Few Stripes and More Tolerable - Degrees of Punishment in Hell?
Can “few” and “tolerable” accurately describe “endless” and “torment”? Can there be tolerable torment and an endless few?
That’s far out, dude!
Stephen Hawking was not very smart. Educated, accomplished, and celebrated, but not that smart. "I am convinced that humans need to leave earth,” the imminent Cosmologist insisted while promoting the colonization of the Moon and Mars. “The Earth is becoming too small for us...We are running out of space and the only places to go to are other worlds." That’s far out! Too far out.
In fear of climate change, in which, according to NASA, earth’s average temperature has risen 0.8 degrees Celsius in the last 150 years, Hawking suggests we relocate to the moon where “when sunlight hits the moon's surface, the temperature can reach 260 degrees Fahrenheit (127 degrees Celsius)” and “when the sun goes down, temperatures can dip to minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit.” That doesn’t sound very smart.
Running out of space? I don't think so. Recently I drove 1200 miles in a wide loop from Salt Lake City, Utah to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming and back. We’re not running out of space. Not even close. As huge as Wyoming is, and as little as I actually saw of it, it’s only the tenth largest state. You can fit nearly three Wyomings in Texas, and over six and a half in Alaska. I’ve also ridden the rails on The Sunshine Limited from Louisiana to California, viewing hundreds of miles of deserted desert- innumerable sagebrush and tumbleweed, but earthlings few and far between. And I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains where I enjoy taking off road jaunts into remote areas that still appear untouched by man. The earth is not too small. There’s plenty of room.
Parading pictures of congested metropolitan areas like Hong Kong and Shanghai as proof of overpopulation is like gauging bee habitat capacity by scattered swarms and hives instead of our vast fields and sky. Hawking said “We are running out of space and the only places to go to are other worlds.” That’s not very smart at all. Not counting Wyoming, here are at least ten places humans could settle before blasting off for the Moon or Mars.
Australia. The world’s smallest continent has the world’s lowest population density by country, and 90% of it is uninhabited. Everyone in the world could live there on about a quarter acre each. There’s air and water, and it doesn’t cost billions of dollars to relocate a handful of people.
Alaska. There’s barely one person per square mile. The climate can be extreme, but it’s paradise compared to outer space.
Siberia. It’s three times the size of Alaska, and if it were its own country would be the world’s largest. Harsh is the word, both for brutal winters and it's infamy for imprisonment and exile, but you don’t have to wear a spacesuit to breathe.
Sahara. The world’s largest “hot desert” is 5.5 times the size of Alaska. Water is scarce but plentiful in contrast to lunar and Martian moisture, and camels are cheaper and safer than rockets.
The Arctic Desert. Home of the North Pole and the Eskimo, it’s dry as the Sahara but has a frozen ocean.
Antarctica. These last two, both larger than the Sahara, would be severe choices, but average temperatures are still warmer than Mars, and O and H2O are readily available.
Uninhabited Islands. There are up to two million of them. Think Swiss Family Robinson. Of Sweden’s 221,831 islands, only a thousand have any permanent people. And boats are cheaper and safer than rockets.
Underground. Not an easy option, but easily easier than outer space to establish and maintain. And, oh yeah, that air and water part, too.
High Rise Apartments. Worldwide there are already hundreds that house thousands, and you can build ten of them for less than you could send five pilgrims to Mars.
House Boats. Nearly three quarters of the Earth's surface is under water. As unlikely as it is that we will ever run out of room on our massive quarter of land, we can float on the other three if we have to. Twenty of the world's most expensive cruise ships with a capacity of 6000 passengers can be built for the cost of one moon landing. And there’s air, and of course, water, and, yep, it doesn’t cost billions of dollars to relocate a handful of people.
But Stephen Hawking said we had better hurry- we’re not only running out of space, we’re running out of time. So says the man who believes the earth has already survived for billions of years. All of the wise may gush that Hawking was most brilliantly adorned, but I say the scholarly emperor was wearing no clothes. His galactic infatuation was not only not smart; it was, dare I say, dumb. Oh, but his admirers oohed and aahed at his phenomenal foresight and didn’t question the wisdom of his preference for a distant waterless Moon or an airless Mars millions of miles away. Far out!
“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools” (Romans 1:22). Not to be unkind, but astrophysicists and theo-apologists have this in common- to be so lettered and learned they sure can say the dumbest things. From Jonathan Edwards to John Gertsner, champions of endless torment have dealt some doozies in defending their dogma.
Johnathan Edwards (1703-1758): The saints in glory will see… and will better understand how terrible the sufferings of the damned are; yet this will be no occasion of grief to them. They will not be sorry for the damned; it will cause no uneasiness or dissatisfaction to them; but on the contrary, when they have this sight, it will excite them to joyful praises.
John Gertsner (1914-1996): Even now, while the evangelical is singing the praises of his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, he knows that multitudes are suffering the torments of the damned… The true Christian, aware of this, is happily, exuberantly, gladly praising the Judge of the Last Day, Jesus Christ, who has sentenced to such merited damnation millions of souls.
Would you go so far to say the visible “sufferings of the damned” will “excite joyful praises” from the redeemed? Egads! That’s farther out than a trip to Mars.
“Why should I care how long Hell is?” said one defender with a slight chuckle, “I’m not planning on going there.” That’s not one bit funny, and you should care.
“If you’re just going to burn up, why would anyone bother to be a Christian?” wondered a “Christian” who didn't want to burn forever, but evidently wasn't interested in eternal life.
