Exactly. If there were such a thing as never-ending Hell, one wouldn’t have to rely upon incorrect translations and forced exegesis to “discover” it. Why would God make His revelation of Hell only through men whose only qualification is their manifest inability to read and understand a text?
(As a member of the Eastern Orthodox Church, I have a parallel argument: Throughout the entire pre-modern history of the Church, at least 99% of believers got all of their religious instruction solely through participating in the Church’s liturgies. So why could a man attend these liturgies all of his life, yet never get an inkling that never-ending Hell existed?)
As far as I can tell, never-ending Hell exists only in the following three places in Christendom:
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On the pages of some turgid religious writings.
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In the minds of Christians infected by said writings.
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In the popular consciousness. Similar examples of things that everybody “knows” but are incorrect:
A. Most Europeans in 1492 thought the world was flat, but Columbus proved them wrong. (Facts: Virtually all Europeans knew that the world is spherical. Dante even wrote about how the center of the Earth is the planet’s center of gravity, so if one descended in a pit to the Earth’s center and kept going in a straight line, he would have to start ascending once he got farther than the center.)
B. The fictional Conan the barbarian was an ignorant fellow who dressed only in boots and a loin cloth. (Facts: Conan was intelligent and multi-lingual. He also wore clothing and armor every chance he could get, which was most of the time.)
Etc.
As Mark Twain wrote in his notebook in 1904: “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).” This is not humor, but grave truth. When any given thing is believed by the majority, what is the chance that each of those people independently reasoned to that conclusion? Zero percent. Thus, when you find yourself agreeing with the majority, it is likely that your agreement is based upon ignorantly following the herd rather than upon reason. Of course, the majority can conceivably be right, but only accidentally. If an illiterate man is given a multiple choice question (A, B, C, or D), he will be right 25% of the time through sheer luck.
The superstition of never-ending Hell must be the stupidest and most pernicious piece of poppycock ever to burden the human mind. I would much rather tell a group of people I was trying to impress that I had shaken Sasquatch’s hand than tell them that I believed in never-ending Hell.
That was so good it needs posting again…[/size]
Given that you just quoted the explanation I’d given to qaz… why not simply READ it again, for therein is the answer.