Significantly, the faunal assemblage, which is dominated by kosher species and the clear absence of pigs, set Jerusalem during its peak historical period apart from all other contemporaneous Roman urban centers.
...
Excavations near the Temple Mount and within the residential areas have already shown that no waste had accumulated there (Reich and Billig 2000), and thus waste must have been removed, most likely in an organized manner. Recently, the contemporaneous city-dump was identified on the eastern slope of the south-eastern hill of Jerusalem in the form of a thick mantle (up to 10 m, 200,000 m3 ) (Reich and Shukron 2003). The dump is located roughly 100 m outside and south-east of the Temple Mount on the eastern slope of he Kidron Valley (fig. 1), and extends at least 400 m and is 50–70 m wide. Large amounts of pottery and coins date the dump to the Early Roman period (the 1st century BCE and the 1st century CE up to the destruction of the city by the Romans in 70 CE). A preliminary study of the garbage (Bouchnik, Bar-Oz and Reich 2004; Bouchnik et al. 2005) showed the presence of animal bones, and a detailed multidisci-plinary joint study of the debris was carried out.
https://www.researchgate.net/public...udy_of_the_City-Dump_of_Early_Roman_Jerusalem

Lazarus Short · Aug 8, 2016

Der Alter said:
If you have something to say about one of my posts, quote the post and say it to me. Don't make vague allusions to something I posted.

I quoted the relevant terms/phrases, and the post # they came from. I thought I was being precise, but I suppose you don't care to go back and check what you said before. Yes, I can quote the whole post, and it is easier for me, too. Maybe you can, in turn, refrain from this:

[Der Alter]
"My previous post.
A number of logical fallacies, argument from silence. Putting one's self in the place of God, "If I was God and I wanted to warn people about hell, here is how I would write it.[ . . . ] I didn't find it written exactly that way so it must not be true."
Lack of evidence is not evidence of lack."

I don't believe I actually said, but if I did, please cite the post # where I did.

Radrook · Aug 8, 2016

Der Alter said:
The above is an "article" you quoted 2nd hand and which you referred to as reliable. Now let's read what the article actually says. The first hand article is accompanied by photographs and detailed analysis of the garbage found in the Kidron valley and says nothing about the valley of Hinnom.

Abstract
Miqweh of Second Temple Period. ......Jerusalem City-Dump in the Late Second Temple Period, ZDPV, 119/1 (2003),
The chance discovery of an Early Roman city dump (1st century CE) in Jerusalem has yielded for the first time ever quantitative data on garbage components that introduce us to the mundane daily life Jerusalemites led and the kind of animals that were featured in their diet. Most of the garbage consists of pottery shards, all common tableware, while prestige objects are entirely absent. Other significant garbage components include numerous fragments of cooking ovens, wall plaster, animal bones and plant remains. Of the pottery vessels, cooking pots are the most abundant type. Most of the refuse turns out to be “household garbage” originating in the domestic areas of the city, while large numbers of cooking pots may point to the presence of pilgrims. Significantly, the faunal assemblage, which is dominated by kosher species and the clear absence of pigs, set Jerusalem during its peak historical period apart from all other contemporaneous Roman urban centers.
...
Excavations near the Temple Mount and within the residential areas have already shown that no waste had accumulated there (Reich and Billig 2000), and thus waste must have been removed, most likely in an organized manner. Recently, the contemporaneous city-dump was identified on the eastern slope of the south-eastern hill of Jerusalem in the form of a thick mantle (up to 10 m, 200,000 m3 ) (Reich and Shukron 2003). The dump is located roughly 100 m outside and south-east of the Temple Mount on the eastern slope of he Kidron Valley (fig. 1), and extends at least 400 m and is 50–70 m wide. Large amounts of pottery and coins date the dump to the Early Roman period (the 1st century BCE and the 1st century CE up to the destruction of the city by the Romans in 70 CE). A preliminary study of the garbage (Bouchnik, Bar-Oz and Reich 2004; Bouchnik et al. 2005) showed the presence of animal bones, and a detailed multidisci-plinary joint study of the debris was carried out.
[https://www.researchgate.net/public...udy_of_the_City-Dump_of_Early_Roman_Jerusalem

You have convinced me that there was actually no burning city dump outside of the walls of Jerusalem in the Valley of Hinnon in Jesus' day. As for the tenth legion using it as a crematorium for its legionnaires, I found no supporting data.

Thanks!

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