Perpetual conscious torment
Wouldn’t you agree that perpetual, conscious torment is a very, very harsh punishment for people who’ve never even heard the gospel? Or good people who just weren’t persuaded by a bad evangelist?
I know the theory that calls this “good,” but it defies every notion of “good” I can think of — other than being conventional Bible teaching.
Well, you know that we’ve discussed this before. I don’t believe that God punishes the damned perpetually. But I believe this because I read the Bible to support a very different interpretation. The idea of perpetual conscious torment came much later in church history.
For example, consider —
(Isa 66:22-24 ESV) 22 “For as the new heavens and the new earth that I make shall remain before me, says the LORD, so shall your offspring and your name remain. 23 From new moon to new moon, and from Sabbath to Sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before me, declares the LORD. 24 “And they shall go out and look on the dead bodies of the men who have rebelled against me. For their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh.”
Isaiah teaches that God will re-create the heavens and the earth.
In the Constitutions of the Holy Apostles, likely composed in the Third Century AD, the writer speaks of the fate of the damned in these two passages —
But when all things shall be reduced to dust and ashes, And the immortal God who kindled the fire shall have quenched it, God shall form those bones and that ashes into a man again, And shall place mortal men again as they were before. And then shall be the judgment, wherein God will do justice, And judge the world again. But as many mortals as have sinned through impiety shall again be covered under the earth; But so many as have been pious shall live again in the world.
If, therefore, man be His workmanship, made by Christ, by Him most certainly will he after he is dead be raised again, with intention either of being crowned for his good actions or punished for his transgressions. But if He, being the legislator, judges with righteousness; as He punishes the ungodly, so does He do good to and saves the faithful.
The writer agrees with Isaiah that the wicked will be punished but they will ultimately cease to live (“again be covered under the earth”). Thus, we have a temporary, just punishment for the damned followed by the end of existence.
Compare —
(Mat 10:28 ESV) And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell [=Gehenna =a burning dump].
“Destroy” is not quite the same thing as “torture without destroying.”
You see, the Greek believes the soul to be innately immortal, and so they could not conceive of a soul being destroyed. Jesus’ words were intentionally shocking to those imbued with Greek thought.
Indeed, the Scripture writers routinely deny the Greek point of view —
(Rom 2:7 ESV) to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life;
(1Co 15:53 ESV) For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.
(1Co 15:54 ESV) When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
(1Ti 6:15-16 ESV) 15 which he will display at the proper time–he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, 16 who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.
God is innately immortal. Humans are innately mortal — but God gives the righteous immortality. The damned receive no such gift. They are not innately immortal.
We’ve discussed the details at length before. For now, just consider how much sense this makes. God is just, and justice is good. Therefore, God’s justice is, of course, good, and it is good that the damned are punished justly.
We therefore have no complaint that the damned do not enjoy eternity. They are treated with perfect, holy justice. And the nearly innocent are punished but a little — no more than they deserve, which for an accountable child would surely be hardly any punishment at all.
(Luk 12:47-48 ESV) 47 And that servant who knew his master’s will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating. 48 But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more.
Notice how Jesus plainly declares that those who know better — who “knew his master’s will” — will be punished with greater severity than the one who did not know.
God is just and God is good.
Yep
I don’t usually speak about things I have not studied much. Final punishment is one of those topics. I am convinced though that whatever the wrath of God includes is not good. I am thankful that we who are trusting Christ will be saved from God’s wrath. Those who are on the other side are human targets for the fury of God’s anger against sin. The story of Jesus and his work for sinners is very, very good news!
Again, we find ourselves basing our considerations of what is “very very harsh” on our own values. We weigh in on what we feel would be theoretically just or unjust, and then go on to try to match God’s prospective actions to OUR moral sense of the matter. No matter which way the argument goes from there, this basis in human values is always suspect, and therefore the conclusions must be also.
I do find valid ideas on both sides of this discussion, and I cannot say I am comfortable with either persuasion. Both persuasions must acknowledge passages of scripture which appear, in plain language, to contradict them. It appears to me that, being unable to fully reconcile the biblical language of eternal punishment, and the language of differential punishment, and language which indicates finite destruction, we have merely perched upon the view which seems most reasonable to us, and which fits our picture of God the best, and we marginalize what seems to contradict us. I do not consider this to be intentional malfeasance, but rather our discomfort with not having good answers to what seems like a valid question. Better a leaky answer than none at all, perhaps?
