Truth on the doctrine of Hell, the just reality of absolute eternal torment (updated verses)

[RickReads]

I'm not trying to prove anything. It's just food for thought.

I would like it better if you proved it. I love it when someone is able to school me.

 

[ozso]

I would like it better if you proved it. I love it when someone is able to school me.

Sorry but I'm not a teacher and I'm not firmly convinced enough that way of interpreting scripture is correct.

 

[RickReads]

Sorry but I'm not a teacher and I'm not firmly convinced enough that way of interpreting scripture is correct.

My brother, I love theory as well so long as it is understood as such. You never know if I could possibly present something that would strengthen your position. It's happened with me before.

 

[Cockcrow]

We never knew so many that believe different can all be right huh Oh then its "not me its you that's wrong" praise God. Add to all this God you know a spirit that is not like man nor thinks like man. There is a place all the fallen angles will go to "hell" that was its already done made for them. There is no redemption for them that is only for man that listen to a lie and is blind so there is no sin. Same as Israel if Christ had not come and spoke they would have no sin..to late.

We seem to think we are much better higher then the angels that fell. That loving God gave them no 2nd changes see they walked with Him in all His glory power and knew HIm. So they knew what why they left. I can't say that for every angel.. we don't know. Now to think there is no MAN that knows GOD knows not guess not wonder no doubt knows Jesus Christ is the only way yet does NOT want Him. Like people on this forum that do not believe in Jesus..yet now they can't say anything they have no excuses after this. Same with this world.. at some point every one gets a choice.

This thing is so real that the one true GOD came to this earth became His creation to save it! So I believe most will be saved well Rev tell us about all those people from every tribe and nation no man could number. Make no mistake we get no say in this as in hell is real or no its not. Your personal truth my personal truth is not the word God. God will not be asking us about this. We are told to share Christ to the world to ever thing in creation period. Not here to offend if so forgive me

Humans are made in Gods image, angels are not, the Bible says that we will judge the angels, how can we not be higher than them in Gods eyes?

Jesus preached about hell that is Gods word and what he says, eternal torment, worm dieth not, which was prophesied in Isaiah, that is not my personal truth, that is the truth of God. Jesus is the truth if you believe his words then you believe the truth, if you believe anyone else then that is not the truth. Jesus said few will be saved, narrow is the way. we can't take the parts of the Bible that we like and reject the parts we don't like (Hell, sin) it's either all true or none of it is true.

 

[TedT]

Sheol (Hebrew) Old Testament and Hades (Greek) New Testament are basically the two words, both meaning grave or gravedom.

ImCo:
Sheol is the place of the dead waiting for judgment. The Greek counterpart is Hades and the old English is hell refer to the place of the waiting dead. The common modern use of the word hell to refer to the palace of final retribution, the outer darkness, has muddled these ancient connotations.

I accept that Sheol is NOT THE GRAVE, as a cursory study shows... There is too much evidence to put it all here so I'll post one url of so many that will provide what is being missed:

Hell, Sheol, Hades, Paradise, and the Grave at
Hell, Sheol, Hades, Paradise, and the Grave

Hades is the New Testament equivalent of the Old Testament word Sheol. The Greek and Hebrew words speak of the same place, the present Hell. However, this is problematic because Sheol has been translated "grave" as often as it has "hell" and some have mistakenly taught that Sheol and Hades are only references to the grave rather than Hell. This erroneous teaching leads to the denial of the existence of an immediate or present Hell. The false doctrine of soul-sleep, and other ideas that teach the unconscious state of the dead between death and resurrection, spring from this error.

The common word for "grave" in the Old Testament is queber. Of the sixty-four times it is used, it is translated "grave" thirty-four times, "sepulcher" twenty-six times, and "burying place" four times. Queber is used five additional times as part of a place name, Kibroth-hattaavah, which means "graves of lust." As we said earlier, Sheol is found sixty-four times, being rendered "grave" thirty-one times, "hell" thirty-one times, and "pit" three times.

A comparison of how Sheol and queber are used reveals eight points of contrast that tell us that they are not the same thing.

1. Sheol is never used in plural form. Queber is used in the plural 29 times.

2. It is never said that the body goes to Sheol. Queber speaks of the body going there 37 times.

3. Sheol is never said to be located on the face of the earth. Queber is mentioned 32 times as being located on the earth.

