I have to admit that I am not a speaker or talker. I was gifted in writing to spread the Word. What about Truth Social, which is where I have been rattling the unbelievers to accept the Lord. My name on Truth Social is dmacmanes2. Let’s have that Bible study. I turned 71 this year. ✝️🇺🇸
Hello dmacmanes, so to start, I don't know if you looked at the last link I posted but since you started the thread about hell, I will start there.
Four different words are translated as hell in the King James Version, one in the Old Testament
(Sheol) and three in the New Testament (Hades, Gehenna, and Tartarus). On careful
examination it will be found that none of these four words has the meaning of our modern word
"hell," which is a place of eternal torment.
'Wrong about hell says it best'
Many Christians insist that if you question hell, you are rejecting what has always been agreed upon by the Church, yet the doctrine of eternal torment was not a widely held view for the first five centuries after Christ, particularly in the early Eastern Church, the Church of the early apostles and Church fathers such as Paul, Clement of Alexandria, St. Gregory of Nyssa, Origen, and others.
'Brazen church says'
Take a phrase like aionas ton aionon. This phrase shows up several times in the Greek New Testament (Romans 20:10, for example) and has been traditionally translated as "forever and ever”.
But here’s the problem. Aión means "Age”, not "forever”. And even worse, ton means "of”, NOT "and”. For example, Abraham was the father of (ton) Isaac. ALL THREE WORDS of this phrase are completely mistranslated. What it actually says is "Ages of the Ages”.
We see this root word Aión every time we see "eternal”, "eternity”, "forever”, "everlasting”, etc. All of these words revolve around the concept of Ages.
So why are we telling you this?
Because "Ages” played a crucial role in the way early Church fathers viewed life. It was a highly significant paradigm to how they viewed God, this life, the afterlife, etc.
The first person to write about "eternal hell” was the Latin (West) North African Tertullian (160–220 A.D.), who is considered the Father of the Latin Church. As most people reason, hell is a place for people you don’t like! Tertullian fantasized that not only the wicked would be in hell but also every philosopher and theologian who ever argued with him! He envisioned a time when he would look down from heaven at those people in hell and laugh with glee!
And finally...
By far, the main person responsible for making hell eternal in the Western Church was St. Augustine (354–430 CE). Augustine…was made Bishop of Hippo in North Africa. He did not know Greek, had tried to study it, but stated that he hated it. Sadly, it is his misunderstanding of Greek that cemented the concept of eternal hell in the Western Church. Augustine not only said that hell was eternal for the wicked, but also for anyone who wasn’t a Christian. So complete was his concept of God’s exclusion of non-Christians that he considered un-baptized babies as damned. When these babies died, Augustine softened slightly to declare that they would be sent to the "upper level” of hell. Augustine is also the inventor of the concept of "hell Lite,” also known as Purgatory, which he developed to accommodate some of the universalist verses in the Bible. Augustine acknowledged the Universalists, whom he called "tender-hearted,” and included them among the "orthodox.”
P.S. I am tender hearted
Look forward to your comments!
@sally Hello your comments are great your Theology is great! But i am a simple forgiven sinner I believe in Jesus Christ! And as his promise Hell is not even in the picture.
I do not have to worry about the proper nomenclatures or derivitives of where or what hell is all i know it is a lake of fire as God says.
And through the Grace of our Lord and saviour Jesus Christ it does not apply to true believers!
The Bible is a spititual roadmap that leads to two significant destinations, to be with God or against Him!
@edgood Hello,
No,there is no lake of fire.
Not for you or the unbeliever! Much of the problem of dealing with the idea of HELL is the fact that most Christians who believe in such a place simply that they believe because someone told them that it is a fact.
No, the bible is not a roadmap to two significant destinations. And to be honest you can't really put forth a realistic defense of why you believe that other than saying 'It's what my pastor told me.'
If so I'd love to hear it.
There are so many folks that want to believe in God, The God of the Hebrew Bible, but have been so put off by the evangelical narrative that they end up saying 'phfff, not for me'
The idea that you do not have to worry about the idea of hell is in and of itself the problem. I challenge you 'through scripture' to show me where I'm wrong.
You said 'But i am a simple forgiven sinner I believe in Jesus Christ! And as his promise Hell is not even in the picture.'
Then you said, The Bible is a spititual roadmap that leads to two significant destinations, to be with God or against Him!
I appreciate your input but you kind of contradict yourself because the issue is not those that believe the idea of salvation through the belief in Christ but the understanding of those outside that belief. To you all, HELL is a nasty place.
And...
Samuel Dawson, author of, The Teaching of Jesus: From Mount Sinai to Gehenna a Faithful Rabbi Urgently Warns Rebellious Israel, says:
Most of what we believe about hell comes from Catholicism and ignorance of the Old Testament, not from the Bible. I now believe that hell is the invention of Roman Catholicism; and surprisingly, most, if not all, of our popular concepts of hell can be found in the writings of Roman Catholic writers like the Italian poet Dante Alighieri (1265–1321), author of Dante’s Inferno. The English poet John Milton (1608–1674), author of Paradise Lost, set forth the same concepts in a fashion highly acceptable to the Roman Catholic faith. Yet none of our concepts of hell can be found in the teaching of Jesus Christ![vi]
At the end of the day, you have to ask why:
1 John 4:18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
I'm not sure why you folks who believe in HELL and FIRE AND BRIMSTONE are not getting after me?