Dumb. And disgusting. But par for the course.
This lengthy introduction brings us to the original target of this chapter. One of the dumbest dictums of orthodox dogma is the theory of degrees of punishment in Hell constructed from phrases such as “few stripes” and “more tolerable.” That the words “few” and “tolerable” could be compatible with “endless” and “torment” is far out- a mockery of language and parody of reason.
“Verily I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrha in the day of judgment, than for that city” (Matthew 10:15). On two different occasions Christ said such a thing (also Matthew 11:22-24; repeated in Mark 6:11 and Luke 10:12-14). “More tolerable” is recorded six times in these four texts, and one thing all six have in common is that each is speaking of a very specific time when it will be more tolerable:
Matthew 10:15: more tolerable... in the day of judgment
Matthew 11:22: more tolerable… at the day of judgment
Matthew 11:24: more tolerable… in the day of judgment
Mark 6:11: more tolerable... in the day of judgment
Luke 10:12: more tolerable in that day
Luke 10:14: more tolerable… at the judgment
This could not be speaking of degrees of punishment in hell because it’s not even speaking of hell. The “in” and “at” limit this to “day” and “judgment.” And that makes sense. Limited to the day of judgment, it is reasonable that it could be more tolerable for some than others on that very day. If unlimited and endless, there is nothing “tolerable” about it. Such nonsense is about as smart as fleeing our hospitable earth for the hostile climes of the Moon and Mars.
One other passage from which traditionalists deduce degrees of punishment in hell is Luke 12:40-48, which concludes with “But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes” (vs. 48). John Walvoord, among many others, is sure this means "punishment in hell would be by degrees, depending on their understanding of the will of their master." So the one “beaten with few stripes” would endure more tolerable but still endless torment? So logically ludicrous that I’m flabbergasted; so dumb that I’m, well, dumbfounded. Christ did not say “less stripes.” He said “few.” How could anything endless be few?
Once again it is specified when this happens- when "the Son of man cometh" (vs. 40). And when Christ comes the unfaithful servant will be "cut in sunder," hardly a picture of ongoing agony. As it was with "more tolerable," the "many stripes" and "few stripes" are limited to the day of judgment when the Lord returns. There is nothing in this passage about hell.
Though often using the word “degrees,” orthodox writers are reluctant to mean it in the sense of Celsius or Fahrenheit. But some have no such qualms, and their degrees or levels of hell correspond with the degrees or temperature of the fire. “Although there is only one hell, there are different levels, or degrees, of punishment there,” James L. Melton contends. Concerning the phrases ”greater damnation” and “more tolerable” he asks, “Do these words not imply that some people will receive a greater damnation, perhaps a hotter hell or a lonelier hell than others?”
A hotter hell? Pastor Melton references a poster on a wall in his church in Martin, Tennessee. “In bright fiery colors, the poster shows the earth’s core, the outer core, and the mantle," he relates. "I was able to glean the estimated temperatures of the areas of the underworld, so I wrote them in the appropriate places on the poster. Now we have an actual scientific picture of hell displayed in our church building. The outer core is believed to be as hot as 6,500 degrees in some places. According to modern science, less than 50 miles below our feet the temperature rises to over 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit, and it reaches 3,600 degrees at 650 miles.”
This idea of different degrees (levels) of different degrees (temperature) is promoted as evidence of God’s fairness. “We would expect a God who is both loving and just to demand justice,” J. Warner Wallace explains, “but do it in an equitable way. And this is exactly what the Bible teaches about the nature of Hell. It is a place where justice is served, but also a place where justice is measured out fairly. So, when someone says, ‘Hey, it’s not fair that my Grandma who doesn’t know much about Jesus and has ”minor” sin in her life should be punished the same as a guy like Hitler (who rejected the truth of Christianity and had “major” sin in his life),’ be prepared to tell them this is not the claim of Christianity. These two people will both be separated from God, but Hitler will face an experience in Hell very different than someone like grandma.”
So don’t worry about grandma. Her hell won’t be as hot as Hitlers- he will be in the hottest part (6,500 degrees); she will only be burning in a 1000 degree fire, which is only a “few stripes” and “more tolerable.” And I know it was a perfect fall day in the Blue Ridge today, but you need to move to the Moon as soon as possible!
At least one traditionalist agrees that “more tolerable” and “few stripes” is still unimaginably horrible: “When we read Scripture there does seem to be different degrees of punishment in hell,” Fritz Chery writes. “The people who sit in church all day and always hear the message of Christ, but do not truly accept Him will be in more pain in hell... At the end of the day Christians should not worry about this (as if Christians would worry that someone was getting off too easy?). Hell is still eternal pain and torment. Everybody is screaming right now in hell. Even if someone is moved from the hottest part of hell to another he will still be screaming and crying.” Ugh! So you should worry about grandma.
Fritz got the same idea (degrees of punishment) from the same texts (his preferred version says “a light beating”). But Fritz admits that in his view “hell is still eternal pain and torment” and “even if someone is moved from the hottest part of hell to another he will still be screaming and crying.” How is it that Fritz, and everyone else like him, can’t see that if they’re right they’re wrong? If it’s “still eternal pain and torment” and they’ll “still be screaming and crying,” then that couldn’t possibly be described as “more tolerable” and “few stripes.” There’s nothing few or tolerable about it!
But they can’t and don’t see it. And many who still think Stephen Hawking was smart are planning their trip to the Moon or Mars. Far, far out.
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