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I Hate Hell
- 04/11/11
- 62
God has put eternity into man’s heart (Ecclesiastes 3:11). The knowledge that there is more to this world than what we see seems to be innate in human nature. it seems God has so wired us that we know there is life beyond the here and now. Every religion acknowledges something beyond, something outside of ourselves. There is something to come. But far more people acknowledge heaven than hell. Though the majority of people believe there is a heaven, very few believe in hell. Even fewer believe they will ever be in hell.
Yet our hearts continue to tell us that there is life and death beyond the grave. Life offers us many hints of what is to come. John Blanchard says, "The judgments of God fall often enough in this world to let us know that God judges, but seldom enough to let us know that there must be a judgment to come." We see God's judgments in this world often enough to know that God does judge sin and that he is provoked against evil. Yet the scarcity of judgment shows us that there must be more. If God is a judge he must judge all sin, not just some sin. And so we know that more judgment is coming. It must come. And really, we want it to come—we just don’t want it to come against us. None of us want Hitler to escape some sort of greater judgment, some kind of greater consequence for what he did before taking his own life. Surely a man cannot do all that Hitler did and then escape judgment. What kind of world would that be?
In the aftermath of Rob Bell’s book Love Wins there has been a lot of discussion about hell. I believe in hell—a hell of judgment and torment. But through all of this discussion I have been convicted that I do not believe in this hell strongly enough. It seems unavoidable to me that if I truly believe in this hell, it will have a greater impact on my life and faith. A hell of conscious eternal torment is not the kind of doctrine I can believe in and then just go on my way unaffected. Either I genuinely believe it and it will deeply affect my life, or I pay lip service to it and allow it to make very little difference to me. I don’t see how I can believe it deeply and not have it radically impact my life.
I have been helped in understanding life after death by reading Edward Donnelly’s aptly-titled book Biblical Teaching on the Doctrines of Heaven and Hell. The first half of the book discusses hell in all its horror; the second part turns to heaven with all its glory. The first half is difficult to read and weighs heavily on the soul; the second is like a sip of cool water on a hot day. The first terrifies; the second elevates. Donnelly is not given to hyperbole or imagination. He does not present a fictionalized vision of hell that owes more to horror movies or medieval art and imaginings than to the Bible. Rather, he simply relates what the Bible tells us, both explicitly and implicitly, about this awful place. He does so under four alliterated headings: Absolute Poverty, Agonizing Pain, Angry Presence and Appalling Prospect.
The absolute poverty of hell is in its separation from God. All that people love and appreciate and enjoy in this life will be stripped away, not for a time, but forever. All that makes you who you are will be destroyed. "You, as a being, will become ever more degraded, more contemptible, more lonely... Everything good in you will be taken away, and everything bad in you let loose. All your evil passions will burn, increasing and consuming you until you become utterly foul... Nothing good, nothing worthwhile, a horrible monotonous dreariness, unenlivened by a single ray of light as you fester and stew in your loathsomeness. This is what will happen to you." This is complete, absolute poverty.
The agonizing pain of hell is the utter agony that will be in that place. "The undying worm is something foul, endlessly gnawing at hell's inhabitants, eating at them continually, giving them no rest. This probably refers to conscience." Imagine an eternity of a violated but re-sensitized conscience continually attacking, accusing and destroying. There will be weeping--an eternity of pouring out intense grief and anguish and intolerable misery. And there will be gnashing of teeth, perhaps a rage or insanity that will beset those in hell, and for good reason. And, of course, there will be unimaginable physical pain such that people will no doubt cry out for the comparable relief of the worst pain they knew in this life.
The angry presence is the presence not of Satan or of his minions, but of God. Many have been deluded into thinking that Satan will own and control hell, but the reality is that God is as present in hell as much as he is in heaven. People in hell will spend an eternity in the presence of God, but in the presence of his just wrath against sin. "Here is the ultimate horror of hell; not the absolute poverty, not even the agonizing pain but the angry presence of God." This ought to invoke a kind of terror, a primal fear.
And the appalling prospect is that all of this will never end. We all know the words of “Amazing Grace” where we sing "When we've been there ten thousand years / bright shining as the sun / we've no less days to sing God's praise / than when we've first begun." Just as those in heaven will be no further from the end when ten thousand years have elapsed, the same is true of people in hell. We cannot fully imagine eternity and thus cannot fully imagine what it would be like to suffer forever and ever and ever, age after endless age. Our minds cannot conceive, and I'm grateful for that limitation. I do not want to conceive because I think it would destroy me.
It is little wonder that I find the subject almost unbearably weighty. Just thinking seriously about it presses on my soul and presses upon my heart. I would far rather think about heaven and about the reward that awaits there for those who know and love the Lord. But it is good and healthy to think about hell. It would not be healthy to think about it too much or to have a long and deep-seating fascination with it. But because God has revealed to us that there is such a place and because he has seen fit to give us a glimpse of it, we must pay attention. We cannot ignore it just because we do not like it.
