A couple of years ago when Rob Bell's book came out titled “Love Wins”, he received a hell storm of critics calling him a Universalist and heretic. Naturally this made me want to read the book that much more considering the fact that I enjoy reading things that the orthodox might consider heretical. I enjoy thinking for myself and don't shy away from exposing myself to different viewpoints and interpretations of scripture, even going so far as to enjoy a little gnostic reading from time to time (though I have yet to find a gnostic book that is anything less than imaginative mysticism.) Things the church have banned or tried to destroy always perks up my interest, and so I happily exposed myself to all the heretical lies (supposed) that Rob Bell would write about in terms of hell and our misperceptions of the afterlife. The truth is however, that many of the thoughts and conclusions he reached in his book were actually not all that unbelievable, didn't seem all that heretical, and that I had already arrived at similar conclusions in my own studies.
Now just to make this clear, I do think Rob Bell took some liberties with his literal interpretations of the afterlife and I enjoy letting a lot of what the afterlife is remain a mystery. I don't read the book of Revelations all that frequently, but when I do, I do so with the intention of letting my imagination picture the scenes that John describes, and in not allowing myself to get too eager in arriving at any conclusions other than that which is obvious. I interpret the whole Bible that way. If a scripture is troubling, I dwell on it, I consider it's implications, and then I do a little research on it's background, original meaning, and how it relates to what the author or speaker is saying.
Perhaps there is no doctrine more troubling to the stoic mind than that of hell. The very notion of a “good God” giving people eighty years to get it right, and then punishing them for all eternity for getting it wrong is a little unsettling. This has led many to leave the faith, and in my opinion rightly so, as Darwin once explained, "I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true; for if so plain language of the text seems to show that the men who do not believe, and this would include my father, brother and almost all my friends, will be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine.” I know as a Christian I must believe the Bible as truth, but what does the Bible actually say about hell? It's strange to me that very few Christians I know are willing to look into this matter, when what we believe about hell has so many implications.
People used to consider hell a physical place of fiery torment, such as the sun, or some hidden chamber deep in the Earth. In recent years the majority of people seem to think of it as a spiritual place (as it exists after death and deals with man's spiritual soul and not physical body) and thus the unquenchable flames are simply used as a metaphor to describe the pain and torment caused by being distant from our creator for all eternity. The equation is simple: Accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior, and enjoy a blissful afterlife where there is no more sorrow, and only joy. Deny Jesus Christ, and enjoy a painful afterlife where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth forever and ever.
There are a lot of problems one might have in believing how this all works in relations to the afterlife. What about those who grew up in the wrong part of the world and never got the chance to hear the name of Jesus let alone make a conscious decision to follow Him? What about those who were born at the wrong time and died before the missionaries came? Christians have a knack for dismissing such difficult questions with rhetorical answers about God's nature being evident in creation, and Catholic Church offers a more structured understanding of this in their Catechism of the Catholic in Church which says: “Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience - those too may achieve eternal salvation.”
This explanation is a great attempt at the Church trying to reconcile the fact that there are many who will never hear the name of Jesus, and how then could we expect a loving, or just God to send these people off into eternal damnation? They must be given a chance prior to dying, or once they die their fate is sealed. What then do we have to say about the people who reject the gospel message not because of what the message says but because of it's messengers? The people who may have been sexually abused by a Christian leader, or someone whose Church going alcoholic father revealed Christianity to be nothing but a realm of hypocrites and do-good busybodies? What about the person who was snubbed by the Church for being a homosexual, or for that fact, the man who wore his hair too long and listened to rock music in the 70's? There are a lot of reasons people do not profess Christ to be their Lord and savior, but I insist that the majority of the reasons come down to the messenger and not the message.
A Pastor's fall from stature, a crazy bible thumping neighbor, a hypocritical father, an abusive marriage, a Sunday morning experience that seemed hostile and less than inviting, a childhood friend who got all religious and threatened you with the fires of hell, and crooked politicians claiming to represent the faith. All of these and many more are perfectly good reasons for anyone to be turned off to the gospel of Jesus. Yes, we insist that the imperfection of the faithful is actually our best ministry tool, but then we build up our expectations to be holy and above reproach when addressing these issues. Let's not forget as well the horrific experience one might have of reading the bible, and not only coming across crazy stories of talking Donkey's and the Earth standing still, but also encountering several stories where God orders His people to commit genocide, and even gets his “friend” Abraham to come inches away from sacrificing his son. I still say however that the hardest doctrine to fathom is that which the Church believes about hell and what the Bible seems to say about the fate of all those who get it wrong.
