The Only Way to Escape Hell

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CopticChristian said:
Shibolet,

Christians are called to use Reason, Revelation to come to belief through Faith…with that understanding we are to live out our life in Christ to be conformed to Christ so that we might be reformed and transformed to Christ and then live our lives by adhering to the Moral law and exercising prayer for strength.

Now this is all done with grace, as on your own you can do nothing.

Salvation is from sin because in living the moral law, avoiding sin, the sin that damages our relationship with God, we become more like the first born of all creation, Christ. This is all done in accordance with understanding that we are called to be children of God and so we are.

All is done as we are called by the Father to become member of the family through Christ in the unity of the Holy Spirit so that we may fulfill our purpose in creation, ie unity with the heavenly Father.

True freedom is understanding that Christ had a human/divine will and they cooperated. We have a human will and have the ability by grace to ascent to the Divine Will and we too are free from fear because there is no fear in living like Christ with our human will aligned with the Divine will. True freedom is freedom from fear. Yes there is a hell. You should get a concordance and see that Jesus spoke of Hell more than any other figure in the NT.🙂
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If you are so sure that there is hell, what have you done to collect Biblical evidences for what you believe? And about faith, it is not subject to Reason. What is subject to Reason
is knowledge. It is for lack of knowledge aka Reason that people perish and not for lack of faith. Read Hosea 4:6. Faith is by definition to believe what you don’t need to know. What do we know about heaven and hell? Has anyone ever gone there and back to tell us about it? It is all by faith that they are there somewhere.
 
Shibolet said:
If you are so sure that there is hell, what have you done to collect Biblical evidences for what you believe? And about faith, it is not subject to Reason. What is subject to Reason
is knowledge. It is for lack of knowledge aka Reason that people perish and not for lack of faith. Read Hosea 4:6. Faith is by definition to believe what you don’t need to know. What do we know about heaven and hell? Has anyone ever gone there and back to tell us about it? It is all by faith that they are there somewhere.
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Since you are not Catholic, I’m afraid we can’t have a fully understood conversation. Catholics do not uphold sola scriptura (after all, the Bible itself doesn’t uphold it) and our teachings come from both the bible and tradition, and in addition from the infallible teachings of our bishops acting of issues of faith and morals.

There are proofs of hell in the bible, but I’m not an apologist and am not versed in the quotes from the bible that prove it.
 
dshix said:
Shibolet, I am once again not sure what you are trying to convince us of. I got the whole idea that you think that hell is a figment of our imaginations (which is false) but what else do you have to say?

I find myself not understanding most of your posts.
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To say that what someone else things is false is of no help. How about why and how, and
to produce evidences for the contrary? BTW, I only said that Jews do not believe in hell when I was warned that I was heading to hell. The main point of Jesus in the parable of the Richman and Lazarus was not to confirm the existence of hell but the continuous validity of Moses aka the Law as not being abolished, as Paul asserted with Ephesians 2:15. That’s all.
 
dshix said:
But the problem is that there IS a hell. There is not a question about it, for Catholics. We have been definitively told by the Church, infallibly, that Hell is real.
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You have been told by the Church. What a power the Catholic Church has in the lives of the Catholics! How about the Scriptures? The say that to appeal to authorities just because they have a title before or after their names, is a fallacy. Not enough the authrority
of the Scriptures? “Sola Scriptura” I thought Catholic would value that concept.
 
Well, in a way, I can consider myself a Messianic Jew because I believe in the collective Messiah; I mean, the whole of the Jewish People. But I am not from the Christian faction of “Messianic Judaism.”
 
Kaninchen said:
Probably because I’ve been unclear we seem to be talking past one another.

You had said:

And Jesus is speaking to Jews before his death and Resurrection. For them, at that time, following Jewish law was the path to salvation.

Which led me to wonder what it was that you thought that Jews at that time and onwards until now believed/believe about the concept of ‘salvation’.

Having been around for some time, I’ve picked up quite a bit about what Catholics believe, by the way.
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I don’t know what the Jews back then believed about Heaven/Hell. It really doesn’t matter.

We’ve had much more Revelation since then: ie. Jesus Christ.