4. An individual's Sheol is never mentioned. An individual's queber is mentioned 5 times.

5. Man is never said to put anyone into Sheol. Individuals are put into a queber by man (33 times).

6. Man is never said to have dug or fashioned a Sheol. Man is said to have dug, or fashioned, a queber (6 times).

7. Man is never said to have touched Sheol. Man touches, or can touch, a queber (5 times).

8. It is never said that man is able to possess a Sheol. Man is spoken of as being able to possess a queber (7 times). (These eight points of comparison are adapted from "Life and Death" by Caleb J. Baker, Bible Institute Colportage Ass'n, 1941).

From the differences between how Sheol and queber are used in Scripture, it is obvious that they are not the same thing. The Greek word Hades in the New Testament would fit into the Sheol column of our chart, strongly indicating that it is the same thing as Sheol. Hades is used eleven times, being rendered Hell ten times and grave once.

ibid:
While we have not exhausted the subject by looking at every passage that Sheol is found in, it is clear from these examples that Sheol is not simply the grave but is located at the center of the earth and is the abode of the souls of the unrighteous dead who are awaiting their resurrection unto condemnation. It is equally clear that those in Sheol/Hades are not in an unconscious state of existence but are quite aware of what is going on around them. There is memory, recognition, and communication there.

PARADISE
While Paradise is not now a part of Sheol/Hades it will be mentioned here because it was located in Sheol/Hades at one time. Before the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ everybody who died went to Sheol/Hades, which was at that time divided into at least two compartments. One was a place of torment while the other was a place of blessing, which was referred to as Abraham's Bosom (Luke 16:22-25).

Christ's soul was in Sheol/Hades between His death and resurrection. The place where Christ's soul went between His death and resurrection is also called paradise (Luke 23:43).

 

[Der Alte]

Yes, there is a good reason why Gehenna is mostly mentioned in the Gospel of Matthew, which is written for the Jews and the second death is mentioned in Rev 2:11 addressing the church of Smyrna, which existed among Jews and was persecuted by them.

Don't know if you are aware of this but contrary to what one might read online there was never a burning trash dump in Ge Hinnom/Gehenna valley. There was indeed a trash dump in a valley near Jerusalem but it was not in Gehinnom/Gehenna it was one valley over in the Kidron valley.

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...Articles/BSac-NT/Scharen-GenenaSyn-Pt1-BS.htm​

= = = =
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.
...
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 the 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.
https://www.researchgate.net/public...udy_of_the_City-Dump_of_Early_Roman_Jerusalem
Jerusalem’s Garbage

The Myth of the Burning Garbage Dump of Gehenna – BiblePlaces.com

 

[Der Alte]

@TedT
¢¢Below are quotes from three credible Jewish sources; the 1917 Jewish Encyclopedia, 1972 Encyclopedia Judaica and the Talmud. Which to date have not been, and I am convinced cannot be, refuted.
= = = = =
…..It is very enticing to claim that the Christian concept of "Hell" was somehow derived from Dante's 14th century writing “Inferno,” or some later writing. But according to these three sources, at least 16 centuries before Dante even scribbled one line, among the יהודים/Yehudim/ιουδαιων/Youdaion/Jews in Israel, before and during the time of Jesus, there was a significant belief in a place of everlasting torment of the wicked and they called it both sheol and gehinnom. Sheol and gehinnom are written Hades and Gehenna, respectively, in both the 225 BC LXX and the NT. As can be seen by the citations in this post The Jews later called both Sheol/Hades, and Ge Hinnom/Gehenna, “Hell.
…..There were different factions within Judaism; Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes etc. and different beliefs about resurrection, hell etc. These differing beliefs do not disprove anything in this post.

[1]1925 Jewish Encyclopedia, Gehenna
The place where children were sacrificed to the god Moloch … in the "valley of the sons 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);[“Soon” in this paragraph would be about 700 BC +/-, DA]​

Note: This is according to the ancient Jews, long before the Christian era, NOT any assumed/alleged bias of “modern” Christian translators. DA
…..This refutes the false narrative that the fifteen [15] times Jesus mentioned “Gehenna” He was referring to the valley of GeHinnom/Gehenna where trash and bodies were supposedly always burning.

