Heaven and Hell - Products of the mind?

[Cabelaz]

So today I was reading an article about this schoolgirl named Junko Furuta.

She was kidnapped and held in the home of another teenage boy, and was:

Raped 400 times by 100 different men, forced to eat and drink her urine and cockroaches, tied to the ceiling and used as a punching bag, had her nails, teeth, and left nipple ripped out by pliers, I kid you not, they also shoved lightbulbs and lit fireworks up her ass too. Finally when they were done with her, she got shoved in a drum barrel and disposed of. When they found the body, she was also pregnant.

The 4 boys got off free due their Yakuza connections, and only spent about a year in prison.

After reading this, my instinctive response was: 'I hope they burn in hell." But then I stopped and pondered, are abstract theories like Heaven and Hell just made up to make us feel good about situations and give us closure? Do we fear that crimes may go unpunished, and do we fear that doing good is not rewarded?

So I guess my question is, are Heaven and Hell just products of the human mind to attempt to make ourselves feel better about ourselves?

 

[kūhaku]

I think so, similar to religion. Hell is a way to create fear in the masses against committing crimes, or reassurance when they are committed. Heaven is a goal to strive to and it keeps most people in check and moral.

Even if I’m not religious, I still thinkthese certainly aren’t bad things, religion is a helpful glue that can keep society together, whether you believe in one or not. It keeps people largely moral.

Most if not all great civilizations had religious backbones and I think things like heaven and hell are some of the major parts of it. They are the reward and punishment for living your life, so hell is the ultimate threat to people.

George Carlin illustrates the absurdity of it in this clip.

 

[mr.moon1488]

I'm personally religious but examining this from a secular view, I think a God or at least a higher moral force is requisite for human societal functioning. At the end of the day humans require some absolute power that they have no way to bribe, overpower, or workaround in some fashion or else they will actively seek out ways to get around any moral enforcement, and since human moral enforcement is fallible, they will often succeed in doing so.

 

[DragoonSierra]

Duel 1

LET'S ROCK!

 

[keyboredsm4shthe2nd]

Maybe. But that's just my feeble human brain clinging desperately to the idea that there's justice beyond human comprehension (call it what you like, equilibrium, the Universe, God, karma) because those goddamn mad dogs deserved to have their brains blown out along with those Ukranian mainiacs (which... lol, were neo-nazis despite not being the correct kind of white)

 

[DecimatedFerret]

Duel 1

LET'S ROCK!

Ah fuck, beat me to it.

 

[Lord of the Large Pants]

Heaven and hell in the sort of "pop religion" sense are mostly inventions. Things like disembodied souls going off somewhere in the sky, or people burning eternally while being poked with pitchforks, aren't really supported by Jewish or Christian texts (can't speak for Islam, and eastern religions have a radically different concept of the spirit world altogether). A lot of it comes out of Plato, Dante, and the human mind being a perpetual idol factory.

That's not necessarily to say there's no such thing as an afterlife or ultimate justice. To give one example, the earliest Jews had no developed picture of an afterlife. But as they thought about it, they realized that if there's a God who created a good world in the beginning, and if this God is a god of justice, there must be some kind existence afterward, and so they developed the idea of physical resurrection. And if their premises are correct, then so is their conclusion. So it really comes down to what kind of god you believe in, if any.

You might check out The Great Divorce by CS Lewis. It's rather short and there are plenty of free texts and audio books available. It's an exploration of heaven and hell told in the form of fiction, a bit like The Divine Comedy, but with way less self important wankery. Lewis makes no attempt to say his ideas are perfectly accurate, only to paint a picture. I think he's not terribly far off.

 

[The Last Stand]

Atheist time.
You rot in the ground.
There.

 

[Ars Goetia]

Its an interesting question. The Biblical Heaven and Hell are described much differently than how most people understand the ideas today. The gospels explicitly make clear that the descriptions of both concepts are allegorical as humans would not be able to understand them as they actually are. Even then much of what the Bible says goes against the modern view of the two concepts. That said, for the modern view of heaven you could just substitute its mention with "Earth 2" and it would be decently accurate. The Biblical Hell is described much differently from how it is now understood.

