![\"Hell4\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2016\/02\/Hell4.jpg\")
<\/div>\nThanks for your reply. To clarify briefly, after having glanced at your reply, I don\u2019t believe in predestination to hell, per Catholic teaching. Catholics believe in predestination to heaven, but without ruling out or superseding our free will. It\u2019s a paradox and not totally understandable by the human mind, but that\u2019s what we believe. It requires faith.<\/span><\/p>\n When I speak of there definitely being persons in hell, it is not from reasoning or deduction alone<\/i>, apart from revelation (i.e., not purely philosophical). It is based on what we know from the Bible, which says that there will be people who are damned, as opposed to those who are saved. The Bible teaches neither universalism nor annihilationism. It also explicitly describes the devil and his angels being tormented in hell indefinitely.<\/span><\/p>\n Jesus on several occasions matter-of-factly states that hell is a reality, and that people will end up there. I know that doesn\u2019t cut it in a purely philosophical discussion, but we\u2019re also discussing Catholic theology, which entails a consideration of revelation (which you will have to accept anyway, should you decide to become Catholic). I\u2019m trying to do mostly philosophy here (badly as I might be doing it), because that\u2019s your area, but I can\u2019t totally divorce my position (surely you understand) from revelation and biblical evidences for hell.<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019m assuming, too, that you accept the distinction between foreknowledge and predestination (God being out of time and knowing all things). This doesn\u2019t necessitate predestination. All who end up in hell freely made the choice to do so.<\/span><\/p>\n First of all, I would like to thank everyone for their thoughtful responses. In particular, thank you to David and Dave for replying so thoroughly. I\u2019m in the process of writing a response to Dave in particular. Dave, you make a great many important points and I want to respond to them fairly systematically in another post.<\/span><\/p>\n Thank you. Glad to be of any service to you.<\/span><\/p>\n However, for the moment, I want to refer briefly to your exchange with Geoffrey and Kevin about universalism etc.\u00a0I took your advice and had a look at it. To be honest, I found a great deal of what you said there very troubling. So before I post my response to your response to my questions I want to clarify some concerns I have with your statements in this discussion.<\/span><\/p>\n Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n I have to say that after reading the discussion carefully a number of times I do think that you missed the point of Geoffrey\u2019s question. As it stands, your arguments seem to me to involve a defence of some kind of predestination, whereby some individuals are necessarily destined for hell. Obviously this claim needs to be clarified, which I will attempt to do here.<\/span><\/p>\n It seems to me that Geoffrey made his point quite clearly.He is not claiming that necessarily no one has or will choose hell. This would clearly involve a denial of free will. What he is asking is whether it is permissible to believe that as a contingent fact nobody will choose to go there. In each and every case a person may go one way or the other. It is possible, however, that in each and every case the person involved will freely choose God, rather than hell. I presume, because of the discussion of the possibility of a last minute reprieve, that Geoffrey is concerned with the possibility of somebody repenting at the end of their life.<\/p>\n As I replied in another brief post already: granting a belief in revelation and NT revelation in particular (which you have done in large part by accepting most of the Nicene Creed), it is not possible to believe that no one will end up in hell, because the NT clearly states that they will<\/i>. Several passages imply a great division between the saved and the unsaved; \u201cfew\u201d are they who take the Christian road, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n The \u201cbeast\u201d and the \u201cfalse prophet\u201d in Revelation are human beings. The Bible tells us that \u201cthese two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulphur\u201d (Rev 19:20). This is reiterated in chapter 20, with mention of large numbers of people (the dead in Hades<\/i>) also being consigned to hell:<\/span><\/p>\n Revelation 20:10-15<\/b><\/p>\n [10<\/b>] and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulphur<\/span> where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night for ever and ever. <\/span>[11<\/b>] Then I saw a great white throne and him who sat upon it; from his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. Therefore, if you accept biblical revelation, you have no choice but to accept this<\/span>. You can\u2019t pick and choose what you personally like and don\u2019t like, or what you think God should have done, rather than what He has revealed that He has done and will do. Christianity doesn\u2019t work that way. Why would you think you could totally understand everything, anyway? I understand that a philosophy doctoral student will use his mind more than most of us, and work through things by that method. I have no problem with that in and of itself, as long as the limits of it are acknowledged. But Christianity is not philosophy: it is a religious faith. It is not contrary<\/i> to reason, but it does go beyond<\/i> it. Surely you know this, and I don\u2019t have to remind you of it, but I am writing for everyone reading this, too. It requires faith and grace to believe in its entirety.