Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian
From: nlt@macbeth.cs.duke.edu (N. L. Tinkham)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: The Fallen Fundie Rambles On...
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Date: 14 Aug 89 03:50:15 GMT
Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu
Organization: Duke University CS Dept.; Durham, NC
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Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu

Darren Provine, speaking about disputes over the nature of Hell, writes:

> And the specifics don't seem terribly important in practice -- most people
> agree that there is some kind of judgement, and Jesus spoke of Gehenna as a
> Bad `Place' -- so quibbling over the particulars of what Bad `Things' are
> `There' seems to me a divisive exercise, and to no particular end.  (That
> is, having arguments and using doctrinal differences to draw lines between
> `us' and `them' -- having an interesting philosophical discussion about this
> stuff is a different matter.)

     I agree that drawing lines between "us" and "them" based on speculative
beliefs is undesirable.  However, I can see beliefs about the nature of Hell
having importance in practice, in that (for me, at least) the existence and
nature of Hell has implications for the goodness and badness of the creation
and, by extension, of God.

     If, for example, there is a state of everlasting torment which many
people eventually endure, then the creation contains an infinite cruelty
which God either cannot or will not redeem.  It is the ancient Problem of
Pain ("How can a good, omnipotent God coexist with suffering?") rewritten
in infinite terms.  The problem becomes that much more serious if it is
combined with a soteriological system based either on predestination or on
correctly-guessed belief.

     More benevolent eschatological systems -- universalism, for instance,
or Hell as annihilation, or Hell as a state of finite duration -- give us
a different picture of the creation and the Creator:  evil and suffering are
temporary, and good is ultimately triumphant.

     My own beliefs are a firm "I don't know" :-) , so I am not arguing for
one view over another here; several different views can be supported from
Scripture.  I am arguing that one's answer to just how "Bad" a "Place" Hell
is can affect one's beliefs about God (To what extent is God an infinitely good
being, to be trusted, and to what extent a cruel being, to be appeased?), and
that can have practical implications.

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"You wanted justice, didn't you?            Nancy Tinkham
 There isn't any.  There's the world..."    nlt@lear.cs.duke.edu
                        -A. MacLeish        rutgers!mcnc!duke!nlt