Wall of Mouths

;)

Heh, fair enough, Sam. I _like_ doing _this_, though. :p

The point was just that if you ignore God, then C.S.Lewis reckons God’ll be just as happy to ignore you. And that that is the worst thing that could ever conceivably happen. Or so C.S. Lewis says…

Misanthropologist wrote:

Or so C.S. Lewis says…

I just _can’t_ respect the opinion of a man who wrote fairy stories about magical lands in the back of wardrobes, though :)

They’re full of Christian subtext. I _could_ (:p) have respected him if it weren’t for that… :)
The Problem Of Pain is quite an interesting read, anyway.

More to the point: have you been doing your previous homework, young man? ;)

I don’t think C.S. Lewis believed in God. I always thought he was a fundamentalist agnostic (;)). Along with J.J.R. Tolkien he was member of a ‘group’, the Inklings. They had long discussions about literature and religion and he and Tolkien had contradictory ideas on religion and god; Tolkien was a devote christian.

Yes, I’m happy Mr Frodo. I didn’t know this part of the tale as it is not metioned in Tolkien’s biography.

This whole does god exist is fair enough, But I’m more interested in if Santa really exists coz if so then he owes me some damn presents!

Well, it all depends on which sections of the bible you want to belive in. There is quite a big difference between the god of the old testament (smitting people, fire and brimstone, etc) and the “loving forgiving” God of the new testament. However, in neither is Hell mentioned. Gehenna (hell according to the ignorant priest who tried to explain this christianinty thing to me…) was really a valley where the hebrews (under solomon) burnt their children to such gods as Baal and Moloch.
So if we go by the new testament, nothing will happen to you.
And if we go by the old, nothing will happen either, cause even god states that he is not the only one (The greatest among all, or words to that effect). One of the others may help you out.
Anyway, “And even the heavens shook when Budha said the nothing was permanent”, so what the hell, say what you want.

Where is this sign as I’m dyslexic and I need help, it’s bad that my seven year old daughter is better at spelling then me!

Also why is Dyslexic so differcult to spell!

Mekhet wrote:

However, in neither is Hell mentioned.

Deu 32:22 For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains.

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2Sa 22:6 The sorrows of hell compassed me about; the snares of death prevented me;

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Job 11:8 [It is] as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know?

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Job 26:6 Hell [is] naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.

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Psa 9:17 The wicked shall be turned into hell, [and] all the nations that forget God.

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Psa 16:10 For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.

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Psa 18:5 The sorrows of hell compassed me about: the snares of death prevented me.

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Psa 55:15 Let death seize upon them, [and] let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness [is] in their dwellings, [and] among them.

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Psa 86:13 For great [is] thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell.

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Psa 116:3 The sorrows of death compassed me, and the pains of hell gat hold upon me: I found trouble and sorrow.

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Psa 139:8 If I ascend up into heaven, thou [art] there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou [art there].

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Pro 5:5 Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.

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Pro 7:27 Her house [is] the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.

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Pro 9:18 But he knoweth not that the dead [are] there; [and that] her guests [are] in the depths of hell.

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Pro 15:11 Hell and destruction [are] before the LORD: how much more then the hearts of the children of men?

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Pro 15:24 The way of life [is] above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath.

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Pro 23:14 Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shalt deliver his soul from hell.

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Pro 27:20 Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.

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Isa 5:14 Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it.

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Isa 14:9 Hell from beneath is moved for thee to meet [thee] at thy coming: it stirreth up the dead for thee, [even] all the chief ones of the earth; it hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations.

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Isa 14:15 Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

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Isa 28:15 Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves:

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Isa 28:18 And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.

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Isa 57:9 And thou wentest to the king with ointment, and didst increase thy perfumes, and didst send thy messengers far off, and didst debase [thyself even] unto hell.

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Eze 31:16 I made the nations to shake at the sound of his fall, when I cast him down to hell with them that descend into the pit: and all the trees of Eden, the choice and best of Lebanon, all that drink water, shall be comforted in the nether parts of the earth.

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Of course it depends on the translation of ‘Hell’, but certainly the idea is there.
Psalms 9:17, and 139:8 are interesting but apparently contradictory. (if ‘thou’ refers to God, anyway.)

The hells that are referd to there are metaphors, not places.
It´s the same as the bible saying satan is the adversary or the devil. When Paul uses that name as someone evil, how do we know he´s not just talking about his pyscho serial killer neighbor?

The only Hebrew word translated “hell” in what is commonly called the Old Testament, is the word “Sheol.” “Sheol” occurs 65 times. It is translated “hell” 31 times, “grave” 31 times, and “pit” 3 times in the King James Bible. It is obvious that if “Sheol” means “hell,” it should not be translated “grave.” “Sheol” means the same as the Greek noun “Hades.”

“Hades” is derived from the Greek verb “horao.” “Horao” means “I am seeing.” The Greeks then prefixed the word with “a” (alpha) which negates “to see” thus coining the noun “Hades” meaning “unseen.” Therefore, “Sheol” and “Hades” mean “unseen.” These two words do not describe what the English theological word “hell” means to convey.

