Why do Christians believe in a place of torment called Hell?

[TheLearner]

Taking poetic literature literally is a mistake. The dead know nothing.

Ecclesiastes 9:6
Contemporary English Version
6 Their loves, their hates, and their jealous feelings have all disappeared with them. They will never again take part in anything that happens on this earth.

When one is not taking part of something they at that time do not know what is going on on earth surface.

In the same way we do not live in another city and do not know what is going on over in that other city unless it is in the news or someone coming to our home from there tells us.

 

[Runningman]

"
Verse 28
Destroy both soul and body in hell (κα ψυχην κα σωμα απολεσα εν γεεννη). Note "soul" here of the eternal spirit, not just life in the body. "Destroy" here is not annihilation, but eternal punishment in Gehenna (the real hell) for which see on Matthew 5:22. Bruce thinks that the devil as the tempter is here meant, not God as the judge, but surely he is wrong. There is no more needed lesson today than the fear of God."
https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/eng/rwp/matthew-10.html

10:28 And 2532 fear 5399 5676 575 not 3361 them which 3588 kill 615 5723 the body 4983, but 1161 are 1410 0 not 3361 able 1410 5740 to kill 615 5658 the soul 5590: but 1161 rather 3123 fear 5399 5676 him which 3588 is able 1410 5740 to destroy 622 5658 both 2532 soul 5590 and 2532 body 4983 in 1722 hell 1067.
http://www.godrules.net/library/kjvstrongs/kjvstrongsmat10.htm

"

1. 1) to destroy
   1a) to put out of the way entirely, abolish, put an end to ruin
   1b) render useless
   1c) to kill
   1d) to declare that one must be put to death
   1e) metaph. to devote or give over to eternal misery in hell
   1f) to perish, to be lost, ruined, destroyed
   2) to destroy
   2a) to lose"
2. http://www.godrules.net/library/strongs2b/gre622.htm

Look up the Strongs numbers for the words in Matthew 10:28.

The word destroy is an accurate translation of the Greek word they used. This means that the body and soul are literally destroyed, not kept alive and tortured forever.

It's definitely annihilation in Matthew 10:38, not even a question of debate as long as we just accept the words used as authoritative.

622. apollumi
Strong's Concordance

apollumi: to destroy, destroy utterly
Original Word: ἀπόλλυμι
Part of Speech: Verb
Transliteration: apollumi
Phonetic Spelling: (ap-ol'-loo-mee)
Definition: to destroy, destroy utterly
Usage: (a) I kill, destroy, (b) I lose, mid: I am perishing (the resultant death being viewed as certain).​

 

[Runningman]

It's not called "Everlasting Fire" for nothing! The lake of fire is never ending.

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And a third angel followed them, calling out in a loud voice, “If anyone worships the beast and his image, and receives his mark on his forehead or on his hand, he too will drink the wine of God’s anger, poured undiluted into the cup of His wrath. And he will be tormented in fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment rises forever and ever. Day and night there is no rest for those who worship the beast and its image, or for anyone who receives the mark of its name.”
================================================================================================

The words "forever and ever" and "Day and night" express on-going never ending torment in the lake of fire. One can't experience torment in flame day and night unless they exist.

"And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

The word 'aionios' translated as 'eternal' is used to describe the eternal state for both the righteous and the wicked. Therefore, the word must retain the same meaning for both. And since with know that eternal life is never ending existence in the kingdom of God, then eternal punishment is never ending existence in separation from God in the lake of fire. You can't have one meaning annihilation and the other mean forever.

Notice the scriptures you quoted don't directly say they are tormented forever. It says "the smoke of their torment" rising forever, not the torment lasting forever. It says "day and night" but not how long of a period those days and nights last.

It also doesn't say it's temporary either, but given the numerous scriptures that promise to destroy inhabitants of hell, seems most likely to me that torment in hell is not permanent.

 

[TheLearner]

Notice the scriptures you quoted don't directly say they are tormented forever. It says "the smoke of their torment" rising forever, not the torment lasting forever. It says "day and night" but not how long of a period those days and nights last.

It also doesn't say it's temporary either, but given the numerous scriptures that promise to destroy inhabitants of hell, seems most likely to me that torment in hell is not permanent.

read post 162 above already had strong's there. A.T. Robertson is a Greek Scholar who gives us the meaning of the grammar.

Matthew 25:46 as I posted already along with Word Pictures in the N.T. proves it is eternal torture or eternal punishment.

 

[ewq1938]

read post 162 above already had strong's there. A.T. Robertson is a Greek Scholar who gives us the meaning of the grammar.

Matthew 25:46 as I posted already along with Word Pictures in the N.T. proves it is eternal torture or eternal punishment.