It seems unfair that a loving God would allow so many to be deceived, to walk around with blinders on, to not call them or open their eyes, and then in the end punish them for not accepting something that always seemed to be out of their reach. You can say that I have no right to question God on these things, and you are correct, but I do have a right to question the Church and what it believes when it appears the Bible actually says something else entirely. So let me then go a bit deeper into what the Bible teaches about the afterlife, judgment, and punishment for all those who don't believe.
Our misconceptions of hell
Try this on for size: the Jewish people don't really have much to say about the afterlife. In fact throughout the Torah, the only mention of the afterlife came in speaking of the world to come. No mention of heaven or hell, well except in terms of speaking of the sky and atmosphere, and when speaking of “sheol”, which could also be translated hades, they mean grave. It's odd then that with the exception of speaking of the world during the messianic age, there is very little thought given to the afterlife.
In fact, the early Church didn't really have much to say about the afterlife as well. Now, before you brand me as a heretic, I want you to hear me out. It might be hard to understand how our view of the afterlife today might be a bit skewed in comparison to the scripture we think it is based upon, but it's important to understand the original context. I will lead you through it and in the end state where I stand on this issue. For now just take it as a history lesson, and let's not quarrel over loose interpretations, as I think you'll find my understanding of scripture is more literal than loose fitting. If you are an atheist who cares little for this, then meet me at the end of this essay and I'll explain how this literal understanding of scripture is much more digestible than what the past 1,600 years of biblical interpretation has led to.
First of all, the Bible speaks of three hells. From the original languages in the which the Bible was written, one Hebrew word, and three Greek words are translated “hell” in our English language Bibles. As we've already discussed, the one Hebrew word is “sheol”, which has the same meaning as one of the Greek words “hades” which (regardless of what you might have heard) both refer simply to the grave. The Hebrew word “sheol” is used in the Old Testament 65 times, and the Greek word “hades” is used only 11 times in the New Testament.
The second Greek word, “tartaroo” is also translated hell in the New Testament, but was only used once in the Bible. 2 Peter 2:4, “For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell(tartaroo) and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment;”. Here tartaroo is translated into the word hell, but tartaroo was an actual place in Greek mythology where the rebellious gods were confined (somewhat of an abyss). In spite of it's Greek implications, Peter was actually explaining how the sinning angels were delivered into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment. The place is not referring to some fiery pit of hell, but rather their confinement on Earth, where they wield influence over the nations and individuals. Jesus and His apostles had very real encounters with Satan and his demons. Jesus even referred to Satan as the ruler of this world. The word tartaroo applies only to demons. Nowhere does it refer to a fiery hell in which human beings are punished after death.
The final Greek word is “gehenna”, which is used by Jesus several times and tends to be the one word associated most frequently with our common view of hell. The word is derived from Hebrew Gai-Hinnom, which translates “the valley of Hinnom. This Valley shows up frequently in the Old Testament, mentioned in passing by Joshua, and found in 2 Kings 23 as a place of idolatrous and human sacrifices. King Josiah (of Judah) decided to put an end to these abominations by polluting it with human bones and other corruptions.
At the time of Jesus this valley was what we might call the city dump-the place where trash was thrown and consumed in the fires that constantly burned there. The bodies of animals as well as despised criminals were also cast into Gehenna to be burned. Jesus used this particular location and what took place there to help His listeners clearly understand the fate the unrepentant will suffer in the future. They would have easily grasped what he meant.
Consider then what Jesus meant when He said in Mark 9:47-48: “If your eye causes you to stumble, throw it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than, having two eyes, to be cast into hell (Gehenna), where 'their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched'”. Notice that the last part about the worm and fire is in quotations, as Jesus is actually quoting here from Isaiah 66:24 which says, “Then they will go forth and look on the corpses of the men who have transgressed against Me. For their worm will not die and their fire will not be quenched; and they will be an abhorrence to all mankind.” In context, Isaiah 66 refers to a time when, God says, “all flesh shall come to worship before Me”. It's a time when the wicked will be no more, and people will go out and look upon their dead bodies and see the consequences of living a life in rebellion, which results in physical death where even their remains would be devoured by worms and consumed by unquenchable fire until there is nothing left.
