Is Hell Necessary To Christianity?

[Penumbra]

Yes, and that invisible undetectable problem --the corruptibility of the human body-- is perfectly in-line with the corruptibility of the soul.

This isn't working. Carry on.

 

[uu_sage]

The problem I have with the doctrine known as substitutionary atonement is it says that a loving God who Jesus knew as Father would will for the death an innocent Jesus to be a blood sacrifice for people's sins. This doctrine says that God requires violence to bring about reconciliation and redemption of the creation, it says that God is incapable of reconciling in more peaceful ways. This doctrine also justifies domestic violence, child abuse, war, and antisemitism. Blood atonement theology is a product of Anshelm in the 12th century created after Jesus's death.

I believe that Jesus died with us in the sense that whenever any of God's children are suffering, God is present with us.

Jesus by his example, teaching, death and resurrection is a savior in the way that Jesus saves us from fear including the fear of death, Jesus saves us from anxiety, Jesus frees us from easy answers and simple solutions, Jesus saves us from superficial relationships.

The cross was a instrument of torture implement used by the Romans to silence those who were thought to be dissidents to the interests of the Empire. The Romans thought that if they can kill this rebel rousing Jew they can effectively end his movement. By crucifying people the Romans sent a message to the people- if you are gonna defend the powerless and the oppressed as Jesus did, then you're gonna pay a hefty price including your life. Even when one kills the love of God in a person (as in Jesus), that God's love is more powerful than death. We die and rise with Christ.

So in as much as there's nothing to be saved from (typically, hell) you don't consider Jesus to be a savior, and therefore his death really didn't suddenly generate any change in anyone or anything, such as an atoning for sins. Pretty much makes him just a good guy.

Interesting.

 

[Midnight Pete]

This isn't working. Carry on.

Meh. The metaphor was getting too complicated anyway.

 

[Skwim]

I believe that Jesus died with us in the sense that whenever any of God's children are suffering, God is present with us.

Jesus by his example, teaching, death and resurrection is a savior in the way that Jesus saves us from fear including the fear of death, Jesus saves us from anxiety, Jesus frees us from easy answers and simple solutions, Jesus saves us from superficial relationships.

So the importance of Jesus in your religion comes from the values you project onto him. And not to get too personal, but just how does this save and free one from the negatives you list here? For instance, exactly how does Jesus save one from superficial relationships? Or free you from easy answers and simple solutions, which don't seem to be necessarily bad at all?

 

[Penumbra]

Meh. The metaphor was getting too complicated anyway.

Ok I have more time now. Earlier I was doing other things online, and only stopping here during breaks. So I'll say what I was trying to say except without trying to keep it short. Short wasn't working.

The metaphor of the dentist does not make sense for Christianity. The Christian posits the argument that Christianity is simply a solution to a problem that exists, much like a dentist is a solution to a problem that exists.

But the difference is that the dentist truly is a problem solver. The dentist did not create the problem in order to fix it. He did not invent cavities and give them to little children so that he can fix them. Furthermore, the problem he fixes is objective and observable. It's not some magical and vague problem that only dentists can see, which would be oddly convenient for them.

With Christianity, the "solution" is only exists because Christians delivered the problem in the first place. They're the dentists for the cavities they create. Judaism had no concept of each person being worthy of only agony in hell unless saved. Neither do other religions from around the world. This concept only came about because Christians delivered it, and within their dogma they presented a solution to their own problem. Then they tell the Jews they don't even know how to interpret their own religious scriptures and claim this doctrine was there all along.

Even if it were true that people are born with original sin, which it's not, then this dilemma of the dentist creating his own cavities to fix would still apply. The dentist would be the Christian god rather than the Christians themselves. Why would Yahweh set up his creation such that beings can be guilty before they even draw their first breath? Why would any reasonable being possibly conclude that any being that does not act perfectly according to his will be deserving of perpetual agony?

It's irrational.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Yes, in the way way you have need to have a toothache before you go to let the dentist poke around in your mouth. Hopefully, it doesn't get to the point where you have a dental abscess and are putting your health in danger. But if you can't bring yourself to go to the dentist, the abscess might actually kill you. Unless you acknowledge your dentist's ability to make things better, things will only get worse.

