According to a friend with an evangelical background (specifically The Plain Truth operation), the saved were granted eternal life, while the damned were thrown into a lake of fire. The implication was that hell is not eternal.
My mainline Protestant church that I attended while growing up seemed to believe that hell was forever. Indeed, it didn’t occur to me to consider other possibilities.
Questions:
Q1: Which churches believe what regarding hell’s duration?
Q2: What is the scriptural basis for these various beliefs?
Q3: Where does limbo fit in? (I was exposed to this concept through the words and diagrams of the artist and scholar known as Jack Chick.)
Q4: What did Jesus’ contemporaries and immediate successors believe?
Q5: What did Dante believe regarding limbo and hell’s duration?
My next post will contain references from previous threads and contemporary googles.
On Q1: Here’s one Catholic position: “Seventh-Day Adventists (SDAs) and other Protestant fringe groups claim that hell is not permanent. They believe that, in the end, all the wicked people and demons, incl. Satan, will be destroyed by God and cease to exist. Catholicism, and most of “mainline” Protestantism, however, teach that hell is a state of unending torment for the wicked, those who rejected God.”
All emphasis will be added. Some emphasis will be taken away:
Nice background. I seeing substantiation for hell=bad, but not hell=forever though.
Everlasting punishment: now we’re getting somewhere!
Q2 and Q4:
From the Catholic site above comes some choice New Testament quotes:
Er. That seems pretty conclusive: hell’s punishment is everlasting. What do the “temporary hell” theologians say in response? (The Catholic site gives some indication, but I’d like a less partisan view.)
First off, Christianity is false. Any religion that uses fear as a motivator has major issues. Which is not to say that the NT has no value or that Jesus the real man had some excellent teachings.
Two, when you die there is an Afterlife. If you have been an evil bastard in life you will go to a place that matches your vibrations. This isn’t an eternal hell; you can change and eventually work your way up to a place of high vibrations.
Three, if you choose to take Xianity seriously anyway, all those translations in the NT that seem to indicate an eternal hell are hotly disputed (pun intended).
----- First off, Christianity is false. Any religion that uses fear as a motivator has major issues.
I don’t see how the first sentence follows from the second.
------ Two, when you die there is an Afterlife. If you have been an evil bastard in life you will go to a place that matches your vibrations. This isn’t an eternal hell; you can change and eventually work your way up to a place of high vibrations.
Ok, but this empirical agnostic sees no direct evidence for such contentions.
------- …all those translations in the NT that seem to indicate an eternal hell are hotly disputed (pun intended).
Presumably. This thread provides a forum to evaluate such translations.
We had a merry donnybrook on this topic, last Summer, including a lot of back-and-forth on whether the punishment of hell was eternal or whether the fires of hell were eternal and the souls cast into those fires were destroyed immediately, after a year, or after some indeterminate period: Is there Biblical support for the concept of Hell?.
I don’t recall that we determined which groups believed which versions.
More recently, we tackled Limbo in Limbo…A Kinder, Gentler Gawd?. (If you don’t want to slog through the whole thread, I will point out that Limbo was always the specualtion of theologians and that the Catholic Church has never taught that Limbo was real–although any number of less well-informed Catholic teachers have done so.
Which is almost every religion.
But as for the Op; having been raised in the evil crooked cult that started the Plain Truth I could go on & on about their beliefs. I finally wised up and ran like a mother fucker from it in 1990. Also in the past 10+ years their doctrin has changed significantly. So I can’t say what they believe any more. But at the time I was there the World Wide Church of God preached that one would be thrown into the lake of fire and burn up and simply cease to exist, not be burned forever & ever & ever.
I remember 3 hour sermons (NO SHIT! 3 HOURS!:eek: ) about how there was no hell, only the L.O.F., blah blah blah.
What really got me was one minister who questioned what kind of fuel source god could make that could burn for many, many years.
What? Like the sun?:rolleyes:
And I thought God was all powerful.:dubious: What’s so hard about keeping a big bonfire going?
