Cross Examiner

Family Man,

I didn't think you'd try to spin it; there's always a surprise to be found:

Physically painful? Don't you need nerve-endings to feel pain? Don't you need a solely material body solely defined by matter/energy, time, space (space-time) to feel pain? When Jesus was in the Resurrection state, he could walk through walls and appear anywhere at will (Luke 24:31; Mark 16:12). That doesn't sound solely material to me and so I cannot deduce that a hell of "fire" can harm such a body. So I find it most reasonable that the oft-referred to “fire” is anything but a figurative representation of the judgment of God, a traditional Aramaic symbol of such.

Regards,
BGic

Secular Pinoy

Please defend this assertion.

Cross Examiner

Secular Pinoy,

Better yet, you tell me how pain is felt in the brain if not through a physical process. Axons. Neurons. Dendrites (sic?) etc.

Regards,
BGic

Mageth

Better yet, you tell me how pain is felt in the brain if not through a physical process. Axons. Neurons. Dendrites (sic?) etc.

The fact that pain is felt in the body through physical processes does not support your assertion "Don't you need a solely material body solely defined by matter/energy, time, space (space-time) to feel pain?"

Secular Pinoy asked you to defend that assertion, which you did not.

BadBadBad

Isn't this Hell as a separation from God bit new? During my life, Hell has always been represented as just what you think it might be (of course based upon the most obvious and common interpretation of these Bible verses). Have you ever seen a commercial depicting some poor soul whithering away pining for God? I seem to recall, you know, a flaming devil with a pointy three prong spear. Hell has always been represented in our culture as eternal torture in hell fire. Isn't this figurative interpretation of simple separation from God just a recent apologetic effort at political correctness?

Even if it's not just a recent tact on apologetics, hell as a simple separation from God is a clear deviation from the interpretation by the overwhelming majority throughout history. Ask any child today. Why is Hell a bad place? The answer will never be "I'm afraid to go anywhere without God."

This is typical:

God must exist. The Bible says God is omnibenevolent, and I like that. The Hell depicted in the Bible presents some rather disturbing contradictions to his omnibenevolence. The Bible can have no contradictions or errors. Therefore, our interpretation of these verses must be wrong. Hell must not be an eternal torture chamber. It's just simply a separation from God. That's what you atheists want right? So, good. We're all happy.

BadBadBad

Well how about you tell us how we'll feel bliss and happiness without a physical process? How will we feel anything without a brain?

Doctor X

Ask a fundamentalist [Stop that!--Ed.]

--J.D.

Secular Pinoy

As Mageth has pointed out, you have not defended your assertion. Try not to shift the burden of proof, thank you.

Cross Examiner

Mageth et al.,

Family Man wrote:
-Pain is a physical process.
-Fire is also a physical process; matter changing states causes the chemical reaction.
-Physical processes, like fire, affect physical bodies, such as fire causing pain in physical bodies.
-The Resurrected body of Christ demonstrated properties of immateriality (Luke 24:31; Mark 16:12).
-The Resurrected body, which can appear suddenly or walk through solid matter could not be harmed by fire and could therefore not feel pain by fire (Luke 24:31; Mark 16:12).
-The bodies of those in eternity (heaven:hell) will be as the Resurrection body of Christ (1 Corinthians 15:49-52, 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, Philippians 3:21; 1 John 3:2).
-Thus, the bodies of those in eternity will not be affected by physical processes like fire.
-Jesus spoke Aramaic.
-Jesus used the Aramaic symbol of God's judgment, fire, to describe hell.
-Hell is not literally "fire and brimstone" because fire cannot affect Resurrected bodies and fire is an Aramaic symbol for God's judgment.

So if not fire, if not a cosmic torture chamber, what is hell?

Separation.

Never is hell depicted as being in God's presence, and it is always, always, always depicted as being separated from God. So hell is essentially separation from God, goodness, and others. Our data and our reasonable deduction can only suggest this much for the present, though it may in reality be more, and likely is, since the symbol is almost always lesser than the reality.

Friends, I'm not going to explain it again. To ensure that I don't explain it again, I am going to unsubscribe to this thread now. No more emails. I'm moving on to something else. Adieu.

Regards,
BGic

Doctor X

Someone left the cat out. . . .

--J.D.