I hate hell. I hate that it exists and hate that it needs to exist. I'm amazed to realize that, when we are heaven, we will praise God for it and that we will glorify him for creating such a place and for condemning the unsaved to it. But for now I am too filled with pride, too filled with sin to even begin to justly and rightly rejoice in the existence of such a place of torment. I cannot rejoice in such a place; not yet. It is just too awful, too weighty. And I know that I deserve to be there.
I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at 
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Comments (62)
Tim,
I’ve been thinking something along the same lines. Thanks for the book, I’ll file it under my To Read list. ;-)
I’ve been thinking that if I really believe that Hell is such a terrible place, then why am I so scared to tell my neighbour who’s so close to going there; my relatives who still don’t know or need to be corrected; my co-workers who joke about it; or, worse yet, my co-workers who “like” Jesus, but don’t believe in the rest, or are members of false cults.
Thanks for another reminder to be praying for opportunities to witness. I hope we will all be bold as we take advantage of those opportunities that God gives us to show His Grace to others and mercy to all of us.
“I do not want to conceive because I think it would destroy me.”
That’s similiar to what John Stott said, I think.This is such a serious truth. Thanks for posting this. The only way to teach and share about hell is in the manner you have done here. Thanks again.
I believe in annihilationism, not eternal torment.
If hell actually exists, then please answer:
1. why is not preached by even one of the apostles? The book of Acts spans 30 years of ministry, yet nary a mention or even an insinuation… and this in a hellenistic culture that already believed in Hades. And in the epistles… Silence (yet death is constantly mentioned, like Rom. 6:23).
2. why is there no mention in the OT at all?
It’s because the 2 opposite and ultimate ends of man are not heaven and hell, but life and death.
Even in Rev 20 (and 21) John defines the “lake of fire” as the “second death”. John 3:16 tells us that the two opposite ends are either perishing (death) or eternal life.
Consider the implications: if hell exists, and the apostles failed to mention it even once, either they misunderstood Christ or they were misrepresenting the gospel.
Of course, what they grasped was Jesus’ parabolic language. There are 11 references to “hell” in the 3 gospels (none in John). Of those, He most often points to the dump outside Jerusalem (Gehenna), hence the references to burning and worms/maggots.
The two opposite ends of man are either life in the eternal kingdom of God finally established on the earth, or death (ie: lake of fire/destruction/Gehenna). Not heaven and hell.
Consider: the doctrine of hell has had more airplay in the last month than it did over 40 years of ministry during the early church times.
Thanks Tim for this very appropriately sobering article. I too do not live in the reality of the doctrine of Hell and it certainly does not motivate me to biblical evangelism as much as it should. Thanks again for your faithfulness in writing this. I hope that it will move my thoughts and actions as a believer to be more aligned with the truth of Hell.
Tim I wonder if we should hate something that God has created to glorify Himself? Maybe to hate the effects of you list, but to hate the fact that God punishes the wicked is akin to being wicked ourselves.
To any who respond: What are some scriptural references to God’s presence in hell?
“Even in Rev 20 (and 21) John defines the “lake of fire” as the “second death”.” -Paul
”.. and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.”
Pastor Donnelly preached the messages that this book is based on at two Reformed Baptist Family Conferences many years ago. The series on hell was particularly powerful and there are many who trace their conversion to those messages. You can still hear them in the sermon archives at grbc.net I remember hearing them in college and being truly gripped by a kind of preaching I had never heard before.
Please pray for pastor Donnelly - he is in poor health and is no longer able to preach.
This is tangential to the point, but it just occurred to me that all this fighting over Hell comes straight from…..Hell. (Poetically speaking — Milton did us a disservice in getting us to believe in Hell as the kingdom of the Evil One as opposed to his eternal execution chamber.)
Now, I am NOT saying that when someone writes a book that is widely appealing that undermines important scriptural doctrine, that we should just shut up about it. Certainly for the sake of the brethren these battles need to be joined.
I’m just saying that the fact of the controversy is just another example of hellishness, and that the one for whom Hell was made must be getting some kind of delight out of it all.
In response to Doc B’s question, the omnipresence of God tells us that he will be there but Rev.14v10 specifically says of the unbeliever, ” he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.”
I agree that hell is a reality but I don’t agree with the need to dwell on it and brood about it all day long. As horrific as hell may be, a relationship with God is a bigger and more important motivator than even this. When the rich man asked if Lazarus could warn his friends about hell but was told that this would be ineffective. If we do not believe and love God and choose him, then we will not avoid hell either.
Jeremy,
Not quite true. The rich man wasn’t told that warning about Hell would be ineffective, he was told that Moses and the Prophets said enough that adding another voice wouldn’t help.
That is, if you don’t believe the OT you won’t believe the NT.
Nothing there about the ineffectiveness of teaching Hell.
After all, Jesus said a lot more about Hell than he ever did about Heaven. Was he also ineffective?
