Tag Archives: Hell

The Lie of Christian Hell

So. Christians worship the Jewish god. They use the Jewish Old Testament to proclaim their knowledge of god. They use the New Testament to proclaim their own theology which? Is totally different than the Jewish mythology from which? Christians got their religion in the first place. They took the Jewish mythology and changed it to fit their own Christian mythology they were trying to pedal.

The Jewish Afterlife: Sheol

Taken from Jewish Enclycopedia
http://jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/13563-sheol

SHEOL ():
Position and Form.
Hebrew word of uncertain etymology (see Sheol, Critical View), synonym of “bor” (pit), “abaddon” and “shaḥat” (pit or destruction), and perhaps also of “tehom” (abyss).

—Biblical Data:

It connotes the place where those that had died were believed to be congregated. Jacob, refusing to be comforted at the supposed death of Joseph, exclaims: “I shall go down to my son a mourner unto Sheol” (Gen. xxxvii. 36, Hebr.; comp. ib. xlii. 38; xliv. 29, 31). Sheol is underneath the earth (Isa. vii. 11, lvii. 9; Ezek. xxxi. 14; Ps. lxxxvi. 13; Ecclus. [Sirach] li. 6; comp. Enoch, xvii. 6, “toward the setting of the sun”); hence it is designated as (Deut. xxxii. 22; Ps. lxxxvi. 13) or (Ps. lxxxviii. 7; Lam. iii. 55; Ezek. xxvi. 20, xxxii. 24). It is very deep (Prov. ix. 18; Isa. lvii. 9); and it marks the point at the greatest possible distance from heaven (Job xi. 8; Amos ix. 2; Ps. cxxxix. 8). The dead descend or are made to go down into it; the revived ascend or are brought and lifted up from it (I Sam. ii. 6; Job vii. 9; Ps. xxx. 4; Isa. xiv. 11, 15). Sometimes the living are hurled into Sheol before they would naturally have been claimed by it (Prov. i. 12; Num. xvi. 33; Ps. lv. 16, lxiii. 10), in which cases the earth is described as “opening her mouth” (Num. xvi. 30). Sheol is spoken of as a land (Job x. 21, 22); but ordinarily it is a place with gates (ib. xvii. 16, xxxviii. 17; Isa. xxxviii. 10; Ps. ix. 14), and seems to have been viewed as divided into compartments (Prov. vii. 27), with “farthest corners” (Isa. xiv. 15; Ezek. xxxii. 23, Hebr.; R. V. “uttermost parts of the pit”), one beneath the other (see Jew. Encyc. v. 217, s. v. Eschatology). Here the dead meet (Ezek. xxxii.; Isa. xiv.; Job xxx. 23) without distinction of rank or condition—the rich and the poor, the pious and the wicked, the old and the young, the master and the slave—if the description in Job iii. refers, as most likely it does, to Sheol. The dead continue after a fashion their earthly life. Jacob would mourn there (Gen. xxxvii. 35, xlii. 38); David abides there in peace (I Kings ii. 6); the warriors have their weapons with them (Ezek. xxxii. 27), yet they are mere shadows (“rephaim”; Isa. xiv. 9, xxvi. 14; Ps. lxxxviii. 5, A. V. “a man that hath no strength”). The dead merely exist without knowledge or feeling (Job xiv. 13; Eccl. ix. 5). Silence reigns supreme; and oblivion is the lot of them that enter therein (Ps. lxxxviii. 13, xciv. 17; Eccl. ix. 10). Hence it is known also as “Dumah,” the abode of silence (Ps. vi. 6, xxx. 10, xciv. 17, cxv. 17); and there God is not praised (ib. cxv. 17; Isa. xxxviii. 15). Still, on certain extraordinary occasions the dwellers in Sheol are credited with the gift of making knowntheir feelings of rejoicing at the downfall of the enemy (Isa. xiv. 9, 10). Sleep is their usual lot (Jer. li. 39; Isa. xxvi. 14; Job xiv. 12). Sheol is a horrible, dreary, dark, disorderly land (Job x. 21, 22); yet it is the appointed house for all the living (ib. xxx. 23). Return from Sheol is not expected (II Sam. xii. 23; Job vii. 9, 10; x. 21; xiv. 7 et seq.; xvi. 22; Ecclus. [Sirach] xxxviii. 21); it is described as man’s eternal house (Eccl. xii. 5). It is “dust” (Ps. xxx. 10; hence in the Shemoneh ‘Esreh, in benediction No. ii., the dead are described as “sleepers in the dust”).