Example, “Out of the belly of hell (Sheol) cried I.” (Jonah 2:2) Verse 1:17 tells us he was “in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights.” Where was Jonah-in Hell or in a fish?
Gehenna was a well-known locality near Jerusalem, and ought no more to be translated Hell, than should Sodom or Gomorrah. See Josh. 15:8; 2 Kings 17:10; 2 Chron. 28:3; Jer. 7:31,32; 19:2.
Gehenna is never employed in the Old Testament to mean anything else than the place with which every Jew was familiar.
The word should have been left untranslated as it is in some versions, and it would not be misunderstood. It was not misunderstood by the Jews to whom Jesus addressed it. Walter Balfour well says: ‘What meaning would the Jews, who were familiar with this word, and knew it to signify the valley of Hinnom, be likely to attach to it when they heard it used by our Lord? Would they contrary to all former usage, transfer its meaning from a place with whose locality and history they had been familiar from their infancy, to a place of misery in another world? By what rule of interpretation, then, can we arrive at the conclusion that this word means a place of misery after death?
The French Bible, the Emphatic Diaglott, Improved Version, Wakefield’s Translation, and Newcomb’s, retain the proper noun, Gehenna, the name of a place as well-known as Babylon. (Many other Bibles since this was written, have also removed “Hell” and put “Gehenna” back.
Gehenna is never mentioned in the Apocrypha as a place of future punishment, as it would have been, had such been its meaning before and at the time of Christ.
No Jewish writer, such as Josephus, or Philo, ever used it as the name of a place of future punishment, as they would have done had such then been its meaning.
No classical Greek author ever alludes to it, and therefore, it was a Jewish locality, purely.
The first Jewish writer who ever names it as a place of future punishment is Jonathan Ben Uzziel, who wrote, according to various authorities, from somewhere between the second to the eighth century A.D.
The first Christian writer who calls Hell, Gehenna, is Justin Martyr, who wrote about A.D. 150.
Neither Christ nor his apostles ever named it to Gentiles, but only to Jews, which proves it a locality only known to Jews, wheras, if it were a place of punishment after death for sinners, it would have been preached to Gentiles as well as to Jews.
It was only referred to twelve times, on eight occasions, in all the ministry of Christ and the apostles, and in the Gospels and Epistles. Were they faithful to their mission to say no more than this, on so vital a theme as an endless Hell, if they intended to teach it?
Only Jesus and James ever named it. Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jude ever employ it. Would they not have warned sinners concerning it, if there were a Gehenna of torment after death?
Paul says he ‘shunned not to declare the whole counsel of God,’ and yet, though he was the great preacher of the Gospel to the Gentiles he never told them that Gehenna is a place of after-death punishment. Dr. Thayer (author of Thayer’s Lexicon and also on the translation committee to the American Standard Bible) significantly remarks: ‘The Savior and James are the only persons in all the New Testament who use the word. John the Baptist, who preached to the most wicked of men, did not use it once. Paul, wrote 14 epistles, and yet never once mentions it. Peter does not name it, nor Jude; and John, who wrote the gospel, three epistles, and the Book of Revelation, never employs it in a single instance. (the Greek words of “lake of fire” in Revelation is not Gehenna) Now if Gehenna or Hell really reveals the terrible fact of endless woe, how can we account for this strange silence? How is it possible, if they knew its meaning, and believed it a part of Christ’s teaching, that they should not have used it a hundred or a thousand times, instead of never using it at all; especially when we consider the infinite interests involved? The Book of Acts contains the record of the apostolic preaching, and the history of the first planting of the church among the Jews and Gentiles, and embraces a period of thirty years from the ascension of Christ. In all this history, in all this preaching of the apostles of Jesus, there is no mention of Gehenna. In thirty years of missionary effort, these men of God, addressing people of all characters and nations, never, under any circumstances, threaten them with the torments of Gehenna, or allude to it in the most distant manner! In the face of such a fact as this, can any man believe that Gehenna signifies endless punishment, and that this is a part of divine revelation, a part of the Gospel message to the world? These considerations show how impossible it is to establish the doctrine in review on the word Gehenna All the facts are against the supposition that the term was used by Christ or his disciples in the sense of endless punishment. There is not the least hint of any such meaning attached to it, nor the slightest preparatory notice that any such new revelation was to be looked for in this old familiar word.
Jesus never uttered it to unbelieving Jews, nor to anybody but his disciples, but twice (Matt. 23:15-33) during his entire ministry, nor but four times in all. If it were the final abode of unhappy millions, would not his warnings abound with exhortations to avoid it?
Jesus never warned unbelievers against it but once in all his ministry, ((Matt. 23:33) and he immediately explained it as about to come in this life.
If Gehenna is the name of Hell then men’s bodies are burned there, and well as their souls. (Matt. 5:29; 18:9)
If it be the name of endless torment, then literal fire is the sinner’s punishment. (Mark 9:43-48)
Gehenna is never said to be of endless duration, nor spoken of as destined to last forever, so that even admitting the popular ideas of its existence after death, it gives no support to the idea of endless torment.
Clement, a Universalist, (of the early church) used Gehenna to describe his ideas of punishment. He was one of the earliest of the Christian Fathers. The word did not then denote endless punishment.
A shameful death, or a severe punishment, in this life, was, at the time of Christ, denominated Gehenna, (Schleusner, Canon Farrar, and others), and there is no evidence that Gehenna meant anything else, at the time of Christ.”

you 3 really scare me…

uh… what?

i think i got ‘cantbearsedreadingthislongareplyphopbia’

reading all this (and ‘tis very interesting, i got to admit) it made me think about changing my title. maybe i should even reconsider supporting my football team as I might end up somewhere not very nice. then again ManUre would be no option…

mr self destruct wrote:

I recited a Christian prayer at school today, as an Atheist, and at the very time I was saying the prayer, I was thinking “fuck God”.

So, the question is, if there is a God, what will happen to me when I die?

can i just say im sorry for pissing you off in the past

after reading that, my opinion of you has gone up!