Who created hell and why?
If you’ve ever read the book of Genesis in the Bible, and exercised at least a little bit of skepticism, you might have noticed that the Official Creation Story contains several conspicuous omissions. I’ve already discussed one of them — the strange case of the Tree of the Knowledge — and now I’m going to discuss another one: who created hell and why?
Why doesn’t the book of Genesis discuss this? The holy text goes to considerable length to credit the god-of-the-Bible with creating everything else in our universe — the sun, the moon, the stars, our planet, every living thing, etc. In fact, the authors of the Old Testament were so enamored with this story that they included a second version of it in Genesis chapter 2. So, why doesn’t the Bible mention who created hell? Indeed, why doesn’t the Bible mention who created *any* of the Bad Stuff — the Serpent who supposedly tempted Eve and forever tainted the entire human race, the demons who supposedly serve the Serpent, the burning hellfires of damnation where they all live…? Obviously, if the god-of-the-Bible created everything in our universe, then he *must* also have created the bad stuff, but why doesn’t the Bible ever mention this?
And, more to the point, why did the god-of-the-Bible create this stuff? Why did he create the Serpent, knowing (because he knows the future) that the Serpent would eventually cause humanity to fall from grace? Why did he create demons, knowing their sole function would be to spread turmoil and strife? And why did he create the burning pit of hellfire, knowing that its sole purpose would be to torture humans who, for whatever reason, didn’t get his message? If you were the Supreme Creator of the Universe, and you had infinite love for all the humans you created, would you create all this bad stuff? Do human parents arrange such things for their disobedient children? Really, was it necessary for the god-of-the-Bible to create eternal torment just to punish people who didn’t sufficiently worship him? Why not condemn heretics to eternity in, say, a sports bar, or a lukewarm Jacuzzi, or a casino in Vegas? You know, something bad but not really that bad. Why hell?
I don’t know about you, but it makes no sense to me that any infinitely loving god would create hell. It’s obviously a self-contradiction: an infinitely loving god would never have created that stuff; therefore, if the god-of-the-Bible created that stuff, as the Bible implies, then the god-of-the-Bible either doesn’t exist or is not infinitely loving.
Maybe that’s why the Bible doesn’t discuss it.
Angel: I have a bridge I’d like to sell you.
Angel: I don’t understand. You say God pushed Satan out of Heaven and yet He wasn’t able to stop the devil from setting up a rival camp called Hell?
Satan is constantly working to ruin everything that God created. It seems to me that to allow this to continue to happen means one of two things…
1. God is not omnipotent and is not really in control of His universe.
2. God WANTS Satan to do what He does. In other words, Satan is still working for God.
Is there a third possibility?
Angel
Lucifer is the “light bringer” and does not appear in any account of Genesis. The equivalence of Lucifer and Satan is a later medieval conflation.
Maybe you should read the book you proclaim to know more about than the rest of us - maybe try a version with actual words this time.
Angel,
That’s Milton, not Moses.
Hell was created by God way before the garden and man was ever created. Lucifer and his followers were striped of their first estate (angel status) and were given a kingdom to rule called hell. Hell was not meant for mankind.
That’s why hell wasn’t mention in Genesis chapter 1 - man was innocent and had no knowledge of evil or Lucifer or even Satan. They only gain the knowledge of evil after they disobeyed God and ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
In Genesis 3:3, states that God gave man a warning not to touch the tree or eat of it or else they would die. This death wasn’t just physically, but also spiritually. Spiritual death is the death of the human spirit. In other words, total separation from God. One can only have a relationship with God if he has a living spirit. Man’s spirit died in the Garden and all of man’s offspring would fallow they same fate.
In Genesis 1:22 says that man had the knowledge of good and evil just like God. However, Because man choose to disobeyed God, spiritual death fallowed mankind.
Every person born after Adam and Eve would be born with the sin nature and a dead spirit, separated from God and upon physical death, man would go to hell to pay for their sins and be totally separated from God. Satan rules hell.
That’s why Jesus, God’s Son was the only chance man had to restore man’s Godliness. Sin,(the act of disobedience) came into the world through a man and only a man that has never sinned can pay for the sin of mankind.