Am I the only one OD’ing on Rob Bell references? Can we just blog without invoking his name or book title…
Don’t mistake me for a Bell supporter… I’ve just become oh so weary that his latest scrawl has become a yardstick by which to distance our theology.
Proposal: Let’s stick with the Bible as our criteria ^_^
This horror, this weight is should drive us to evangelize others. May God open our hearts to the reality of both heaven and hell more and more. We can’t keep quiet. Thanks so much for opening your heart and sharing.
Pastor Donnelly preached a total of 8 messages on Hell and Heaven at the Southeastern Reformed Baptist Family Conference in 1997 and 1999. Here they are, for anyone who’d like to hear them:
The Doctrine of Hell (1997): http://www.grbc.net/sermons/index.php?series=31
The Doctrine of Heaven (1999): http://www.grbc.net/sermons/index.php?series=38
As Lewis wrote in The Problem of Pain, I hate hell, but not as much as God. He showed us how much He hates hell on the cross.
Amen to all, but, some good news - Prof. Donnelly is making some progress by God’s grace and has actually preached once in recent weeks.
Paul C
I tend to agree with you that the preaching of the gospel in the record of the book of Acts does not appear to be one of fire and brimstone type preaching does it? People aren’t coerced to thinking about their eternal estate? Yes we are given glimpses of hell. Yes Jesus spoke of it, but to whom and why? It troubles me that I have seen so little written about hell within the old testament. Methinks we could be driven to despair if our tendency is to over emphasis hell and the horror of where our friends, relatives, neighbours, near and far, before or following might end up. My own father died afaik as an unregenerate man. I can either accept that what e’re my God does is right, that He has His elect and non elect, that He is sovereign over the affairs of men, that maybe my own father was not amongst the elect or I could flagellate myself day and night that I did not tell my father that he would go to hell (if that is the gospel??). I look forward to a new heaven and a new earth where righteousness dwells. Whatever becomes of those who reject the free offer of the gospel (and my fathe r may be one of these) does not cuase me grief as such as were some ordained to do. I do not believe this is an issue which should be causing so much division in the church at this present time.
It’s difficult to state how much I admire Pastor Donelly. He is knowedgeable yet unassuming. He is Reformed because he is convinced of his position; he is not captive to a subculture. So he is intelligent and convincing when he preaches. I am glad to see that his sermons are receiving wider attention, and I hope that many more are adapted as books.
I’m a little confused by the reference to unimaginable physical pain. I’m not sure that we can draw that inference directly from the imagery. And I am sure that those who are outside the Kingdom will not receive “Resurrection” bodies like our Lord’s. In other words, they will not escape physical death. And physical pain requires a physical body. (Which is not an endorsement of annihilationism. There is more to each human than their body. A person can survive the destruction of their body).That said, substantially I agree with the rest of this post. It provides a lot of food for thought, and encouragement to prayer and action.
KMS,
Just a couple comments:
“People aren’t coerced to thinking about their eternal estate?”
Actually, the concept of their eternal state is presented time and again. It’s just that the 2 ultimate ends are not heaven and hell, but rather life and death.
“It troubles me that I have seen so little written about hell within the old testament.”
Actually, there is ZERO reference to hell in the OT (not just “little”). In the OT, the word used to describe the state of all dead people (righteous and unrighteous) is “sheol” - the abode of the dead; all dead until the resurrection.
So it goes back to the fact that if you believe in hell, either the apostles misunderstood Christ or they misrepresented Him. Paul writes 14 letters, outlining the basics of the gospel, to the most difficult areas, yet never mentions hell (though he speaks of destruction, consistent with the annihilationist view).
We’re really left with Matthew, Mark and Luke, where Christ was always speaking parabolically in terms of “Gehenna”; a vivid picture of eternal destruction or an unrecoverable state.
Paul,
Don’t be too quick to dismiss the Revelation. Hell as eternally conscious torment is pretty plainly laid out there as well.
Well said, Jeremy.
Hell is real…but that is not our message. Our message is the love of God for sinners in Christ Jesus.
Every now and then someone will hear that Word, and be snatched from the jaws of the evil one.
Paul
I’m with you. Wasn’t it death that man and woman faced in the garden of Eden? Where was the warning of eternal punishment? Tes - life or death. Life is what is given to those who believe-trust in God’s promises - either to the OT believer or the NT believer. Each are justifed by faith. What I was trying to say is that so much evangelical preaching on this subject can appear as coercion - “be saved from hell”. That wasn’t the apostolic gospel. What one makes of Revelation and all it’s pictorial language is another thing.
I wonder if all the torments of hell are simply what an unredeemed person experiences in the presence of a Holy God…after all if we are the fragrance of Christ AND the smell of death (depending on the “smeller”) then why cannot the very presence of God be simultaniously the great joy of the redeemed and the greatest horror to the lost?
What I am saying does not negate at all any of the biblical descriptions of hell-I am simply saying that to an unregenerate there could probably be nothing worse than being in His presence in that state of being.
