Will emotions exist in heaven?

[diablodelmar]

If not, then we can't be happy can we? However, there must be some sort of substitute.

What do you think?

 

[Homie]

Good question. My initial response was: "Of course there will be." but when you think about it, emotions can lead to sinful behaviour and sorrow, such as anger arising over a disagreement, resulting in a murder, and thus sorrow for the friends and family of the killed person in heaven. And Jesus says there will be no sorrow, no tears in heaven. And even if this is heaven and the victim would come back to life, there would still be hard feelings, and they are not supposed to exist in heaven according to our Lord Jesus.

 

[Carcosa]

Just ruminating, not trying to say this is the way things are:

After death, everything that is organic about us decays. If anything goes to another plane of existence (this "Heaven" deal) it has to be something completely separate from the bio-material that composes us. Whatever isn't organic and changeable in you - if there is anything at all that could be permanent, non-organic and considered a "soul" - would be all that could remain in existence for eternity; would be all that could remain in a fixed state from birth to death, and could be all that would survive after death exactly as it was in life.

Your brain is organic; it suffers from degenerative brain diseases and traumatic brain damage, both of which affect your emotions, your personality, your memories, and your sense of self. In a "Heaven" you could therefore have none of these, as your brain has rotted away.

 

[El_Machinae]

It seems that all emotions have some type of hormonal/neural basis. Cheerfulness, optimism, certainty ... these are just variants of natural themes.

Current religious thinking is that there is something special about emotions, something magical. I don't know if that's true, I don't believe that it is - but religious thinking tends to not be based on other ideas.

So - chances are emotions are special, if people believe in Heaven ... so they should be preserved.

 

[ComradeDavo]

If not, then we can't be happy can we? However, there must be some sort of substitute.

What do you think?

I don't think heaven exists

I also think emotions make us what we are, so a place with no emotions would not be good.

 

[diablodelmar]

I don't think heaven exists

I also think emotions make us what we are, so a place with no emotions would not be good.

What is going to happen when we die, and what/who decides right or wrong here if there is no God?

 

[El_Machinae]

That would be topic drift, and it's worth many, many pages.

You could start a new thread with that question, unless you're willing for your own topic to drift this quickly.

 

[ComradeDavo]

What is going to happen when we die, and what/who decides right or wrong here if there is no God?

El Machine is right in that if we go into this in detail it will cause a topic drift and the dicussion will go off the whole 'emotions in heaven'.

What I will say is that
1)I don't know what happens when people die
and
2)Right and wrong are all about perception and human feelings

 

[puglover]

I don't know. The Bible doesn't go into details about eternity.

 

[GenMarshall]

I would not know for I am not there nor does the Bible go into much detail about that eternal reality.

When I hear "angels rejoycing in heaven" when a fallen away Catholic returns back to the Catholic Church. I would say that there would be evidence in heaven.

 

[El_Machinae]

I guess we already knew that Angels have emotion (Pride being one of the first ones we hear about).

I wonder if we'll all be like Spock on the Enterprise; all cold logical and raising our eyebrows at those 'barbarian' angels with the 'illogical' emotions?

 

[Masquerouge]

I think that if there is such a thing as Heaven, it will require some serious rewiring of the human brain for anyone trying to live here. Eternity is not something that humans can currently handle.

 

[GenMarshall]

I wonder if we'll all be like Spock on the Enterprise; all cold logical and raising our eyebrows at those 'barbarian' angels with the 'illogical' emotions?

I doubt that. I also have a feeling that my grandfather who is up in heaven is most certanly rejoycing along with the angels that I plan to return to the Catholic Church .

 

[ironduck]

I doubt that. I also have a feeling that my grandfather who is up in heaven is most certanly rejoycing along with the angels that I plan to return to the Catholic Church .

That raises an interesting point. If your grandfather is rejoicing in heaven because of an even that is happening, does that mean he would be sad if the opposite happened? And how does that correspond with heaven if people are being sad there?

Going by that line of thought it would be likely that a lot of people are sad a lot of the time in heaven considering how terrible things are going for a lot of their loved ones on earth.

That doesn't make heaven seem very heavenly, does it?

 

[El_Machinae]

I said it before, I would be sad if my gramma wasn't in Heaven.

Eternity is not something that humans can currently handle.

Since we're currently stuck in time, eternity is not something we will ever experience. I believe it's possible to live forever, but I don't think that we'll ever experience eternity.

 

[diablodelmar]

El Machine is right in that if we go into this in detail it will cause a topic drift and the dicussion will go off the whole 'emotions in heaven'.

What I will say is that
1)I don't know what happens when people die
and
2)Right and wrong are all about perception and human feelings

I don't mind if we drift.

If it is merely a perception, then how come they are randomly accidently coiciding with the Bible? Was that the beginning of the current popular "perception"? If I went back in time, say, 100,000 years, would it be perfectly normal to kill someone?

I think it is no coicidence that we have a convenient conscience which tells us what is right or wrong. We have a set of rules which were preordained.

 

[diablodelmar]

I think that if there is such a thing as Heaven, it will require some serious rewiring of the human brain for anyone trying to live here. Eternity is not something that humans can currently handle.

Which is why I think that we won't even have a brain! Our brains were created to suit us to this earth, not the next.

 

[ironduck]

I think it is no coicidence that we have a convenient conscience which tells us what is right or wrong. We have a set of rules which were preordained.

This is really drifting fast, but I'm curious. Maybe you could open a new thread where you tell us what rules are preordained.

 

[Elrohir]

Good question. My initial response was: "Of course there will be." but when you think about it, emotions can lead to sinful behaviour and sorrow, such as anger arising over a disagreement, resulting in a murder, and thus sorrow for the friends and family of the killed person in heaven. And Jesus says there will be no sorrow, no tears in heaven. And even if this is heaven and the victim would come back to life, there would still be hard feelings, and they are not supposed to exist in heaven according to our Lord Jesus.

Not quite. The actual verse is this:

Revelations 21:4
"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."

These emotions will not exist; it is stated clearly. However, that is not to say no emotions exist, just because the bad ones won't be there doesn't mean the good ones won't be either. That's like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Nowhere does it say that good emotions, such as happiness or love will not be allowed in Heaven. Quite the opposite.

In Psalm 2:4 God laughs while in Heaven. ("The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them.") Even sarcasm is apparently allowed, at least toming from Heaven to Earth, tThe 38th chapter of Job is pretty much God burning Job with withering sarcasm over his arrogance. ("Have you ever given orders to the morning, or shown the dawn its place....")

And finally, sin never helps anything, it only hurts. Joy and Love are good things, thus they cannot be a product of the Fall or Sin - why then, in perfect bodies in Heaven, shouldn't we experience them? To me at least, the question of whether we will have emotions in Heaven is quite simple: Yes, we will.

 

[El_Machinae]

Yes, if you're a spiritual being, you won't need an actual brain. But I do believe the bible says you'll have a new body. Does it say whether you'll have a different body?

I think it is no coicidence that we have a convenient conscience which tells us what is right or wrong.

I do too. However, I think our conscience is due to something other than Heavenly dictates. I have a question, though - why do you think people disagree on whether something is wrong, if we all have a conscience? I'm not talking about sick or evil people, just normal people.

For example, some people feel it's wrong to kill animals, and they could never do it, except for survival. Alternatively, other people think it's okay to kill animals. We can't use our conscience, because we disagree with each other. And it's not as if some people are more evil than the other, in this case.

edit due to crosspost

And finally, sin never helps anything,

Does this mean that anything that results in a benefit wasn't a sin? Galatians 5:22-23 thinks so.