God Its Ruler.

God’s rulership over it is recognized (Amos ix. 2; Hos. xiii. 14; Deut. xxxii. 22; I Sam. ii. 6 [Isa. vii. 11?]; Prov. xv. 11). Hence He has the power to save the pious therefrom (Ps. xvi. 10, xlix. 16, the text of which latter passage, however, is recognized as corrupt). Yet Sheol is never satiated (Prov. xxx. 20); she “makes wide her soul,” i.e., increases her desire (Isa. v. 14) and capacity. In these passages Sheol is personified; it is described also as a pasture for sheep with death as the shepherd (Ps. xlix. 15). From Sheol Samuel is cited by the witch of En-dor (I Sam. xxviii. 3 et seq.). As a rule Sheol will not give up its own. They are held captive with ropes. This seems to be the original idea underlying the phrase (II Sam. xxii. 6; Ps. xviii. 6; R. V., verse 5, “the cords of Sheol”) and of the other expression, (Ps. cxvi. 3; R. V. “and the pains of Sheol”); for they certainly imply restraint or capture. Sheol is used as a simile for “jealousy” (Cant. viii. 7). For the post-Biblical development of the ideas involved see Eschatology.

Etymology.—Critical View:

The word “Sheol” was for some time regarded as an Assyro-Babylonian loan-word, “Shu’alu,” having the assumed meaning “the place whither the dead are cited or bidden,” or “the place where the dead are ingathered.” Delitzsch, who in his earlier works advanced this view, has now abandoned it; at least in his dictionary the word is not given. The non-existence of “Shu’alu” has been all along maintained by Jensen (“Kosmologie,” p. 223), and recently again by Zimmern (in Schrader,” K. A. T.” 3d ed., p. 636, note 4) even against Jastrow’s explanation (in “Am. Jour. Semit. Lang.” xiv. 165-170) that “sha’al” = “to consult an oracle,” or “to cite the dead” for this purpose, whence the name of the place where the dead are. The connection between the Hebrew “Sheol” and the Assyro – Babylonian “shillan” (west), which Jensen proposed instead (in “Zeitschrift für Assyriologie,” v. 131, xv. 243), does not appear to be acceptable. Zimmern (l.c.) suggests “shilu” (= “a sort of chamber”) as the proper Assyrian source of the Hebrew word. On the other hand, it is certain that most of the ideas covered by the Hebrew “Sheol” are expressed also in the Assyro-Babylonian descriptions of the state of the dead, found in the myths concerning Ishtar’s descent into Hades, concerning Nergal and Ereshkigal (see Jensen in Schrader, “K. B.” vi., part 1, pp. 74-79) and in the Gilgamesh epic (tablets ii. and xii.; comp. also Craig, “Religious Texts,” i. 79; King, Magic,” No. 53).

This realm of the dead is in the earth (“erẓitu” = ; comp. Job, x. 21, 22), the gateway being in the west. It is the “land without return.” It is a dark place filled with dust (see Sheol, Biblical Data); but it contains a palace for the divine ruler of this shadow-realm (comp. Job xviii. 13, 14). Seven gates guard successively the approach to this land, at the first of which is a watchman. A stream of water flows through Sheol (comp. Enoch, xvii. 6, xxii. 9; Luke xvi. 24; Ps. xviii. 5; II Sam. xxii. 5).

Origin of Biblical Concept.

The question arises whether the Biblical concept is borrowed from the Assyrians or is an independent development from elements common to both and found in many primitive religions. Though most of the passages in which mention is made of Sheol or its synonyms are of exilic or post-exilic times, the latter view, according to which the Biblical concept of Sheol represents an independent evolution, is the more probable. It reverts to primitive animistic conceits. With the body in the grave remains connected the soul (as in dreams): the dead buried in family graves continue to have communion (comp. Jer. xxxi. 15). Sheol is practically a family grave on a large scale. Graves were protected by gates and bolts; therefore Sheol was likewise similarly guarded. The separate compartments are devised for the separate clans, septs, and families, national and blood distinctions continuing in effect after death. That Sheol is described as subterranean is but an application of the custom of hewing out of the rocks passages, leading downward, for burial purposes.