”(I)n general …sinners go to hell immediately after their death. The famous teacher Johanan b. Zakkai [30 BC-90 AD] 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 [Talmud]. 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).[Talmud] “When Nebuchadnezzar descended into hell, [שאול/Sheol] all its inhabitants were afraid that he was coming to rule over them (Shab. 149a; [Talmud] 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)[Talmud].
Link: Jewish Encyclopedia Online
Note, scripture references are highlighted in blue.
= = = = = = = = = =
[2]1972 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.
Link:
Gehinnom
http://www.jevzajcg.me/enciklopedia/Encyclopaedia Judaica, v. 07 (Fey-Gor).pdf
= = = = = = = = = =
[3]Talmud -Tractate Rosh Hashanah Chapter 1.
The school of Hillel says: . . . but as for Minim, [i.e. 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 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 [Γέεννα/gehenna] where the fire is not quenched and the worm does not die, 3 times 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 [A fate worse than death. DA]
• “Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven. …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 [A fate worse than death]
• “But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable in that day for Sodom, than for that city.” Luke 10:12 [A fate worse than death. DA]​

…..These teachings tacitly reaffirmed and sanctioned a then existing significant Jewish view of eternal hell, c.f. Jewish Encyclopedia, Encyclopedia Judaica and Talmud, supra.
In Matt. 18:6, 26:24 and Luk 10:12, see above, Jesus teaches that there is a punishment worse 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. [A fate worse than death. DA]​

…..“how much sorer punishment,””Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord,””It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” these deprecations certainly do not sound like everyone will be saved, no matter what.
…..Jesus is quoted as using the word death 17 times in the gospels, if He intended to say eternal death, in Matt 25:46, that is what He would have said but He didn’t, He said “eternal punishment.”
….The Sadducees did not believe in the resurrection, see Acts of the Apostles 23:8. They knew that everybody died; rich, poor; young, old; good, bad; men, women; children, infants; sick, healthy, and knew that it was permanent and often it did not involve punishment.
When Jesus taught, e.g., “eternal punishment” the Sadducees would not have understood it as simply death, it very likely would have meant something worse to them.
…..Re: Matt 25:46 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 attended Temple and synagogues for about 25 years +/-. He undoubtedly knew what the Jews believed about the fate of the unrighteous. He opposed the Jewish leaders many times, If the Jewish teaching on hell was wrong, why wouldn’t Jesus tell them there was no hell, no eternal punishment etc? Why would Jesus teach “eternal punishment,” etc. to Jews who believed, e.g.

"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"[/i] ([Judith xvi:17]Judith xvi. 17).
Link: Judith, CHAPTER 16​

 

[Fervent]

My motive is not to demean anyone, just saying it took me a while to learn that we should not take everything in the Bible so literally. I think Paul may have summed it up when he said we need to get to solid food rather than remain on spiritual milk.

If the Bible is not to be taken literally, then we have no objective basis for understanding our faith and may as well just be making the whole thing up as divorcing it from being literal is to say it has no real meaning. The problem is that a wooden definition of literal is often used that does not allow for the literature to determine the literal intent. There is polemic, rhetoric, hyperbole, metaphor, allusion, and all sorts of other ways language is used in the Bible that must be accounted for when deriving a literal interpretation but abandoning that the Bible is literal is to place yourself as its judge creating meaning rather than discovering it.

 

[Der Alte]

If the Bible is not to be taken literally, then we have no objective basis for understanding our faith and may as well just be making the whole thing up as divorcing it from being literal is to say it has no real meaning. The problem is that a wooden definition of literal is often used that does not allow for the literature to determine the literal intent. There is polemic, rhetoric, hyperbole, metaphor, allusion, and all sorts of other ways language is used in the Bible that must be accounted for when deriving a literal interpretation but abandoning that the Bible is literal is to place yourself as its judge creating meaning rather than discovering it.

There is an old maxim about translating the Bible. If the plain sense makes good sense it is nonsense to seek any other sense.

 

[Fervent]

There is an old maxim about translating the Bible. If the plain sense makes good sense it is nonsense to seek any other sense.

That seems like good advice, but I think it falls apart on further inspection since no statement is made in a vacuum and often the context informing the "plain sense" is more heavily informed by our backgrounds than the text itself.

 

[DavidPT]

How could you torment someone who was burning?