According to the “Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament”, the original Hebrew word translated “worm” in Isaiah 66:24 and Mark 9:47-48 means “worm, maggot, larvae”. The reason I want to point this out is to let you know that Jesus was not speaking of immortal worms, but rather the cycle of maggots and how they consumed flesh. Maggots would live sustained by flesh to turn into flies, the flies would lay eggs that hatch into more maggots, and on and on until there is nothing left. So what does Jesus mean when he speaks of unquenchable fire? Well, as I pointed out in speaking of the verse in Isaiah, the fires will burn until there is nothing left to consume. Traditionally speaking in Hebrew culture, a body that was not buried, but was subjected to burning, was viewed as accursed.
In short, Jesus uses a common site of trash disposal in His day, the burning garbage dump in the Valley of Hinnom outside of Jerusalem's walls, to illustrate the ultimate fate of the wicked in what scriptures call a lake of fire. Just as the refuse of the city was consumed by maggots and fire, so will the wicked be burned up, consumed, by a future gehenna like fire more than 1,000 years after Christ's return.
So what is the point you ask? Perhaps I should answer your question with a question...does God punish people by throwing them into a fiery pit of damnation to suffer for all eternity? I personally don't think the Bible ever really says that. Do I believe that some will go to “gehenna” and be consumed until there is nothing left? Yes, but I think this act must be voluntary and of freewill. This is not to confuse freewill with choices made while being deceived, but a literal choice made to rather face the fires that destroy, than to accept the free gift of salvation and enter into eternity. Notice I draw a distinction between the lake of fire, and eternity. Think for a moment what Jesus meant in Matthew 10:28, “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell (gehenna).” Notice here that Jesus does not speak of people suffering everlasting torment. He says that God can destroy both body and soul in Gehenna fire.
Jesus here explains that, when one man kills another, the resulting death is only temporary because God can raise the victim to life again. But when God destroys one in hell (gehenna), the resulting death is eternal. There is no resurrection from this fate, which the Bible calls “the second death”.
Lastly, and then I'll move on, for those of you who are hung up on the word “everlasting” and ready to pounce on all the holes in my theology, let's look a bit more closely at what the word “everlasting” actually implies in terms of this gehenna fire.
The word “everlasting” comes from the Greek word “aionios”, which actually does translate as something eternal, without beginning or end, etc. The use of this word in scripture however is not as cut and dry as it appears. For instance, the book of Jude mentions Sodom and Gamorrah as “suffering the vengeance of eternal (aionios) fire”, yet it is obvious that these cities are not still burning. In the case of these cities, and in the case of the wicked, who are consigned “aionios” fire, the first burns and completely destroys. But the eternal aspect of the fire is it's everlasting effect, not how long it actually burns. It's like dropping a wad of cash into an open fire, no matter how much you wish you could get it back, once the act is done, it's done. That money is literally gone for eternity.
Does this mean that I don't believe in a literal hell? Of course not, as long as you don't hold me to your idea of what that literal hell might be. Perhaps this is where I agreed the most with Rob Bell, in that he explained how many people today are already living in hell. Just as I spoke last time about the suffering in this world, there are many people who are held captive by their own depression, and insecurities. People who are heartbroken and lonely, not to mention hopeless. The Bible speaks of how God gives us great joy, peace, and hope. Jesus and John the Baptist both mentioned how the kingdom of God was at hand, and I believe that by us fulfilling our purpose here on the earth, and entering into God's presence through our worship and times of reflection, that we actually experience this kingdom firsthand. I don't know what happens when we die, and surely there are a lot of ideas of what happens whether we immediately go to our destination, or our bodies lie dormant waiting for Christ's return in which the dead in Christ would rise up. I have heard fabulous stories of people who went to the other side and what they saw, and I have also realized that scripture tends to treat death as if we're going into an unconscious slumber. Consider how many times Jesus and Paul referred to death as “sleeping”, and the very fact that he wrote in Romans 6:23 that “the gift of God is eternal life” might lead us to believe that even now our souls, which is our consciousness, will die along with our bodies until Christ Himself raises us up. My point is that I don't know too much about the afterlife, and therefore I don't dwell too much on that which I don't know.
