If there were no Hell...

[CrystalDragon]

The idea of hell is monstrous. How many people have lived lives of misery because of this teaching?

That is one reason why I'm doubting so heavily. Hell is a monstrous, horrible, unjust, evil concept.

 

[CrystalDragon]

That is interesting...can you tell me why?

People can be loving and still not be Christians. Easily. In fact Christians perpetuated women being inferior and slavery being okay.

The fact that people may be mainly Christian due to a fear of hell seems to me like an abusive ideology.

 

[DarthNeo]

Sure thing! I find the concept hard to accept. Infinite punishment for finite crimes? Squaring that with a loving and just God is difficult to accomplish, at least for me. And from what I understand, disbelief in God/Jesus is adequate for eternal torment. I know Christians would say, "Hell is separation from God, and you choose separation so He won't force you to spend eternity with Him," or something to that effect. I have a number of issues with such an argument that I'm happy to discuss, if you'd like to go there.

I totally get where you are coming from, but, and I don't even necessarily like this answer, but when you are God, you get to make the rules. So...God hates sin, cannot have anything to do with it. But He made it pretty easy to deal with, for mankind anyway, NOT His Son. Christ did the hard part, he became the death and blood offering that God requires to pay for sin. As mankind, we merely need to have FAITH that Christ is who He is and believe He did what He did. When we stand before God, He will not have a scale, weighing our good actions against our bad, he will look into our hearts and say either, You had faith in my son...or you didn't. There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many other issues that I even question. But when you get RIGHT down to it, God provided such a gracious way for us to escape hell...

 

[CrystalDragon]

I totally get where you are coming from, but, and I don't even necessarily like this answer, but when you are God, you get to make the rules. So...God hates sin, cannot have anything to do with it. But He made it pretty easy to deal with, for mankind anyway, NOT His Son. Christ did the hard part, he became the death and blood offering that God requires to pay for sin. As mankind, we merely need to have FAITH that Christ is who He is and believe He did what He did. When we stand before God, He will not have a scale, weighing our good actions against our bad, he will look into our hearts and say either, You had faith in my son...or you didn't. There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many other issues that I even question. But when you get RIGHT down to it, God provided such a gracious way for us to escape hell...

He wouldn't have needed to if he didn't create hell to begin with. We humans would never create such an unjust evil place.

 

[Gene Parmesan]

The fact that people may be mainly Christian due to a fear of hell seems to me like an abusive ideology.

If the threat of Hell or the promise of Heaven is the motivation for how you behave, I'd say that person is not behaving morally.

 

[grasping the after wind]

Sure thing! I find the concept hard to accept. Infinite punishment for finite crimes? Squaring that with a loving and just God is difficult to accomplish, at least for me. And from what I understand, disbelief in God/Jesus is adequate for eternal torment. I know Christians would say, "Hell is separation from God, and you choose separation so He won't force you to spend eternity with Him," or something to that effect. I have a number of issues with such an argument that I'm happy to discuss, if you'd like to go there.

Christians say a lot of things about Hell and there seems to be a vast diversity of opinion on the subject among Christians . I would say that if one believes in eternal torment for finite crimes one cannot accept a merciful and just God being the author of that situation. That would be too much of a contradiction even for the most practiced rationalizers among us. I do not think that most Christians see Hell in that way but surely some do. Some Christians believe God to be just first and merciful as an afterthought or merciful first and if it doesn't cause anyone any real grief then just too. The fact is we simply do not understand God's thought process ( He told us "My thoughts are not your thoughts") and we ought not act as if we do yet we engage in this kind of thing all the time. I am humble enough to accept that I do not understand everything because I as a time bound and finite creature am simply incapable of understanding the eternal and infinite. Yet I also am able to conjecture that I may well be also eternal and infintite in some way myself. So if we can accept the idea that Parrallel lines can indeed cross despite their being defined as always being equidistant from each other why cannot we consider the possibility that the evil men do lives after them through eternity and therefore the punishment for an eternally consequential crime ought also be eternal? If we can accept the idea that if you have 2 apples and you take away 3 apples you have something called a -1 apple left, why not accept the idea that any small stretch of time is also eternal and anything finite is really in some way infinite. After all, I have been told that there is infinity within the confines of a point upon a line i.e. there are an infinite number of points at any one point upon a line. Now i am not going to tell you that all or even any of what I have proposed here is surely factual information but I would try to leave my mind open to the possibilities of what God or religion or metaphysics might propose at least as far as I am willing to keep my mind open to the possibilities that those involved in scientific inquiry might propose. Things that one might dismiss as illogical upon first glace may be seen as totally logical and evident themselves upon further reflection when seen in the correct context.

