dannyh44

Friends, Atheists, Countrymen, Lend me your ears on this:

In some recent conversations with Christians, I have tried to explain why I hold the belief that if hell exists, then it makes God a sadist. The response I get is that God created us as eternal creatures, and that God is so good that he will always honor our decisions, so if God cant' destroy us (cuz we're eternal) and he has to honor our decision not to be with Him(cause He's fair) then we must be somewhere else, ie, hell. (I've checked, and this response is consistent with the popular apologists - Geisler, Strobel, McDowell, etc.)

Nevermind the absurdity of the logic attributed to an omnipotent, omniscient God in the above paragraph, if God respects our freewill and won't violate it in hell, then what about Heaven? If God respects our freewill in Heaven, then our memories - the obvious results of our freewill choices - will be intact. So I ask: How could anyone who wasn't completely self-absorbed, conceited and shallow enjoy an eternity in Heaven while 90% of his species (including spouses, children, siblings, parents) endlessly roast in boiling napalm?

If the Christian scenario were true, I'd obiously be miserable in Hell because of the pesky never-ending torture, but I'd also be miserable in Heaven because I'd be endlessly petitioning the Almighty to turn down the heat on my loved ones!

Given the context of this rebuttal to the Xtian explanation of Helll, does my logic hold?

Thanks

GakuseiDon

Probably OT to BC&H: If Hell is torture, you may have a point. But a lot of theists believe that people choose Hell, which isn't a place of eternal fire, but just eternal boredom. But if you assume that God is respecting people's wishes to be in Hell rather than in Heaven, then why would you expect anyone else to disrespect those wishes?

Nectaris

This would probably be better suited for GRD, so if a discussion picks up perhaps the mods will move it.

I don't know if I would consider it a choice though. For me, the choice would be to lie and say that I believe in a god and hope that I choose the right version of the right one to lie about my belief. However, if this is the Christian God, I'm assuming he would have the power to see through my lie and condemn me for violating one of His commandments. The other option is to tell the truth and say I don't believe in any gods and get punished for it anyway. It doesn't really strike me as much of choice, as either way I end up in the same place.

Aren't there Christian sects that postulate that Hell is the absence of God? In which case Hell wouldn't be that much different for me than what I have right now. Of course, even I would get bored of living forever. I would imagine no matter how ideal the circumstances, all people would become bored with living forever.

Dave

Vorkosigan

And so, Don and Nectaris are proven prophets....

Eldarion Lathria

That is the peculiar alchemy of forever. It converts everything into boredom. That's why no-one has ever imagined a really desireable heaven. The christian/jewish heaven is boring, lobotomized people standing around flattering god. The muslim heaven is more fun, if you like deflowering virgins and drinking fruit juice all day. But that soon palls. The Asatru heaven is the most fun, if you are into the Society for Creative Anachronism. You fight all day and party all night. And you don't have to do it forever. Bymeby comes Ragnarok, and you die, finally, fighting for Odin. The Hindu and Buddhist heavens I know little about, but I understand eventually they end in Nirvana.

There are many things I like to do. There are more I'd like to try. But after I've done them a few million times, I would be heartily sick of all of them.

Eldarion Lathria

WCH

An argument I've heard against the eternal boredom of the afterlife is that the only reason we, as humans, desire change is because of our temporal bodies. Our souls, however, are atemporal, existing in all times simultaneously, and therefore, effectively, no time passes in heaven at all. You can't get bored, because you aren't there for eternity, you're just there, period.

run2white

Could it be that we're all an experiment evolving over great spans of time (as we know it). Does God have peers or authority figures to be responsible to? Is the "eternal fire" a physical fire? Are we important as individuals as our egos tell us? Why is the universe designed to keep us from moving at the speed of light? What is the nature of a black hole? Why is it that an animal with a very low metabolic rate cannot perceive the movements of an animal with a very high metabolic rate? Does that mean that the hummingbird and the crocodile don't exist for each other?

Getting caught-up in popular beliefs on a micro level keeps us from having an expanded view of our possible nature. For all we know, it amounts to a single grain of sand on an endless beach.

newtype_alpha

Ah hah!!!!!

You may just be onto something, and I believe others in here already stated that hell is merely "the absence of God." This is very easy to support, after all Jesus described hell as "the outer darkness," or otherwise stated that he would tell the hellbound, "away from me, ye workers of iniquity!" Basically, if you don't want to be in the house with God, God is going to kick you out... anything "out" is hell.

That isn't automatically a place of torture, expecially if you subscribe to a more OT interpretation that there are, in fact, many gods. Getting kicked out of the Kingdom of Heaven might not be such a bad thing if you think about it; In heaven there is no beer, no fornication, no pork, no violent movies, and none of those cute Pagan goddesses roaming about. The Aphrodite and the Nymphs are all OUTSIDE the kingdom :thumbs:

Ierrellus

I prefer oblivion to heaven or hell. Dammit, I'm tired. Swift had Gulliver meet a race who had to live forever in increasing senility, praying to die, but could not. (Struldgruubs?) Reward and punishment are Pavlovian incentives. Not being a dog, neither move me. And if I couldn't care less about anything in eternity, why care at all?

johntheapostate

The concept of freewill can be refuted from Scripture, and is peddled by Christians to let god off the hook.