Your analogy doesn't work. I go for regular checkups even when my teeth don't hurt; I think this is true for most people.

I don't "need" dental abcesses or pain as inducement to go to the dentist. Just wanting good teeth is incentive enough for me.

OTOH, no amount of pain in my mouth would make me seek out a dentist if I didn't think that dentists existed at all. You need a certain level of acceptance of the tenets of the religion before that religion's threats matter.

 

[TheKnight]

As a theologically-minded Unitarian Universalist, I've been following the thread Why is universalism heresy? with great interest.

Several folks have expressed the thought that, without Hell, Christianity falls apart completely.

I don't get it.

If you share the opinion above (and are willing to defend it), kindly explain why you think eternal damnation is the lynchpin of Christianity.

Furthermore, if something so ugly is so important to the religion, doesn't that make the religion itself despicable?

Interestingly enough, it was this issue that ended up with my leaving Christianity.

It was in the course of my "struggle" with the idea of hell that I "discovered", more or less, that hell isn't threatened pre-Christ, and there's no need for the salvation that comes "through Christ."

Essentially, there isn't anything in the OT that would lead a person to believe that they will suffer any sort of eternal punishment. Those punishments that are mentioned, aren't eternal. And they have solutions that are laid out.

Because it was what put Christ on the cross. The otherwise inevitability of Hell for mankind and the sin-debt that was paid in full with his blood.

Where does the concept of sin-debt come from?

 

[Reverend Rick]

Hell is absolutley nessessary for Christianity as I know it. You have to scare the living daylights out of little children that if their not good, they will burn for all eternity in an all consuming fire.

This will encourage them to say their prayers each and every evening before bedtime.

I remember saying every night, "If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take".

I also remember what a comfort that was that I might actually die each and every night. :help:

 

[Midnight Pete]

Hell is absolutley nessessary for Christianity as I know it. You have to scare the living daylights out of little children that if their not good, they will burn for all eternity in an all consuming fire.

This will encourage them to say their prayers each and every evening before bedtime.

I remember saying every night, "If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take".

I also remember what a comfort that was that I might actually die each and every night. :help:

That sounds like Christianity without Christ.

 

[Skwim]

Hell is absolutley nessessary for Christianity as I know it. You have to scare the living daylights out of little children that if their not good, they will burn for all eternity in an all consuming fire.

This will encourage them to say their prayers each and every evening before bedtime.

I remember saying every night, "If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take".

I also remember what a comfort that was that I might actually die each and every night. :help:

I have to agree. That damn prayer brought me more anxious nights then the comfort it was supposedly meant to bring. It's on par with outright child abuse. Another example of nearsighted religious thinking.

 

[Storm]

I have to agree. That damn prayer brought me more anxious nights then the comfort it was supposedly meant to bring. It's on par with outright child abuse. Another example of nearsighted religious thinking.

We really need a child abuse equivalent of Godwin's Law......

 

[Midnight Pete]

We really need a child abuse equivalent of Godwin's Law......

Storm's Law?

 

[Skwim]

We really need a child abuse equivalent of Godwin's Law......

In this case the issue truly is about children and the unnecessary anguish brought about by unthinking adults, which is on par with child abuse.

 

[Storm]

In this case the issue truly is about children and the unnecessary anguish brought about by unthinking adults, which is on par with child abuse.

What about a slightly creepy prayer is on par with, say, putting a cigarette out in a kid's arm?

Such comparisons offend me not as a religious woman, but as a survivor of actual child abuse. I know using hyperbole makes you feel all nice and righteous, but it only serves to belittle the very real suffering I and far too many others have endured.

 

[Midnight Pete]

In this case the issue truly is about children and the unnecessary anguish brought about by unthinking adults, which is on par with child abuse.

It can amount to a form of psychological and emotional child abuse *IF* the parents aren't careful enough to listen to their child's questions about what they've been taught in Sunday School. Or careless enough to let their child live in fear.