(or I could be totally wrong. But nevertheless best to run to Jesus!)
Mark 9:42 “But whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea. 43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed, rather than having two hands, to go to hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched— 44 where ’ Their worm does not die And the fire is not quenched.’ 45 And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame, rather than having two feet, to be cast into hell, into the fire that shall never be quenched— 46 where ’ Their worm does not die And the fire is not quenched.’ 47 And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, rather than having two eyes, to be cast into hell fire— 48 where ’ Their worm does not die And the fire is not quenched.’ Quoting from Isaiah 66:24
Three times our Lord said that the fire is not (present tense) quenched and “their worm” does not die.
The fire of Gehenna and the worms that were there are long gone, but the Word of the Lord is forever. We are not to confuse an illustration with the extent of the truth it portrays.Their “worm” is their/our sin laden eternal soul which Christ identified with on the cross for our/their salvation. Such salvation is acquired by faith in Him. “I am a worm and no man.” Ps. 22Additional texts for the everlasting nature of damnationMatthew 18:8 (New King James Version)8 “If your hand or foot causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you. It is better for you to enter into life lame or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into the everlasting fire.Luke 3:17His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather the wheat into His barn; but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire.”
The horror of Hell is that it is separation from God. The wonder of Calvary is that Christ would willingly suffer that separation for us. Amazing grace!Scrip
Paul,
The thought that your father may be in Hell does not cause you grief?
DavidM
The fact that my father might be in hell does not cause me grief because God is sovereign. He decides - His justice is absolute. By grace has He rescued me. Whether He chooses some and not others is to His glory. What makes my father special to other who face the same fate? Billiions wil be condemned, is that sad? In a sense there wil be grief but will it last? I cannot see me being grief struck in a new heaven and new earth. This is the position that holding to a Reformed worldview must reach…..
Oh - do I hate Hell? No - did God says He hates Hell?????
Anonymous (#26): the word that actually came out of Jesus’ mouth was Gehenna in all those references. It was an unrecoverable state, as in once you’re there, you’re not coming out. Extremely serious consequences, no? And very vivid to His listeners.
Consider Cain. Even after he sinned and killed Abel, what was his main concern?
“My punishment is more than I can bear. Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your presence…” (Gen 4)
If this was Cain’s reaction, what will the reaction be of those eternally separated from God at the time of the resurrection? Weeping, gnashing of teeth when the magnitude of what they missed hits them.
The apostles preached annihilation, in line with the OT, as well as Christ. The burning aspects covered in some of the gospels and Rev are parabolic, meant to clearly demonstrate the impact of eternal destruction.
Paul
I think that you are rushing to equate “destruction” with “annihilation”. Now
(i) I think that CS Lewis described several ways by which a person can be eternally “destroyed” without being annihilated. (And Lewis’ views are not compatible with Mr Bell’s!)
(iia) Being eternally lost means that you do not benefit from Christ’s Resurrection. Whatever being “raised” on the last day means for the lost, it does not mean receiving a Resurrection body like Christ’s. It does not mean escaping the consequences of physical death.
(iib) To lose one’s body is to be less than fully human in Scripture. To lose all hope of bodily existence is to undergo some kind of eternal destruction.
(iii) I’m also sure that an annihilated person is not experiencing an exile. Annihilationism cannot make sense of the concept of “eternal separation.”
Graham
Graham:
“Eternal separation” is not a biblical expression. Similar expressions are found only in mangled, paraphrase translations of 2 Thessalonians 1:9 (the NLT for instance).
Humans are physical creatures, and the plain scriptural teaching from beginning to end is that there is no life apart from our bodies (which is precisely why the unsaved are raised for judgment and why our hope as Christians is explicitly tied to our resurrection). Most Christians just assume a kind of Cartesian dualism, read it into the text whenever English words like “soul” appear, and perfunctorily throw out proof-texts like Luke 23:43, or 2 Corinthians 5:8 whenever that view is challenged.
Ronnie - excellent response. I agree with you.
Graham: “I think that CS Lewis described several ways by which a person can be eternally “destroyed” without being annihilated.”
To be honest, I’m not overly concerned with what Lewis has to say on this topic. You’re biggest challenge, if you are going to proclaim hell, is one of integrity.
No one can put forward a believable argument as to why there is not a single mention in Acts, 14 of Paul’s epistles or other writers PLUS the OT.
Couple this with most of Jesus’ references to a dump outside Jerusalem and we begin to understand what is quite clear: the wages of sin is DEATH, the gift of God is eternal LIFE.
Or John 3:16.
Paul
I do not believe in annihilationism. Based on your comments, which I briefly reference below, here are some things for you to consider:
“The book of Acts spans 30 years of ministry, yet nary a mention or even an insinuation . . .”
Acts 1:25 says, “Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place.” The word place does not mean ‘death’; in addition, this statement has emphasis that says he went to “his own” place, which further rules out a generic reference to death.