 

[Gene Parmesan]

I totally get where you are coming from, but, and I don't even necessarily like this answer, but when you are God, you get to make the rules. So...God hates sin, cannot have anything to do with it. But He made it pretty easy to deal with, for mankind anyway, NOT His Son. Christ did the hard part, he became the death and blood offering that God requires to pay for sin. As mankind, we merely need to have FAITH that Christ is who He is and believe He did what He did. When we stand before God, He will not have a scale, weighing our good actions against our bad, he will look into our hearts and say either, You had faith in my son...or you didn't. There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many other issues that I even question. But when you get RIGHT down to it, God provided such a gracious way for us to escape hell...

I want to reply but it'll probably be tomorrow as I am out of time. If I tried now it would be word vomit for sure. Perhaps you can give me more to reply to tomorrow by defining "FAITH" as you used it.

 

[grasping the after wind]

He wouldn't have needed to if he didn't create hell to begin with. We humans would never create such an unjust evil place.

I do not believe you have sufficient evidence to corroborate your last sentence. IMO if we were capable of so doing we would definitely create such a place for our enemies. Do you think the Nazis would have shied away from the idea? They did their best to create such a place they just lacked the means to impose it universally.

 

[DarthNeo]

I want to reply but it'll probably be tomorrow as I am out of time. If I tried now it would be word vomit for sure. Perhaps you can give me more to reply to tomorrow by defining "FAITH" as you used it.

Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as "The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Does that mean blind faith, not at all. First, look at the world all around us, the creation, the planet, it is AMAZING, only someone of intelligent design could have made a world so wondrous. Then we have the Holy Spirit, while He is not tangibly visible, there is no deny that He exist and lives in me and through me. Faith is believing who Christ is and what He did...

 

[faroukfarouk]

Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as "The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Does that mean blind faith, not at all. First, look at the world all around us, the creation, the planet, it is AMAZING, only someone of intelligent design could have made a world so wondrous. Then we have the Holy Spirit, while He is not tangibly visible, there is no deny that He exist and lives in me and through me. Faith is believing who Christ is and what He did...

Verse 6 of the same chapter says: 'He that comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him'.

If a secularist argues from the starting point of the physical universe without the Creator, and the believer starts with faith, then ultimately the discussion will be circular.

 

[CrystalDragon]

I do not believe you have sufficient evidence to corroborate your last sentence. IMO if we were capable of so doing we would definitely create such a place for our enemies. Do you think the Nazis would have shied away from the idea? They did their best to create such a place they just lacked the means to impose it universally.

You have a point there, but in a way that strengthens my point. Maybe some people like sociopaths would do it who lack empathy (may not be eternal though), but we'd never call it loving. We'd call those people evil. Now when God does that why do we say that he loves us if that's the exact opposite of love. That's what people like the Nazis would do to those they hate.

 

[DarthNeo]

Verse 6 of the same chapter says: 'He that comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him'.

If a secularist argues from the starting point of the physical universe without the Creator, and the believer starts with faith, then ultimately the discussion will be circular.

The thing is Science confirms God, proves Him more and more every day...

 

[ToddNotTodd]

The thing is Science confirms God, proves Him more and more every day...

This statement needs some backing up, since science doesn't deal with gods.

 

[grasping the after wind]

You have a point there, but in a way that strengthens my point. Maybe some people like sociopaths would do it who lack empathy (may not be eternal though), but we'd never call it loving. We'd call those people evil. Now when God does that why do we say that he loves us if that's the exact opposite of love. That's what people like the Nazis would do to those they hate.

What exactly is it that you think God does to us in this instance that you are calling evil? Are you suggesting that God created a physical place called Hell to eternally physically torture people?

 

[grasping the after wind]

If the threat of Hell or the promise of Heaven is the motivation for how you behave, I'd say that person is not behaving morally.

I don't know if I can totally agree with you here because I would judge the morality of a person's behavior by their actions rather than their motivations for acting. IMO the bulk of humanity does not consistently act morally out of a sense of benevolence but out of either fear of retribution or hope of gain. I would prefer everyone acted morally because they believed it was the right thing to do and because, if they have a religious belief system like Christianity, they want to please God out of love , or if they had a different basis for their moral code out of some benevolent feeling toward whatever they considered the source of that code rather than fear or greed but, as a rule, we humans have been reduced to motivating each other by fear and greed( envy being a subset of greed).This is because it is the most effective way to motivate people that are not basically benevolent but rather basically self centered. Religions, though they are guilty of it, are not the sole or even the major source of using fear and greed as a means of control. Governments do it consistently with the added ability to enforce the fear and greed through physical force or grants of favor that are in the present and not feared or hoped for at some future time. A large proportion of the human population is not known for patience and responds best to immediate reward or punishment rather than deferred. Political philosophies and political activist for specific causes work much the same as religion using fear of some future catastrophe and hope of some future utopia to motivate people to support them but government is able to deliver its feared consequences and its rewards right here and right now which makes it the most effective at controlling people's behavior.

 

[DarthNeo]

This statement needs some backing up, since science doesn't deal with gods.

