Atheist view of hell

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Actually, while reading the book The Dogma of Hell the other day, I came upon this passage. I’ll leave it here to add to the discussion as it really struck me.
A holy priest was exorcising a demoniac, and he asked the demon what pains he was suffering in Hell. “An eternal fire,” he answered, “an eternal malediction, an eternal rage, and a frightful despair at being never able to gaze upon Him who created me.” “What would you do to have the happiness of seeing God?” “To see Him but for one moment, I should willingly consent to endure my torments for 10,000 years. But vain desires! I shall suffer forever and never see Him!”
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On a like occasion, the exorcist inquired of the demon what his greatest pain in Hell was. He replied with an accent of indescribable despair: “Always, always! Never, never!”
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One day, a holy soul was meditating upon Hell, and considering the eternity of the pains, the frightful “always… never,” she was thrown into complete confusion by it, because she was unable to reconcile this immeasurable severity with the divine goodness and other perfections. “Lord,” she said, “I submit to Thy judgments, but do not push the rigors of Thy justice to far.” “Do you understand,” was the answer, “what sin is? To sin is to say to God, I will not serve Thee! I despise Thy law, I laugh at Thy threats!” “I understand, Lord, that sin is an outrage to Thy Majesty.” “Well, measure, if you can, the greatness of this outrage.” “Lord, this outrage is infinite, since it attacks infinite Majesty.” “Must it not, then, be punished by an infinite chastisement? Now, as the punishment could not be infinite in its intensity, justice demands that it be so at least in its duration.
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Accordingly, it is the divine justice that wills the eternity of the pains: the terrible ‘always,’ the terrible ‘never.’ The damned themselves will be obliged to render homage to this justice, and cry out in the midst of their torments: ‘Thou art just, O Lord, and thy judgments are equitable.’” (Psalm 118: 137).
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misstherese said:
Actually, while reading the book The Dogma of Hell the other day, I came upon this passage. I’ll leave it here to add to the discussion as it really struck me.
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My understanding, and I am just an average sinner, is that the desire for God is itself a grace.

Therefore, those in Hell could not desire Him.

ICXC NIKA
 
thinkandmull said:
Hello,

When Christians tell atheists that hell is real because God is so very holy, I think they aren’t using the proper line of explanation. If someone in Africa shot someone dressed up as a monkey, thinking he was merely hunting, would he be guilty of murder? It doesn’t seem right to point to God as the reason for hell without taking into account the conscience. What I want to find out on this thread is what atheists think about conscience and the idea of an eternal punishment.
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Atheists as a rule do not believe in heaven or hell. That would be a bit like asking me what I think the tooth fairy looks like.
 
GEddie said:
My understanding, and I am just an average sinner, is that the desire for God is itself a grace.

Therefore, those in Hell could not desire Him.

ICXC NIKA
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I think the desire to see God is a natural desire in everyone. My understanding of why the demon would suffer that to see God is because before the fall of the angels, they knew God. It makes sense that they feel regret just as those others in Hell feel regret. That’s one of the torments of Hell, is regret. Not necessarily regret that they offended God maybe, but that they took pleasure in those few things to gain nothing while they could have endured some few trials and gained everything forever.

These are just my thoughts and understanding, it might be better to ask a priest for clarification.
 
misstherese said:
I think the desire to see God is a natural desire in everyone. My understanding of why the demon would suffer that to see God is because before the fall of the angels, they knew God. It makes sense that they feel regret just as those others in Hell feel regret. That’s one of the torments of Hell, is regret. Not necessarily regret that they offended God maybe, but that they took pleasure in those few things to gain nothing while they could have endured some few trials and gained everything forever.

These are just my thoughts and understanding, it might be better to ask a priest for clarification.
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I thought that was a powerful quote. Yes, it does make sense that the demons feel regret - they remember who they were and they know why they are justly punished.

I thought this was very important also:
Accordingly, it is the divine justice that wills the eternity of the pains: the terrible ‘always,’ the terrible ‘never.’ The damned themselves will be obliged to render homage to this justice, and cry out in the midst of their torments: ‘Thou art just, O Lord, and thy judgments are equitable.’” (Psalm 118: 137).
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I notice that it is God’s justice that wills this situation – because God’s Justice is something very good. Then even the damned admit that they are being punished rightly. They know that God gave them every chance for salvation, but they didn’t want it.
To sin is to say to God, I will not serve Thee! I despise Thy law, I laugh at Thy threats!
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I am frightened when I see people laughing at God and of His teachings – it sounds exactly like that quote above.
 