 

[Skwim]

What about a slightly creepy prayer is on par with, say, putting a cigarette out in a kid's arm?
Such comparisons offend me not as a religious woman, but as a survivor of actual child abuse. I know using hyperbole makes you feel all nice and righteous, but it only serves to belittle the very real suffering I and far too many others have endured.

Sorry about your unfortunate childhood, but there are gradients of child abuse; not all child abuse is the same or is extreme. Some forms are significantly worse than others, but this doesn't negate the fact that the lesser forms fail to qualify as abuse. That you apparently require child abuse to measure up to some perceived level of wrong---"real suffering"---is not only naive but arrogant. Obviously you're unfamiliar with psychological harm and its possible crippling effects. This isn't to say that the prayer necessarily rises to this level, although it well could (it certainly scared the **** out of me for years), only that it's unthinking imposition on children can easily abuse a child's sense of security and peace of mind, instilling a genuine terror of sleep. But go ahead and poo poo such mental anguish because it doesn't raise visible scars, and stick to your patronizing attitude toward any suffering you don't judge as meeting that of your own " real suffering."

*Sheesh!*

 

[Storm]

Sorry about your unfortunate childhood, but there are gradients of child abuse; not all child abuse is the same or is extreme. Some forms are significantly worse than others, but this doesn't negate the fact that the lesser forms fail to qualify as abuse. That you apparently require child abuse to measure up to some perceived level of wrong---"real suffering"---is not only naive but arrogant.

Yeah, I require it to be abusive, not merely misguided.

Obviously you're unfamiliar with psychological harm and its possible crippling effects.

:biglaugh: Would you like the list of my abuse-related diagnoses? PTSD; Sleep Terror Disorder (from which I am thankfully recovered); and Schizo-Affective Disorder, which in my case means learned paranoia.

Tell me again how unfamiliar I am.

This isn't to say that the Lord's Prayer necessarily rises to this level, although it well could (it certainly scared the **** out of me for years), only that it's unthinking imposition on children can easily abuse a child's sense of security and peace of mind, instilling a genuine terror of sleep.

If a rhyme is enough to trigger such trauma, the issues are already there.

Also, for clarity's sake, it's not the Lord's Prayer. That's "Give us this day our daily bread." I don't think the prayer in question has a name.

But go ahead and poo poo such mental anguish because it doesn't raise visible scars, and stick to your patronizing attitude toward any suffering you don't judge as meeting that of your own " real suffering."

I'm not going to be drawn into making suffering into a ****ing contest. If that's how you took my outrage, you were mistaken.

That said, yeah, I do have standards for terms like "child abuse." If you think that that stupid little prayer is anything close to it, well... I envy your naivete.

ETA: This is seriously hijacking the thread, though. If you respond, please do so by starting a new topic and pointing me to it.

 

[Skwim]

Yeah, I require it to be abusive, not merely misguided.

:biglaugh: Would you like the list of my abuse-related diagnoses? PTSD; Sleep Terror Disorder (from which I am thankfully recovered); and Schizo-Affective Disorder, which in my case means learned paranoia.

Tell me again how unfamiliar I am.

If a rhyme is enough to trigger such trauma, the issues are already there.

Also, for clarity's sake, it's not the Lord's Prayer. That's "Give us this day our daily bread." I don't think the prayer in question has a name.

I'm not going to be drawn into making suffering into a ****ing contest. If that's how you took my outrage, you were mistaken.

That said, yeah, I do have standards for terms like "child abuse." If you think that that stupid little prayer is anything close to it, well... I envy your naivete.

ETA: This is seriously hijacking the thread, though. If you respond, please do so by starting a new topic and pointing me to it.

See HERE

 

[Storm]

See HERE

Responded.

Much as it pains me, I should apologize for getting so heated. This is an important issue, and if you're willing to discuss it, I think we should.

 

[Willamena]

What if the dentist designed the system that ensured every baby is born with cavities?

They practically have. They give out candies at the front desk.

(Yeah, I got the metaphor. I just wanted to comment on dentistry.)