Eternal hell or nonexistence

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MaximilianK

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I don’t understand why God created a rational soul (angel or human) knowing that this creature will chose for all eternity to stay apart from Him, in the eternal hell.

Saint John of Damascus says that eternal hell is thousands of times more preferable then non-existsnce, is better to be in hell for all eternity then to not be born or created at all.
 
Because if anyone is in hell, then what it amounts to is God allowing that person the maximum amount of goodness that his nature is capable of.

In this life, we form ourselves. It is true we have a human nature, built for goodness and the Supreme Good: God. But while on Earth, we can form a “second nature” through habit, in the sense of constantly choosing self over love, ego-centrism and pride over compassion and service.

Although I have not read it myself, the quintessential symbol of hell in Dante’s inferno is actually on target, so I hear. Because notice the people in hell are not all sent to a random torture chamber. Rather, they continue on in the kind of existence they preferred on Earth. At least, that’s how I understand the story. If that’s off track, the point still remains (since the Inferno is just imaginative poetry).
Should he then annihilate them? To annihilate them is to eradicate their being; but to eradicate being on Aquinas’s theory is a prima facie evil, which an essentially good God could not do unless there were an overriding good which justified it. Given Aquinas’s identification of being and goodness, such an overriding good would have to produce or promote being in some way, but it is hard to see how the wholesale annihilation of persons could produce or promote being. In the absence of such an overriding good, however, the annihilation of the damned is not morally justified and thus not an option for a good God.
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I recommend you read the paper Dante’s Hell, Aquinas’s Moral Theory, and the Love of God by Dr. Eleonore Stump.

And also, more generally regarding the “punishment” of hell, again from the same paper:
Because of the nature he has given himself, the closest Filippo Argenti can come to the natural functioning of a human being is to act in wrath. By granting him a place in which to exercise his wrathfulness, God allows him as much being, and thus as much goodness, as Filippo is capable of. God does what he can, then, to preserve and maximize Filippo’s being and the being of each of the damned. In so doing he treats the damned according to their nature and promotes their good; and because he is goodness itself, by maximizing the good of the damned, he comes as close as he can to uniting them with himself that is to say, he loves them.
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Here, Filippo Argenti is a character from the Inferno who was wrathful in life, and so ended up in hell.
 
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I think the real question is why anyone would actually knowingly and willingly choose hell, if it meant their misery.

Still, sometimes people willingly commit to endure the loss of something or suffer in preference for another good.

Is anyone actually in hell? I’m not sure. But we know the fallen angels aren’t redeemed. So we know it’s possible to definitively choose against God.

But why would an angel choose hell? It can’t be through passion or ignorance (often causes of human sin). The Tradition is confident the angels fell through pride, which apparently is not reducible to ignorance or passion. How that is fleshed out is what I’m struggling with. But when you’re lacking sinful passions and deceptive ignorance, pride seems to be the only cause of sin left. Hence the fall of Adam is often said to be due to pride.

So does the fallen angel simply choose his own will over God’s will, just 'cause? Even if he knows it will cause him misery? Even if he knows his ultimate nature is to be in union with God? Well, I guess that’s what it means to sin through pride. It may seem absurd, but free beings are free beings. God has given us at least some sense of self-determination. He did not make himself unavoidable to us.
 
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Why it is said that it would have been better for Judas to have never been born?
 
Because Judas betrayed Jesus…

A lot of people use this verse haphazardly as if it means Judas is damned. I don’t think that’s very persuasive.
 
But it doesn’t say that. It doesn’t mention hell.
 
According to St. Thomas Aquinas the fallen angels knew at a glance the outcome of their choice, and they made it anyway.
 
Yes that is true.

I get hung up on why even an angel would choose against God, if they knew they could only be happy with God.
 