Jesus, the Son of God came as a man and took the sin of man upon himself and said before dying, “it is finished”, he died and went to hell and took the key of death and hell from Satan. He spent 3 days there and hell had to release him because hell is for sinners and he never sinned.
After his resurrection,the price for man’s past, present and future sins was paid for in full. Now each person must choose to follow God’s way or the world’s way, which is rule by Satan.
And good works will not get anyone in Heaven. The only way in through Jesus. There is no other way.
John 3:3 state, unless a man has a resurrected human spirit, he or she cannot enter Heaven period.
If God wasn’t a loving God, then why he sent his Son to take the place of mankind and die on a cross and go to hell for us? He restored manking. And better then because in the garden man was a innocent child of God. Now, thanks to Jesus, we are joint heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17).
Do you know that means? It means we are equal with Jesus. Having the same power through his name,(John 14:6)
That sounds like loving God to me. Has a father myself, I would give my life for my kids so that they wouldn’t have to suffer.
I hope it answered some questions.
Reverend,
That’s good Milton, but ultimately just fiction.
Mark…Just because you don’t believe or understand the good book, doesn’t mean it’s fiction.
A couple of 100 years ago people believed the world was flat, and to say the world was round was considered fiction.
Every cities or civilizations mentioned in the good book have been documented to have existed exactly where it said it did. But also, artifacts and ruins have been found to reinforce what the good book says. Is that call fiction?
“A man was driving down a country road then was pulled over by the police. The man ask, why he was pulled over. The officer said that he was speeding. The man said he saw no speed sign. The officer told him that some weeds was covering the sign. The officer gave the ticket and left.
The man was mad. He decided to fight the ticket in court. When that day came, he gave the judge his argument. The judge said to the man, Ignorance of the law is not an excuse.
In other word the judge was simply tell him that just because didn’t see the sign doesn’t mean its not there.
Rev,
Just because Atlanta is depicted in “Gone With The Wind” and there was something called the Civil War, does that change that book from fiction to history?
Also, people in ancient Greece knew the world is round, hundreds of years B.C.E. People here and there, from time to time, have lost that knowledge and regained it, usually because someone in authority found it useful to teach that view to them. (Hm, I wonder why?)
Just because the archaeology of Jerusalem, Jericho, and so forth has verified the existence and much of the history of such places is no reason to accept the mythic confabulations of the authors of the Pentateuch with regards to creation—no more than the actual existence of Troy proves that Zeus, Poseidon, Apollo, and Athena were real.
And trust me on this, Reverend—I understand the bible. I’ve simply come to a different conclusion than you.
Rev. Claude needs to read some actual history. The diameter of the Earth was known (within a few percent) hundreds of years before Jesus. This knowledge was not lost to navigators or intellectuals, even if the uneducated public might have missed it. After all, the Bible itself misleads on this point: Inerrant Biblical Geology Falls Flat
The Bible is a good blend of allegory and myth. That locations mentioned in it actually existed is as amazing as there being a city on the north eastern coast of America that strongly resembles Metropolis, as documented by DC Comics. This is not proof of Lois Lane.
Well what a story someone made up. And why exactly would someone make up such a tell? I’ll tell you what. I died 10 years ago and you would never guess what happened. I had given up on God and religion. I scoffed God in the face. Two months later I became very sick. I died. I had thought for sure that there was a hell and I was doomed to go there. Almost the moment when I left my body, I went to heaven. Yes folks. I went straight to heaven! And as a matter of fact, I was with God in heaven and we were checking out the universe. God was so concerned for my fear that He went out of His way to show me the far reaches of the universe and every thing in it. It was his deep desire to assue me that He had never created such a place. He wanted me to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that His love was unconditional. He wanted me to return to the Earth to tell everyone that I came into contact with that man had made up in their imagionaltions a hell that did not exist. There was no fear. The only hell that any of us will ever experience is the hell we create in our thoughts. Can you hear me? Are you listening? There is no eternal HELL! Know this and be free. “You shall know the truth, and the trugh shall set you free.” Be free and keep in mind while you are free that there are still consequences in this life. For every cause there is an effect. We do reap what we put out there. I give you peace and blessings.
Jeanette: With all due respect, you didn’t die or you wouldn’t have been able to write your comment.
…It got better…