<\/span><\/p>\n Your replies clearly negate free will.<\/span><\/p>\n They do not. You must have misunderstood them if you got that impression, or you are argung from a supposed logical reduction of my arguments.<\/span><\/p>\n You say for example:<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t see much of a distinction between believing in a hell that the reprobate and damned go to and then turning around and saying that it is quite possible that no men go there\u2026\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019m not sure what I meant in this statement, but I think it is muddled and unclear, looking back at it after 4 1\/2 years, and I would like to remove it because if I<\/i> can\u2019t figure out what I meant, I suspect readers won\u2019t be able to, either. Much more clear is what I wrote immediately afterward:<\/span><\/p>\n As I said before: if no men go to hell, then why is so much of the NT devoted to warning men to not end up there by virtue of their rejection of God? Why would the Church tell us that all mortal sins place us in potential danger of hellfire, when in fact, that never occurs because no men end actually up in hell?<\/span><\/p>\n That makes no sense to me. It seems to me that if universalism were in fact the true state of affairs and that all men end up in heaven, then we would be informed of this in the Bible, as it is a wonderful truth. Instead, God plays a sort of game by scaring us half to death with all this business about hell and fire and torture and all, and then no one goes there anyway except the devil and his demons.<\/span><\/p>\n I find that as silly and implausible as a parent who constantly scares his children with threats of punishment, but never follows through with any of it. Just as the child would not believe the parent when they make such claims, after a few years of that, I wouldn\u2019t trust God\u2019s word, either, if He acted in such a weird, arbitrary fashion with us, involving virtual deception.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n I\u2019m not sure whether Geoffrey would agree with the following formulation of an argument for the possibility of an empty hell, but in any case I think the idea is quite simple:<\/span><\/p>\n 1) There is a hell.<\/span><\/p>\n 2) If a given person chooses hell then they will go to hell.<\/p>\n 3) If a given person does not choose hell then they will not go to hell.<\/p>\n 4) Human beings have free will.<\/p>\n 5) Since human beings have free will it is not the case that any human being will of necessity go to hell.<\/p>\n 6) From this it follows straightforwardly that it is possible that hell is empty because, as a contingent fact, ( not as a necessity) no one has chosen to go there, i.e. everyone has repented before death and been reconciled to God.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n And again, I have stated that if the discussion involved merely<\/i> philosophy and the question of free will, of course your statement about necessary truths and possibilities of human choices would be undeniably true. But this discussion also<\/i> involves revelation<\/i>, and that revelation informs us that it is a certainty that in fact many human beings will reject God and thus end up in hell. It\u2019s a fact that is yet to happen: known by God in His foreknowledge and omniscience. God has communicated this fact to us, and repeatedly warns us to avoid the same fate. It\u2019s no less fact because it happens to be \u201cfuture\u201d to us. It\u2019s not future to God. He knows all that will happen in the future because He is already there<\/i>.<\/span><\/p>\n It is crucial to be clear about where the necessity lies. It is a necessary truth that if<\/i><\/b> a person chooses hell then<\/i><\/b> they will go to hell. So if some group of people chooses hell, then that group will necessarily go to hell. It is a completely different thing to claim that necessarily some group of people will go to hell.<\/span><\/p>\n I understand that. I took logic in college too. But it\u2019s not my claim in the first place. It is a statement of fact based on the revelation of what will<\/b> happen. I made this very clear in the dialogue of mine that you reference, as well, so you should already know that my reasoning is entirely consistent, with regard to incorporation of biblical revelation, which I as a Catholic am not at liberty to deny (nor will you<\/i> have any such liberty should you decide to become Catholic). As it is, now you accept some revelation and reject other portions of it that you find difficult. That <\/i>is the logically inconsistent position, not mine.