Why would you ask something like that? As if someone who is literally burning, that they are not being tormented while they are still conscious? If you were to stick your hand in a raging fire, you would not feel any torment at the time? What we need to keep in mind here, the unsaved are raised bodily and then cast into the LOF bodily. And clearly the fire they are cast into, it is literal fire, which means, since they would be in a body at the time, they would be in torment beyond belief. But, for forever, though? I don't tend to think so when there are passages such as Matthew 10:28.

Matthew 10:28 And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.


Some will argue that there is no such thing as killing the soul, that the soul is immortal, thus impossible to kill it. So why did Jesus even bring it up then if there is no such thing? He also brought up killing the body. Does that mean there is no such thing as that either? Wouldn't it be cherry picking to take His mentioning of the killing of the body literal, while interpreting His mentioning of killing the soul as not literal? This verse says, while man has the ability to kill the body, man doesn't also have the ability to kill the soul. If man can kill the body, and that, God can kill the body, but man can't kill the soul, and neither can God, this means man can do everything God can do, and that, God can't even do something man can't do, kill the soul.

 

[Hmm]

Wouldn't it be cherry picking to take His mentioning of the killing of the body literal, while interpreting His mentioning of killing the soul as not literal?

Why should it be? Are you cherry picking when you take His claim to be the Messiah literally while taking His claim to be a door not literally (I'm assuming you don't think He was made of wood)?

 

[DavidPT]

Why should it be? Are you cherry picking when you take His claim to be the Messiah literally while taking His claim to be a door not literally (I'm assuming you don't think He was made of wood)?

If the unsaved are in bodies when they are cast into the LOF, and that the fire is literal, except there is no such thing as the killing of the soul, what should we be concluding then? That the fire eventually destroys the body, as if the body had not existed, but, since there is no such thing as killing the soul, the soul remains in torment forever and ever in literal flames of fire? Or should we be concluding the body is never destroyed, as if it had not existed, and that both body and soul are being tormented forever without end in literal flames of fire? Or should we be concluding something else altogether? And if yes, what do you propose that would be?

 

[Hmm]

If the unsaved are in bodies when they are cast into the LOF, and that the fire is literal, except there is no such thing as the killing of the soul, what should we be concluding then? That the fire eventually destroys the body, as if the body had not existed, but, since there is no such thing as killing the soul, the soul remains in torment forever and ever in literal flames of fire? Or should we be concluding the body is never destroyed, as if it had not existed, and that both body and soul are being tormented forever without end in literal flames of fire? Or should we be concluding something else altogether? And if yes, what do you propose that would be?

But the fire is not literal so any guess I could give would have no actual meaning.

 

[DavidPT]

But the fire is not literal so any guess I could give would have no actual meaning.

What reasons are there to believe it might not be literal, when there are passages such as the following?

Luke 16:24 And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.

Matthew 7:19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.

Matthew 13:42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 13:40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.

Matthew 13:50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

Hebrews 6:8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

Revelation 20:15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

 

[RickReads]

What reasons are there to believe it might not be literal, when there are passages such as the following?

Luke 16:24 And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.

Matthew 7:19 Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.

Matthew 13:42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 13:40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.

Matthew 13:50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 25:41 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels:

Hebrews 6:8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

Revelation 20:15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

The Bible indicates that some people are judged more harshly than others so it is not a one fire fits all type of thing. Makes the theory that the fire is a metaphor have some credibility.

 

[DavidPT]

The Bible indicates that some people are judged more harshly than others so it is not a one fire fits all type of thing. Makes the theory that the fire is a metaphor have some credibility.

Personally, I prefer that the fire is a metaphor rather than literal. So it's not like I want the fire to be literal, it's just that all these passages lead me to believe it likely is. But then again, you make a good point here about how some ppl are judged more harshly than others. And like you pointed out, that tends to make the theory that the fire is a metaphor have some credibility. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. I'm not certain yet.

 

[RickReads]

Personally, I prefer that the fire is a metaphor rather than literal. So it's not like I want the fire to be literal, it's just that all these passages lead me to believe it likely is. But then again, you make a good point here about how some ppl are judged more harshly than others. And like you pointed out, that tends to make the theory that the fire is a metaphor have some credibility. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. I'm not certain yet.

Whatever it is I`m sure it will horrible enough to satisfy everybody. I want no part of it or in it.