Why do non-believers go to Hell?

[Paraprakrti]

That seems like selective wish granting to me. I desire a million dollars, yet have seen nary a penny.

I think that Christians think that Atheists choose to not believe in god, and in fact, that they might not want to. This is a serious misconception. As Alaric put it elsewhere in these forums, and this is not a direct quote, 'I wouldn't say that I've turned my back on god, so much as he has faded from my sight in my search for truth.'

Well, in general it was our desire to be our own "Gods" that caused us to fall under the illusion that we actually can be supreme in all aspects.
You may desire a million dollars, and you may get it. But your first mistake will be thinking that your chance of receiving this expires upon the death of your body.
Also, further from the initial desire we had to play God, our more recent, specific desires are granted due to qualification. You may not receive a million dollars in this lifetime, and perhaps not the next because you may not have the qualification. This is called karma.
So it is not desire alone, but qualification. Currently, the general qualification of people is a deviation from our constitutional spiritual position. It is accepted on faith that those who are sincerely seeking answers will be given the proper facility in order to obtain those answers. If one cannot have such faith, then there is no use for any further inquiry into the truth.

 

[true blood]

The title is Why do non-believers go to hell, hades aka "the grave"?. This is the meaning of the word "hell" in the Bible. Believers and non-believers, when they die go to the grave aka hell, everyone does. It isn't a place of endless torture that is commonly believed. Now the basis of Christianity is the resurrection of Christ. We believe that Christ will return and gather together his people before the resurrections. This gathering of the Church will be void of God's judgement because we believed and stood for Jesus Christ, His Son and he has built a place for us in the heavenlies. If other people want to believe in something else or nothing at all...fine, we don't really care. The first resurrection will be for the children of Israel and unbelievers. The second resurrection will be for the just and unjust. On what criteria will God judge you is unknown. It's only known that Jesus Christ will not defend you so I'm guessing its either based on the Law or on deeds. Good luck.

 

[Fra.Morelia]

My problem with conventional religion is this: the god most talk about is the equivilant of a 2 year old child with a tactical nuclear weapon. Pay attention to meeeeeeee.... that is what it sounds like to me. This being of love is running around flattening cities and generally ruining peoples days (for exerting the free will he gave us might I add.... i.e. the libidenous little monkeys in Sodom and Ghemmora). I thougt we called people like that terrorists.
So: you come up to someone and essentially say this: you are wrong. your people are wrong. my god is bigger (and has an ICBM), better, stronger and faster. My god can beat up your god. your culture stinks. your people are all misguided, but pleeeease... let my god love you... or else.
In addition: since those who havenot been given the chance to accept Christ are generally acceoted to be on a grace period of sorts, would it not be far better to just let them get on with their lives and get thru on a technicallity than to try and make it legit and thus damn half of them? I wouldn't want to be the one to answer to the Big G about why I damned half an amazonian tribe....

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Spinkles, we each have our opinions. You think if God created man without the ability to say "no" wouldn't be boring and I think it would be more interesting to have the ability to say yes or no.

A little more interesting, perhaps...on the other hand, everyone would spend eternity in paradise. I think most would agree, that's a bit more important.

We wouldn't even have these forums to discuss such matters and I'm sure some of us find it quite enjoyable, silly...maybe, but some people would say that even being silly is enjoyable.

Even if we all believed in God, we could still be silly and have a good time. Think about it.

I didn't know loving parents completely control their children as you put it. Mine certainly did not and I love them more for it.

Yes, and I'm not saying God should completely control our lives. I'm saying that a loving parent would imbue his children with the knowledge required to get into heaven, rather than let a bunch of his children go to hell....that wouldn't be controlling our lives, but only giving us what is required to go to heaven (and God does want us to go to heaven, doesn't he?)...it's called good parenting. If your parents found you were smoking crack, they should take the drugs away from you, even if their actions seemed "controlling" to you.

This is what is silly, true blood: you (and others) seem to be suggesting that having the freedom to come to a different conclusion other than that God exists and Jesus is our Savior is MORE important than everyone going to heaven. In saying this, you greatly devalue the importance of going to heaven (which is, traditionally, very important). It would be like me saying "oh no, if I ever got really high and was about to jump off a bridge, I would want my parents to respect my freedom of choice and let me". Silliness, through and through.