I could go on for a long time but about this but the most notable point in my opinion is that the original gospels used the Greek word aión (where we get the word aeon) to describe the time spent in hell. An aión is a finite time though. The modern equivalent would be something like a zeitgeist or age in the sense of say "age of enlightenment". It isn't until the latin translations of the Roman church which used the word aeternus that Hell began being preached as eternal damnation. That probably isn't a coincidence. Of the churches established in first few centuries of Christianity, only the Roman church taught eternal damnation. It also raises a very interesting point. In Revelations, God lets Satan out of hell after 1000 years. How bad do you need to be to deserve more time in Hell than Satan?

I could cite a massive list of scriptures which show that all will eventually be saved but the strongest one is probably 1 Corinthians 15:22 - £For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive." There are around 30 other passages that state it clearer but this section of 1 Corinthians is importantly from a much earlier Christian creed which over 95% of New Testament Historians agree was being taught shortly after the crucifixion. The atheist and foremost skeptic scholar in America Bart Ehrman puts this teaching 2 years after Jesus's death. We also know it was approved of by Peter, James, John and Paul. If not the clearest, its the most authoritative passage that says all are saved.

That raises the question though, why are the modern views so different from what early Christianity taught? Both the church and popular imagination have shaped how we view those ideas now.

Firstly, there's the fact that the church as an institution wanted power. The best way to get even the most powerful of kings to bow to you is to say that he'll be damned if he doesn't. The best example of that is the relationship with the Pope and the Holy Roman Empire and especially Charlemagne. You see the power of the idea of damnation when one old guy in robes can get one the most powerful men in Europe to bend the knee with only the threat of hellfire. I also wouldn't discount the influence of St. Augustine. He developed the view of limited atonement. Essentially, he said that while Christ could have saved everybody through the crucifixion that he just decided to be a dick and didn't. Add both of those together and your Church becomes an elite group which nobody can defy without facing the ultimate consequence.

Secondly, there's also a very twisted idea of Justice that most people have. Go anywhere on the internet that's talking about a pedophile and you'll mostly get a collection people writing out their torture fantasies. A lot of people just like the idea of really harsh judgement. Thinking that everybody who does wrong is inescapably tortured eternally by the most powerful being in existence is pretty much the peak of torture porn. I think this is what Op is getting at in his post and in this sense I agree.

 

[The Curmudgeon]

When I think of Hell, I remember these quotes.

First, the overused Sartre quote, "Hell is other people,"

Then a little known Robert Crumb quote that follows up on that, "Hell is also yourself."

Finally, a quote from the Buddhist monk Shinran, "Hell is my only home."

Everything is Hell. Sometimes it's fun. Other times it's shit. It's okay though, because when I die it will be nothing but sweet eternal oblivion.

 

[Dick Pooman]

Jim Jefferies had a good bit about the idea of Hell. It was pretty much the assumed premise of Hell being a place where you're tortured for all eternity, when in reality you're probably one of Satan's boys if you do enough bad shit to go there in the first place.

 

[Robert James]

Obligatory Fidora Tip.

Spoiler: Theology Sperging

You're dealing with a pretty heavy level of theology here so I'll try to break it down in bites size chunks so you can understand the christian mentality behind it.

First let's take care of the concept of good and evil and why god let's bad shit happen we have free will, it's what separates us from all of god's other creations. In fact it is one of the reasons the angels rebelled as we were so easy to disobey god by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, it only took a snake saying how dare god tell you what to do to brake it. Now several times god has interfered with humanity and punished us but when he does that it's more of a whipping the slate clean or nuking a village and considering anyone in said village complicit. This is why god flooded the world and salted two cities in his eyes the humans knew that they were doing wrong and got rid of them. This changes when Jesus comes along and convinces his papa that we aren't evil we are just retarded. God understands and we are allowed to be saved and eventually resurrected through jesus. After that god takes a more hands off approach and allows us to learn and change ourselves to be better people, I mean we proved the Lucifer right by being hopless degenerates but that may be why we don't have as many holy interventions anymore.