“2. why is there no mention in the OT at all?”
Isaiah 14:9ff. presents Sheol as a place where the wicked dead greet one who joins them there and proclaim that he has been made weak as they were. Isaiah 66:24 pertains directly to what Jesus said about the worm not dying and the fire not being quenched. Ezekiel 32:18-32 vividly depicts many of the wicked dead who receive hordes of people God has judged into their company; although Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 32 do not speak explicitly of the dead being tormented, they support Isaiah 66 in showing the OT is not silent about the torment of the wicked dead
“Consider the implications: if hell exists, and the apostles failed to mention it even once, either they misunderstood Christ or they were misrepresenting the gospel.”
You appear to be attaching unwarranted importance to the often highly condensed summaries of the apostolic messages in Acts. What is recorded shows that Luke knew that there was much more that he could have recorded and chose not to. The records of apostolic preaching in Acts were not intended to be taken as exhaustive summaries; we should not use them to say what was not preached in a given evangelistic encounter.
“There are 11 references to “hell” in the 3 gospels (none in John).”
In John 17, Jesus says that he lost none that the Father had given Him, “and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition, that the scripture might be fulfilled” (17:12). The word perdition renders a Greek word that does not mean ‘death.’ It is the same word that Paul used for the destruction that the man of sin will experience one day (2 Thess. 2:3). Revelation 17:8 and 11 use the same word to speak of his destruction. Revelation 19:20 and 20:10 show that his fate will be “to be tormented day and night forever and ever,” in the lake of fire and brimstone in which the devil will join him and the false prophet in being tormented eternally in the place that was specifically prepared for the devil and his angels.
The reality of an eternal hell of conscious torment is a very solemn truth that should lead us to be faithful to God and to evangelize people in the Spirit according to the will of God.
The undying worm is something foul, endlessly gnawing at hell’s inhabitants, eating at them continually, giving them no rest. This probably refers to conscience.
Yeah, except not.
Even a superficial reading of Isaiah 66:24 shows that the worms are simply maggots that are consuming corpses. Jesus quotes the passage and gives no indication that he’s investing it with any new meaning.
It’s amazing to me that Donnelly can make this claim (not to mention people like Anonymous who assert that the worms are actually the immaterial souls of the wicked), offer no support for it, and most evangelicals will just nod and agree.
“It seems unavoidable to me that if I truly believe in this hell, it will have a greater impact on my life and faith.”
Very good point. I agree with you. The arguments mean virtually nothing. There are things that God is clear on…Hell is bad. We weren’t meant to be there. He has the power and authority to keep us from falling. We should submit to His eternal grace. Peace brother, keep doin it.
Anonymous:
Acts 1:25 says nothing of eternal torment. The fact that you cite this verse strikes me as a little desperate.
The passages you reference in Isaiah and Ezekiel are not intended to be literal descriptions of reality! Both passages depict actual rotting corpses (not disembodied “souls”) talking to to one another. Isaiah 14:8 even has trees talking to the corpses! Again, for people to take these passages as literally teaching a conscious intermediate state just strikes me as desperate.
We need to understand what Isaiah 66:24 meant in the original context before we can understand what Jesus was getting at by directly quoting him. You’re assuming that Jesus was talking about eternal torment, then working backwards which is completely illegitimate.
The word for “perdition” is apoleia which is just the noun form of the verb apollumi. And yes, apollumi when used transitively of humans almost always means something like “to slay”. For instance, “Herod is going to search for the Child to apollumi him.” (Matthew 2:13)
Yes, whatever the beast of Revelation represents will be destroyed. You just correctly interpreted the symbolic vision of Revelation 20:10! As most exegetes know (but curiously seem to forget when it comes to Revelation 20:10) in apocalyptic visions, both the symbols and what happens to the symbols represent something else. The fact that John sees a beast being tormented in a lake of fire does not mean that the thing represented by the beast will literally be tormented in a lake of fire. Anyone who uses that hermeneutic might as well believe that Daniel teaches that Media and Persia would literally be trampled upon by a goat.
I hate hell, too. So did Jesus. It is why it will not be.
I don’t see how you can conceive that one day you will praise God for condemning the “unsaved” to what you describe as hell. Sounds no different from the Aryans praising Hitler for condemning the “unclean” Jews (who will, since they don’t know Jesus, be condemned to hell alongside their killer).
Yes, Ghandi and Hitler in agony for eternity side by side. An image worthy of praise and a picture of God having reconciled ALL things to God’s self in Christ.
Ronnie - my thoughts exactly… Anonymous’ comments strike as very desperate.
Plus, he doesn’t address the fact that hell is not even hinted at in the epistles… instead he points to Acts and says it was condensed. Even so, rest assured, if hell exists it would have received adequate airplay (at the minimum a single mention).
A very disingenuous approach Anonymous. You are twisting the scriptures.
Ten paragraphs on hell. Not one mention of Jesus Christ. There is a problem of theological method here.