God Bless
 
dshix said:
Since you are not Catholic, I’m afraid we can’t have a fully understood conversation. Catholics do not uphold sola scriptura (after all, the Bible itself doesn’t uphold it) and our teachings come from both the bible and tradition, and in addition from the infallible teachings of our bishops acting of issues of faith and morals.

There are proofs of hell in the bible, but I’m not an apologist and am not versed in the quotes from the bible that prove it.
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If you forgive my arrogance, I think I could be of some help in both Bibles, mine and yours.
How about setting aside for a while the “infalible teachings of your bishops” and study
with me in your own Bible? According to Jeremiah 31:33,34, after the New Covenant was established with the House of Israel and the House of Judah, we no longer need anyone to teach us how to know the Lord. All from least to greatest shall know Him by studying the
Scriptures directly. God’s Word is not too mysterious and remote for us. It is not up in the
sky, that we should say, 'Who will go up to get it for us and to tell us of it that we may carry it out? Nor it is across the sea, that we should say, 'Who will cross it to get it for us and tell us of it, that we may carry it out? No, it is something very near to us; already in our mouths and in our hearts; we have only to carry it out. That’s in Deut. 30:11-14.
 
Shibolet said:
If you forgive my arrogance, I think I could be of some help in both Bibles, mine and yours.
How about setting aside for a while the “infalible teachings of your bishops” and studying
with me in your own Bible? According to Jeremiah 31:33,34, after the New Covenant was established with the House of Israel and the House of Judah, we no longer need anyone to teach us how to know the Lord. All from least to greatest shall know Him by studying the
Scriptures directly. God’s Word is not too mysterious and remote for us. It is not up in the
sky, that we should say, 'Who will go up to get it for us and to tell us of it that we may carry it out? Nor it is across the sea, that we should say, 'Who will cross it to get it for us and tell us of it, that we may carry it out? No, it is something very near to us; already in our mouths and in our hearts; we have only to carry it out. That’s in Deut. 30:11-14.
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You speak as if we use different Bibles. As I’m sure you know, Catholics use the same bible as Jews, so there is no friction there.

I’m not well versed, as I have said, but I have a few.
  • “You shall not kill; and whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.” But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, “You fool!” shall be liable to the hell of fire. (Matt. 5:21-22)
  • (Luke 16:19-31) This is the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Rich Man goes to hell.
  • And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matt. 10:28; see also Luke 12:5)
  • Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you traverse sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves. (Matt. 23:15)
  • Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, saying, “If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.” Thus you witness against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? (Matt. 23:29-33)
  • Not every one who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?” And then will I declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.” (Matt. 7:21-23)
It seems to me that Jesus is speaking with pretty certain terms of the reality of Hell.

You said that we all should be able to read the Scriptures directly. This is true, but two people can come up with very different interpretations. You need an infallible source to tell you what is right and is incorrect.
 
Hey Jharek, I am well aware that Judaism does not allow Jews to be involved with proselytism, and I have no intention to. Besides, we don’t have anything to offer the Gentiles of the things they expect to get in the afterlife. I am just availing myself to study the Scripture so that people could love God as a result of knowledge and not of faith that
brings no knowledge. That’s all.
 
We also use an OT translation based on the Greek Septuagint, rather than the Hebrew Masoretic text. The Dead Sea scrolls showed the Septuagint to be an earlier version.

God Bless
 
dshix said:
You speak as if we use different Bibles. As I’m sure you know, Catholics use the same bible as Jews, so there is no friction there.

I’m not well versed, as I have said, but I have a few.
  • “You shall not kill; and whoever kills shall be liable to judgment.” But I say to you that every one who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother shall be liable to the council, and whoever says, “You fool!” shall be liable to the hell of fire. (Matt. 5:21-22)
  • (Luke 16:19-31) This is the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. Rich Man goes to hell.
  • And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matt. 10:28; see also Luke 12:5)
  • Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you traverse sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves. (Matt. 23:15)
  • Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, saying, “If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.” Thus you witness against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? (Matt. 23:29-33)
  • Not every one who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?” And then will I declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.” (Matt. 7:21-23)
It seems to me that Jesus is speaking with pretty certain terms of the reality of Hell.