<\/span><\/p>\n This only follows if it is necessarily true that some group of people will choose to go to hell. And this flatly contradicts the reality of free will.<\/span><\/p>\n As I have not asserted this, it is not a problem of my position that I have to explain.<\/span><\/p>\n Geoffrey seems to me to pick up on the troubling consequences of this way of thinking when he says:<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe Catechism condemns the teaching that God predestines anyone to Hell. Therefore there can be no certainty that some are in Hell\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n It seems to me that what you are defending clearly implies that some are predestined to Hell.<\/p>\n Not at all. This exhibits the rather common confusion between predestination and foreknowledge. Since God is outside of time (and I actually took a philosophy of space and time course in college too), He has the ability to state what will happen in the future (acts and facts) back to us for whom the acts are not yet accomplished. So we human beings can make a free choice in the future that God knows (knowing all things). He can tell us now that there are people who will be damned, and He has indeed done so in the Bible. You need not take my word for this.<\/span><\/p>\n Your reply to this really does miss the point. You say:<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt follows from the fact of original sin and mortal sin. There are people who fall into the latter, and we are all (except the Blessed Virgin) subject to the former. Therefore there will be people in hell, because there are people in original sin and mortal sin.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n By your own claim, the Catholic Church teaches that the moment of death determines the fate of the soul. Now assuming for the sake of argument that this is true, it would certainly be true that if some person dies in a state of mortal sin they will go to hell. This is just a specification of the general if-then<\/i><\/b> statement above- If some person chooses hell, that person will necessarily go to hell. But you are claiming something else: Some person will necessarily go to hell. But this is completely dependent on whether some person chooses hell, in this case, dies unrepentent and in state of mortal sin. For your view to follow you would need to hold that at least one person will of necessity choose hell. In a concrete sense you would need to be able to say with absolute certainty that a given person has not repented and been reconciled to God. I don\u2019t see how anyone could claim this kind of knowledge of what goes on in someone\u2019s heart. This is predestination plain and simple, and makes a mockery of free will.<\/span><\/p>\n It was overstated a bit. I should have said \u201cit is extremely likely\u201d or some such. But the overall thrust of my statement remains true, based on what we know from Revelation. The Bible clearly states that those who are beholden to serious, mortal sin will not inherit the Kingdom (and that means hell, when we harmonize all related biblical teachings) and that unbelievers will be judged and sentenced to eternal darkness and separation from God. Jesus assumes this as a fact on several occasions.<\/span><\/p>\n Your subsequent statements only seem to confirm that you hold to some form of predestinationism, in other words that there is some definite group of people who will of necessity be damned.<\/span><\/p>\n Incorrect. There is a group that will be damned, as we know from the Bible and as a function of God\u2019s omniscience, but not because they were predestined. They freely chose to reject God.<\/span><\/p>\n In your response to me you say clearly that Catholicism is not Calvinism,<\/span><\/p>\n Indeed.<\/span><\/p>\n that the Catholic Church does not teach that people are predestined to hell.<\/span><\/p>\n That\u2019s correct. You can take it from me, as a longtime apologist. If the Catholic Church did teach that, there is a strong likelihood that I wouldn\u2019t have converted to it myself, as I was an Arminian and never a Calvinist.<\/span><\/p>\n I am glad if this is the case, but I fail to see how your own statements avoid the charge of defending predestination.<\/span><\/p>\n I have amply explained it by now. You may object to God being outside of time or omniscient, for all I know. That would entail an entirely different discussion. You may subscribe to some form of process theology, that is heretical according to Catholicism. Other discussions . . . <\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019d like to make a start on a reply to the various ideas that have so far arisen in this thread. Part of the problem in a discussion like this, especially from my side, as someone who does not share all of the assumptions which my Catholic respondents do,<\/span><\/p>\n In the case of hell, it is also historic Protestantism and Orthodoxy that disagree with you, not just Catholicism, because all Christians pretty much agree on this.