Should you be afraid of Hell?

[Tahuti]

According to the Catholic church, Islam and several other faiths, sinning - and not being forgiven - leads to eternal damnation. In hell, you will be subjected to a number of painful tortures and other fun stuff.

Let's assume, that we can prove the existence of hell, although we aren't able to look into it, for the sake of argument. Should we still be afraid?

Maybe not. Hell is eternal. So whatever tortures you are going to be subjected to, you will probably get accustomed to it sooner or later. However, maybe, hell does not even remotely do what the Catholic church says it does. Maybe it is all scaremongering to have you refrain from things like homosexuality, irreligiousness and scepticism for no good reason. Maybe there is something like promotion in Hell, and those destined for hell may one day torture new denizens of hell!

Now, we are to present you a staple of Nietzschean philosophy: Eternal recurrence. Your life as it is now, will be repeated. Again, again, and again. So what do you fear most: Repeat an unenjoyable life forever, or be destined to hell for an enjoyable life forever?

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Very relevant

Link to video.

 

[Borachio]

So what do you fear most?

Not making the most of the opportunities I have here and now.

 

[warpus]

If hell was real, I would probably fear it. I mean, I would fear being waterboarded by Americans for 5 minutes, if I thought that was coming, so..

 

[sophie]

The existence or lack thereof of a hell is unknowable. The only thing I know for sure is that this life I'm in now is real. So I'm going to focus on doing that.

 

[thecrazyscot]

At least in Christianity, there are actually several interpretations as to what Hell is like as the Bible is actually not terribly specific about it.

One is that it is a place of eternal suffering. Given that it's where you soul goes, I don't know that you would actually "get used to" the torment as it doesn't seem to be bound by purely physical laws.

Another is that your soul is annihilated in Hell ("second death") so that you cease to exist entirely.

CS Lewis' The Great Divorce has some very intriguing thoughts regarding Hell:

“Son,'he said,' ye cannot in your present state understand eternity...That is what mortals misunderstand. They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say "Let me have but this and I'll take the consequences": little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death. The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man's past already conforms to his badness and is filled only with dreariness. And that is why...the Blessed will say "We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven, : and the Lost, "We were always in Hell." And both will speak truly.”

 

[Perfection]

Yes. If Hell exists then eternal recurrence is probably wrong (it's probably wrong anyways)

And i see no reason to believe you couldn't design a form of suffering one could never be accustomed to.

 

[Cheetah]

The existence or lack thereof of a hell is unknowable.

Considering that we know pretty well how ancient Canaanite religion evolved into Judaism, and how concepts such as monotheism, heaven and hell developed, I think it's pretty fair to say that a Hellenistic-inspired Hades with Egyptian-influenced characteristics ruled over by a Canaanite minor god (or just spiritual being?) made absolute evil through an adaption to Zoroastrianism and named after a garbage-filled valley outside ancient Jerusalem is extremely unlikely to exist, to put it mildly.

But if we imagine that it did in fact exist, then it's really a toss up between being psychologically and physically abused in Heaven with God (no seriously, have you actually read the Book of Revelation?!) or being physically and psychologically abused in Hell by the Devil (well actually, the Bible itself is very unclear how much abuse there will actually be there)... I think I would spend all my time looking for ways to extend my life, and failing that, I would probably try to make myself brain dead before I'm declared dead, so as to have a hope to escape eternity.

 

[El_Machinae]

I'd be intensely more interested in preventing people from dying! And I'd be horrified by pregnancies

 

[Kaitzilla]

I am terrified of Hell.


One night I had the worst nightmare of my life.

It started out on Mars? in the twlight.
Right away there was this static noise louder than anything possible in life. (200db?)
I screamed but I heard no sound over the omnipotent noise.
It was so loud my mind was incapable of thinking.
I felt deep loneliness, like I was the only one in the whole world (I was)
The ground started pulsating, and I tried to cover my eyes, but I could see right through my hands.
I closed my eyes, but I could see through them too.
I covered my ears, but the sound was not diminished in any way.

Some malevolent voice accompanied the groan, and I started to sink into the pulsating landscape.
Once underground, things wandered past my vision, and then I fell into a cave.

There was a dead baby asking for help. (not sure how I could hear it over the static noise)
It seemed soulless when it gazed at me, like it thought that's what a dead baby would ask.