If for a moment we suppose that hell really is a holding chamber for the damned who never professed Christ as their Lord and Savior, we must also recognize that it is in no way eternal regardless of how we interpret it today. In Revelations chapter 20, verse 13, John writes about the throne of God and how the “sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them; and they were judged according to their deeds”. After which death and Hades, all whose names were not found in the book of life, along with the Devil, the beast, and the false prophet, are thrown into the lake of fire which is the second death. The Bible clearly teaches that the wages of sin is death, and not eternal life. To say that God grants people eternal life so that they could suffer seems to be a contradiction.
I also must point out that there is one passage that might seem a little troubling to my take on these things, and that being Revelations 20:10 which says, “And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.” Out of all of the scriptures, this might be the hardest one to overlook, but even this is subject to error. First of all, being tormented day and night does not seem to apply to anyone else other than the Devil and cronies. Second of all, the book of revelations is extremely high in symbolism and we must be very careful not to take too many thinks too literally. The lake of fire represents the second death, and the fact that death itself and the grave are tossed in to be destroyed has strong implications of God's intentions of creating a world where there is no more death. Secondly, the words “forever and ever” literally means in Greek, “age to age”, which is not quite as clear as “forever and ever” in terms of actual meaning. It is also important to point out that the scriptures that follow in the next chapter are in relation to the “New Jerusalem”, and all the incredible joy that would follow, which makes one wonder if God would in fact keep a separate realm for all those souls who were rebellious so He could hold them against their will in a fiery torment without end. Perhaps He would, but this again is a hard concept to grasp in trying to determine whether or not God is a good God who acts in mercy, or if He is a mean, vengeful God who enjoys watching people suffer. Afterall, it was God who said through the prophet Ezekiel, in Ezekiel 18:23, “Do I have any pleasure in the death of the wicked," declares the Lord God, "rather than that he should turn from his ways and live”.
Are You Still With Me Atheists?
Here's the bottom line; I have a terrible hard time with the belief that God sends people to hell, and would never condemn anyone to hell myself. Now there is a lot I don't know, and perhaps I am wrong and I will have to make an account for this error, but I don't fear being wrong about hell, for I don't think salvation is tangent on whether or not I believe in it correctly. Someone once told me that it was dangerous to say such a thing and how people who are less versed than I am in scripture might be easily swayed, to which I replied that fear of hell is no means of salvation, and if we are Christian because we fear hell or desire heaven, then we have missed the point entirely of what the gospel message is.
I believe in consequences for the way we live, and I believe as evidenced in scripture that the chosen, the disciples, the teachers, preachers, and representatives of the faith are held to a higher account for our actions than those who don't belong. I remain a Christian today because I discovered our current understanding of hell to be incredibly inaccurate, and that I would have a seriously hard time thinking the gospel to mean good news when it means such bad news for so many other people.
I believe the judgment seat of God which is mentioned in revelations chapter 20 is the one last chance for people to accept the free gift of eternal life. I am not saying we should wait until then to live for God, mostly because it means you are likely going to be living in a figurative hell until then and not know the joy and peace that comes from knowing the Creator Himself, and also because I could be wrong, and if you are at this moment willing to consider that God is in fact real and that He does love you relentlessly, then to dismiss this and hope for a second chance in the afterlife is nonsense. There are some who have a great excuse as to why they didn't confess Jesus as Lord, and then there are some, who don't. All I hoped to accomplish in this essay was to explain how our current thinking of hell is not only illogical, but grossly misunderstood in light of what the Bible actually says about it. There are consequences for our actions, but I don't believe that God is interested in tormenting you for all of eternity over the bad choices you made during the 80 years of your life. The torment you receive is yours and yours alone to own based on a conscious choice you make, and God in His mercy is willing to either grant you eternal life, or let you go the path of destruction which ends in death.
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Christianity Doesn’t Add Up Historically, and The Story of Jesus is Borrowed From Other Mythologies
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