Do you honestly believe a little earthly 'excitement' is more important than our fate in the afterlife? And you can't tell me that we would all be "robots" if we were imbued with the knowledge of God/Jesus....we could still have political debates, culture, sports, movies, architecture, etc etc. Everyone believes the Earth exists, but that neither makes us robots nor does it make life boring.

A friendly reminder to you Christians out there: I honestly do not mean to offend you, but try to see my point of view here. Are you afraid that Jesus is not the Son of God, and when you get to heaven you will be eternally damned by Allah for being an infidel? Of course you aren't. We atheists are not afraid of damnation from the gods of others, either. I'm not debating this issue out of fear, but for the love of the debate. :goodjob:

 

[painted wolf]

speaking from an Non-christian POV...

non-believers are fine, if god wanted everyone to be the same we would be. Creator gave humanity variety for a reason.

Besides in the end everyone believes in something, god or human worth or whatever.

wa:do

 

[true blood]

Spinkles, please note I do not believe in the "heaven" and "hell" traditionally taught. Also I very much believe that God has provided a means for mankind to "be saved" during this age but you put it "go to heaven". I think we have a different point-of-view here and see it differently. I think we both agree that the bible teaches there will be a "new heaven" and a "new earth" and in this "new heaven" will be a "city" and upon the "new earth" will be a "paradise". The city called new jerusalem in the new heaven is apart or different then the paradise on the new earth. The question should be who will live where? The Bible teaches those who are born of the seed of God will abode in this city called new jerusalem that sits in the new heavens. The bible states this very plainly. Now ask yourself, who then will inhabit the new earth? After all is accomplished as told in the book of Revelation, there are going to be people on the new earth. It says in that book that they are going to bring in their produce; specifically naming corn, wheat etc.. but in this new land there is going to be no cursed thistles or death or sin. Now if the believers are in new jerusalem in the new heaven who are these people living in the perfect new earth? Probably the good hearted "non-believers". After this is established, death and evil will be completely destroyed. You speak of eternal damnation as if its a place of physical torture when, in truth, eternal damnation in the bible stands for God's final judgment that is unchangable. "And heavenly bodies there will be and earthly bodies, one kind will be the glory of the heavenly and of another kind that of the earthly."

 

[Mr Spinkles]

true blood-- So the good-hearted non-believers, in your opinion, do not go to Hell but merely a different kind of paradise? If this is what you are saying, it makes much more sense in light of the belief in a loving, merciful God.

 

[quick]

In a nutshell, here is the argument:

1) God is God over all creation, believers and non-believers alike.

2) God has at least two defining traits we know of from the Bible--he is perfectly just and perfectly loving.

3) God created man to have fellowship with him and to glorify him.

4) God made a covenant with man; man broke the covenant, letting sin into the world.

5) God gave man the Law; if man complied perfectly with this Law, he could overcome sin and become reunited with God. Man, being corrupted by sin, could not do so. Indeed, the Law demonstrates how much man needs mercy from God to over come sin.

6) God, being loving as well as just, sent his own Son to become incarnate to live a life in perfect accord with the Law so he could be the perfect sacrifice for man's sin. By this sacrifice, the initial sin of Adam is atoned for by the sacrifice of one man, Jesus, and God's justice is served. Just as Adam brought all men into sin, we are promised that by faith in Christ, all men who so beleive can have their sins forgiven, as Christ's death paid for all debts. In this way, both perfect justice and pefect love are met in one plan. In fact, God loved us so much that his own Son had to suffer the pain of hell to buy us back from death. Imagine the pain endured when you must submit your own child to such suffering.

7) If you do not believe in Christ, you remain dead to sin and subject to God's justice. Since God cannot love someone who is unjust, you are subject to his wrath. No man can earn salvation-we cannot obey the law on our own; we can only be saved by grace through the Lord, Jesus Christ, a gift available to all who accept Christ as their savior.

There you go.

 

[Paraprakrti]

God's love and God's enmity are non-different from each other.

 

[Alaric]

Alaric, I don't really understand your statement that the Christian God isn't different then any belief of how the world works. And please state how God punishes someone? All the bible states is that those who believe in him are rewarded? Is not being rewarded a punishment...to you? I suggest and support that everyone read whatever books they can get their hands on, including the bible and then make their decision. Now if you don't believe in the resurrections then shut off your computer and go live life to the fullest.