Now let's move on to heaven and hell and why hell seems to be temporary, through most of the bible the devil/ other demons play a more passive role with only a few being straight antagonistic. They work by convincing humans to do wrong since their entire rebellion was proving that we can easily be led down the wrong path. This is why when you hear about deals with the devil the devil doesn't outright posses you and do what it wants. This is where hell comes in the demons already have their hands on you and have convinced you to avoid gods light so they can do whatever they want to you and 10/10 times it's some form of torture because you are the reason they got their wings broken. If you accept gods love and repent the allmighty can seperate you from the demons but most people will never change who they are. It's the equivilant of forgiving a gamblers debt if he changes himself and will not only never gamble again but do what he can to prevent others from gambling. This is why you can eventually redeem yourself from hell but unlike most atheist jokes it isn't as easy as saying I believe in Jesus. You need to repent you need to understand what you did wrong and honestly change so theoretically the guys mentioned can eventually return to gods life and be let into heaven but only after accepting responsibility and changing themselves not only to avoid committing such depravity but do whatever they can to make up for it.

The reality is Christianity has lost a lot of it's backbone and has decided to let God do the punishment. No more than a hundred years ago the mentality wouldn't of been I hope they rot in hell but would have been let's find these fucks torture and kill them and maybe their families as well. Issue is as Christians have gone softer they have had to change their preaching from "commit sin get put in the bin" to "All can be forgiven and the worst people are punished by god" their is a heavier dependence on heaven and hell because we can't go around stoning whores and frankly humanity has gotten more depraved as time goes on. You have to preach forgiveness because most people are living pretty sinful lives, Shit I know people who turned atheist because the church told them cooming was bad, and you won't get many people in the seats if you tell them they have to earn it.

So to answer your question Heaven and Hell aren't designed to be an easy way for us to believe justice was served but are becoming a heavier crutch since Christianity has decided to take a more passive role and can no longer dish out punishment. Shit we have a hard enough time giving the death penalty to criminals just as bad if not worse than these fucks so actively torturing or punishing people like this would be impossible we have to depend on our heavenly father.


We were given free will and it is childish to depend on God to do all the work for us but their is only so much we can do that is why we depend on god to dole out the punishment because we are too weak as a people to do it ourselves. It's effectivley pushing the buck to the big man and waiting till death to see if he did the job we couldn't.

Jim Jefferies had a good bit about the idea of Hell. It was pretty much the assumed premise of Hell being a place where you're tortured for all eternity, when in reality you're probably one of Satan's boys if you do enough bad shit to go there in the first place.

The issue is that Devils don't work like that, I'll try not to get too spergy here but to make a long story short we are the reason devils have been shunned from gods light, we are the reason they are disfigured and deformed, we are the reason they have lost their purpose, we are the reason they had to betray their brother, and we are the reason they lost so many more of their brothers. To them we are nothing we are so much lesser to them but because of us they are forced to suffer such indignities. It be like if you stepped on an ant and because of it you get kicked out of your house and have one of your arms chopped of. It doesn't matter what you do they will torture you because you are the reason they are in hell and this is the only way they can get their revenge not to mention it's the only thing that gives them purpose since god, who has the power to save their victims, does not which could be seen as passive approval.

 

[Lemmingwise]

George Carlin illustrates the absurdity of it in this clip.

Nothing in the scripture is about god needing money. There are even verses in the bible that say to not donate unless you are giving gladly.

There is nothing absurd about turning someone you love away from you if they behave badly; one could easily argue that it's that person turning themselves away from you. After all, you might love your son or daughter, but if they start stealing your stuff and money for drugs, eventually throwing them out of the house is the right thing to do, even if you love them.

 

[Horus]

Hell is, for lack of a better term, metaphysical separation from God, who is basically existence and consciousness itself. The guys in the example may be absolutely evil, however they still have the slimest connection to God while they are alive, because they have consciousness.

Sever that connection through sin, which it is likely they have done, and they will basically enter non-existence upon death. Those of us who honestly strive to avoid sin as best we can, will continue to exist after death, albiet in a form we have great difficulty undetstanding because in life we exist in a very limited set of dimensions

Forget all the fire and brimstone versions of Hell, they are inaccurate.

