There is no rigorous way to relate quantity of punishment to objective experience. People just make something up. Punishment does not exist inside of actions, it is exists inside of the people who punish it.
So when people say things like "eternal punishment is unjust" like they are talking about a mathematical relationship, it isn't like this at all.
Why should anyone believe that eternal punishment is unjust? Why should repayment of sin follow one curve of judgement than another curve?
There is no way to prove that punishment of an action should be lesser or greater. I challenge anyone here to "prove" that a burglar "deserves" 2-5 years of punishment as opposed to 25-50. Where does the word "deserve" find its reference? To the person making the claim. It is made up.
People have a sense that there must be punishment for crimes, this is from God, but that sense doesn't tell us exactly how it should be done. People also have a sense that there must be mercy and impartiality applied, and this also comes from God. But there is absolutely no way to mathmatize this, no way to prove that people deserve one punishment about another.
There is nothing "scientific" or "logical" about saying that eternal punishment is necessarily an unjust punishment, because there no scientific or logical relationship between actions and the punishments they deserve. It is more like there are different circumstances, repeat offenders deserve worst circumstances, motives, culture, level of knowledge about what was happening and many other things color the nature of what happened.
That all said, I am not sure that the Bible necessarily teaches that people will always receive eternal punishment, without exception or any chance of being accepted. When you look at what Jesus says to the thief on the cross, who repents of his sins, he says "today you will be with me in paradise". He didn't require the thief to meet a faith test (other than humbling himself) or to have a sanctified life and he didn't reject the thief even though he was a condemned criminal.
I am not sure that it is not possible for God to accept people into heaven under these same circumstances, as they are dying like the thief, right after they die, or at some other time.
But there is no reason that eternal punishment is necessarily unjust. No one will ever prove that in any rigorous terms, they will just use psuedo-logical terminology to make points that seem like common sense, really they are just people arguing their pressupositions that punishment should follow the form that is acceptable to them or their culture.
So when people say things like "eternal punishment is unjust" like they are talking about a mathematical relationship, it isn't like this at all.
Why should anyone believe that eternal punishment is unjust? Why should repayment of sin follow one curve of judgement than another curve?
There is no way to prove that punishment of an action should be lesser or greater. I challenge anyone here to "prove" that a burglar "deserves" 2-5 years of punishment as opposed to 25-50. Where does the word "deserve" find its reference? To the person making the claim. It is made up.
People have a sense that there must be punishment for crimes, this is from God, but that sense doesn't tell us exactly how it should be done. People also have a sense that there must be mercy and impartiality applied, and this also comes from God. But there is absolutely no way to mathmatize this, no way to prove that people deserve one punishment about another.
There is nothing "scientific" or "logical" about saying that eternal punishment is necessarily an unjust punishment, because there no scientific or logical relationship between actions and the punishments they deserve. It is more like there are different circumstances, repeat offenders deserve worst circumstances, motives, culture, level of knowledge about what was happening and many other things color the nature of what happened.
That all said, I am not sure that the Bible necessarily teaches that people will always receive eternal punishment, without exception or any chance of being accepted. When you look at what Jesus says to the thief on the cross, who repents of his sins, he says "today you will be with me in paradise". He didn't require the thief to meet a faith test (other than humbling himself) or to have a sanctified life and he didn't reject the thief even though he was a condemned criminal.
I am not sure that it is not possible for God to accept people into heaven under these same circumstances, as they are dying like the thief, right after they die, or at some other time.
But there is no reason that eternal punishment is necessarily unjust. No one will ever prove that in any rigorous terms, they will just use psuedo-logical terminology to make points that seem like common sense, really they are just people arguing their pressupositions that punishment should follow the form that is acceptable to them or their culture.
