Do you believe in hell, Christians?

**Tauromachos** · 05-12-2020, 07:33 PM

Originally Posted by Hahns

Actually in Gospels hell mentioned multiple times. Example when Our Lord mention his Second Coming.

The Good people stands to His right side (Kindom of Heaven)
The Sinners stands in His left side and dropped in Hell (Πυρ το εξωτερων)

Yes they mentioned it but it wasn't the most important thing in the Christian teaching it played only a secondary
or peripherial role

**~~Moje ime~~** · 05-12-2020, 07:52 PM

Originally Posted by SuperDorian

I think the Catholic Church emphasized this part much more and enhanced extented these notions also

because of social and political reasons as Freeroostah mentioned

As for me personally i don't believe in hell as a place of eternal damnation but rather in a state of purgatory a person
passes after physical death which in its duration and intensity depends on how the person lived and what he did and how
is interior or soul is developed when he dies.

One can experience this already during his life time when he does something which goes against his own inner principles he feels a sort
of emptiness or punishment from within himself possible a separation from himself and the divine similar to what you explained which causes
him to repent and become cleansed from his guilt after

Well said.

I think this interpretation is from teaching about "Toll Houses" (Mitarstva in Serbian language) in Orthodox Christianity.

Quote:

"The teaching of Aerial Toll-Houses regards the soul's journey after its departure from the body, and is related to the particular judgment. In its most general form, it refers to the idea that after death, the demons attempt to find a basis for taking the soul to Hades, while the angels defend the soul, taking the reason in the righteousness of the reposed person. Whether the soul is finally seized by the demons, or taken to heaven depends on the state of the soul at death and the intercession (prayers) of the living."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerial_toll_house

https://orthodoxwiki.org/Aerial_Toll-Houses

**Ranger0075** · 05-12-2020, 08:06 PM

"I, Sister Faustina Kowalska, by the order of God, have visited the Abysses of Hell so that I might tell souls about it and testify to its existence...the devils were full of hatred for me, but they had to obey me at the command of God, What I have written is but a pale shadow of the things I saw. But I noticed one thing: That most of the souls there are those who disbelieved that there is a hell." (Diary 741)

"Today, I was led by an angel to the Chasms of Hell. It is a place of great torture; how awesomely large and extensive it is! The kinds of tortures I saw:
The First Torture that constitutes hell is:
The loss of God.
The Second is:
Perpetual remorse of conscience.
The Third is
That one's condition will never change.
The Fourth is:
The fire that will penetrate the soul without destroying it. A terrible suffering since it is a purely spiritual fire, lit by God's anger.
The Fifth Torture is:
Continual darkness and a terrible suffocating smell, and despite the darkness, the devils and the souls of the damned see each other and all the evil, both of others and their own.
The Sixth Torture is:
The constant company of Satan.
The Seventh Torture is:
Horrible despair, hatred of God, vile words, curses and blasphemies.
These are the Tortures suffered by all the damned together, but that is not the end of the sufferings.

Indescribable Sufferings
There are special Tortures destined for particular souls. These are the torments of the senses. Each soul undergoes terrible and indescribable sufferings related to the manner in which it has sinned.

I would have died
There are caverns and pits of torture where one form of agony differs from another. I would have died at the very sight of these tortures if the omnipotence of God had not supported me.

No One Can Say There is No Hell
Let the sinner know that he will be tortured throughout all eternity, in those senses which he made use of to sin. I am writing this at the command of God, so that no soul may find an excuse by saying there is no hell, or that nobody has ever been there, and so no one can say what it is like...how terribly souls suffer there! Consequently, I pray even more fervently for the conversion of sinners. I incessantly plead God's mercy upon them. O My Jesus, I would rather be in agony until the end of the world, amidst the greatest sufferings, than offend you by the least sin." (Diary 741)

**~~Ford~~** · 05-12-2020, 08:25 PM

I don't believe in any form of afterlife.

Ülev · 05-12-2020, 08:26 PM

**Insuperable** · 05-13-2020, 12:00 AM

Originally Posted by Teutone

Ofc I do believe in it, a place where all non christians end up.

Catechism:

We cannot be united with God unless we freely choose to love him. But we cannot love God if we sin gravely against him, against our neighbor or against ourselves . . . To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God’s merciful love means remaining separated from him forever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called “hell.” (CCC 1033)

Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, “eternal fire.” The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs. (CCC 1035)

There is hell/hades or place of dead who wait for resurrection and there is hell aka The Lake of Fire.

The Bible is a bit ambiguous on what hell is, but it is more pointing that the eternal punishment is an eternal destruction/death in the Lake of Fire. Life should be contrasted with death.

John 3:16

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

John 2:17

The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.

John 10:28

I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

John 3:36

Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.

Galatians 6:18

Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.

Romans 5:21

So that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Matthew 7:13-14

Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Matthew 25:46

"Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."

The Lake of Fire is a spiritual crematorium. It represents the second death, the eternal destruction. There is hades (or sheol in the Old Testament if I am not mistaken) and there is the Lake of Fire. It is a place of the dead, place we go when we all die. It represents the first death. On the day of the Resurrection all the dead ones will rise and everyone will be judged accordingly.

Revelations 20:14

Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.

Revelations 21:18

But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars - their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.

And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

Matthew 10:28

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

Only Revelation 14:11 (and with a similar structure 20:11, but you can see that it soon in 20:14 identifies it as the second death) is what makes the thing debatable

Wenham claims that just a single verse (Revelation 14:11) sounds like eternal torment. This is out of a total of 264 references. Ralph Bowles argues the word order of the verse was chosen to fit a chiastic structure, and does not support eternal punishment.