Bibliography:

  • Stade, Ueber die A. T. Vorstellungen vom Zustande nach dem Tode, Leipsic, 1877;
  • idem, Gesch. des Volkes Israel, i. 418 et seq.;
  • idem, Biblische Theologie des A. T. pp. 183 et seq., Tübingen, 1905;
  • F. Schwally, Das Leben nach dem Tode, Giessen, 1892;
  • A. Bertholet, Die Israelitischen Vorstellungen vom Zustande nach dem Tode, Freiburg, 1899;
  • G. Beer, Der Biblische Hades, Tübingen, 1902;
  • idem, in Guthe, Kurzes Bibelwörterbuch, s.v. Hölle;
  • Zimmern, in K. A. T. 3d ed., ii. 641, 642, Berlin, 1903 (where the Assyrian literature is given).

The Christian Hell

From Hell
https://www.britannica.com/topic/hell/Christianity

The early Christians proclaimed that Christ had conquered death, opening the door to resurrection and heavenly immortality. The defeat of death does not necessarily mean the immediate abolition of hell, however. Gehenna appears in the New Testament 12 times, where its terrors for the wicked, as a place “where the worm never dies, and their fire is never quenched” (Mark 9:48)

In the great eschatological discourse of Matthew 25, Jesus announces that the Son of Man will come in glory to judge the nations, to separate the sheep from the goats, and to consign sinners to everlasting fire. This separation is stark, with no explicit provision made for fine gradations of merit or guilt. While the poor man Lazarus enjoys a blissful repose in the bosom of Abraham, the rich man who failed to help him in life is tormented in eternal fire without hope of respite, the two realms being separated by a great chasm (Luke 16:26). The standard of judgment is right relationship to Christ, as expressed by deeds of mercy. Jesus himself set this standard when he declares:

You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me. (Matthew 25:41–43)

The physical location of hell is similarly ambiguous. Some ancient and medieval Christian texts describe places of postmortem torment and demonic mischief in the upper atmosphere, while others locate hell in the centre of the earth, finding entrances in caves, moors, bogs, and volcanic fissures. Such entrances to hell appear frequently in folk traditions, along with lore about the fairy underworlds in which the unwary may be trapped. Virgil’s Lake of Averno and the infernal rivers Styx, Acheron, Cocytus, Lethe, and Phlegethon, among other Classical features, recur in Christian literary treatments. Drawing on diverse biblical, Classical, and folkloric sources, a great variety of cautionary tracts and tales, often cast in the form of firsthand visions, further developed the imagery of hell, mapping its flaming lakes, perilous bridges, demon-infested pits, and stinking cesspools and enlarging its catalogue of torments while at the same time providing milder sufferings for penitents. In the 2nd-century Apocalypse of Peter, for example, blasphemers hang by their tongues over a lake of flaming mire, murderers are tortured in the sight of their victims, and slanderers have their eyes burned out by hot irons. Hope remains, however, that some sinners can be saved through the prayers of the righteous. Anticipating the doctrine of purgatory, the postbiblical apocalypses suggest that penitents may be purified by the same fires of hell in which the reprobate sink to their doom.

In his Dialogues, Pope Gregory I (590–604), writing in a time of pestilence and invasions, included return-from-the-dead accounts from a hermit, a merchant, and a soldier who witnessed the terrors of hell and the joys of the blessed before being sent back to warn the living of what lies in store.

Tales of this kind proliferated throughout the Middle Ages, receiving consummate literary expression in Dante’s The Divine Comedy and providing matter for allegories such as Guillaume de Deguileville’s The Pilgrimage of the Soul (1358) and John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress (1678). Dante’s hell, with its nine levels leading to Satan frozen in a lake of ice, is a parodistic inversion of the sublime order of heaven; even here, justice prevails in the precise conformity of punishment to crime.