I do wonder why this is an issue. It is a moot point to the believer. And for the unbeliever, salvation is by faith, not terror. I cannot imagine a person coming to faith in Christ because eternal punishment frightened him into belief where the prospect of ultimate oblivion could not. So, as a functional matter, having a full and settled answer is of little moment, IMO.
Biblically, interpretive disagreement over the nature of how God deals with the dead unbeliever does not seem to me to create any problems in discerning the gospel or life in Christ or faith and practice in the church. I suppose any disagreement could fracture fellowship– we often need no reason at all– but this difference in view seems to have insufficient immediacy and consequence to truly divide brothers.
If, OTOH, this is an issue which is important because we are trying to understand the character of God, we seem to arguing it in circular fashion, or at least we are “affirming the consequent”. We BEGIN with assumptions about God’s character based on our own moral compass, and induce our way backward from there to doctrinal positions about hell, which doctrines then purport to offer insight into God’s character. I’m not sure this tells us much about anything but ourselves.
It seems that part of being faithful to God is to rightly assess His character. The parable of the talents includes a man that misjudged God’s character by supposing Him to be harsher than He is: Then the man who had received the one talent came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. I would love to hear your thoughts, everybody.
I don’t see anything hard to understand about “The Second Death”
Rev 2:11 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.
Rev 20:6 Blessed and holy [is] he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.
Rev 20:14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
Rev 20:15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.
Rev 21:8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Laymond,
I agree the Second Death is not hard to understand, but I don’t know your view of it. I put forth that the lake of fire-sulfur-brimstone of Rev. 21:8 and Rev. 20:14-15 is the same lake of fire in Rev. 20:10, where there is torment day and night, forever and ever. Five verses later (v15), unsaved humans are punished in that same place. I believe there are degrees of punishment, but it is eternal conscious punishment nonetheless.
Well, Jay, it seems to me that the answer to the “dilemma of a judging God” is not an attempt to redefine the penalty. As I see it it leeds away from the original topic, that’s why I said earlier: “Please don’t bring this up again!” Because now it’s not going to be a conversation over lunch, but it will last till past midnight …
HG… I wonder if we all haven’t made some assumptions which turned into fact regarding the “lake of fire.” The fact that it exits forever; that there is some use of it for punishment; and that humans will experience some judgement in it; does cause one to believe that humans will be tortured forever but does it say that exactly? Could it be metaphorical or symbolic of something that isn’t imaginable….say like heaven.. Do we expect streets of gold ? Gates of pearl ? Probably not in reality since God also said we don’t have the capacity to imagine it… Could be that hell is much the same… Who can say with exactness ? It sounds bad, the other sounds good… let’s go with the good…:)
Robert, I agree that it is a key part of our life in Christ to come to better know our Father. But in discussions of understanding God’s character, I find two common fallacies at work. The first is fatalism masking intellectual laziness, or covering a simple unwillingness to admit what we don’t understand. In this approach, folks find paradoxes about God’s character in the scripture and then throw up their hands, concluding that “God is occasionally arbitrary and capricious, but he’s God, so we should just get over it”.
The second fallacy is the one I continue to point out, which is that we begin with the tacit assumption that God is like us, only better. This leads to a discussion of God’s character in which we judge His actions in terms of our own moral code and expectations, and we find ourselves in the bizarre position of considering what God must or must not do (though we NEVER use that terminology) under various hypothetical circumstances. An interesting version of this fallacious approach is the idea of “binding God” to his promises or to his previous recorded actions or statements, as though something God said is actually greater than the One who said it. This method puts God in the dock when he does not perform his contractual obligations.
I am of the opinion that we think we are closer to understanding God than we really are. Part of this illusion comes from the closed canon construct, which suggests everything we need to know is between the covers of the latest edition from Zondervan. This leads us to believe that if we want to know God, we need merely to mine the scriptures more thoroughly. When a believer has spent many years faithfully mining the scriptures and becoming expert in recalling what it says, he comes to believe that he MUST know God. Or at least knows God better than anyone else on his block.
I am more of the opinion that our revelation of God comes in bits and pieces, almost like a jigsaw puzzle. We get a piece of revelation about God, and turn it round and round, examining how it fits with the other pieces we have. We need each other’s pieces of revelation if we are to get anything approaching a picture of our Father’s character. Unfortunately, when we find our puzzle piece not resembling the puzzle piece from the guy across the street, we tend to argue against his revelation instead of the more difficult task of seeking out the pieces in between.
