Do You Believe in an Eternal Hell

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Serenity4321

Serenity4321

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Hope this topic is ok. :cool: I can not accept the idea of an eternal hell. I still think it was a teaching specifically to 'control the masses'
What loving God would condemn anyone for eternity. I accept karma and the need to atone for wrongdoing in some way or another, but not eternal damnation.
This may be why I also am slowly accepting the idea of reincarnation, though I am not totally 'happy' with it 🙂
Still, it seems to be a 'just' method to work out our challenges and misdeeds.
 

I choose to not give the idea credence. But who the . . . hell . . . knows?
Personally, I've got my eye on a better afterlife; assuming there just might be one.
I agree it has been used to control the masses. The impure Puritans were terrific at it. As I recall from school, they had everyone believing they were all going to hell, except for the minister, and there was nothing they could do about it but continually atone for their sins.:rolleyes:
 
Serenity4321 said:
Hope this topic is ok. :cool: I can not accept the idea of an eternal hell. I still think it was a teaching specifically to 'control the masses'
What loving God would condemn anyone for eternity. I accept karma and the need to atone for wrongdoing in some way or another, but not eternal damnation.
This may be why I also am slowly accepting the idea of reincarnation, though I am not totally 'happy' with it 🙂
Still, it seems to be a 'just' method to work out our challenges and misdeeds.
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What loving God would condemn anyone for eternity?

One who has been rejected by unbelievers. One who refuses to accept evil in the kingdom of heaven. That's what God.
 
Here's a thought of mine: Meriam Webster says that one of the definitions for punishment is "correction." And I think that most good parents punishing a child or a good pet owner punishing a pet, let's say, is doing it to *correct* wrongful behavior, to teach correct behavior, etc. Sooo, what would then be the point of *eternal* after-life punishment? So then that leads us to the punishment not being done to correct or teach but because of meanness. JMO, of course.
 
officerripley said:
Here's a thought of mine: Meriam Webster says that one of the definitions for punishment is "correction." And I think that most good parents punishing a child or a good pet owner punishing a pet, let's say, is doing it to *correct* wrongful behavior, to teach correct behavior, etc. Sooo, what would then be the point of *eternal* after-life punishment? So then that leads us to the punishment not being done to correct or teach but because of meanness. JMO, of course.
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I like this. There was (and maybe still is?) a program called "Scared Straight" in which hard prisoners told their stories both in and out of prison to early offenders with the intent to get them to realize that this path was bound for severe hardship.

Reading your post gets me thinking that just maybe the "fire and brimstone" crowd may have been doing the same thing to get people to get baptized, rather than because they supposedly had the inside track on what happens after we die.

Tony
 
tbeltrans said:
I like this. There was (and maybe still is?) a program called "Scared Straight" in which hard prisoners told their stories both in and out of prison to early offenders with the intent to get them to realize that this path was bound for severe hardship.

Reading your post gets me thinking that just maybe the "fire and brimstone" crowd may have been doing the same thing to get people to get baptized, rather than because they supposedly had the inside track on what happens after we die.

Tony
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You know, the more I think about this, the thought I posted above may answer a question I've had for a while now: Why do some people prefer--I've seen and heard them come right out and say it--a ruthless, unreasonably-authoritarian, unforgiving, "strongman"-type in an political leader? (Can't find the quote & who said it right now but I think it was a Republican referring to how Jimmy Carter was "too nice" to be President and he'd rather have the meanest son-of-a-gun in office.) I guess it's because some people believe in a supreme being who is a mean son-of-a-gun? I wonder.
 

No..I do not believe in eternal hell. Heaven and hell reside right here on earth and we have a choice where we want to dwell. I believe in 🌈 🌈
 
As quantum physicists are beginning to put together theories of multiple universes, parallel or within, some of these religious concepts start to become more possible to those of us on the outside looking in. As usual, regarding the existence of heaven and hell, I honestly haven't a clue. I don't understand how I could possibly know.

However, those here who talked about our own heaven and hell on earth, made immediate sense to me. We each experience the world differently, and that changes all the time. You can have two people sitting in the same room and one can be having an awful day while the other may be walking on clouds with happiness. It is said that it isn't what happens to us, but how we react to it in our own minds that determines how we feel and therefore, the inner quality of our lives (i.e. the heaven or hell here on earth).

Knowing that and being able to live it such that we are generally above what is happening around us, are two very different things unfortunately. But I do suspect that this is the crux of heaven or hell on earth - a state of mind. I don't see that as the same thing as the religious sense of heaven and hell as places we go after we die, but I do think that our mental health while here on earth is of vital importance to our life experience.

Tony
 
If you wanna get biblical;

There is a hell
There's no endless burning in agony
There'll be some
Then gone......for eternity

There's choices to be made

It's kinda like partying all yer life, then, getting cirrhosis of the liver

Yer gonna die...forever.....there's some agony involved


Serenity4321 said:
What loving God would condemn anyone for eternity
Click to expand...

No condemnation
He gave the dearest He had

His Son died the eternal death....
That's why the agony in the garden
......the separation from The Father
Death

I had trouble with this for awhile
I mean, I have friends who gave their lives for others

But, God the Son......died the eternal one

So we could live

It's our choice
 
Maybe not fire and brimstone, but something. My feeling has always been, that if your faith allows for your to believe Heaven exists, it seems the opposite must also exist. Seems a rather simplistic belief, but one to ponder.
 

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