<\/span><\/p>\n is that I can\u2019t assume that people are aware of or understand my own theological, moral, and philosophical presuppositions. What I would like to do is lay out as clearly as possible the main problems I have with the doctrine of hell, more clearly than I have so far, present as clearly as possible my own presuppositions, and then proceed to fairly systematically work through the various thoughtful and generous responses I\u2019ve received.<\/span><\/p>\n Okay. And I will counter-reply.<\/span><\/p>\n I would like to begin by outlining what I take to be the key claims involved in the dominant or traditional conception of hell. To do this I would like to refer to the work of the philosopher of religion Jonathan L. Kvanvig whose book, \u201cThe Problem of Hell\u201d presents many of the issues with admirable clarity. Kvanvig lists the following theses as being central to the traditional concept of hell:<\/span><\/p>\n \u201d (1) The Punishment Thesis: the purpose of hell is to punish those whose earthly lives and behavior warrant it.<\/span> Now I basically agree with Kvanvig that this is an accurate account of how hell has, for the most part, been understood throughout the history of Christianity.<\/span><\/p>\n Because that is precisely how the Bible has presented it! That\u2019s why Christians have believed this in the first place. <\/span><\/p>\n Kvanvig himself argues for a version of annihilationism, in other words the view that the damned simply taken out of existence. I disagree with his arguments here, but the above formulation should give people participating in this thread a fairly clear idea of what I\u2019m objecting to.<\/span><\/p>\n Annihilationsim cannot be squared with the biblical data. I knew this 25 years ago, when I used biblical arguments to disprove the Jehovah\u2019s Witnesses position, which is the same.<\/span><\/p>\n Now I would like to briefly state some of my presuppositions. Since I will describe my presupposition as far as content is concerned as I go along, I want to begin here by stating what one might call my methodological assumptions, in other words how I approach the Christian faith, how I understand the relation between Faith and Reason, and where some of my basic influences lie.<\/span><\/p>\n Good.<\/span><\/p>\n This is meant also to be a partial response to David\u2019s contention that my \u201d fixation with reasoning to a conclusion\u201d is causing me to stumble.<\/span><\/p>\n Insofar<\/i> as you don\u2019t also include revelation in the analysis, I think he is correct. It\u2019s impossible for any Christian to intelligently discuss hell without taking that into account. But as you clarify, I think the problem may not be so much \u201chyper-rationalism\u201d as it is \u201cselective revelation.\u201d You accept part of revelation and reject another part, and the criterion is reason and your feelings about things like hell. The orthodox Christian replies that this is unreasonable and arbitrary.<\/span><\/p>\n David made a number of points about the relation of reason, and thus philosophy, to religion. His view seems to be that reason is flawed as an approach to religious truth.<\/span><\/p>\n He\u2019s certainly less inclined to philosophy than I am, but I think it would be most unfair to categorize him as \u201canti-reason\u201d in any way. David can speak for himself, but I think he means it in the sense that I described above. He wants to harmonize faith, revelation, and reason, as I do. We usually have different approaches in our answers on this forum, as the folks here are well aware (and which I think is wonderful), but on that broad principle we are in complete agreement, I can assure you.<\/span><\/p>\n I have to say I disagree strongly with this view. I certainly have specifically philosophical reasons for disagreeing, which it wouldn\u2019t be appropriate to go into here. But quite apart from this this view does not seem to me to accurately reflect the profound influence which philosophical thought has had on Catholicism. Thomism is one obvious example. I mention this because my own philosophical convictions on a great many questions are basically Thomist, with a strong element of phenomenology. David made the point that philosophy students often make the mistake of legislating for God, of thinking that they can judge God\u2019s actions and so on. Now I think this criticism is to a large extent valid, and not only of philosophy students but also great philosophers. There is a lot of titanic presumption in the history of philosophy ( e.g. Hegelianism). At the same time I think this charge is unfair with respect to my own concerns.<\/span><\/p>\n I hope so, and I\u2019ll accept your word on that.<\/span><\/p>\n I would never presume to legislate what God Himself can or cannot do. But none of what I say is directed at God, rather it is directed at human conceptions of God with which I disagree.<\/span><\/p>\n But that is a fine line, because in this case the human conceptions are directly derived from revelation, which we believe is<\/i> from God. If one accepts the validity and truthfulness of the NT, hell is part of the package. It is as impossible to extract from it as it was for Thomas Jefferson to eliminate all the biblical miracles from his ridiculous Bible. To do so guts the NT and it is no longer the NT after that ransacking of it.