Charles wrote,
“[The nature of hell] is a moot point to the believer. And for the unbeliever, salvation is by faith, not terror. I cannot imagine a person coming to faith in Christ because eternal punishment frightened him into belief where the prospect of ultimate oblivion could not.”
Respectfully, I disagree. The Medieval doctrine of hell as perpetual conscious torment is a stumbling block for many potential converts because it is so obviously unjust. It’s just hard to reconcile a loving God with a God who imposes such a severe punishment on all.
As Edward Fudge has demonstrated in The Fire That Consumes
, the overwhelming evidence is in support of a destroying, truly just hell.
I argue from the standpoint of manifest justice because the topic is justice, and because I’ve covered the exegesis in many previous posts. But I came to this conclusion, not by pondering the justice of the matter, but by testing Fudge’s claims against the scriptures — long before I read his book. I just looked up all the damnation passages to see what they really say.
And I would urge anyone else to take on the same exercise. Search “destroy*” and “destruct*” and “hell” and “hades” and “tartarus” and “fire” and “torment” and “death” in any computer concordance. Read the passages just as literally as possible, but start in the Old Testament.
It’s a lot of work, but a richly rewarding study if you have the patience.
Price,
I agree that Revelation is full of symbolic language, and I would even contend that the lake of fire is symbolic; I deny a literal lake of fire in some far away land! However, Revelation 20 and 21 uses the same symbol consistently to speak of what is symbolized, which is location and punishment. The lake of fire-sulfur-brimstone symbolizes the location of punishment, while punishment has its own description, namely “tormented day and night for ever and ever” . Certainly, I believe even this description is symbolic because day and night will have passed away, but the meaning of the symbol remains true, that being some degree of eternal conscious punishment.
Who is cast into the lake of fire and receives punishment? The devil, beast, false prophet (Rev. 20:10), as well as every human is not found in the Book life (Rev. 20:15), who are described as “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… (Rev. 21:8).
I realize my position is nothing new, and that you and Jay disagree; for the record, in my finite knowledge of things, I wish universalism were true.
HG…Not into universalism… Just was suggesting, however inaccurately, that the place of torment or punishment, whether symbolic or literal, can be a place designated to exist for all of eternity but that it’s existence does not require that those thrown in have to be tormented forever.
Jay… I John 4:18 “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.” Does this passage have any relevance to this conversation?
Jay noted: “The Medieval doctrine of hell as perpetual conscious torment is a stumbling block for many potential converts because it is so obviously unjust.”
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I would suggest that folks who stumble over this are more likely to seek and accept universalism than a one-time eternal destruction. The substitutionary death of Jesus offers a similar stumbling block as hell, for similar reasons. The gospel is indeed foolishness to those who are perishing. And God does not bind himself to what is “obvious” to us. After all, he kills the one universal Innocent so that the guilty might be reconciled to Him– perhaps the most counter-intuitive idea ever to reach mankind. If our approach to whether a doctrine is reasonable or true is predicated on how well it will be received by the lost, we have lost our own way. And, IMO, eternal destruction is not much more philosophically impalatable to the unbeliever than is the destruction of the Amelekites. God’s instructions to Abraham about Isaac create similar consternation. Although I do find believers trying to explain these away as well.
I wonder if we could catalog all the doctrinal “deal breakers” which are identified by unbelievers. (Eternal punishment, condemning homosexuality, male/female relationships, “only one way to heaven”, divine creation, etc.) And I wonder if we should be trying to find a way to meet folks halfway on these things. So far, I don’t lean that way.
Jay, I do see many indicators which favor the position you have put forward. But “the unbelievers will like it better” simply does not make that list.
Charles…agreed that whether one likes the concept isn’t a determination of it’s reality…However, who gets to decide? Was creation in 6 24 hour periods or does the Hebrew language allow for more extended period of time? We once had to believe in the Earth as flat and geocentric …Is the story of Lazarus symbolic or actual…Hard to imagine having a conversation with others while burning alive… Is this God of unimaginable grace able to burn people alive forever? As with many other topics on this blog it does seem there are differing points of view on some if not all topics… It’s not surprising then that unbelievers have difficulty deciding in what they should believe as they watch us condemn each other to hell… I’d say there is room for improvement in how we deliver the truth…Some things we know for sure…other things not so much..We have to be willing to be honest about that and less dogmatic on things we can’t demonstrate or have other reasonable explanations.