The Catholic Church, most historic Protestant churches, the Eastern Orthodox Church and most Evangelical/Fundamentalist/Charismatic/Pentecostal churches officially teach eternal conscious damnation in Hell (the relationship of Hades/Sheol. Gehenna & the Lake of Fire are debated). So does the Latter-Day Saints’ Church but it also believes very few will end up there.
Seventh-Day Adventism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, all Armstrong-based groups (Worldwide Church of God & its various derivatives, which includes the friend of the OP), many Sabbath-keeping groups and a good portion of the Anglican Church teaches the eventual extinction of the incorrigibly wicked.
The Greek word that is translated “eternal” or “everlasting” is “aionian”, which means literally “aion-lasting”, tho it may carry the inference of “ongoing”, so it’s not an airtight case.
I’d always assumed (at least id never previosuly considered the question) that the various gods of the major religeons were not limited by the laws of physics and so forth, in as much as they created them but by no means had to follow them themselves (which in terms lead lateral thinkers to consider that these laws could perhaps be bypassed by humans too if they only knew how).
another way to question it, how could he make sure the pain was everlasting, afterall, as with all sensations, the more you get that sensation the less potent it feels. after the first few weeks of being burnt surely you would have aclimatised somewhat to the pain and perhaps even be getting rather bored.
I understand; I was merely commenting on the non-eternal nature of stars, even though they might seem long-lasting from our relatively brief mortal POV.
I think all bets are off here; hell is by definition the worst possible torment; the mechanism of torment is secondary to that fact. As you say, the laws of physics are simply set aside if they don’t fit the narrative.
As I was led to understand it Hell was the separation from God (all good) so it was an emotional burning,but yet it doesn’t give reason as to why Satan and his angels do not seem to be suffering, but have pleasure in getting souls away from God. Hard concept for me to accept.
I don’t know if you are just asking about Christian churches or not. If not, then no. In Zoroastrianism hell only lasts for 3 days (I think it is 3 days) at the end of the world and is meant to purify the impure souls who were sent there.
While looking it up I found this site which is a little interesting.
For many ancient Christians, Hell was the same “place” as Heaven: living in the presence of God and directly experiencing God’s love. Whether this was experienced as pleasure or torment depended on one’s disposition towards God.
Most Christian groups teach that Hell is eternal. Some, however, believe that Hell is only temporary, and that souls in Hell cease to exist after serving their time there, and others believe there is no conscious Hell at all but the word refers to the decay of Earthly remains in the ground. Both these beliefs are called annihilationism. Others believe that after serving their time in Hell all souls are reconciled to God and admitted to heaven, or ways are found at the time of death of drawing all souls to repentance so that Hell is never experienced. Both these beliefs are called universalism.
The Universalism view: Hell is eternal, but it’s a room for one: Satan. God loves all of his children, even the unrepentant, and has no interest in seeing them suffer. If they will not allow themselves to be forgiven and welcomed into God’s graces, they simply will cease to be - painlessly…which oddly shares a lot in common with what people who don’t believe in an afterlife see happening to themselves.
Actually, many Universalists would also admit Satan (some interesting theories about him/it in Unie circles), and also will not admit that anyone can permanently refuse God’s grace, to the point of denying ultimate free will.
Personally, I very much doubt that God would destroy one his beloved children (us). He might put us through some trouble. He might not help us when we screw up, forcing us to work our way out of it. But I very much doubt He’ll just smack you and unmake. He made you for a reason.
But He won’t go where He is not wanted. tell Him to get lost, and I believe He’ll let you be. Invite Him in, and He’s got plans greater than you can comprehend.
Personally, I suspect that there are some souls who degrade themselves such that they will simply never accept God. Their choice, foolish though it is. Some people just can’t accept others. Perhaps more sad, in their own way, are those who would like to invite God in, but would prefer if He sort of kept off to the corner a bit and didn’t interfere. They wanted the benefits without actually paying the price.
Is it possible for them to be redeemed? I don’t know. The possibility you see, is up the them. But I take heart from the hope. Hell is eternal, I’m sure - but will it always be Hell is the question. nevertheless, I see that Eternity is sundered between the endless domains of the Lord and the foul prison the rebels have crafted for themselves.