Well, just look at the time it would take to randomly form the DNA in a 400 protein cell - 10 to the 74th power are the chances of RANDOM DNA sequencing. If you subscribe to the big bang theory, it only happened 10 the 18th power (in time) ago - so not enough time even for a 400 protein CELL to form randomly, much less all the species there are on the earth now - that SCREAMS Intelligent Design...

 

[Gene Parmesan]

I totally get where you are coming from, but, and I don't even necessarily like this answer, but when you are God, you get to make the rules. So...God hates sin, cannot have anything to do with it. But He made it pretty easy to deal with, for mankind anyway, NOT His Son. Christ did the hard part, he became the death and blood offering that God requires to pay for sin. As mankind, we merely need to have FAITH that Christ is who He is and believe He did what He did. When we stand before God, He will not have a scale, weighing our good actions against our bad, he will look into our hearts and say either, You had faith in my son...or you didn't. There are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many other issues that I even question. But when you get RIGHT down to it, God provided such a gracious way for us to escape hell...

I agree that if the God of the Bible were true, He'd absolutely be the one who makes the rules. Of course that, in no way, changes how I feel about the concept of Hell.

So I'll have to disagree with the statement "He made it pretty easy to deal with," as far as mankind is concerned. It's as simple as accepting Jesus as our Lord and Savior, at least to a lot of popular denominations. But is that easy for someone who is unconvinced of the veracity of the story? It's basically framed like Morpheus offering the red or the blue pill. It's easy to make a choice. The pill to devote your life to Christ or the pill to turn your back on Him. What I'm saying is I can't actually accept a pill/choice from someone I believe to be merely a fictional character from a story. I don't see it as making a choice at all. To put it simply, I do not find it easy to believe something with insufficient evidence. I find punishment for honestly coming to conclusions using the faculties I was given repugnant.

Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as "The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Does that mean blind faith, not at all. First, look at the world all around us, the creation, the planet, it is AMAZING, only someone of intelligent design could have made a world so wondrous. Then we have the Holy Spirit, while He is not tangibly visible, there is no deny that He exist and lives in me and through me. Faith is believing who Christ is and what He did...

Thanks. I find that is one of those words that has a lot of different definitions depending on context or who you are speaking with. I feel like you look at the world and have no choice but to believe, and that makes sense to me. If we are honest, we admit that we can only actually believe things of which we are convinced. If you are using the word like "confidence" or "trust" then you understand that a prerequisite to faith (as you define it) is evidence of some sort. And I can't simply choose to have faith without first being at least somewhat convinced. I wish the "look at the trees"/"watchmaker" argument was as convincing for me as it is for you, but it's not. And while I honestly seek truth with just as much fervor as anyone else and come to my current conclusion, according to the Bible as I understand it, I would be doomed Hell. That just seems like a horrible reason to punish someone for eternity.

Side note: I understand that a lot of Christians have different understandings of Hell and, of course, my reply would be different depending on a different definition of Hell.

 

[DarthNeo]

I agree that if the God of the Bible were true, He'd absolutely be the one who makes the rules. Of course that, in no way, changes how I feel about the concept of Hell.

So I'll have to disagree with the statement "He made it pretty easy to deal with," as far as mankind is concerned. It's as simple as accepting Jesus as our Lord and Savior, at least to a lot of popular denominations. But is that easy for someone who is unconvinced of the veracity of the story? It's basically framed like Morpheus offering the red or the blue pill. It's easy to make a choice. The pill to devote your life to Christ or the pill to turn your back on Him. What I'm saying is I can't actually accept a pill/choice from someone I believe to be merely a fictional character from a story. I don't see it as making a choice at all. To put it simply, I do not find it easy to believe something with insufficient evidence. I find punishment for honestly coming to conclusions using the faculties I was given repugnant.



Thanks. I find that is one of those words that has a lot of different definitions depending on context or who you are speaking with. I feel like you look at the world and have no choice but to believe, and that makes sense to me. If we are honest, we admit that we can only actually believe things of which we are convinced. If you are using the word like "confidence" or "trust" then you understand that a prerequisite to faith (as you define it) is evidence of some sort. And I can't simply choose to have faith without first being at least somewhat convinced. I wish the "look at the trees"/"watchmaker" argument was as convincing for me as it is for you, but it's not. And while I honestly seek truth with just as much fervor as anyone else and come to my current conclusion, according to the Bible as I understand it, I would be doomed Hell. That just seems like a horrible reason to punish someone for eternity.

Side note: I understand that a lot of Christians have different understandings of Hell and, of course, my reply would be different depending on a different definition of Hell.

Let me ask you a question, do you believe in evolution?

 

[Gene Parmesan]

Let me ask you a question, do you believe in evolution?

I find the evidence for evolution to be convincing.

 

[DarthNeo]

I find the evidence for evolution to be convincing.

So, science requires observable evidence over time for anything to be true. Can you give me a specific example of change in kind, one species evolving into another?