“Praise God for hell”?
We will?
This sounds like an extra-biblical stretch. Similar to John Piper’s blasphemous over-reach by describing Christ’s cry of dereliction as the “scream of the damned”.
For a community that declares their superiority in biblical precision, it seems there is a great need for circumspection in how far you raise an apologetic for the doctrine of hell.
It’s too important to muddy the waters by throwing out unnecessary and unfounded claims like “praising God for hell”.
Otherwise you are no less egregious with a form of “provocation” as the writer of the book that inspired this whole theological dogfight.
Paul/Ronnie
(ia)”To be honest, I’m not overly concerned with what Lewis has to say on this topic.”Dodges the point. You are making a lazy connection between annihilation and destruction.(ib) I’m not sure what you meant by a reference to “integrity”.
(ii) You then try to argue that the absence of teaching on Hell in section of the New Testament is somehow significant. This is less than persuasive:(iia) The Old Testament says very little about life after death, period! There are no clear, non controversial, descriptions of the afterlife. NT Wright systematically examines all the references in “The Resurrection of the Son of God”.(iib) Nor can I see why absence of evidence in Luke is evidence of absence. This seems rather like the argument that Mark was unaware of the “appearance” traditions as he does not describe them! Luke had his own theological and apologetic agenda in Acts, and a limited amount of space.(iic) Paul does not develop the Kingdom of God, or give an exposition of “The Son of Man”. Paul does not mention an Empty Tomb. Am I to conclude that Paul did not believe in the Empty Tomb? Should I conclude that Paul did not believe that the Kingdom of God was essential to understanding Jesus’ ministry? Or that the “Son of Man” is not an important Christological title?
(iii) “Eternal separation” is not a biblical expression.
No, and neither is “incarnation” or “Trinity”.
I’m not sure what your point is here. I am sure that your certitude is unwonted and unhelpful.In any case, many of Jesus’ parables end with the lost “exiled” from a feast or the presence of a King. Given the importance of the theme of exile in Scripture as a whole, I think it is imprudent to ignore the constant connection between everlasting destruction and everlasting separation. And I cannot see how annihilationism can explain this theme. How can a non-existent person be exiled?
(iv) If we should not read “Cartesian Dualism” into the Bible (and I’m not a Cartesian Dualist - I’m an emergent dualist who believes that the soul has a physical location) we should not read non-reductive physicalism (or any other version of physicalism) into the Old Testament Scriptures either. This is anachronistic. We did not start to argue about the relationship between mind and matter until the Scientific Revolution gave us atomism and the mathematical quantification of matter. This left experiences like “colour” or “pain” out of the physical world, and conscious experience became something of a mystery.
(v)There is significant evidence from cognitive science that “naive dualism” is a universal human concept. Given that there is no reflection on Philosophy of Mind in the Hebrew Scripture, it would be remarkable if the Ancient Hebrews were the only people group who did not differentiate “biographical life” from “biological life”!
(vi) And the Old Testament writers sound like naive dualists. In the case of Samuel the “plain reading” assumes that biographical life can continue after biological life has ceased. You are making claims about the Hebrew thought world that are not substantiated by the evidence (although these claims were fashionable not so long ago.)
(vii) Gen 2 v 7, Ezekiel 37, and the numerous descriptions of Sheol all seem (on a plain reading) to endorse some form of “naive dualism” (which you confuse, anachronistically, with Cartesian dualism!) Naive dualism is not a coherent, rigorous philosophical or scientific thesis. It is just the simple observation that thoughts are not identical with bits of bodies; and that thoughts seem to “move” bodies. So often one’s “thought life” is identified with a life principle.
(viii) That “naive dualism” is used in Ezekiel’s imagery does not mean that Ezekiel 37 is teaching that some form of dualism is true. I doubt that Ezekiel spent a lot of time pondering the difference between mind and matter. I’m not sure that physicalism or Cartesian dualism would have made much sense to him. Because the Old Testament does not reflect in depth on the mind/body distinction, I do not think that physicalists or dualists should be searching the Old Testament for support.
Chad(A) That is a caricature of my position.
(B) I can’t see how your arguments help the annihilationist much. A universalist would cheerfully point out that you have Hitler and Gandhi in exactly the same eternal state. I’d point out that they receive equal amounts of retribution, which seems a tad unfair. I can’t see any defence of your position that wouldn’t also be open to the proponent of “everlasting destruction”.
(C) I’m not happy with references to the Holocaust. The Holocaust had little to do with a perverted view of retribution, and much more to do with a pseudo-scientific view of “racial hygeine”. If you wish to compare (a) with (b), it sometimes helps to have some grasp of what (b) actually entailed.And, as it happens, the aim of the Holocaust was elimination of a group, not retribution. So annihilationists are also open to lazy, unwarranted analogies with the Holocaust. They have no clear advantage over the proponent of everlasting destruction.