MaximilianK said:
Saint John of Damascus says that eternal hell is thousands of times more preferable then non-existsnce, is better to be in hell for all eternity then to not be born or created at all.
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  1. You exist because God is love
  2. God’s love is eternal because God’s nature is eternal. Love is not something that God begins doing or ceases to do or be.
  3. Because of premise 1 and 2 it follows necessarily that your existence, or personal beings in general, is eternally loved by God
  4. If you cease to exist, then you are not loved by God anymore, and this is impossible because of premise 1,2, and 3.
  5. Your relationship to God (your destiny) and therefore your very existence is immortal in nature (in despite of physical death) because of premise 1,2,3, and 4.
  6. You can choose to not love God and therefore reject love forever because of free-will.
  7. Therefore eternal hell exists because to be without God for all eternity is to be in a state that lacks eternal love, and therefore eternal joy and anything else that would comprise a loving relationship with God. More importantly you would lack the will and the grace to repent.
Conclusion: Hell, despite being a state of eternal suffering, is still a reflection of God’s love for you. For you to cease to exist would mean that God does not love you.
 
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RealisticCatholic said:
I get hung up on why even an angel would choose against God, if they knew they could only be happy with God.
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I have had difficulty with this as well, but only because it is hard to think of an idol that an angel would have.

However, not wanting to suffer for all eternity is not exactly the same thing as wanting to be a servant of love for all eternity.

Someone once said it is better to reign in hell than be a servant in heaven. If a person can think this, then hell is surly a possibility. Some people want to be there own Gods despite the sacrifice being made.

Kinda reminds me of that song by Frank Sinatra “i did it my way”
 
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RealisticCatholic said:
Is anyone actually in hell? I’m not sure. But we know the fallen angels aren’t redeemed. So we know it’s possible to definitively choose against God.
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So we really know that fallen angels aren’t redeemed, or are unredeemable? The idea of “fallen angels” is not truly biblical, as I understand it. Are you relying on Enoch (which I am not sure supports the idea, either), or some traditional source? Or am I missing something else?
 
Might it be, that people choose not to give up on their passions? I’ve been around 50-60 year old men who choose to gawk and comment on 20-30 year old girls. Men who have not even the slightest inclination on reflecting on what is right and wrong (beyond the obvious of theft or rape or murder). No inclination of following any objective truth. No inclination of Church or religion.

Perhaps, this is hell. Perhaps this lifestyle void of love other than the love of worldly passion is their eternal destiny. I can’t say they do not love their family or close friends but their love appears centrist based. In other words they love their 20 year old daughter but have no trouble objectifying someone else 20 year old daughter.

What would heaven mean to them? Might it be hell?

Maybe we reap what we desire. An eternity of passion and lust.

Maybe not. What do I know? Admittedly nothing. But I ponder.
 
Well, we know that many demons masqueraded as gods to deceive the nations. Perhaps they’d rather be worshiped than worship, even if it meant fighting an unwinnable war.
 
I used this parable to describe what Heaven would be like for an unrepentant sinner: A man who is immortal but not impassible stands at ground zero of a nuclear explosion. Searing heat envelops him, and light is so bright as to be blinding even through the closed eyelids. He is thrown prostrate onto the ground, though he wills to stand. A violent roar drowns out all sound. The impassible saints around him sing for joy at the beautiful sight, but he sees only fiery destruction and terror.
 
But as we often hear, God is not “a god.” It’s not like the Christian God is just the highest being out there. He is utterly different.

So I have a hard time understanding how any creature – especially as intelligent as an angel – would somehow conflate the fullness of Goodness and Being that is God, with a sense of being one’s “own god.”
 
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Fallen angels are biblical.

Jesus says he saw Satan fall.

Besides, it would be incoherent to say God created any creature evil.

The Bible is clear demons exist, but God did not make them demonic. They themselves did.

As for their redemption, the mainstream Christian tradition has said the demons will not be redeemed — and not without good philosophical reason, as well.
 
I think I get what you are saying.

But we’d still have to ask: Why do these people choose what they do? What is it about one person that chooses God, and another person that does not?
 
RealisticCatholic said:
What is it about one person that chooses God, and another person that does not?
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It’s a mystery. Why do people sin against the very thing that will ultimately fulfil their existence?

It’s tempting to think of a sinner as having a form of insanity.

The truth is, some people want to live their lives according to their own agenda and not God’s. They are not willing to make the kind of sacrifices that a saint would.
 
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