GEddie said:
My understanding, and I am just an average sinner, is that the desire for God is itself a grace.

Therefore, those in Hell could not desire Him.

ICXC NIKA
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Why should we choose to stay in Hell if the opposite choice is just about out goodness? That you can expect it from irrational person. Are we irrational?
 
C.S. Lewis is quoted as saying, “I willingly believe that the damned are, in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the gates of hell are locked on the inside.”

My quote, “I think after about 2 minutes of Hell the gates would be unlocked and everyone would come running towards God.”
 
Vonsalza said:
I think we can prove pretty reasonably that yes; humans are often irrational.
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Lets see, we are rational beings and have feelings. Doesn’t that mean that we often cannot control our feeling when we look irrational? Why should we be blamed if we cannot overcome our feelings?
 
STT said:
You ignore the rest: That you can expect it from irrational person. Are we irrational?
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To commit sin is to act irrationally.
When we work to overcome sin by acts of virtue, we act in accordance with reason.
 
STT said:
Lets see, we are rational beings and have feelings. Doesn’t that mean that we often cannot control our feeling when we look irrational?
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To act in a rational manner is to choose by our intellect and not by feelings. Feelings come and go and cannot be relied upon for understanding the truth. Feelings are responses in the body. But the intellect grasps the truth and helps us act even if our feelings indicate something different.

That is the difference between a hero and a coward. The coward acts on feelings of fear. The hero feels the same fear, but acts by intellect which tells him what the virtuous and good thing to do is. So, he rises above feelings.
Why should we be blamed if we cannot overcome our feelings?
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Because we would be denying that which is greatest in ourselves - our rational intellect tells us to overcome feelings when they do not lead to virtue. When we fail to overcome feelings, we are slave to them. We surrender our freedom, decision and intelligence to the body which is unthinking, like an animal.
So, that is a sin against the gift of intelligence and reason - so we should be blamed for degrading ourselves in this way. That’s what we would call a sin.
 
STT said:
We commit sin when we cannot resist temptations or emotions anymore.
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Right - so you asked why we should be blamed if we cannot overcome feelings, and you answer it here.
 
reggieM said:
To act in a rational manner is to choose by our intellect and not by feelings.
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We couldn’t survive if our feelings didn’t allow us. What if everybody hates everybody (mother hates her children)?
reggieM said:
Feelings come and go and cannot be relied upon for understanding the truth.
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Why should be looking for the truth if there is no desire for it? We follow our desire when we look for the truth.
reggieM said:
Feelings are responses in the body. But the intellect grasps the truth and helps us act even if our feelings indicate something different.
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Feeling are essential part of us which let us to live.
reggieM said:
That is the difference between a hero and a coward. The coward acts on feelings of fear. The hero feels the same fear, but acts by intellect which tells him what the virtuous and good thing to do is. So, he rises above feelings.
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A hero also followed a feeling to become hero.
reggieM said:
Because we would be denying that which is greatest in ourselves - our rational intellect tells us to overcome feelings when they do not lead to virtue. When we fail to overcome feelings, we are slave to them.
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Yes, we become slave and follow our feeling when we break and cannot resist our feeling anymore. What should be blamed?
reggieM said:
We surrender our freedom, decision and intelligence to the body which is unthinking, like an animal.
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With freedom we decide to avoid sin and resist. We just cannot resist temptation anymore when temptation is very strong.
reggieM said:
So, that is a sin against the gift of intelligence and reason - so we should be blamed for degrading ourselves in this way. That’s what we would call a sin.
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Feelings are also a gift without them we would be desperate depressed not wanting to do anything. The problem is that sometimes we just cannot overcome feelings. Why should blame a person who breaks and sins?
 
Dorothy said:
God does not condemn anyone to hell. When a person dies and they see Him they either embrace Him or walk away from Him because they do not recognize Him.

To not recognize Him and turn their backs to Him is hell.
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That’s like saying the robber doesn’t take people’s money. When a person sees the robber with a gun they can either give him their money or die.

OR

That’s like saying the mafia doesn’t break your thumbs. When a person sees the mafia and they ask you to worship their children or have your thumbs broken.

To not worship their children is to have your thumbs broken.
 