The older biblical conception of Hades-Sheol as the gathering place of the dead retained its importance for the Christian tradition, however, as Christians reflected on the redemptive significance of Holy Saturday, the day between Christ’s Crucifixion and his Resurrection. According to the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus and patristic writings from as early as the 2nd century, Christ invaded Hades during the interval in which he lay dead in the tomb and “made a proclamation to the spirits in prison” (1 Peter 3:19), freeing the just who sat in exile awaiting their Redeemer. Hell, in this sense, is a waiting place for the righteous before the coming of Christ, and Christ’s descent into hell is understood to be a rescue mission. In support of this teaching, Eastern Christian icons of the Resurrection depict Christ breaking the jaws of hell, entering in triumph, and drawing Adam upwards by the wrist.

An article of the Apostles’ Creed, the statement of faith used by most Christian churches and a favourite subject of medieval mystery plays, the theme of Christ’s descent into hell has persisted in theological discussion as a focal point for debates on the scope of universal salvation. Among Christian theologians, Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254)is the preeminent advocate of a doctrine of universal salvation (apocatastasis). Origen believed that after passing through hell, as through a refining fire, all souls—including the fallen angels—would be restored. Although Origen’s influence on Christian biblical and spiritual theology remained profound, he was condemned for this teaching on universal salvation by the Council of Constantinople in 553. The major branches of Christianity have traditionally affirmed that the moral order of the universe and the justice of God require a certain symmetry between eternal reward for the blessed and eternal punishment for the damned, with the degree and kinds of suffering in hell being proportionate to the sins. Hell is the dwelling place of those who reject God irrevocably, whose alienation from God is a permanent expression of their own ill-used freedom, and whose suffering is at once physical (burning by fire) and spiritual (deprivation of God). While modern religious writers tend to interpret the pains of hell metaphorically, a great many artistic masterpieces derive their compelling power from their graphic and dramatic depictions of these torments.

The falseness of the Christian hell

Again, if you are going to take your own religion from another? Then why are you changing the theology of the religion in which you take yours from? Which is exactly what Christians did with the Jewish theology of Sheol and changed it to their version of their afterlife they call hell.

BUT? THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO BASIS FOR THIS THEOLOGY OF THE CHRISTIAN HELL IN THE OLD TESTAMENT AT ALL. NONE. ZIP, ZERO.

Again? The Old Testament is the first part of the Christian bible. That Old Testament? Is the historical records and theology of the Jewish people and their worship of their god and their theology of their afterlife. It is full of their rules and laws. These rules and laws? Were not applicable to ANYONE who was not a Jew.

And? The Jews? NEVER BELIEVED THAT JESUS WAS THEIR MESSIAH.

How insane that Christians? Can tell the Jews? Who their Messiah is. That they can literally change the theology of over 6,000 years of Jewish theology and create their own.

They changed the Jewish theology of their Messiah and then? Changed the Jewish mythology of their afterlife.

So? How can Christians proclaim all the things that the Jews rejected based on their own theology, was wrong? And then try to tell Jews what their mythology and theology is?

Christians are lying to you about hell

The concept of the Christian hell? Did not start showing up until the Christians created their New Testament portion of the bible. At no time in the Old Testament was the Jewish afterlife described as a hell like Christians describe it as. The Jewish afterlife Sheol? Was where EVERYONE went to and also? Their God ruled over it. There was no fire and brimestone punishment. It was basically a very dark place, full of silence, where you only saw shadows, but? You continued doing there what you did in your life on earth.

It was not until the Christians? Changing the Jewish mythology on their Messiah? And creating their own version in their New Testament? That they came up with the concept of hell. Why?

I believe? They did not find the afterlife of the Jews? Horrifying enough to scare their Christian believers in accepting their bullshit. I mean really? Who would be afraid if someone told you if you did not accept their god and Jesus? You would go to a place that was basically just dark, no real suffering, and you were going to continue doing there what you were doing in your life as the Jews theology descibed it.

Hell? Is a much more horrifying place to scare the living daylights out of you being used as a threat against you. And? Most of the Christian theology on hell? Is actually based upon Dante’s Inferno from his Divine Comedy series. And? Christians sure did not understand what Dante was doing when he wrote this series.

