A few years ago, a strange thing happened to me: I decided to write a book about hell. The name I landed on was Decoding Gehenna: Hell and the Afterlife in the West.
Does ‘Forever’ Mean ‘Forever’? Literalism and Christianity’s Latest Bible Stoush
Since the eighteenth century, a Cold War has been smouldering within Christianity. This war is not, as might be expected, between Catholicism and Protestantism; nor is it between traditional little-old-churches-next-door and modern ‘megachurch’ behemoths. Rather, this spat is contested by what might be termed ‘fundamentalist’, ‘evangelical’, or ‘Awakened’ Christians, on the one hand, and ‘progressive’, … Read more
Location Creates Ideology: Christianity and Hell in Northern Africa (Part 2)
Why have certain beliefs and ideologies (for example, the doctrine of hell) persisted throughout history, where others have failed? In our last post, we talked about how the location of a particular society can have an uncanny effect on what that society holds as ‘truth’. The relative isolation and anti-Roman sentiment of third-century Northwest Africa, for instance, made it a natural source of harsh, ‘us versus them’ conceptions of hell and the afterlife. The fact that the region’s key writers produced their works in Latin was a quirk of fate that made them more appealing and enduring within the influential Western half of the Roman Empire (including Rome itself).
The Northwest region of Africa was not the only big player in early Christian ideology, however. Alexandria, once a pet favourite of Alexander the Great, had persisted under Roman rule as a centre of philosophical and intellectual sophistication, culture, and learning (not to mention wealth and trade!). This is perhaps symbolised most strongly by the famous Library of Alexandria. It is unsurprising, therefore, that this culturally prominent city would produce several important Christian scholars. While Northwest African writers like Tertullian were railing against philosophers and painting grim pictures of hell’s torments, though, key Alexandrian Christians were coming to very different conclusions about the afterlife.
Location Creates Ideology: Christianity and Hell in Northern Africa (Part 1)
Why have certain beliefs and ideologies (for example, the doctrine of hell) persisted throughout history, where others have failed? An idealist may argue that such survival is based on merit, and that it is always the most worthy ideas which endure. A cynic might claim that the great ‘battles of ideas’ are dictated by power — that is, by whoever has the biggest guns, the most money, or the best connections. Curiously, though, there is another factor at play, one that humans are often blind to: the unique quirks and values of specific societies (or, to put it more simply, location).
For a contemporary example, one needs look no further than the classic American traits of entrepreneurialism, innovation, and business-mindedness; anyone who has spent time behind the curtain of 21st-century evangelical Christianity will testify to the growing prevalence of marketing campaigns, TED Talk-esque keynote speeches, boards of directors, strategic plans, and so on. At the other end of the scale is the development of explicit atheism in the 18th century, a phenomenon which was particularly centred in Paris, and which contrasted with more widespread European positions such as deism or agnosticism. (Unfortunately, my lack of detailed knowledge about French culture precludes me from speculating exactly why this was the case.)
Rocking the Boat: Baruch Spinoza and Modern Bible Scholarship
Spend any amount of time around fundamentalist Christianity, and one thing will become evident — the sacredness of the Bible. Asking the question, “What does the Bible say?” is of first importance in all matters of life and faith, and “The Bible says…” is the gold standard for credibility. There’s even a term for this level of reverence: Sola Scriptura (literally ‘by Scripture alone’). Violating this sacredness — say, by meddling with the words of Scripture, or by ‘manipulating’ the ideas it contains — is seen as a supreme sin.
… Except when it’s not, of course.
Does Gehenna Mean ‘Hell’? Unpacking the Origins of ‘ge hinnom’
You won’t find the word ‘hell’ anywhere in the most ancient copies of the Bible. That’s because hell is an English word, and the Bible was, well, not written in English. Instead of ‘hell’, the original languages of Hebrew (Old Testament) and Greek (New Testament) contain a perplexing variety of terms like sheol, hades, geenna, krisis, abysson (or ‘abyss’), and the ultra-rare tartaros.
Our attention for today is on the term geenna (which, for simplicity’s sake, I’ll be referring to by the more commonly known Latin word ‘gehenna’). There are a few reasons for this interest in gehenna. Most significantly, in modern versions of the Christian Bible (such as the RSV, NRSV, NIV, ESV, and so on), gehenna is virtually the only word still translated into English as ‘hell’ (the other one is tartaros, which is basically irrelevant because 1. it only appears once in the entire Bible; 2. it has barely any impact on modern Christianity; and 3. it’s easy enough to replace with the term ‘abyss’ — the supernatural demonic prison — by comparing the book of 2 Peter with other Christian sources of the time).
