There is no Hell?

[gord44]

2 Tim 3:16
All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching the truth, rebuking error, correcting faults, and giving instruction for right living.

Hebrews 4:12
The word of God (Bible) is alive and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It cuts all the way through, to where soul and spirit meet, to where joints and marrow come together. It judges the desires and thoughts of the heart.

Both Hebrews and 2 Tim were written before the Christian Bible was even an idea. So they aren't talking about the bible (OT and NT together), despite someone adding bible in parenthesis in the Hebrew 4:12 passage.

 

[smaneck]

Hell


by Matt Slick

Oh, please. If we wanted to hear from Matt Slick, we would go over to CARM one of the most hateful forums on the internet.

 

[smaneck]

Ecc. 9:5 For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.

Seems to me that if this verse is true the false teaching of a burning everlasting hell is not true.

I've never quite understood how that book ended up in the Tanakh.

 

[smaneck]

Both Hebrews and 2 Tim were written before the Christian Bible was even an idea. So they aren't talking about the bible (OT and NT together), despite someone adding bible in parenthesis in the Hebrew 4:12 passage.

Ah, come on now. Why couldn't they be referring to the Qur'an?

 

[BruceDLimber]

Is Hell Eternal?

According to the Baha'i scriptures it need not be:


[continued]
"...It is even possible that the condition of those who have died in sin and unbelief may become changed - that is to say, they may become the object of pardon through the bounty of God, not through His justice - for bounty is giving without desert, and justice is giving what is deserved. As we have power to pray for these souls here, so likewise we shall possess the same power in the other world, which is the Kingdom of God. Are not all the people in that world the creatures of God? Therefore, in that world also they can make progress. As here they can receive light by their supplications, there also they can plead for forgiveness and receive light through entreaties and supplications. Thus as souls in this world, through the help of the supplications, the entreaties and the prayers of the holy ones, can acquire development, so is it the same after death. Through their own prayers and supplications they can also progress, more especially when they are the object of the intercession of the Holy Manifestations."
−(Some Answered Questions, Page 232)

Thus God, in His infinite Love and Mercy, assists even those in the worst sort of hell (separation from God) eventually to draw spiritually near to Him (the definition of Heaven)!

Peace,

Bruce

 

[TDickensheets]

BIBLE: Hell is real, hot & eternal.

a. God promises punishment to the wicked - Rom 2:6-11
(1) Everlasting fire - Matt 25:41
(2) Either everlasting punishment or life eternal - Matt 25:46
(3) Those not written in the Book of Life will cast into the second death where "they will be tormented day or night forever and ever" - Rev 20:14-15, 10
(4) Wicked tormented with fire & brimstone & "have no rest day or night" - Rev 14:10-11
(5) God lives "forever and ever" (Rev 4:9); Torment is "forever and ever" (Rev 20:10)
b. Jesus spoke of hell more than anyone else in the Bible (gehenna, 11 of 12 times by Jesus)
(1) Place of unquenchable fire - Mark 9:43-48
(2) Greater destruction than the death of the body - Matt 10:28

 

[Rajni]

For the first 6,000 years, humans believed hell is below the soil and heaven is above the clouds. Now, hell's definition is refined as a place without God and heaven is refined as a place with God's presence. But, God is everywhere! So does that mean we don't need to follow the scriptures and still be in heaven when we died?

If I'm not mistaken, there's a branch of Christianity (is it Eastern Orthodox?) that teaches that heaven and hell are the same place. The difference lies in how the inhabitants experience it. Those who love God will, naturally, be tickled pink to be there. Those who don't (yet) will be less than thrilled.

I personally don't believe in eternal torment after death, nor do I believe in annihilation. Both of those solutions sound an awful lot like man-made ones. Since God's ways are said to be higher than our ways, His solutions are likely to be higher as well; eternal torment and/or annihilation seem like lower ways unworthy of Divinity. Like something mankind dreamed up, most likely for controlling the masses.

 

[MehGuy]

Yes, hell is real. I've been there.

I have photographic proof too, and will be posting some pictures here shortly.

 

[Jane_the_Bane]

2 Tim 3:16
All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching the truth, rebuking error, correcting faults, and giving instruction for right living.

