Don't ask, don't tell, don't persueFollow

You damn well better. You're the reason for most of this ******** and someday, you'll have to pay for it.

More like testes-fy, AMIRITE???

This is usually the appropriate response to most of what Joph posts.

Sheol was a separate concept. The idea that, when you die, you just go to rest. There wasn't a concept of a beneficial or detrimental afterlife in Judaic custom; God rewarded your piety on earth and everyone went to the same afterlife when they died.

The linked bits refer to the JKV which immediately puts me off to them as there's been much better translated texts since then.

Is it? I'll admit I haven't gone through the bookcases of many Evangelicals but, given that the KJV isn't the translation used by most Protestant denominations, I'd be surprised to learn that most Evangelicals use it. I'd have guessed the New English Version or something.

As for Hell itself:
"It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out" - Mark 9:43
"Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell." - Matthew 10:28
"How will you escape being condemned to hell?" - Matthew 23:33
"But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him." - Luke 12:15

Now, if you want to substitute Sheol or whatever other word for "Hell" in those passages, feel free. If you think that substitution means that Jesus wasn't really warning of a detrimental afterlife as a consequence of not obeying God, I don't know what to tell you.

Edited, Jan 11th 2012 11:56am by Jophiel

Don't sell yourself short.

Gehenna was used in all those cases, referring to the dump site of dead bodies and refuse outside of Jerusalem, a place of where the dead were left and burned until they are destroyed. It is also synonymous with the Valley of Hinnom, infamous from the Old Testament as the Jews there turned from God and were to be punished by letting their dead bodies lie there to rot.

Seems pretty clear when you realize this is exactly how the Jews would understand it, that Jesus is referring to true death, without the chance of eternal life. In effect he's saying that if you don't follow God (or Jesus, as they're pretty much synonymous in this sense), your body won't have an afterlife. You'll just be dead, thrown into the garbage dump of the earth, and rot or burn up. This is also exactly what I was talking about with needing to know the actual translations. You did hit the nail on the head with Sheol though; the KJV is one of the only mainstream Bible that translates it as Hell in both Old and New Testaments.

You're a more mature man than I; I never know when to back down

Apropos of nothing, I was just reading the description of Fear 3 on Greenmangaming and cracked up:


I don't think I want to play that game

Yipes! Sounds scary indeed.

hate to interrupt
SpoilerThe suffering portion of hell works like this (as I see it):
SIN is like every human is coated in a thick coating of black pitch.
As I said before; this "sin" doesn't represent actions necessarily.. it is just how we are.. covered in this pitch and whatever we do and whatever we touch naturally gets coated in the stuff.

On the "day of judgement" basically God is going to light a match and throw it.. and I'm sure you could imagine the.. uh "gnashing of teeth" that will ensue.. They will not burn forever..it depends on how much of their "self" has been infused with the stuff.. but they will burn and suffer.. but this will only last until they they are left as a raw spirit to be judged before God.. and as REV20 says they are all cast into oblivion forver forgotten and no longer in existence. Truly Dead:
THEN the "New Heaven and New Earth" comes down.
The purpose of Christ is to wipe that flammable material off of us.. The blood of Christ is the only stuff that can wipe it off and free us from that burning judgment.. When we stand to be judged Christ already paid our debt of suffering and we are free to go.

AS far as debating about the "when" this happens.. you're right.. debating that is very tedious.
My own view that that "the dead" leave our time/space dimension.. so as far as they are concern their judgement happens right when they die.. even though to the physical universe it may be years or thousands of years..
..but I think that the suffering incurred by this "burning away" is determined by exactly how much of the black-pitch that you have basically fused yourself with...
This burning coupled with the fact that scripture says that EVERYONE shall stand before God and know the truth that they have given up means that everyone will suffer not just from the burning away of the sin that they has fused with but also in knowing that they denied their Creator and rejected the chance that they had in life to accept the forgiveness that He provides in Christ.

..and THAT is why I will never again sleep naked in a barracks with a live hamster and a fat Nepalese man!

SpoilerIt is the point of sentience and free-will..
Trees and quasars were created without those things. In your context "sick" merely means we think for ourselves but that is what separates us FROM trees and quasars.
We have a choice to GET well: getting well in our case mean eternal perfection... everything else in the universe has no choice of that and will burn away without emotion. That is why(and how) we more than just animals, vegetables, and minerals.

So then I said; I never want to catch you sniffing there AGAIN, MOM!!