Then I was suddenly on a plains.
I had eyes in the sides and back of my head so I could see in every direction.
I was surrounded by an impossible all consuming 360 degree tidal wave was chasing 5 semi-tractor trailer gasoline trucks that were converging for a head on collision with me in the middle.
The one time in my life I really felt doom, because where would I run?
They crashed into me and suddenly I was drowning and on fire at the same time.


I woke up with a scream after the 5? minute dream.
The constantly changing realities and mind destroying noise threw reason right out the door.
There was no hiding either because my body was ghostlike.
There was only torment, but no physical pain.
Not sure if the dream was a glimpse of Hell, the one place defined by the absence of God.

 

[Agent327]

According to the Catholic church, Islam and several other faiths, sinning - and not being forgiven - leads to eternal damnation. In hell, you will be subjected to a number of painful tortures and other fun stuff.

I think you're confused with certain Protestant denominations; the Catholic church doctrine no longer teaches hell and eternal damnation.

 

[warpus]

Considering that we know pretty well how ancient Canaanite religion evolved into Judaism, and how concepts such as monotheism, heaven and hell developed, I think it's pretty fair to say that a Hellenistic-inspired Hades with Egyptian-influenced characteristics ruled over by a Canaanite minor god (or just spiritual being?) made absolute evil through an adaption to Zoroastrianism and named after a garbage-filled valley outside ancient Jerusalem is extremely unlikely to exist, to put it mildly.

That's a pretty great summary of hell.

 

[Tahuti]

I think you're confused with certain Protestant denominations; the Catholic church doctrine no longer teaches hell and eternal damnation.

It's precisely the other way around. There are Protestant churches that teach Hell isn't literal or even that all people are destinied for heaven (universal reconciliation). This is quite alien to Catholic thought.

 

[Borachio]

Strange. But true.

We cannot be united with God unless we freely choose to love him. But we cannot love God if we sin gravely against him, against our neighbor or against ourselves: "He who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him."612 Our Lord warns us that we shall be separated from him if we fail to meet the serious needs of the poor and the little ones who are his brethren.613 To die in mortal sin without repenting and accepting God's merciful love means remaining separated from him for ever by our own free choice. This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called "hell."

1034 Jesus often speaks of "Gehenna" of "the unquenchable fire" reserved for those who to the end of their lives refuse to believe and be converted, where both soul and body can be lost.614 Jesus solemnly proclaims that he "will send his angels, and they will gather . . . all evil doers, and throw them into the furnace of fire,"615 and that he will pronounce the condemnation: "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire!"616

1035 The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend into hell, where they suffer the punishments of hell, "eternal fire."617 The chief punishment of hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs.

Unless this catechism is no longer current.

 

[Agent327]

My apologies.

There is a hell, i.e. all those who die in personal mortal sin, as enemies of God, and unworthy of eternal life, will be severely punished by God after death. On the nature of mortal sin, see SIN; on the immediate beginning of punishment after death, see PARTICULAR JUDGMENT. As to the fate of those who die free from personal mortal sin, but in original sin, see LIMBO (limbus parvulorum).

(http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07207a.htm)

Meaning there is a hell for persons in personal mortal sin. So we can expect the likes of Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot there. But not the average believer, I should think. So, for the average person there is indeed no hell to fear.

 

[Crime Doesn't Pay]

The notion of receiving an infinite consequence for a finite amount of sin seems very.. fallacious to me.

 

[Borachio]

I don't see why Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot should be singled out for hell. There's no reason to think they didn't repent shortly before dying.

(It might even turn out that they're not guilty of anything at all. Some people just get the sticky end of bad publicity and never manage to live it down. Though this possibility isn't particularly likely for these three, imo. And besides Hitler never killed anyone as far as I know. Just because he was a raving lunatic he can't be held responsible for people taking what he said seriously. Or can he?)

 

[Tahuti]

I don't see why Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot should be singled out for hell. There's no reason to think they didn't repent shortly before dying.

(It might even turn out that they're not guilty of anything at all. Some people just get the sticky end of bad publicity and never manage to live it down. Though this possibility isn't particularly likely for these three, imo.)

A lot of people would feel insulted by the thought that they could be forgiven. I suspect that if hell is indeed a human invention, it was primarily to soothe people such as the victims of the very people you mentioned.

 

[Borachio]

Isn't forgiveness at the very heart of Christianity?

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

If Hell is eternal or soul inmortal its becouse of God. What wouldnt make sense is that God would force any soul to stay in Hell for ever. And even if that is true it would only mean Hell isnt what we think it is...