Fourteen Views on Hell (Part 3)
So far in this little miniseries, I’ve briefly outlined nine different Western takes on the afterlife (which you can check out in Parts 1 and 2). Despite their differences, each of these different theories has shared one thing in common: a belief in multiple ‘places’ in the afterlife. The criteria for who ends up in which ‘place’ may vary; so, too, the fate of those who end up in the ‘bad place’ (be it never-ending torments, destruction into non-existence, future salvation, or something else completely). Nevertheless, a sense of justice and hope is maintained: ‘bad people’ (whatever that means) receive the deserved consequences of their misdeeds; ‘good people’ are remembered and rewarded, their troubles and sufferings brought to an end.
‘Dual-destination’ models of the afterlife do not, however, represent the entire range of Western thought on the topic. The following, then, are five important Single-Destination views. I’ve tried to follow my own ‘naming rules’ as closely as possible (that is, choosing labels that are reasonably simple, easy enough to understand, and unbiased); I will admit, though, that my chosen labels are by no means perfect.
Fourteen Views on Hell (Part 2)
Questions about the afterlife hold great significance for most Christians. As I mentioned in my last post, however, the terms used to categorise different theories of heaven and hell (such as the ‘traditional view’, the ‘biblical view’, the ‘literal view’, or the ‘metaphorical view’) are often vague and perhaps even inaccurate. In Part 1, I described the first five afterlife models from my list of fourteen: Predestination, Endless Physical Suffering, Simple Separationism, Simple Destruction, and Second-Chance Separationism.
And now, let us continue!
Fourteen Views on Hell (Part 1)
When I first started to question the idea of hell (back when I was still an evangelical Christian), one of the things that frustrated me to no end was words. It seemed to me that people liked to use words like ‘traditional’ and ‘biblical’ to describe their views on the afterlife (as in, “Our church holds to a traditional, biblical understanding of hell”), which was confusing to me for a number of reasons.
21st Century Hell: New Atheism, Separationism, and the Watering Down of C. S. Lewis
“I am persuaded that the phrase ‘child abuse’ is no exaggeration when used to describe what teachers and priests are doing to children whom they encourage to believe in something like the punishment of [unconfessed] mortal sins in an eternal hell.”
Those who followed religious trends during the early 2000s might well be familiar with this incendiary quote, made by Richard Dawkins in his 2006 bestseller, The God Delusion. The ‘New Atheism’ of writers like Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens shot to prominence, of course, as a reaction to the infamous September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The sheer popularity of ‘New Atheism’ (not to mention its unashamed hostility towards religion) forced Christians across the Western world to face some uncomfortable questions, not least about the doctrine of hell. One man, it seemed, had the answers to soothe their troubled minds: the legendary British writer and theologian, C. S. Lewis. Appearances, though, can be deceiving. How? Well… it’s a long story.
Revivalism, ‘New Measures’, and Modern Entrepreneurial Christianity
Before we get started, I have a little challenge for you. Read the quotes below and take your best guess as to their year of origin (and, if you’re feeling ambitious, the country they were spoken in):
“Without new measures it is impossible that the Church should succeed in gaining the attention of the world to religion…
The measures of politicians, of infidels, and heretics, the scrambling after wealth, the increase of luxury… will gain men’s attention, and turn them away from the sanctuary and from the altars of the Lord, unless we increase in wisdom and piety, and wisely adopt such new measures as are calculated to get the attention of men to the Gospel of Christ...
It is evident that we must have more arousing preaching, to meet the character and wants of the age. Ministers are generally beginning to find this out. And some of them complain of it … The character of the age is changed, but these men retain the same stiff, dry, prosing style of preaching, that answered half a century ago...
We must have powerful preaching, or the devil will have the people… Many ministers are finding out already, that a Methodist preacher, without the advantages of a liberal education, will draw a congregation around him which a Presbyterian minister, with perhaps ten times as much learning, cannot equal, because [the Presbyterian minister] has not the earnest manner of the other, and does not pour out fire upon his hearers when he preaches...”