STT said:
Why should be looking for the truth if there is no desire for it? We follow our desire when we look for the truth.
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I would separate desire from feeling.
As I see it, you’re talking about several things:
Intellect: This is our rational activity that understands the good thing to do.
Will: This is our decision-making power. When the intellect reasons correctly, it can then direct the Will to do a good thing or bad thing.
Feelings: These are bodily reactions. The intellect and will can direct, change and generate feelings, and sometimes feelings just come from the body.
Desire: This is love - not a feeling, but the movement of the heart towards what is perceived as good. Desire for God is the greatest love - because we love the greatest Good.

So, feelings and desires don’t always aim for good things. They need to be directed by the intellect. We think about things, then choose with the will.
By habits, over time, we will either do good things or bad things repeatedly.
The intellect can redirect choices, and from that good or bad feelings can result.
A hero also followed a feeling to become hero.
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The feeling to become a hero was created by the thoughts in the intellect. As we said, both the hero and coward have feelings of fear. The fear is also caused by the intellect as it remembers past events that caused pain. But the hero fights against the fear and does the good deed. The coward follows the fear.
Yes, we become slave and follow our feeling when we break and cannot resist our feeling anymore. What should be blamed?
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Yes, exactly - we try to resist certain feelings because we know with our mind the good thing we want to do. So, we fight. We don’t want to follow the feelings. However, you said we become a slave when we follow the feeling when we could not resist it. True. In the fight, we were weak. We did not want to fight any more – so our Desire or Love was for something else.
Perhaps we have a fight to resist the feeling of comfort. We want to do something good, but the feeling of having comfort is strong. We fight. But we love the feeling of comfort more than we love the good things we wanted to do. So, we do not want to resist the desire for comfort and we stop fighting. Then we commit a sin.

Should we be blamed because we wanted the good feeling of comfort? No. We are blamed because we wanted comfort more than we wanted the better thing to do – the good thing. Perhaps we wanted to do some good work. But we choose comfort instead. The comfort we choose may also be sinful (drunkeness, lust, etc).

What is to be blamed is our weakness. That is a sin of weakness. A weak man is one who does not want to fight, or has a habit of avoiding things. He chooses the easy path every time. That’s a bad habit.

A weak man gets weaker the more he falls into sin.

The only way the man can become free is to turn to God and repent, say that he is sorry. Then he tries again when the next temptation comes.

Otherwise, if he is too proud to pray to God - he stays a slave to his sin.
With freedom we decide to avoid sin and resist. We just cannot resist temptation anymore when temptation is very strong.
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Yes, absolutely right. When we are too weak, we lose the fight against temptation. Some temptations are so strong, nobody can resist them on their own.
That is why, we say from the Christian perspective - the only way to overcome sin and live with true virtue, is with the help of God. Only God can save us from those sins and temptations - and God actually gives us inner strength to win and resist temptation. Then we become more like God - we have more goodness and we are no longer slaves to sin. That is freedom and joy.
But only God can give that. Why?
Because without God we have pride. We think we can do everything ourself.
Humility is the first virtue. Humility before God. We admit that we cannot resist some temptations. But we want to resist - we want to win.
So, we humble ourselves and admit. We are just weak human beings. Only the power of God can change us. Then God will change us! You can see people who have overcome terrible addictions by the power of God - they asked through prayer and God helped them (this usually takes time for the person to realize their own sin).
Feelings are also a gift without them we would be desperate depressed not wanting to do anything. The problem is that sometimes we just cannot overcome feelings. Why should blame a person who breaks and sins?
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Again, yes - you’re right. Feelings are a gift. But they have to be controlled, then they will be a benefit to us. Anger is something good when it is directed against evil. Desire for a woman is good when it is directed towards marriage.

However, when we cannot overcome feelings and we fall into sin - that is a sin of weakness. Why didn’t we have the strength?
If the person did not want to fight - then he would be blamed.

Most importantly - if a person did not want to ask God for help, then he will be blamed for his sins and weaknesses. He is doing things that he knows are wrong and sinful. Why? Because he has pride and thinks he has strength in himself, and he won’t turn to God with humility.

In our view, God allows Satan to tempt us. Satan will always win. The person who falls into sin is falling into Satan’s trap.

Why? Because the person does not want to serve God. If we turn away from God, we are turning towards Satan and evil. Then temptations will have tremendous power over us and we will become slaves.

We are slaves because evil actions possess us. Those temptations and sins come from our own weakness and desire for pleasure (pleasure is good, but not if it is more important than God) and from Satan who wants to possess souls.
 
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