<\/span><\/p>\n When a philosophical theologian says that God cannot do evil, he is not telling God what he can or cannot do, he is simply clarifying a truth which follows necessarily from the nature of God, if we the virtually universally accepted view that God is Perfectly Good.<\/span><\/p>\n Yep. No problem there. And this is grounded in Revelation as well.<\/span><\/p>\n In the same way if someone says that God cannot make a square circle, he is not legislating for God, or claiming to know God\u2019s mind better than God.<\/span><\/p>\n That\u2019s right. I made that very argument in my first installment, as I recall.<\/span><\/p>\n Similarly, my claim is not that I know better than God, but rather that on my understanding of God\u2019s nature ( which is not merely some arbitrary personal construction but informed by many years of studying) the doctrine of hell seems to be incompatible with God\u2019s nature.<\/span><\/p>\n And I deny that just as vigorously.<\/span><\/p>\n There are certain things which I accept without philosophical argument. I believe and accept everything contained in the Nicene Creed, with two provisos: 1) I would have a different interpretation of what is involved in God\u2019s judging the quick and the dead than Catholics; 2) I have doubts as to whether the \u2018 One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church\u2019 refers exclusively to the Roman Catholic Church.<\/span><\/p>\n To do so one must accept revelation. You have done that in large part. Yet when it comes to hell that same revelation isn\u2019t sufficient for you. This is the incoherence that I see in your position thus far.<\/span><\/p>\n I do not question what I take to be the central truths of the Christian faith: the Trinity, The Fall, the Son\u2019s Incarnation, Death and Resurrection, The Last Judgment and so on, not only because I believe them to be true by faith, but because they enlighten my reason, because the beauty and moral grandeur of these idea inspires me unlike any other religious conception. So faith and reason are not for me at odds with each other.<\/span><\/p>\n Great.<\/span><\/p>\n On the other hand there are clearly things in both the Old and New Testament which are morally unacceptable: one obvious example is the fact that slavery is not only never condemned in the Old Testament, but is clearly practiced by some of Israel\u2019s prophets. In the New Testament similarly, there is St. Paul\u2019s injunction that slaves should obey their masters. Now it seems obvious to me that by any sane contemporary standards of morality St. Paul was in error, in so far as he did not speak out against the institution of slavery and even, in some places seems to give it a partial acceptance.<\/span><\/p>\n Slavery in the Bible (in most instances) was essentially being an indentured servant. Paul\u2019s conception of slavery was not identical to the chattel slavery of early America. But this is a sidetrack. See these articles:<\/span><\/p>\n Development or Reversal? (Slavery)<\/span><\/a> (Avery Cardinal Dulles)<\/p>\n A Response to John Noonan, Jr. Concerning the Development of Catholic Moral Doctrine (Usury, Marriage, Slavery, Religious freedom)<\/span><\/a> (Patrick M. O\u2019Neil)<\/p>\n On Slavery in the Old Testament <\/span><\/a>(Luke Wadel)<\/p>\n Catholic Encyclopedia<\/i>: Slavery and Chrisrtianity<\/a><\/p>\n Catholic Encyclopedia<\/i>: Slavery, Ethical Aspect of<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n This is just one instance of many, especially as pertains to the Old Testament, where God Himself is presented, at least if read literally, as counselling the Israelites to commit genocide against their enemies, killing every last woman and child.<\/span><\/p>\n This is perfectly defensible as acts of judgment on God\u2019s part (Who has this prerogative as our Creator). See:<\/span><\/p>\n How Could a God of Love Order the Massacre of the Canaanites?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n
\n[12<\/b>] And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Also another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, by what they had done<\/span>.
\n[13<\/b>] And the sea gave up the dead in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead in them, and all were judged by what they had done.
\n[14<\/b>] Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire<\/span>. This is the second death<\/span>, the lake of fire;
\n[15<\/b>] and if any one\u2019s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire<\/span>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
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\n<\/span>(2) The No Escape Thesis: it is metaphysically impossible to get out of hell once one has been consigned there.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>(3) The Anti-Universalism Thesis: some people will be consigned to hell.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>(4) The Eternal Existence Thesis: hell is a place of unending conscious existence.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n