Why did Jesus not stay in hell?
Offline When overlooking all these claims about Jesus "giving himself up for our sins" or "suffering for our sins" or even "god gave up his only son for us".
God wanted to forgive sin forever, instead of just forgiving us, he tries to impress us by sending his "only son" which is also himself. He then makes himself/his son go through a short torture session, then to hell for three days. It would of made a lot more sense for god to stay in hell as Jesus to forgive the sins of future, yet like a pussy leaves after three days onto complete happiness. How is that a sacrifice, or giving up his son at all? Is Jesus still existant in heaven? Then he did not give him up. Did he impress us? Well a lot of delusional people he did. Did he make a sacrifice of him? Well depending on how you take sacrifice, I would say no. A sacrifice would require either Jesus staying in hell, or vanishing.
Any theists want to try explaining this?
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
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What do you mean by hell?
Edit: What would staying in hell accomplish?
Already said what it would accomplish. Since god wanted to forgive man kind, he wanted to make a sacrifice. Yet all he does is make his son die then 3 days later go to heaven. Not giving him up, or sacrificing him.
Since hell is punishment for sin, and you stay there forever for sin, then to keep Jesus there is the only logical thing to do. Three days? That is... Nothing. Jesus was not sacrificed for us, because he went to heaven. God never gave up his son, because his son is still by his side. So how does this forgive us?
Also, this is all "if Jesus existed" talk. There is no proof for Jesus, so no point in arguing in the first place but whatever.
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
Hell (Sheol in Hebrew, Hades in Greek) is simply the name for any abode of the souls of the dead. Hell is descriptive of anyplace where one is denied the presence of God. Christ descended to the abode of those souls who had passed prior to his fulfillment of the Old Covenant, those who had been promised the beatific vision. His purpose there was not part of his suffering, but to take to them the message of the fulfillment of salvation.
During this time, His Body laid in the tomb, dead.
On the third day, He rose again, assuming once more His physical human form. After a period of fifty days, He ascended to assume His seat at the right hand of the Father. Why, you ask? Because a King reigns within His Realm, the Realm of the living, not from outside His Realm, the abode of the dead.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
How can an omnipresent being deny you of it's presence?
Sounds made up...
Agnostic Atheist
No, I am not angry at your imaginary friends or enemies.
Perhaps put more simply:
Jesus died and was resurrected. The punishment for sin is death, taken from Genesis in regards to the first commandment (not eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil). Jesus conquered death and became the way for all people to do likewise. The resurrection does not trivialize the death or the sacrifice. It demonstrates that even our sin is not greater than God's love.
I will offer the caveat that the gospel also states plainly that it will sound like nonsense to someone who does not believe in God. I mean to say that I don't expect you to be persuaded into faith somehow, only that I hope I've clarified Christian belief.
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
Omnipresence means that God can exist everywhere at a given moment in time, but he can also choose otherwise. God is described many times as moving or going to places in the Bible.
Of course, relativity sees space and time as a single entity. If God can be any place at once, he is arguably also not bound by time at all. It would be entirely reasonable to expect God to be finitely in one place and also in another, as opposed to being some kind of medium surrounding space (thus permitting omnipresence).
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
I dunno. But am aware that the peona damni, or pain of loss consists partially of the loss of the beatific vision, that is, the sight of the face of God, and in a complete separation of the powers of the soul from God.
Kinda like asking, "If a photon can be in two places at the same time, why can't I?". LOL
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
Although this is a good explanation, too.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
So Hell isn't a fiery place of torment, where the screams of the damned and the sounds of teeth gnashing rise up to the high heavens, AS THE BIBLE STATES? Hmm, interesting...
Actually, it does trivialize the sacrifice. I would have happily made such a "sacrifice" in the place of Jesus Christ, but then again, I wasn't offered that choice.
Inquisition - "The flames are all long gone, but the pain lingers on..."
http://rigoromortis.blogspot.com/
I dunno whether hell is fiery place or not, having never been there. My Bible dictionary defines Hell as "The abode of the damned. In the Old Testament the word almost always translates the Hebrew word sheol, which means the abode of all the dead, not just the wicked...In the New Testament the matter is quite clear. In the first place, the word hell (gehenna, or hades in Greek) usually means the abode or state of the damned only. And, in the second place, there is nothing more clear and certain taught in the New Testament than that hell is a reality, not just a figure of speech, and that its torments are unimaginably severe and everlasting. The intensity of the suffering in hell will depend upon the number and greatness of sins committed, and there will never be any lessening of that suffering. The greatest grief results from being separated from God, for the damned realize that they had been created only for God and because of their own foolishness and pride they have lost Him...the fire is some agent outside the souls of the damned and causes them real pain and suffering."