In General
It is worth noting that CS Lewis comes out of this debate rather well. His writing has been misused by some proponents of “empty Hell”, and misread by some of Rob Bell’s critics. When what Lewis actually wrote is examined, it appears that he neatly tied together the themes of punishment, separation and destruction in a plausible way (although I think that what Donnelly calls “angry presence” needs to be added to his account.) I’m not sure how appeals to “integrity” evade his arguments - or excuse us from engaging with those arguments!
Graham
Why are we shouting at Tim?
I didn’t like the reference to physical pain. And I don’t think that the “pangs of conscience” can be read out of Jesus’ description of Gehenna. (But I do think this is a plausible model of everlasting destruction & punishment, and shouldn’t be lightly dismissed!)
So should I attack him for not being Christocentric, or provoking a dogfight in an egregious manner? Aren’t these criticisms a bit OTT, when his heart was plainly in the right place when he wrote this post? I’m all for impolite disagreement and a rough debate, but I’m a bit uneasy with some of this…
a comment from Anonymous 04/13 @ 11:43am
Quote: “We need to understand what Isaiah 66:24 meant in the original context before we can understand what Jesus was getting at by directly quoting him. You’re assuming that Jesus was talking about eternal torment, then working backwards which is completely illegitimate.” End Quote
No, I think we can trust how Jesus used the OT. In context, He assures us that entering into life (being born-again) is far better than going to Hell, the only other alternative. Jesus and the Apostles often opened the OT scriptures in ways that the original OT Prophets had not foreseen. For instance, did Sarah know that she was going to be part of Paul’s allegory about Law and grace when she angrily had Abraham throw out her slave girl and her child?Also, any question about the existence, extent or degree of punishment in Hell must take into account the “Lake of Fire” which supersedes Hell as eternal destiny of the unsaved. It would seem that Hell is a “holding tank” until the great White Throne Judgment where the wicked dead will be judged. That vivid revelation was written in the NT by the Apostle John, so it should meet your objection of the lack of same.And if God is going to annihilate the wicked it must be AFTER the Great White Throne Judgment. So some are alive in Hell right now awaiting that awful day for centuries now. The question often asked is “How can a God of love send someone to Hell for all eternity?”If it’s not right for eternity it would not be right for a day, to say nothing about centuries.We must be aware that God is capable of forgetting, even as He has forgotten our forgiven sin. So the sinner’s self inflicted eternal punishment will not find God agonizing over their final righteous destination.Christ cried, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”That will be the cry of the lost that will not be heard by a loving God.
Ronnie/Paul C,
I did not say that Acts 1:25 says anything about eternal torment. It was a response to an overstatement that Acts does not have anything, not even a suggestion of such a concept.
As far as the epistles go, it seems that you explain away Paul’s use of apwleia, and therefore conclude that there is no mention.
Concering Isaiah 66:24, it in its original context is teaching about the future state in the new heavens and earth (66:22). It speaks of all flesh worshiping God continually (66:23), and then it gives the teaching in 66:24. The teaching of 66:24 is not teaching about something in the past; it speaks of what will be true in the future.
The corpses will be burning in a fire that is not quenched. The passage also goes on to say that these corpses will be an abhorrence to all mankind, which shows that they will not be annihilated. The book of Isaiah ends on that very solemn note.
Even if I were working backwards in my OT interpretation, which I am not, my doing so is not automatically “completely illegitimate.” Jesus and the apostles often brought out greater understanding of OT teaching that was not previously revealed.
You are incorrect in your statement concering the goat in Daniel because the book of Daniel itself shows us that we are not to take the visions about the goat that destroys Media and Persia literally and even tells us who the goat would be (8:21). Those visions are interpreted for us, so citing that as an example of flawed literal interpretation is illegitimate.
You say that in apocalyptic literature symbols and what happens to them represent something else. You then seem to assert dogmatically that the beast’s being tormented does not mean that the thing represented by the beast will literally be tormented … Yet, the Bible itself does not give any indication of that fact in that context. How then do you know that it is not to be taken literally with the certainty that you claim?
Revelation 14:10-11 says that an angel will one day proclaim to the world that anyone who worships the beast and receives his mark will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb and the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they have no rest day or night. This passage explicitly speaks of eternal torment for those align themselves with the beast, and Revelation 20:10 says the beast, the false prophet, and the devil will be eternally tormented in the lake of fire.
The Gospels speak of demons who plead with Jesus not to torment them (Mk. 5:7) before the time (Matt. 8:29). Jesus taught that the everlasting fire was prepared for the devil and his angels (Matt. 25:41). Revelation 20:10 speaks of that place as a place of eternal torment to which the devil is consigned. So, in your thinking, what is the eternal fate of the devil? If you believe that those spoken of in 14:10-11 are annihilated, to be consistent, it would seem that you would also have to believe that the devil is annihilated. Since he is a spirit being, there is no question of his “body.” If you believe that he is annihilated, you would therefore have to believe that he as a spirit would suffer annihilation. How then would he be tormented forever if he is annihilated? It would seem that you would also have to believe that the demons who asked Jesus not to torment them before the time were also mistaken about what was ahead for them.