There is no eternal torture. That would be a God of hate but our God is a God of love.

 

[TheLearner]

Revelation 14:10–11 (NIV)
10 they, too, will drink the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. They will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. 11 And the smoke of their torment will rise for ever and ever. There

Revelation 20:10 (NIV)
10 And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

Isaiah 34:9–10 (NIV)
9 Edom’s streams will be turned into pitch,

her dust into burning sulfur;

her land will become blazing pitch!

10 It will not be quenched night or day;

its smoke will rise forever.

From generation to generation it will lie desolate;

no one will ever pass through it again.

https://reknew.org/2008/01/the-case-for-annihilationism/

 

[TheLearner]

There is no eternal torture. That would be a God of hate but our God is a God of love.

God is also JUST. Would you want to live with someone who hates you?

Then you shall see, while still on earth, that God in the heavens rules over [the universe]; then you shall begin to speak the mysteries of God; then shall you both love and admire those that suffer punishment because they will not deny God; then shall you condemn the deceit and error of the world when you shall know what it is to live truly in heaven, when you shall despise that which is here esteemed to be death, when you shall fear what is truly death, which is reserved for those who shall be condemned to the eternal fire, which shall afflict those even to the end that are committed to it. Then shall you admire those who for righteousness' sake endure the fire that is but for a moment, and shall count them happy when you shall know [the nature of] that fire. Second Clement 5:5

https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07207a.htm


Cease, therefore, to set up such great absurdity, and to kindle hell and unquenchable fire; and let us look steadfastly (at length though late) as we ought, unto the things to come, having put away the film on our eyes, that we may both pass the present life honestly, and with much reverence and godly fear, and attain unto the good things to come, by the grace and love towards man of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory world without end. Amen.

https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/200173.htm

 

[TheLearner]

The future judgment by Christ. Communion with and separation from the divine being. The eternal punishment of unbelievers.
1. If the Father, then, does not exercise judgment, [it follows] that judgment does not belong to Him, or that He consents to all those actions which take place; and if He does not judge, all persons will be equal, and accounted in the same condition. The advent of Christ will therefore be without an object, yea, absurd, inasmuch as [in that case] He exercises no judicial power. For He came to divide a man against his father, and the daughter against the mother, and the daughter-in-law against the mother-in-law; Matthew 10:25 and when two are in one bed, to take the one, and to leave the other; and of two women grinding at the mill, to take one and leave the other: Luke 17:34 [also] at the time of the end, to order the reapers to collect first the tares together, and bind them in bundles, and burn them with unquenchable fire, but to gather up the wheat into the barn; Matthew 13:30 and to call the lambs into the kingdom prepared for them, but to send the goats into everlasting fire, which has been prepared by His Father for the devil and his angels. Matthew 25:33, etc. And why is this? Has the Word come for the ruin and for the resurrection of many? For the ruin, certainly, of those who do not believe Him, to whom also He has threatened a greater damnation in the judgment-day than that of Sodom and Gomorrha; Luke 10:12 but for the resurrection of believers, and those who do the will of His Father in heaven. If then the advent of the Son comes indeed alike to all, but is for the purpose of judging, and separating the believing from the unbelieving, since, as those who believe do His will agreeably to their own choice, and as, [also] agreeably to their own choice, the disobedient do not consent to His doctrine; it is manifest that His Father has made all in a like condition, each person having a choice of his own, and a free understanding; and that He has regard to all things, and exercises a providence over all, making His sun to rise upon the evil and on the good, and sending rain upon the just and unjust.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103527.htm

 

[TheLearner]

The two posts above and those below will be quotes from the church fathers to show what the christian church has historically taught about eternal torture, punishment.

 

[Runningman]

read post 162 above already had strong's there. A.T. Robertson is a Greek Scholar who gives us the meaning of the grammar.

Matthew 25:46 as I posted already along with Word Pictures in the N.T. proves it is eternal torture or eternal punishment.

Matthew 10:28 contains no such language that suggests eternal torment. The people who translated the New Testament are also Greek scholars and they're saying the best word to describe the state of people in hell is "destroyed." There's no such thing as being destroyed while simultaneously living forever.

Matthew 25:46 says only the righteous receive eternal life. You're saying the unrighteous have eternal life in hell; it can't be both. The punishment is everlasting because there's no coming back from being destroyed.

Death is permanent, atleast until the second resurrection, when God will sentence those who deserve to die to a second death.