So we see that "Hell" can mean any abode of the dead, dependent on the context.
I still can't quite figure out this damned "quote" system, so I don't know how to spilt these up, but to answer the second part of your post:
Jesus was savagely beaten, humiliated, tortured, ridiculed, abandoned by His friends, deprived of sleep, food and water for the better part of 16 hours. He who had known only perfection and sinlessness took our infractions into His Soul, He literally felt our sin and suffered our guilt. At then end of that, He was forced to carry a heavy wooden beam, up hill, for a quarter of a mile, at the end of which He was nailed to it and left to suffocate to death slowly in the heat of the day. Then He died. Died dead, deceased, gestirbt, muerte. You don't want that kinda death, you wanna die in your sleep, just like I do.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot...you have been offered a chance to be resurrected, St Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15: "20 But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21* For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22* For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23* But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. "
Still care to make that sacrifice?
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
totus_tuus - I won't quote all you said, because it's long.
We have a few conclusions, though:
- hell is the place where the dead hang out
- hell is a place of torment
...depending on context. Well, which context was it when Jesus died?
Regarding your reply to my second part: you've got your horse-glasses on, dude! What happened to Jesus after that tormenting death of his? He unconditionally went to Heaven, where it's eternaly blissful, andwhere he is second to God only. Actually, he is second to nobody, since, according to the trinity thing, he IS God.
Now let me ask you straight: would you NOT accept 3 days of torment, when you can have at least 348975693845693847639284856 trillion years of bliss? If you wouldn't, you'd have to be at least barking mad...
The part when you tell me I was offered a chance to be resurrected is plain rubbish. I posted a significantly different point. And that was: I was not given the choice of being in the place of J.C., to suffer for three days, but then to unconditionally spend at least 348975693845693847639284856 trillion years in eternal bliss, second to none. Which is significantly different from just being plainly resurrected. Pay more attention, or people might get the cooky impression that you are dodging.
Inquisition - "The flames are all long gone, but the pain lingers on..."
http://rigoromortis.blogspot.com/
Not only that, if Jesus is actually God, how exactly could he not be in the presence of himself?
Matt Shizzle has been banned from the Rational Response Squad website. This event shall provide an atmosphere more conducive to social growth. - Majority of the mod team
The Bible actually isn't clear about the nature of hell - any more than it is on the nature of heaven.
You can't take on the sins of the world because you are already a sinner, and can't handle your own sins. It's the same plight for all people. It's also why Jesus' death - God's death - was necessary. Since God can't die, he had to become human. As a human, he had to suffer and be tempted by sin as all the rest. Forgiveness of sins would be fairly meaningless if God had never dealt with sin in the first place.
Jesus was the begotten son of God. "Begotten" implies a creation of the same kind - God from God. God "makes" people, but "begets" God, the same way a human makes a statue but begets a baby. Because Jesus was fully human as well, he was bound spatially and temporally, whereas God the Father is not.
Jesus wasn't dying to save himself. He was sinless, and of God. He died that we might be saved from death. And as I said above, he was the only one uniquely qualified to do so, since none of the rest of us can conquer our own sins, let alone anyone else's.
I want to reiterate that a person can't be persuaded to faith, so the purpose of this discussion is simple clarification. The gospel will probably always sound like nonsense without faith, but there are also a lot of misconceptions and additions to the gospel (such as the nature of hell) that might at least be dispelled.
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
God made Jesus perfect, therefore even if Jesus tried he would not of comited a sin. Even though he did comit sins, but people reading the bible overlook them. Not everyone is with sin, unless you believe the bullshit about we are born sinners, which would also make Jesus a sinner, unless god wanted to do more nonsense and make him the only person not born of sin.
Uhm, it would be more meaningful if god just forgave us, that would show hes all loving. Yet he is more all hating.
If god can't die, he is not all powerful. Which makes him a crappy god.
Jesus is still a part of god at all times, meaning when he was in hell it was no longer hell. Also, are you not trying to rationalize the only reason Jesus sucked was because he made himself suck?
Does not matter. He still saved himself either way. He went through a pathetic 3 day torture session, which hundreds of thousands went through before him, some willingly like him, yet he goes to heaven afterwards. The only way it could of ever been impressive is if he stayed in hell, a real way to forgive sin, a real sacrifice. Alas, it was just bullshit god couldn't think through right.