1. His Divine Comedy? Was actually a political and religious satire slam against all the leaders of the state and church. He created his levels of hell as punishment for all the disgusting, scumbag Christian leaders and politicians of his day. He slammed much of them in his writings. So basically? Christians took his satire and created much of their theology about hell from it.

So basically? Christian teachings and beliefs in hell? Were created inventions by the Church founders and leaders to scare the living daylights out of you? To believe their new bullshit Christianity, which has absolutely NO BASIS from the original source, the Jewish theology from which they took it from.

A Lesson to Christians on why? YOU DO NOT TELL SOMEONE THEY ARE GOING TO HELL!!!

Yes, I am an atheist. Yes, I do not believe in your god, nor your Jesus, nor your bible, nor your religion. Your god and your religion is just one of many of humanity. Your god is as real as the Muslims’ god, the Jewish god, or the old Pagan Greek, Egyptian, Roman, Welch, Anglo, Saxxon, etc gods and religions. NO ONE can prove to me their god is real. That would be like proving to me? That the sound of thunder is the sound of the voice of your god, which? If you actually read your buybulls and studied your history of this god? That is what he actually was to the Jews, their version of Thor, the Thunder god.

Be that as it may? I am doing this posting on the topic of why NO CHRISTIAN SHOULD EVER TELL ANYONE THEY ARE GOING TO HELL!!! And? This posting is a result of a set of comments on the posting Is the Bible Creating Atheists?

https://atheistmilitantsrising.home.blog/2020/02/23/is-the-bible-creating-atheists/

Satan, because without a scapegoat you might have to take personal responsibility for your own actions.

This is an edited response to Becky, one of the commentors.

ONE of the worst things ANY Christian can tell someone like myself or ANY victim or survivor of a rape by a Christian priest or pastors is that they would be going to hell if they do not accept your Jesus!!!

Why do I say this?

Because that is one of the tools that these Christian pedophile perverts used with great effect to silence us. Now here is my personal example, but it applies to most of the victims and survivors. If you were to read any of their stories? You would see how much this is typical for all of us. When we speak of these nightmares? Think of vivid lucid dreaming, where this shit is real to you. You feel everything, you experience everything, and it is constant, night after night after night. I am sure some of you have had dreams that felt so real it was as if you were not dreaming but you were actually there. This is what these nightmares are like.

Brain-washing in the horrors of hell

It's YOUR God.
They're YOUR rules.
YOU go to hell.

Now, when you grow up in the RCC like I did? Hell is drilled into your head big time. They tell you with great detail the horrors of hell. They brainwash you into this by putting great fear into your head, your heart and soul about the horrors of hell and they also drill into you the commandments of god from the OT that you were to stone to death mouthy kids, and all the other shit that happened to kids, like the 42 kids in the Prophet Elisha’s story. The second part of the brainwashing is? A priest tells you to do something? That is like God and Jesus himself telling you to do something. YOU NEVER QUESTION a priest, or a leader of the church. You do? YOU are going to hell. So can you understand this so far? I am sure you can.

Hell used to silence the victims
Hell is probably full of Christians, just like American prisons

Then? When you get raped by these scumbags? They use the brain-washing horrors of hell to keep you silent and it works perfectly.

My rape started out with one pedo priest, Father Leon Gaulin, right after the cops dropped me off at the church. He was real disgusting. He had me saying Our Fathers and Hail Mary’s as he raped me anally in the places bedroom. Hell, I can still to this day see it in my mind. The wool blankets, the dark headboard, the wastebasket I eventually tried to puke in after he forced me to perform oral sex on him. But? It was while he was raping me anally that he started using the horrors of hell to control me. Saying over and over to me if I told anyone about his “special healing” of me I would burn in hell for all eternity. I do not know if you can understand what that is like for a Roman Catholic brain-washed kid, but hey…it is not something you would want done to you.

And? There you are, having this done to you, in a fucking church no less, well the church buildings bedroom, and you, deep inside yourself, are begging, screaming and praying to god and Jesus to make this shit stop and it does not? Well another brain-washing tool used is that if god or Jesus did not answer your prayers? Then it was their will for what was happening to keep happening. So again, you are being raped by a Christian Roman Catholic priest, you have the horrors of hell drilled into you being used against you, your prayers have failed so you feel this is what god and Jesus want to have done to you and you? Go literally insane.

