Vivid Descriptions of Hell as Eternal Torment?

From a Facebook interaction:

//There are vivid descriptions of hell in the Bible as a place of conscious, eternal torment.//

There actually isn't. Not a single one of eternal torment. 

Revelation 14 is not about hell or the dead but of a specific judgment of mark-receiving beast worshippers that takes place on earth in the presence of the angels and the Lamb.

It is the smoke that goes on and on, not the torment. Just like Sodom, Idumea, and Babylon, the smoke rises on and on, but the people are gone.

The satirical parable of the buried rich man is silent on duration of the final punishment.

Mark 8:44, 46, 48 is a direct quote from Isaiah 66:24 about dead bodies ("carcasses"), not undying souls.

Matthew 25 and 2 Thessalonians 1 reveal that the punishment of everlasting destruction is an everlasting punishment - punishment, not punishing; destruction, not destroying. 

Revelation 20 says for those raised from the dead not found written in the book of life, to be cast into the lake of fire "IS the second DEATH," not eternal life in torment. 

//At the end of human history Jesus Christ divides humanity into "sheep" and "goats" and says the sheep (saved) receive “eternal life” but the goats (unsaved) are cast away into “eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” to suffer “eternal punishment.” (Matt 25:41, 46).//

Just like in the punishment of Sodom and Gomorrah, the fire was eternal, not Sodom. Fire fell and "destroyed them all" turning them to "ashes" and happened "as in a moment and no hands stayed on her."

John the Baptist says Christ "will BURN UP the chaff with unquenchable fire." The fire is unquenchable, not the chaff. Chaff burns up in a fire that can't be put out. 

//In Luke 13:28, Jesus commands “evildoers” to depart from Him into “a place of weeping and gnashing teeth.”//

I'm not sure which version you are quoting that says "place."  It is "there shall be" not "place" and we are told exactly when the weeping and gnashing of teeth occurs:

There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, WHEN YE SHALL SEE Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.

It is at the casting, not everlasting.

Comments

Post a Comment

Thoughts?

Popular posts from this blog

The CI-123

Image
Here are 123 texts from Genesis to Revelation that support Conditional Immortality, the teaching that only believers in Christ receive eternal life.  These verses reveal the "soul" can and will die and be destroyed, the penalty for sin is death, the nature of God's judgment and justice of His jurisprudence, that eternal life is the gift of God Who only has immortality, and that the final fate for unbelievers is the everlasting punishment of everlasting destruction - to perish in the second death in a fire that consumes.  Genesis 2:17: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely DIE Genesis 3:19: till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto DUST shalt thou RETURN Numbers 24:20: His latter END shall be that he PERISH FOR EVER Deuteronomy 4:24: the Lord thy God is a CONSUMING fire Joshua 10:28: He UTTERLY DESTROYED, them, and all the SOUL
Read more

A Most Rare Rendering: Adding "Away" to "From" for "Apo"

Image
Don’t take Triscuit to Greek class.  Take country ham biscuits, or homemade brownies, but not Triscuit. As detailed in “From the Presence of the Lord,” chapter twenty-four of my book Wholly Smoke - The Myth of Endless Torment , traditionalists maintain that the punishment of “everlasting destruction” in 2 Thessalonians 1:9 is eternal separation from God in conscious torment. That's their interpretation, and it conveniently and curiously became an influential translation.  “ Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power” smack dab in the middle of the Lord’s coming with "mighty angels in flaming fire taking vengeance… in that day” is deemed parenthetical (meaning the actual punishment does not happen at the event described, but, say they, after and away). In the text (1:7-10), the phrases “ when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven” and “ when he shall come” tower like Big Ben keeping time over the Thames
Read more

"Perish" as Defined in Scripture

Image
Here are all 154 times some form of the word perish is used - 118 Scripture texts containing the word perish , 1 text, perishing (Job 33:18 ) , 9 texts, perisheth (Proverbs 11:7, which also contains perish ), and 26 texts, perished : Genesis 41:36             that the land PERISH not through the famine Exodus 19:21             lest they break through unto the L ORD to gaze, and many of them PERISH Exodus 21:26             if a man smite the eye of his servant…that it PERISH Leviticus 26:38          ye shall PERISH among the heathen… the land of your enemies shall eat you up Numbers 16:33          went down alive into the pit, and the earth closed upon them: and they PERISHED Numbers 17:12          Behold, we die, we PERISH , we all PERISH Numbers 21:30          Heshbon is PERISHED even unto Dibon, and we have laid them waste Numbers 24:20          his latter end shall be that he PERISH for ever Numbers 24:24          he also shall perish for ever  (Alas, who shall live when God d
Read more