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
Sure... that's a logical conclusion.
Well, he did die through Jesus, so... I guess he's still all-powerful.
Well, yes.
No, he didn't save himself because there was nothing he could be saved from.
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
Actually if god dies, he is not powerful because he died. However if he can't die, he is not powerful because he can't die. These actions, these statments are logical conclusions that nothing can be all powerful.
The hell thing was a joke, even in the old testament it talks about hell being a torturous place.
Uhm, how about real sacrifice, and real torture for eternity? He saved himself from that, which he should of endured. Pussy only lasted 3 days.
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
He died and lived again. That's part of the point - God was greater than death, and conquered it.
That's what the OP was getting at, but I don't see what you or the OP thinks it would accomplish. If God said the punishment for sin was eternal torture, that would make sense. Since the punishment for sin is death, the price to be paid is also death.
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
If something dies, or is destroied, then comes back, it never died, therefore never conquered death.
Uhm, no the punishment for sin was death during adam and eve stage, death then meant to vanish forever. However god mad hell to punish sinners. So now the punishment, and at the time of Jesus, was hell.
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
Do you have a source for this claim?
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence
I wanted to add a bit something else to this thread and that's in response to the original post.
Who said Jesus went to hell?
The entire premise is based upon the following message in Matthew.
Matthew 12:40 for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
The "heart of the earth" is assumed to be hell since it is goes along the lines of the concepts of Sheol or Hades. It would also continue into scripture where it states that until Jesus the dead would wait before their resurrection to go to Abraham's bosom.
The problem is the word used to describe hell itself. Various translations use the Greek word Hades which is a translation from Hebrew's Sheol. Both of these however have the meaning of grave as well (Strong's 07585). We see here a possible misunderstanding of the use of the word.
The bible itself does not give specifics as to what happened to Jesus during his three days but that is not the point; Jesus being in hell does not come from the bible. Being that hell is permanent, would any soul be able to be saved? If there are souls to have been saved before Jesus then it's probable those souls were in limbo, a limbo no longer necessary by Jesus' resurrection.
Reference (I picked this one because it's short and an easy read but there are several others on the net that speak the same thing. The author does a very good job in relating many more passages from the bible to explain in biblical terms the meaning):
http://www.allaboutjesuschrist.org/jesus-in-hell-faq.htm
What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason. - Voltaire
In this context, Jesus is in the "place where the dead hang out." It's the sam place he talks about in the parable of Lazarus and the beggar in Luke 19:19-31. This was the place where spirits of th faithful were confined until the fulfillment of the New Covenant. At the Ressurection, these spirits were recieved into Heaven.
Absolutely! Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed One, that makes him, according to Jewish tradition, the King. Don't kings rule from their Kingdom?
I'd prefer not to, but yeah, I'd do it. Who's to say I'll not suffer a painful death?
I answered the question now, so I'm not dodging. The offer for a shot at that eternal bliss still stands.
"With its enduring appeal to the search for truth, philosophy has the great responsibility of forming thought and culture; and now it must strive resolutely to recover its original vocation." Pope John Paul II
Your kidding right? You know... The book you read for your religion, you know.
"When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever.... I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it." ~H.L. Mencken
Thank god i'm a atheist!
It would seem that you are forgetting two things. One of which is that every man sins, no one will ever achieve what God wants and because of this, every man commits sin (Psalm 14:1-3, Romans 3).
The second thing you are forgetting is that only God condemns someone to hell. Abraham, the one that God gave his promise to, was still a man. Hell he committed adultery but it was still forgiven him because of his faith.
So the question must be asked, where did those who died (and were not condemned) go before the time of Jesus? They did not go to hell!! It is described as a prison (1 Peter 3:18-19), as captivity (Ephesians 4:
, and of course as the "lower parts of the Earth". THIS WAS NOT HELL.
Luke 16:19-31 describes what happened to a man who was condemned but still got to talk to Abraham. It explains that people cannot cross a large "chasm" when they are condemned. It is from the bible that we understand those who died before the coming of Jesus did not have a way into heaven. They were in a "waiting room" if you will waiting for the savior. This is not the same as hell as when Jesus rose, he brought them out and gave them the salvation promised.
What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason. - Voltaire
I was meaning a more specific source, like a book in the Bible or a specific scripture. I think razorphreak's comments adequately address the issue, though.
"The map appears more real to us than the land." - Lawrence