An Agnostic's Look at The Bible - Part XXV - What The Hell?

I've often noted that The Bible isn't an instruction manual for Christians, nor is it a doctrinal exposition. The Old Testament is a collection of mythological creation stories, legendary ethic history, poems and songs. The New Testament has a few doctrinal treatises, but is many letters to churches and incomplete biographies of Jesus. The Biblical view of the afterlife, or even if there is one, is unclear. The description of an afterlife for those who are outside God's eternal rewards even less so. 

Here are a few verses in the New Testament:

(I did not include verses from Revelation, since they are describing events in the future, and generally refer to Satan, The Beast and the False Prophet; I also excluded Old Testament verses)

Matthew 10:28 Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

Matthew 13:42 They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 13:50 and throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matthew 25:41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Matthew 25:46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”

There is some scholarship that maintains that the word translated "Hell" is translated from hades, which could be translated "the grave". In the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures it translates sheol, which is simply the place or realm of the dead.  There is some reference to a blazing furnace and eternal punishment. 

Mark 9:43 If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out.

Acts 2:27 because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, you will not let your holy one see decay.

II Thessalonians 1:9 They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might

Jude 1:7 In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.

In these other verses there are a few references to eternal fire. Acts 2:27 is an Old Testament quote. I'm sure there are others, but this sets the template: if you're not a beneficiary of eternal life, you're getting eternal punishment, described as eternal fire. One verse refers to everlasting destruction and shut out from The Lord's presence. I have seen scholarship that suggests that being thrown into a figurative furnace equals utter destruction, as being thrown into a physical furnace doesn't leave you alive, but obliterates you. 

So, with such a paucity of information in The Bible regarding an afterlife away from God and Jesus, where do we get the idea that Hell is a place of organized torment, let alone the domain of Satan/The Devil? Not from The Bible. 

Hell as the place of eternal punishment for the evil, presided over by The Devil and his demons, was a concept that evolved over time. One of the contributing factors was the desire for retribution against evil doers who had apparently escaped consequences in life. Some of the details were posited by theologians, others by popular imagination. When you think about it for a nanosecond, does it make sense that the place of punishment for rejecting God is presided over by the entity who is God's enemy, who would presumably be punished as well? 

One of the weird things I see culturally regarding Hell is when people imagine that Hell is a place where all the cool people hang out. I guess they look at how religious people act and figure the alternate must be okay, despite the popular imagery of what Hell is like. Another weird cultural thing is when people who reject organized religion proudly state that they're going to Hell, in all it's cultural imagery. I'm of the opinion that if you really believed in the popular concept of Hell, you would do everything you could to avoid ending up there. It's kind of a reverse Pascal's Wager. The person who says that is placing a bet that whatever benefits they're accruing by acting in an ungodly way is worth rolling the dice that they won't end up in what they imagine hell is. 

Hell, not even a real thing in The Bible.

Start at The Beginning: Part I