 

[TheLearner]

Let us tremble then at hearing this parable. For indeed that fire is unquenchable. And how, it may be said, is it unquenchable? Do you see not this sun ever burning, and never quenched? Did you not behold the bush burning, and not consumed? If then you also desire to escape the flame, lay up alms beforehand, and so you will not even taste of that fire. For if, while here, you will believe what is told you, you shall not so much as see this furnace, after your departure into that region; but if you disbelieve it now, you shall know it there full well by experience, when no sort of escape is possible. Since in truth no entreaty shall avert the punishment from them who have not shown forth an upright life. For believing surely is not enough, since even the devils tremble at God, but for all that they will be punished.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/200111.htm

1. And this is the passage regarding demons. But now we must speak of Hades, in which the souls both of the righteous and the unrighteous are detained. Hades is a place in the created system, rude, a locality beneath the earth, in which the light of the world does not shine; and as the sun does not shine in this locality, there must necessarily be perpetual darkness there. This locality has been destined to be as it were a guard-house for souls, at which the angels are stationed as guards, distributing according to each one's deeds the temporary punishments for (different) characters. And in this locality there is a certain place set apart by itself, a lake of unquenchable fire, into which we suppose no one has ever yet been cast; for it is prepared against the day determined by God, in which one sentence of righteous judgment shall be justly applied to all. And the unrighteous, and those who believed not God, who have honoured as God the vain works of the hands of men, idols fashioned (by themselves), shall be sentenced to this endless punishment. But the righteous shall obtain the incorruptible and un-fading kingdom, who indeed are at present detained in Hades, but not in the same place with the unrighteous. For to this locality there is one descent, at the gate whereof we believe an archangel is stationed with a host. And when those who are conducted by the angels appointed unto the souls have passed through this gate, they do not proceed on one and the same way; but the righteous, being conducted in the light toward the right, and being hymned by the angels stationed at the place, are brought to a locality full of light. And there the righteous from the beginning dwell, not ruled by necessity, but enjoying always the contemplation of the blessings which are in their view, and delighting themselves with the expectation of others ever new, and deeming those ever better than these.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0520.htm

 

[TheLearner]

Matthew 10:28 contains no such language that suggests eternal torment. The people who translated the New Testament are also Greek scholars and they're saying the best word to describe the state of people in hell is "destroyed." There's no such thing as being destroyed while simultaneously living forever.

Matthew 25:46 says only the righteous receive eternal life. You're saying the unrighteous have eternal life in hell; it can't be both. The punishment is everlasting because there's no coming back from being destroyed.

Death is permanent, atleast until the second resurrection, when God will sentence those who deserve to die to a second death.

I already showed from the Greek Grammar if you limit the length of time for eternal punishment than you have also limited the length of eternal life in Matthew 25:46. From the grammar Robertson shows that is the case.

 

[Runningman]

I already showed from the Greek Grammar if you limit the length of time for eternal punishment than you have also limited the length of eternal life in Matthew 25:46. From the grammar Robertson shows that is the case.

Everlasting punishment = Dead forever
Eternal Life = Living forever

I disagree with Robertson. There's no need to change the length of eternal life because eternal life lasts as long as everlasting punishment.

 

[TheLearner]

At last the assembly is dissolved, the spectacle of this life ceases: its deceit and its semblance are passed away. Cleave to me, to whom every knee bows, of things in heaven, and things on earth, and things under the earth. For all who have been negligent, and have not shown pity in well-doing there, have nothing else due them than the unquenchable fire. For I am the friend of man, but yet also a righteous Judge to all. For I shall award the recompense according to desert; I shall give the reward to all, according to each man's labour; I shall make return to all, according to each man's conflict. I wish to have pity, but I see no oil in your vessels. I desire to have mercy, but you have passed through life entirely without mercy. I long to have compassion, but your lamps are dark by reason of your hardness of heart. Depart from me. For judgment is without mercy to him that has showed no mercy.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0504.htm

11. For some of them, beholding Him in glory, saw His glorious life (conversationem) at the Father's right hand; others beheld Him coming on the clouds as the Son of man; Daniel 7:13 and those who declared regarding Him, They shall look on Him whom they have pierced, Zechariah 12:10 indicated His [second] advent, concerning which He Himself says, Do you think that when the Son of man comes, He shall find faith on the earth? Paul also refers to this event when he says, If, however, it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you, and to you that are troubled rest with us, at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven, with His mighty angels, and in a flame of fire. 2 Thessalonians 1:6-8 Others again, speaking of Him as a judge, and [referring], as if it were a burning furnace, [to] the day of the Lord, who gathers the wheat into His barn, but will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire, Matthew 3:12 were accustomed to threaten those who were unbelieving, concerning whom also the Lord Himself declares, Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire, which my Father has prepared for the devil and his angels. Matthew 25:41
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103433.htm

 

[TheLearner]

Everlasting punishment = Dead forever
Eternal Life = Living forever

I disagree with Robertson. There's no need to change the length of eternal life because eternal life lasts as long as everlasting punishment.

