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Is Hell an Invention of the church ?

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I don’t think the church invented hell, but I don’t think the church understands hell.
 
gotta love it, you are now part of the chinese confederation, be lucky that they let have some type of free market.
 
Hi Hawkins does it make you feel better to attack my training as opposed to yours?
Do you feel inadequate so you feel you must lash out at me?
Are you not able to converse without the personal comments?
Why do you feel the need to assail me?
Am I not allowed free speech in your world?
Most of your quotes come from the new testament can you show what Abraham , Isaac, Jacob believed about going to hell?

It is one of God's principles that the punishment for sin is death (Rom. 6:23; 8:13; James 1:15).

We have previously shown death to be a state of complete unconsciousness. Sin results in total destruction, not eternal torment (Matt. 21:41; 22:7; Mark 12:9; James 4:12), as surely as people were destroyed by the Flood (Luke 17:27,29), and as the Israelites died in the wilderness (1 Cor. 10:10). On both these occasions the sinners died rather than being eternally tormented. It is therefore impossible that the wicked are punished with an eternity of conscious torment and suffering.

We have also seen that God does not impute sin - or count it to our record - if we are ignorant of His word (Rom. 5:13). Those in this position will remain dead. Those who have known God's requirements will be resurrected and judged at Christ's return. If wicked, the punishment they receive will be death, because this is the judgment for sin. Therefore after coming before the judgment seat of Christ, they will be punished and then die again, to stay dead for ever. This will be "the second death", spoken of in Rev. 2:11; 20:6. These people will have died once, a death of total unconsciousness. They will be resurrected and judged at Christ's return, and then punished with a second death, which, like their first death, will be total unconsciousness. This will last for ever.

It is in this sense that the punishment for sin is 'everlasting', in that there will be no end to their death. To remain dead for ever is an everlasting punishment. An example of the Bible using this kind of expression is found in Deut. 11:4. This describes God's one-off destruction of Pharaoh's army in the Red Sea as an eternal, on-going destruction in that this actual army never again troubled Israel, "He made the water of the Red sea to overflow them...the Lord hath destroyed them unto this day".

Even in early Old Testament times the believers understood that there would be a resurrection at the last day, after which the responsible wicked would return to the grave. Job 21:30,32 is very clear: "The wicked...shall be brought forth (i.e. resurrected) to the day of wrath...yet shall he be brought (then) to the grave". One of the parables about Christ's return and the judgment speaks of the wicked being 'slain' in his presence (Luke 19:27). This hardly fits into the idea that the wicked exist for ever in a conscious state, constantly receiving torture. In any case, this would be a somewhat unreasonable punishment - eternal torture for deeds of 70 years. God has no pleasure in punishing wicked people; it is therefore to be expected that He will not inflict punishment on them for eternity (Eze. 18:23,32; 33:11 cp. 2 Peter 3:9).

To understand the truth my teachers still tell me I must read at least three chapters from the old testament every day just like all the others around the world we all read the same chapters every day.
My Ancestors were burned at the stake for telling the people to read the old testament.

The Huguenots and the Waldenses died trying to bring the Bible to the People.

To this day the church has won the victory few Christians ever study the old testament.

Psa 78:5 For he established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children:

Isa 8:20 To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, [it is] because [there is] no light in them.


The old testament is full of future events, Prophecy.
Please study the old testament.
 
jasoncran said:
gotta love it, you are now part of the chinese confederation, be lucky that they let have some type of free market.
Me?
 
Someone who's annihilated wouldn't have contempt, let alone everlasting contempt. Of course all the references to eternal punishment noted above from the New Testament was well documented evidence to dispute annihilation.[/b]

The contempt is what is experienced by the living towards the dead. It is symbolic, figurative language.

The NT does not disprove annihilation. All the 'eternal torment' texts find their symbolic meaning in the OT language of complete extinction. Terms such as 'day and night forever and ever', 'unquenchable fire', 'worm dieth not' all have temporary meanings to denote continuity to completion as opposed to eternal duration.

Mark 9:44-45 uses the destruction language of Isaiah 66 and Jeremiah 17:23
Revelation 14:10-11 uses the language of eternal destruction as a state of Isaiah 34:10

Terms such as 'everlasting', 'eternal' and 'forever and ever' are used to denote results, not duration. Unquenchable fire means the fire cannot be PUT out, not that it will never GO out (See the Jeremiah notation). Words such as 'consume', 'perish' and 'death', are never used in the bible to denote 'eternal conscious punishment' when applying to the fate of the wicked.

Here is a quote from RF Weymouth, renowned Greek scholar on this matter:
"My mind fails to conceive a grosser misinterpretation of language then when the five or six strongest words which the Greek tongue possesses, signifying 'destroy,' or 'destruction,' are explained to mean maintaining an everlasting but wretched existence. To translate black as white is nothing to this." (R. F. Weymouth, Life In Christ, page 365, translator of "The New Testament in Modern Speech.")

The bottom line is this:

The wicked do not have eternal life or immortality in any fashion. This is a gift solely for the righteous. Nowhere does the Bible show that the wicked have immortal souls to be punished for all eternity (Luke 16 does not apply here).

The wages of sin is death (thanatos), BUT the gift of God is eternal life (the opposite of thanatos). - Romans 6:23

If the wicked are not immortal, they cannot be tormented for eternity. The inherent immortality of the soul of the wicked must first be proved before apocalyptic proof texts like Revelation 14:11 and Revelation 20:10 are stampeded to to try and support eternal torment.

I would refer anyone to this site for many scholars' views on the erroneous, unbiblical teachings of immortality of the soul and hell fire. Click on the link to the left called 'Death and Immortality' for a comprehensive listing of articles, book passages and sermons.

Truth According to Scripture - Defending the Christian Faith
 
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