Read Revelations (ch. 20-21) to find out what's in store for those who are not "written in the book of life".

The problem here is that people choose individually, in different circumstances and with different faculties, which worldviews to belief in. Why should only those who believe in God be rewarded? Is there something inherently dishonest in believing some other worldview? Shouldn't we be judged based on our actions towards others rather than which worldview we happen to believe in?

 

[Mr Spinkles]

Yes, Alaric, we should, but there is a pragmatic purpose for beleiving that those who do not believe are damned. There is usually a purpose for such beliefs, and 'because it is true' isn't always the purpose. Remember our discussion on memes? Every meme wants to survive, and if this meme says "believe in me, or you are damned" people might just abandon their "be rational" memes in favor of this one out of fear....just like a virus tricking its host.... mg:

 

[Paraprakrti]

speaking from an Non-christian POV...

non-believers are fine, if god wanted everyone to be the same we would be. Creator gave humanity variety for a reason.

Also speaking from a non-Christian POV...

What if that reason was due to our desires? That God created variety due to our varying desires.

 

[Ardhanariswar]

what faith (or not) do u follow paraprakrti

 

[Paraprakrti]

Hare Krsna

 

[Ceridwen018]

Or do we have varying desires because of variety?

 

[Paraprakrti]

Or do we have varying desires because of variety?

This becomes a question of whether you accept that life comes from matter or that life comes from life.

If life comes from matter then our varying desires come from our engaging in the material variety.

If life comes from life, completely separate from the material energy, then our varying desires are the reason the varying conditions of material life are present.

This is really just an atheist versus a theist perspective. Atheists believe that life conditions arose from chemical arrangement. Theists believe that before this chemical arrangement, there was life. And that life (or spirit) was responsible for this chemical arrangement to take place.


Though, basing off the premise that God in fact exists, if it is that our varying desires are results of material variety, then the question remains, "why did God make people so different?"

Where did this variegatedness come from? Why are certain individuals more capable in certain fields than others? The only reconciliation I can see is to accept that our desires came first, and then we were placed in our respective positions in the material world. The soul is the soul in all living entities, but it only fills it's consciousness to the capacity of the body it indwells.

I personally cannot accept the idea that leads to believing in a random conditioning of living entities. I hold 'order' to be the absolute and supreme quality, and I feel this goes in line with the order that all men seek in all fields of scientific study.

 

[chamberlain]

God created people so he could have a meaningful relationship with them.
If we were created as robots to always do the right thing by default then our relationship with God wouldn't be to meaningful. Free will is a gift from God because if we had a choice to love him or do something else and we chose to love him it means more than if we love him by default.

 

[Ceridwen018]

chamberlain,

Oh but it is so much more complicated than that. If the world were a happy place, full of rainbows and butterflies, your theory would work here, but that is not reality. The reality is that this world is full of hardships and immense pain. Now, I don't know what constitutes a meaningful relationship for you, but for me, constant tests and obstacles aren't going to win my heart. If god wishes merely to have a meaningful realtionship with us, then why is there all of this suffering and evil? It would seem to me that perhaps god's intentions are not as pure as people would like to believe.

As far as free-will goes, logically that is still nonexistant. I assume that you believe that those who reject god go to hell, a sort of 'turn or burn' philosophy, if you will. What you are basically saying, then, is that if you don't believe in and love god, you will suffer for eternity in hell. This doesn't seem like free-will at all to me-- 'do or die' is never a fair choice. true free-will demands the possibility of equal reward and punishment for each possible choice.

 

[chamberlain]

When you said that free will does not exist i decided to exercise that logically nonexistant right and stopped reading. Free will right there for you. Would you like fries with it?
I am dumber having read your last post.

 

[painted wolf]

Non-believers go to hell because otherwise no one would believe... (at least in some faiths)

It also makes believers feel better about themselves ie. "well at least I'm not going to hell, so there!"

Hell is a great way for churches to control the population, do as we tell you or your immortal soul will be tortured for eternity by GOD! That is a scarry punnishment, especally for young/uneducated minds. Ofcource now that education is common, so is rebellion against the punnishment threat, much like teenagers...

just my 2 cents

wa:do