Robertson is a well known greek scholar. You are wrong friend. everlasting and eternal is the same greek word sharing the same grammar. The word death is not in the text. The Greek word is punishment or torture.

 

[Magenta]

One must be alive to experience contempt and disgrace.

According to you, then, Hitler is not viewed with contempt, and not seen as disgraced? Oh my.

 

[TheLearner]

'Rejoice, O you nations, with His people, and let all the angels of God be strengthened in Him: for the blood of His sons He avenges, and will avenge, and will recompense His enemies with vengeance, and will recompense those that hate Him; and the Lord will purify the land of His people.' And by these words He declares that we, the nations, rejoice with His people— to wit, Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and the prophets, and, in short, all of that people who are well-pleasing to God, according to what has been already agreed on between us. But we will not receive it of all your nation; since we know from Isaiah Isaiah 66:24 that the members of those who have transgressed shall be consumed by the worm and unquenchable fire, remaining immortal; so that they become a spectacle to all flesh.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/01289.htm

19. We shall be raised therefore, all with our bodies eternal, but not all with bodies alike: for if a man is righteous, he will receive a heavenly body, that he may be able worthily to hold converse with Angels; but if a man is a sinner, he shall receive an eternal body, fitted to endure the penalties of sins, that he may burn eternally in fire, nor ever be consumed. And righteously will God assign this portion to either company; for we do nothing without the body. We blaspheme with the mouth, and with the mouth we pray. With the body we commit fornication, and with the body we keep chastity. With the hand we rob, and by the hand we bestow alms; and the rest in like manner. Since then the body has been our minister in all things, it shall also share with us in the future the fruits of the past.
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/310118.htm

 

[TheLearner]

According to you, then, Hitler is not viewed with contempt, and not seen as disgraced? Oh my.

says the bible verses I posted.

Also the definition of the word. Hitler today would be viewed as evil.

 

[TheLearner]

The City of God (Book XXI)
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Of the end reserved for the city of the devil, namely, the eternal punishment of the damned; and of the arguments which unbelief brings against it.

Chapter 1.— Of the Order of the Discussion, Which Requires that We First Speak of the Eternal Punishment of the Lost in Company with the Devil, and Then of the Eternal Happiness of the Saints.
I Propose, with such ability as God may grant me, to discuss in this book more thoroughly the nature of the punishment which shall be assigned to the devil and all his retainers, when the two cities, the one of God, the other of the devil, shall have reached their proper ends through Jesus Christ our Lord, the Judge of quick and dead. And I have adopted this order, and preferred to speak, first of the punishment of the devils, and afterwards of the blessedness of the saints, because the body partakes of either destiny; and it seems to be more incredible that bodies endure in everlasting torments than that they continue to exist without any pain in everlasting felicity. Consequently, when I shall have demonstrated that that punishment ought not to be incredible, this will materially aid me in proving that which is much more credible, viz., the immortality of the bodies of the saints which are delivered from all pain. Neither is this order out of harmony with the divine writings, in which sometimes, indeed, the blessedness of the good is placed first, as in the words, They that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of judgment; John 5:29 but sometimes also last, as, The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things which offend, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth, Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of His Father; Matthew 13:41-43 and that, These shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into life eternal. Matthew 25:46 And though we have not room to cite instances, any one who examines the prophets will find that they adopt now the one arrangement and now the other. My own reason for following the latter order I have given.

 

[TheLearner]

Chapter 2.— Whether It is Possible for Bodies to Last for Ever in Burning Fire.
What, then, can I adduce to convince those who refuse to believe that human bodies, animated and living, can not only survive death, but also last in the torments of everlasting fires? They will not allow us to refer this simply to the power of the Almighty, but demand that we persuade them by some example. If, then, we reply to them, that there are animals which certainly are corruptible, because they are mortal, and which yet live in the midst of flames; and likewise, that in springs of water so hot that no one can put his hand in it with impunity a species of worm is found, which not only lives there, but cannot live elsewhere; they either refuse to believe these facts unless we can show them, or, if we are in circumstances to prove them by ocular demonstration or by adequate testimony, they contend, with the same scepticism, that these facts are not examples of what we seek to prove, inasmuch as these animals do not live for ever, and besides, they live in that blaze of heat without pain, the element of fire being congenial to their nature, and causing it to thrive and not to suffer — just as if it were not more incredible that it should thrive than that it should suffer in such circumstances. It is strange that anything should suffer in fire and yet live, but stranger that it should live in fire and not suffer. If, then, the latter be believed, why not also the former?