Hebrews 4:12
The word of God (Bible) is alive and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It cuts all the way through, to where soul and spirit meet, to where joints and marrow come together. It judges the desires and thoughts of the heart.

Discounting all questions of authorship, these epistles were written in response to the question of whether Christians ought to discontinue reading the Hebrew scriptures. Most books of the New Testament were not even written at the time, and an official canon was even further removed.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Hell


by Matt Slick

Ah, good ol' Matt Slick. The self-appointed judge of all Christendom, and all and any who don't subscribe to his narrow, particular brand of Reformed/Evangelical/Fundamentalist theology are non-Christian heretics.

You'll pardon me as I don't consider him particularly noteworthy as an authority on Scripture or Christian Theology.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[MehGuy]

Yeah, especially with a name like "Matt Slick".

Lol, doesn't sound like a trustworthy fellow.

... seriously, is that a real name?

 

[Rajni]

2 Tim 3:16
All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching the truth, rebuking error, correcting faults, and giving instruction for right living.

Technically, everything is God-breathed, at least in my estimation, as one who believes He made everything.


-

 

[dlamberth]

Technically, everything is God-breathed, at least in my estimation, as one who believes He made everything.

I tend to take it a step further. I believe that not only did God make everything but that God IS everything. The Breath of God runs through all there is, both the seen and unseen. Thus, there is no room for Hell.



.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Yeah, especially with a name like "Matt Slick".

Lol, doesn't sound like a trustworthy fellow.

... seriously, is that a real name?

Yessir. Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In my younger days (read: late 90's) I used to frequent CARM pretty often. Not the forums (I don't know if there were forums back then), just the apologetics stuff. At the time I don't think I even paid attention to who ran it, as such I only heard of Matt Slick many years after I stopped bothering with CARM. There's a number of posters who frequent here on CF who have their stories concerning the CARM forums, usually along the lines that if you don't toe the line, you get your Christian icon taken from you and you're forbidden from the Christians-only area of CARM. Though, that's only what I've heard, I've never actually partaken of their forums over there.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Timothew]

Mod Hat

Thread has been cleaned.

Hello Red

 

[smaneck]

Ah, good ol' Matt Slick. The self-appointed judge of all Christendom, and all and any who don't subscribe to his narrow, particular brand of Reformed/Evangelical/Fundamentalist theology are non-Christian heretics.

Not just heretics, reprobates who have been foreordained to hell.

Matt Slick is a Calvinist.

 

[ViaCrucis]

Not just heretics, reprobates who have been foreordained to hell.

Matt Slick is a Calvinist.

While, as a Lutheran, I have plenty of theological beef with Calvinism (well, the entire Reformed tradition broadly really); but I think there's an idea that floats around where Calvinism is a basically a four letter word for scoundrel. I think, generally, what most people find repulsive about Calvinism is probably certain forms of Calvinism, rather than Calvinism entirely.

Karl Barth, the Swiss Reformed theologian of the early part of the 20th century who wrote most of the Theological Declaration of Barmen, was a Calvinist; but he's hardly a would-be villainous sort.

I think it's safe to say that the average Calvinist out there in (for example) Presbyterian land probably doesn't go around systematically acting as judge and jury of the entire Christian world (or, of the world generally).

-CryptoLutheran

 

[dlamberth]

I think it's safe to say that the average Calvinist out there in (for example) Presbyterian land probably doesn't go around systematically acting as judge and jury of the entire Christian world (or, of the world generally).

You wouldn't know it by the Calvinist that pop up here periodically.

.

 

[smaneck]

While, as a Lutheran, I have plenty of theological beef with Calvinism (well, the entire Reformed tradition broadly really); but I think there's an idea that floats around where Calvinism is a basically a four letter word for scoundrel. I think, generally, what most people find repulsive about Calvinism is probably certain forms of Calvinism, rather than Calvinism entirely.

Mind you, I think more highly of John Calvin than I do with Calvinists. In the US Calvinism tends to be associated with the most obnoxious from of fundamentalism, namely Christian Reconstructionalism.

 

[Rationalt]

I find the Calvinist take on NT is more literal than any other denomination.I view their interpretation as brutally honest.