Then? When they gang-raped me? Even though Gaulin drugged me with a glass of water after he raped me? My sub-conscious recorded everything. When I first came out about this as an adult? I only remembered what Gaulin did to me, until he gave me that glass of water to drink. But now?After years of great therapy and lots of work? Well as one of my favorite Five Finger Death Punch song goes? I Remember Everything now. I remember every damn thing Gaulin, Desmond and McQue did to me at St Thomas More parish in Durham NH that night and why I tried to kill myself not soon afterwards for the first of many times.

They took their turns with me on that damn altar and they used the horrors of hell over and over again, same type of shit that Gaulin used. Imagine being a kid, stretched, bent over an altar of a church, three damn Christian pedophile priests taking turns, raping your ass, and telling you again, over and over, you tell anyone you are going to hell and this is what God and Jesus is giving you as a punishment for backtalking your father and breaking the commandments.

And this is why when some Christian? Tells me or someone who went through this that if they do not accept their god and Lord and Savior they will be going to hell? That is why we go off so freaking psycho at times.

Welcome to my Nightmares
It's your hell, YOU burn in it!!!

Not soon afterwards? The nightmares began. First? I would be in the family car, the old station wagon we used to have, the one where my little brother Ricky suffered an accident with a huge scythe. We would be going over the bridge over Great Bay, a trip we took a lot really. At first? It would be horrible storms, a huge tidal wave, almost hurricane weather and we would be blown off the bridge. Then it became sheets of literal fire coming down the bay to engulf us all in the car. After my second serious suicide attempt? They got really, really bad. And because of them? I became a pyro.

I started burning things. I would burn down old abandoned houses, set fire to woods, and then one day I got arrested for blowing up an abandoned truck almost in the center of town. I was literally acting out what was going on in my nightmares. Because they changed to my now being in hell, being gang raped by the demons of hell, just like I was gang raped by those priests in that church.

The demons? Were the priests with demon faces. And I would wake up from this shit screaming, drenched in sweat. Why? Because one of the demon priests would say to me, see, I told you what would happen if you told anyone about your special healing and he would bite off my dick. See why I would wake up screaming. Again realize, these are very lucid nightmares, YOU feel the heat of hell, you see the flames, it is just like you were brain-washed into believing. The demons are real in these nightmares, you feel it all, the pain, it is like living that night of horror all over again, each and every time you have these nightmares. But now? You are in hell having this done to you.

So the billions of people who existed before "Your Jesus" are burning in hell for being born too early in history?

You say you are a Christian? Then practice love, patience and understanding instead of telling someone they are going to hell. YOU may never know what they went through and why they might literally snap on you and throw all kinds of nasty disgusting words at you. It is not personal, it is you telling us that we are going to hell that causes our PTSD to react to you and what you said to us. Understand that the word HELL is a huge trigger for people like us. YOU have no idea what this is like for us. Yes, I am an atheist, but the horrors of hell brain-washing technique is one of the hardest of all brain-washing techniques to overcome, especially? When it is used in this fashion against you.

So when someone tells me, or many other victims and survivors that if we do not accept their god and Jesus we would spend an eternity in hell? Christians should try to understand why victims and survivors have such as myself have a mental blow out reaction when we are told this. Again!!!

It is nothing really personal against the Christian saying this to us, it is just the fact that those who raped our bodies? Those who raped our minds? Those who raped our souls? Our hearts? Used the horrors of hell to torment and torture many of us into silence. Most ask why do we wait so long before we speak of what happened to us? Well this is one of the main reasons.

So Christians?

THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK TO SOMEONE, ESPECIALLY US ATHEISTS, BECAUSE THERE MAY BE? A DAMN GOOD REASON WHY? WE ARE ATHEISTS AND SOME OF THE WORDS YOU DO USE TO US? ARE TRIGGERS, WORDS THAT WERE USED BY CHRISTIAN PRIESTS AND PASTORS, WELL VERSED IN BRAIN-WASHING YOU INTO THE HORRORS OF THEIR HELL, AND THEN USING IT TO DESTROY YOUR LIVES, DESTROY EVERYTHING ABOUT YOU FOR THEIR SICK AND TWISTED, PERVERTED, PEDOPHILE PLEASURE.