 

[Sorlock]

Heaven and Hell are states of mind, though I think there is also an afterlife with Heaven and Hell. I think Heaven and Hell begin on Earth. People who do really horrific things are probably also already suffering horribly on Earth or they wouldn't want to do horrific things. I think Heaven is much more interesting than Hell. Hell has to be boring in order to be pure torture, and Heaven has to be interesting in order to be absolute bliss.

 

[NIGGER ASS PEE POOPY RAPE]

once you take the redpill and can see that all females are demons, you will realize that the rapists did nothing wrong and will go to heaven while all the demon-worshipping simps will go to hell. how can heaven and hell be real when morality is this subjective? "bad" people rarely believe they're doing anything wrong so how are people supposed to do the right thing if their moral compasses are broken?

 

[Drifting Panzer]

There is no heaven or hell, some good people will suffer, some evil people will prosper and we all will die in the end. To top it off, it will all be pointless, not even a blip on the radar of an uncaring universe.

Also, I had forgotten about that story, thanks for reminding me. Guess I am drinking myself into a stupor tonight in hopes of forgetting this again.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

Maybe they are an invention, maybe not. It's impossible to prove or disprove either way.
Speaking from a social angle it makes sense as they give a the ultimate incentive not to be an ass towards others and follow communal laws. After all, what is an infinity of torment versus a temporary gain from lying/cheating/murdering? It also enforces the idea of universal morals, rather than the (depressingly pushed) modern idea of subjective morality.
Also I wouldn't really put those ideas as making people feel better since they are more stressful in the personal level than satisfying in the community level.

 

[Zarael]

That raises the question though, why are the modern views so different from what early Christianity taught?

It isn't. The vast majority of the Church Fathers were not universalists and it's debatable whether even those that do write some universalist things like Gregory of Nyssa were actually full fledged universalists. Which is frankly to be expected when Jesus says straight up that it would be better to cut your hand off than let it make you sin and send you to hell. I assume you got the Aion thing from David Bentley Hart since he's the biggest proponent of that, but there's an issue there when Jesus uses the same term to describe the life after ressurection. If hell is finite then so is heaven, unless you twist yourself into knots over trying to justify interpreting aionos one way for hell and another way for heaven.

Don't worry OP there is a hell and those individuals are most definitely going there.

 

[Ars Goetia]

I assume you got the Aion thing from David Bentley Hart since he's the biggest proponent of that, but there's an issue there when Jesus uses the same term to describe the life after ressurection. If hell is finite then so is heaven, unless you twist yourself into knots over trying to justify interpreting aionos one way for hell and another way for heaven.

If you want to go with that argument and say that an aion must be infinite then you also have to tie yourself in knots. Galatians 1:4 says that refers to an aion of wickedness. It would be very unfortunate if that were never ending. More relevantly, Jesus himself refers to the apocalypse as an aion in Matthew 13:39 and 13:40. The word is also used in in Ephesians 2:7 and Ephesians 3:9 to past and future aions which presumebly have ended or will end. Aions are therefore not necessarily infinite and can be temporary. If the Resurrection is the last stage in time then obviously it will never end as there is no new age to replace it. In that case I do admit that it could be used to refer to an eternal age in that context. That's why I complemented my argument with reference to the fact that the bible says all will be saved eventually.

I could debate you over what the church fathers. I don't especially think that it matters thought. I prefer to consider the teachings of the disciples and Paul as well as the teachings they endorsed considering they're in the better position to know what Christ actually taught. As such, I'll offer a list of verse that imply universal salvation from those sources. If you want anymore then feel free to ask.

Spoiler: Verses

1 John 4:14
1 Timothy 2:4
John 17:2 with consideration for John 3:35 and John 13:3
Romans 5:15-21
Romans 11:15
Ephesians 1:10
Philippians 2:9-11
Hebrews 8:11-12
Revelation 5:13
Revelation 15:4

Don't worry OP there is a hell and those individuals are most definitely going there.

I don't dispute the existence of Hell. For the principle of ultimate justice to exist so must a place of penance and rehabilitation. However, the correlate of an all loving and all just God is an infinite capacity for forgiveness and redemption. Let me ask you, if a person in Hell truly repents his actions and beg for forgiveness, would it be just for God to torture him?