You said that we all should be able to read the Scriptures directly. This is true, but two people can come up with very different interpretations. You need an infallible source to tell you what is right and is incorrect.
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Protestants use the same Bible as Catholics do. How do you explain the friction? We all use the same Bible. The issue is not what the Bible says but what we do with it.

To be liable to the hell of fire is a symbol to pay for the consequences to have offended our neighbor.

Rich man goes to hell! That was a parable. A parable is like an allegory. An allegory is like a dream one has. Metaphorical language must be interpreted metaphorically. The only thing real in a parable is the message the speaker intends to convay. In the case of the Richman and Lazarus it was to confirm the validity of Moses, aka the Law.

Hell in Biblical language is not a place of fire but the grave where the demons are the gnats and maggots. What is forever about this kind of hell is that one will never return from it. Read Job 10:21; 2 Chron. 12:23; Prov. 2:19.

Jesus could not have dispatched all those insults upon the Pharisees for two reasons. He was of the line of the Pharisees himself and because he would have offended them and broken the Golden Rule that says not to do unto others what we would not like they did unto us. Bing it a sin to offend another, Jesus could no longer be sinless.

What Jesus meant by kingdom of Heaven was a state of mind we must invite into ourselves. That’s what he meant in Luke 17:21 when he said the kingdom of Heaven is to be found within ourselves.

It seems rather that Jesus was speaking about hell in metaphorical language and not literally. Jesus was a Jewish man, and Jews do not believe in hell other than the grave.

Nobody born of a woman can be an infalible source. Keep that in mind and never forget it.
 
Well Jharek, I don’t believe I said anything that’s not actually true. To obey God’s Law with an eye in the rewards of Heaven or for fear of going to hell is to bribe in exchange for what one can get in return. Does it seem anything else?
 
I have several translations of the bible. The one I use in this forum to be in tune with all of you guys, is the NAB Saint Joseph’s edition translated from the original by the Catholic Biblical Association of America sponsored by the Bishop’s Committee of the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine with the imprimatur of Pope John Paul VI. Needless to say I have all
the Apocrypha books, which I have read them more than several times.
 
Shibolet said:
Once, one of the Scribes approached Jesus and asked which was the first of all the commandments: Jesus answered and said: “This is the first: ‘Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is absolutely One, and the Only Lord.’ (Mark 12:29) So, as such we must love Him. And the second is to love our neighbor as ourselves.” Now, my question is: Do all Christians obey these two commandments or at least try to? Not that it is my business, but you implied above.
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It may not be your business, I don’t know, but it seems to answer your question. To obey both seems to satisfy the law and prophets etc.
 
Not wanting to derail but I would like to know any more about it, it sounds interesting, Jharek.
 
You have all the right in the world to doubt anything about me. But to tell you the truth, I
can’t be more honest about anything I tell you here about the Jewish way to serve God.
What would we keep our commitment to God for, if we believe that all is over with death?
That’s enough evidence that our servitude to God is completely free of interest in rewards.
 
pig said:
It may not be your business, I don’t know, but it seems to answer your question. To obey both seems to satisfy the law and prophets etc.
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How can we love the Lord with all our heart and soul? Is it not by obeying the first four commandments? And how do we love one another, is it not by observing the next six commandments? It means that with two we observe ten and with ten we observe two. How is that any different from the old version of the Decalogue? It is all verbal juggling that means the same in the bottom line. What Jesus did was to explain that all ten can be done with two that means only a resume of the ten. No change whatsoever.
 
Shibolet said:
How can we love the Lord with all our heart and soul? Is it not by obeying the first four commandments? And how do we love one another, is it not by observing the next six commandments? It means that with two we observe ten and with ten we observe two. How is that any different from the old version of the Decalogue? It is all verbal juggling that means the same in the bottom line. What Jesus did was to explain that all ten can be done with two that means only a resume of the ten. No change whatsoever.
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All of your laws are directed to an end; and this end is simple, Love God with all your heart, soul and mind and love your neighbour as yourself. We are called to be good to one another, that is our mission and the ultimate purpose of any of those laws.
 
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