It would just be completely absent of good.
Good defined in the dictionary:
morally excellent; virtuous; righteous
satisfactory in quality, quantity, or degree
right; proper; fit
well-behaved
None of this will exist there, and everything that comes with all of this being absent will result.
I'm not sure if I can agree with that. I know a lot of nonbelievers who are morally excellent, virtuous, righteous, satisfatory in quality, quantity, and degree; right, proper, fit, and well-behaved. In what sense would goodness not exist, then, if there are good people in Hell -- and I daresay that I'd count myself as a good person, too?
pwfaith said:
Hell is a consequence. A consequence is the effect, result or outcome of something occurring earlier - or in this case the effect/result of not accepting something given to us freely. So in a way it's not a choice to it, it's the result of a choice of not accepting the way out of it. Does that make sense?
(at least from my pov)
I understand it from your pov, but I think there are some serious issues with that mode of thinking. My counterpoint is very similar to the one I would offer to your next paragraph, so just see my response below.
pwfaith said:
Unfortunately, yes I believe you would
But I do not believe anyone is ignorant. I am sure, there have been people here who have attempted to provide you evidence of God's existence, which you have not accepted. So you are not ignorant. Scripture says people will be held responsible for the truths they have been told, not for their understanding of the truths.
Can't you see the dubious unrighteousness of such a system, though? Just because someone reads a book to you and exposes you to a subject, you're forever accountable for having been exposed to it -- even if a good argument wasn't made? God still gets to say "Well, you heard about me, even if a good case wasn't made; and you didn't believe it, so, sorry, you get to go to Hell?"
Please, think of it like this. Most people end up in the same religion they're born around. How is it fair that God will send people to Hell just for being born in India or Pakistan, for instance -- places where most people do not end up as Christians but rather as another religion? Is that righteous on God's part?
Look at it from a person's POV who isn't sure what to believe. 50 different people will approach them in their lifetime and tell them about 50 different religions or variations of religions: I'm sure everyone on this forum has been exposed to Catholicism, Protestantism, Mormonism, Scientology, Islam, Buddhism, Taoism, and many more -- it appears that you believe God expects people to listen to the Christians that approach them and single them out as the only correct ones, even though they sound exactly like all the other ones.
Here's an analogy. You wake up with a bomb in your hands. It has 50 buttons on it; all of them look the same to you as far as you can tell. You're surrounded by 50 different people, each of them telling you to press a different button. A note by the bomb says that it's going to explode soon, and that only one of the buttons disarms the bomb -- pressing the wrong button just causes it to explode anyway. None of the people telling you to press their choice of button are making a very good case for why their choice of button is the right one.
Is this a fair situation?
If you agree that it's not a fair situation, then you'll understand why I find your notion of God allowing people to go to Hell through merely being unconvinced by Christian evangelists to be unrighteous, even evil.
pwfaith said:
One either believes this to be true, or they do not. The consequence for accepting it to be true is eternity with God, denying it to be true is eternity without God.
Ok, suppose that I asked you whether or not a 300 km square shaped crater existed on the far side of Pluto; but I don't offer you very good evidence either way. I then tell you that if you make the right choice, I'll give you $1,000,000; but if you make the wrong choice something horrific will happen to you.
Am I offering you a fair choice? Of
course not! A loving God wouldn't play such childish games.
A loving God -- a just God -- would give people an
informed choice, not some blind guesswork in the dark with eternity as a consequence! If you ask me, it sounds more demonic than God-like to judge people on a choice that isn't well informed -- that's just monstrous, that's totally malevolent and vile.
If you have children, try punishing them for some choice they have to make without knowing why they're making it or how they're supposed to know the right choice: see if you feel like a monster or not after punishing them. I bet you would, and for good reason -- it's a horrible thing to do. So why would God do it?
pwfaith said:
I understand how you are looking at it. This is how I see it. God cannot look upon anything that is not righteous. We are all unrighteous b/c we have all sinned. However when we accept the payment Jesus made for us, then God sees us as righteous. God cannot allow anything that is unholy or unrighteous to enter heaven. It would corrupt the perfect holy heavenly realms. So the only way one can enter is if they are considered righteous in the eyes of God and the only way to do that is to live a completely sinfree life, which none of us can do, or accept the payment Christ made.
Ok, so why not give us good evidence that He exists so we can make an informed choice instead of blindly guessing in the dark -- instead of blindly pressing a button on our bomb with 50 other buttons? As far as I know, maybe Allah exists and Mohammed was his prophet and I'll actually go to Hell for not believing in him. As far as I know, maybe Zeus exists and Jesus doesn't, and I'll go to Hades for not paying my respects to Zues. How am I supposed to pick which -- if any -- religion is right if there is no good evidence for any of them? What kind of sick and perverted monster would punish people eternally for making a wrong choice (or abstaining from a choice) because they don't feel they have enough evidence to make a
wise choice?
pwfaith said:
Are they ignorant, are they deceived, are they rebellious? I don't think there is one across-the-board answer b/c every individual is different. Do they have to understand everything first or just believe me in order for a relationship to begin being built?
The point, though, is whether or not you would allow the child to suffer immensely just because they aren't sure whether or not you exist?
Something tells me that you wouldn't. Would you consider a parent who allows their child to suffer horribly just because that child isn't sure the parent exists to be a good person or a bad person?
If you answer "bad person," then why does God get exception to that?
Here's an analogy. Ever seen Honey, I Shrunk The Kids? Let's say that for whatever reason some parents get shrunk such that their kids can't see them, and for the sake of argument we'll say that the kids are taken care of somehow. Let's say that the tiny couple tries to leave little signs here and there, which the kids see, but the kids aren't sure how to interpret them: are they coincidence, are they a message, etc.? The kids ultimately decide they don't have enough evidence to come to a conclusion, so they withhold judgement about whether or not their parents are still around.
Do the parents then say, "Aha, they have made their choice, so be it -- I will now leave forever and leave these kids to starve in my absence?"
What kind of horrible parents would do that?
What kind of horrible God would do that?
pwfaith said:
So basically what you are saying is you want God to play by your rules, not the other way around?
I'm saying is that if God expects people to make blind guesses without good evidence, then that's a totally unreasonable expectation. He might as well stick all of us in front of 3 numbered doors and tell us to pick one (which we get stuck with eternally), and behind two are hell and behind one is heaven. With little information to go off of, we're stuck eternally with our "choice" (it can't really be called a "choice" unless it's an INFORMED choice). That's not fair. That's downright evil. That sounds more demonic than Godly.