How is annihilation eternal torment for a spirit being? If I understand annihilation correctly, it is an instantaneous thing, not something that goes on and on.
Based on the Bible data, one cannot consistently deny eternal torment for unrepentant sinners and hold that the NT writers wrote infallibly. As difficult a teaching as it is for us to accept, either we accept what God says about hell or we have to reject what the Bible says about heaven as a real place as well.
Yes, Alan K, we should talk about Jesus; my earlier comments were not a setting forth of what we should or should not talk about—they were a response to comments that someone else made concerning specific points about biblical teaching.
The good news is that God through Christ does not want anyone to perish and has provided a way for them not to do so. Those who do perish in spite of God’s offer will sadly face the consequences.
That’s not “good news.”
No, and neither is “incarnation” or “Trinity”.
I said what I did specifically because you put “eternal separation” in quotes, which led me to think that you believed yourself to be quoting Scripture (which wouldn’t be unusual—many believe that the Bible actually uses such an expression, due to the paraphrases I mentioned). That being the case, your quip about my “certitude [being] unwonted and unhelpful” is just obnoxious. Be careful with your own writing and these miscommunications wont occur.
As for your challenge, I can’t see why you would think a theme of exclusion incompatible with conditionalism, except that you’re unfamiliar with the view. Conditionalists have always believed that the death of the wicked will not be instantaneous, and that analogous to executions in this life, there will be some process involving pain. The torment of the unsaved will include watching the righteous enter into the blessed realm while they themselves are perishing outside the camp, so to speak.
As for your lengthy treatise on dualism: Regardless of your (or my) own particular view, the fact is that most evangelicals do assume a type of Cartesian dualism when they read the text, and bring those assumptions into their interpretation. And that type of dualism can best account for the disembodied existence most evangelicals believe will occur between death and resurrection.
Now without getting into the complexities of particular views (including “naive dualism”, which I’ve never heard of), the issue that matters is whether or not Scripture teaches such a thing as disembodied human existence. Neither Gen 2:7, Ezekiel 37, or 1 Samuel 28 even hint at such a thing.
You are making claims about the Hebrew thought world that are not substantiated by the evidence.
I’ve done no such thing. Please don’t make stuff up Graham. Hebrew thought was also often polytheistic. So what? I’m interested in what Scripture positively teaches about human nature and life after death, and thus far, that’s all I’ve commented on. This makes your comment that I “confuse, anachronistically, with Cartesian dualism” all the more ridiculous. I was accusing Anonymous of reading those passages and importing in Cartesian dualism. For myself, I don’t see that they support any type of dualism (including your “naive dualism”).
I’m curious, did you respond to me in order to be helpful, or to try to bully me by pretending to be well-versed in philosophy of mind and misrepresenting me?
I can’t see how your arguments help the annihilationist much. A universalist would cheerfully point out that you have Hitler and Gandhi in exactly the same eternal state. I’d point out that they receive equal amounts of retribution, which seems a tad unfair.
1. Chad never claimed to be a conditionalist, and a quick glance at his page reveals him to be some kind of universalist. I shouldn’t have accused you of malice above; maybe it’s the case that you’re just not careful, at all.
2. Conditionalists do not believe that the unsaved receive equal amounts of retribution. I’m not sure why you would think that, except, again, that you’re unfamiliar with the view.
I don’t often think of hell, but when I do, I have a similar response as you. The absolute poverty of hell is separation from God.
Er, ok…I’ve had similar discussions on other blogs on this topic, and made similar statements without incident.
I did not think that suggesting that someone’s certainty was unwarranted was offensive or obnoxious.( I was referring to the general tone of your replies.)But I apologise unreservedly if offence was caused. And I’ve more to do with my day than maliciously intimidate complete strangers. If I type a lot on a lot on a blog it’s because I find the topic interesting, and it helps me order my thoughts…. Nevertheless, it’s not nice to hurt or offend, so once more apologies.
Unfortunately , I don’t see any substantial reply to any of my points. Unless you are prepared to take the historical context of texts seriously, and not read modern views of the mind/body relationship back into ancient texts , you can’t established very much IMHO. My charge of reading texts anachronistically was clumsily stated, but it still stands. ( on re reading I did say that “you” confused ND with CD, when I should have typed “some”. Apologies, once more).
I also explicitly stated that the Old Testament texts should not be used to support any one philosophy of mind (for example, that a human mind cannot exist apart from it’s body.)
If the end point is oblivion, then the same final/eschatological fate is shared by everyone outside the Kingdom, even if different temporal states precede this. This leaves “exile” or “separation” is not part of an individual’s final state.
So, sorry all round really, but I still think that Tim’s getting an unduly hard time here. And my admiration for Ted Donnelly has already been stated.
Graham
But, like I said, sorry!