Hell (part II)

In our first post concerning hell, I made the claim that Jesus was a man of his times, here in reference to apocalyptic writings popular at that time. One of these writings, and the most important for our subject, is the Ethiopic Book of Enoch. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. That the Hebrew scriptures and the Christian NT have a completely different idea of the afterlife is quite clear, especially in connection to any form of punishment after death for the unrighteous. The New Testament is indeed clear that there will be a punishment of the unrighteous, a reckoning, a righting of wrongs, and “avenging of blood.” This is entirely necessary in a place and time when whole families were persecuted for their belief. It also satisfies the sense of injustice that people have had since ancient times that the wicked should prosper while the righteous perish. This life is not the end of the story, in other words. Whether this punishment is eternal or not is a matter of which author you ask. The NT does not have a uniform voice here. The writer of Hebrews, for example, seems to indicate that this punishment is temporary, that sinners will be completely consumed by fire and destroyed:

“If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.” (Heb. 10:26-27).

The word translated by “consume” here means literally “to eat” often used in the most mundane passages of the NT to indicate someone eating a meal etc. Here would be a passage that annihilationists (those people who believe there is no hell, but that the unrighteous are completely destroyed) might use in their arsenal. The writer later says:

“Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. See that no one is sexually immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son. Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. Even though he sought the blessing with tears, he could not change what he had done” (Heb 12: 16-17).

Here too people have found evidence that there is no second chance, that once one is lost, they are always lost. This is consistent with the declarations of the early councils that I mentioned in our first post, and it is also consistent with the first passage I quoted from chapter 10: "no sacrifice for sins is left," only fearful expectation. The councils applied this to the afterlife, but here is there not a possibility the writer even means in this life there is no grace beyond the “falling short” of God’s grace, the immoral act, the one who hates peace and holiness, even if sought with “tears?” We see here the same parallel: sin followed by a sign of regret (tears/fearful expectation), guaranteed rejection/destruction. In its context (both here and in the previous two chapters) is this not a reasonable interpretation? So for the writer of Hebrews one does not even “see the Lord” but is completely destroyed by God’s fire (perhaps God himself, see 12:29). No mention of eternal damnation to be sure, but also an interesting coupling of the usual modern response: “hell is living in the absence of God” (not “seeing the Lord”) with literally being eaten and (we must reasonably infer) completely consumed or annihilated. This same coupling can be found later in chapter 12:

“See to it that you do not refuse him who speaks. If they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, how much less will we, if we turn away from him who warns us from heaven? At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, “Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens.” The words “once more” indicate the removing of what can be shaken—that is, created things—so that what cannot be shaken may remain.” (12: 25-27)

Here we find the “removal” of the contingent, the created, that which is not the Kingdom of God (12:28), i.e. those who “turn away from him who warns us from heaven.” There is no mention of this removal involving eternal punishment, but merely a vanishing away of anything not in the Kingdom (see 11:5 where the same Greek word is used of Enoch in a seemingly positive sense, indicating the neutrality of the word: he was “taken” so that he could not be found, i.e. he vanished). Once again a possible annihilationist passage.

In our next post we will have to consider some other NT writers and their position on hell.