Christians: What kind of heaven do you believe in?

[ronedee]

We know that Jesus said: "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."

So basically, Heaven is "light". And "unimaginable", according to Jesus and the scripture.

....and Hell? I'd say "dark". Very dark! No sight... like here on earth.

I'm betting other senses will be fine though! Thats very imaginable!

[Angrboda]

We know that Jesus said: "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."

So basically, Heaven is "light". And "unimaginable", according to Jesus and the scripture.

....and Hell? I'd say "dark". Very dark! No sight... like here on earth.

Everything old is new again...

The Blessed One said this:

"Punna, there are four kinds of karma proclaimed by me after realization myself with direct knowledge. What are the four? There is dark karma with dark ripening, there is bright karma with bright ripening, there is dark-and-bright karma with dark-and-bright ripening, and there is karma that is not dark and not bright with neither-dark-nor-bright ripening that conduces to the exhaustion of karma."

— Kukkuravatika Sutta

This was the first knowledge I attained in the first watch of the night. Ignorance was destroyed; knowledge arose; darkness was destroyed; light arose — as happens in one who is heedful, ardent, & resolute.

When the mind was thus concentrated, purified, bright, unblemished, rid of defilement, pliant, malleable, steady, & attained to imperturbability, I directed it to the knowledge of the passing away & reappearance of beings. I saw — by means of the divine eye, purified & surpassing the human — beings passing away & re-appearing, and I discerned how they are inferior & superior, beautiful & ugly, fortunate & unfortunate in accordance with their karma: 'These beings — who were endowed with bad conduct of body, speech & mind, who reviled the Noble Ones, held wrong views and undertook actions under the influence of wrong views — with the break-up of the body, after death, have re-appeared in the plane of deprivation, the bad destination, the lower realms, in hell. But these beings — who were endowed with good conduct of body, speech, & mind, who did not revile the Noble Ones, who held right views and undertook actions under the influence of right views — with the break-up of the body, after death, have re-appeared in the good destinations, in the heavenly world.' Thus — by means of the divine eye, purified & surpassing the human — I saw beings passing away & re-appearing, and I discerned how they are inferior & superior, beautiful & ugly, fortunate & unfortunate in accordance with their karma.

— Dvedhavitakka Sutta

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Buddhist hell:



"Can't be a law without a lawgiver..."

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You know, the scuttlebutt is that Jesus spent time in India, where he was known as 'St. Issa.'

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"No matter where you prepare your last bed,
No matter where the sword of death falls,
The terrifying messengers of death descend,
Horrid and giant; and glare with thirsty eyes.

Friends and family, weeping, surround you.
Eyeing your wealth and possessions,
They offer prayers and enshroud you.
Unprepared, you pass away;
Helpless and alone."

From 'Songs of spiritual change' by His Holiness the 7th Dalai Lama (transl. Glenn Mullin)

[Zen Badger]

You will have to elaborate as this makes no sense at all.

Surely.

The end goal in Christianity is not that all the Jesus lovers go to heaven and all the unbelievers go to hell. This view that the physical world will be destroyed one day and our immaterial souls will live in eternal bliss is highly influenced by Greek and Platonic philosophy, but it is not what the Bible teaches.

The end goal is the physical resurrection of the dead upon Christ's return on the final day of judgement (Romans 8:18-25, 1 Corinthians 15:21-58, Philippians 3:8-14 20-21). It is fairly hypothetical as to what exactly happens immediately after death here on earth. Based on John 14:1-3, Philippians 1:22-24, and Revelation 6:9-11, 7:9-17 one could make a good argument that the Christians soul/spirit will go to heaven in the meantime (I am highly agnostic as to what happens to the unbeliever at this time). The NT makes it clear that the end goal is the physical resurrection from the dead when the soul/spirit of each person is returned to their body and transformed for immortality Then, after judgement, the people that reject God's invitation for salvation will be thrown into the lake of fire, and the believers will live in the newly established world (New Jerusalem) ever to be in the presence of God in the new heavens and the new earth, having received the redemption of our souls and bodies as well as the creation itself, glorifying God in the form of His creation.

I suggest you read Revelation 20, it's got a lot of details about what the end goal in Christianity will look like. Hope this helps.

Cheers

I have read revelations several times.

A more deranged load of twaddle I have yet to encounter.

I am constantly amazed that people take it seriously.

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We know that Jesus said: "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."

So basically, Heaven is "light". And "unimaginable", according to Jesus and the scripture.

....and Hell? I'd say "dark". Very dark! No sight... like here on earth.

I'm betting other senses will be fine though! Thats very imaginable!

And you'd just love that wouldn't you, the thought of all those unbelievers and heretics burning in exquisite agony.

I bet it even gives you a little bit of a boner.

[ronedee]

We know that Jesus said: "Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed."

So basically, Heaven is "light". And "unimaginable", according to Jesus and the scripture.

....and Hell? I'd say "dark". Very dark! No sight... like here on earth.

I'm betting other senses will be fine though! Thats very imaginable!

And you'd just love that wouldn't you, the thought of all those unbelievers and heretics burning in exquisite agony.

I bet it even gives you a little bit of a boner.

Honestly?

No.

I don't want anyone to perish. What I stated would be Hell to me.

I think we each make our own hell. Whatever that may be.

I'd much rather have us all in Paradise together as brothers and sisters.

[Polaris]

My beliefs are that Hell may not be eternal and that God will be moved to pardon all who are in Hell (well probably not the devil since that dude never seems to want to repent) even if they did great evil in life or always denied Him.

[max-greece]

Just a thought but isn't the only difference between God and the Devil that God has better PR.

The Devil's first sin was to give us self-awareness (its called knowledge in the Bible). That doesn't seem to be much of a crime whether God wanted it or not. God reacted by throwing his toys out of the pram.

Other than that everything we know about God comes from God himself. How do we know he isn't lying through his proverbial teeth?

[Zen Badger]

Just a thought but isn't the only difference between God and the Devil that God has better PR.

The Devil's first sin was to give us self-awareness (its called knowledge in the Bible). That doesn't seem to be much of a crime whether God wanted it or not. God reacted by throwing his toys out of the pram.

Other than that everything we know about God comes from God himself. How do we know he isn't lying through his proverbial teeth?

Number of people killed by god or at his command.... millions

Number of people killed by satan.......10(in a bet with god)

But satan is the evil one apparently

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List appended

http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.com....bible.html

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And you'd just love that wouldn't you, the thought of all those unbelievers and heretics burning in exquisite agony.

I bet it even gives you a little bit of a boner.

Honestly?

No.

I don't want anyone to perish. What I stated would be Hell to me.

I think we each make our own hell. Whatever that may be.

I'd much rather have us all in Paradise together as brothers and sisters.

And will you be happy in heaven? When you look down at all those people writhing in agony in the eternal fires? When 99% of them have committed no real crime? When you recognise friends and family who failed to make the grade in the eyes of your callous god?
Will you still be happy then?
Or will you ignore their screams of agony and turn away.

And will you happy to share heaven with all the rapists, paedophiles and murderers who got in by asking for gods forgivness at the last moment?

[Palko]

Is it a heaven where only those who believe in the Christian God go to? Is it a heavn where those who are kind, regardless of faith, go to? Or is it the heaven where only those who believe in the Christian God go to and everyone else, no matter how kind and caring, go to hell?

And why?

Dear CleanShavenJesus,
heaven is attainable to all, regardless of faith, provided that one has not died willfully rejecting Christ. If someone does not know Christ, through no fault of their own, then they may enter heaven. However, if someone has truly rejected Him without repentance, then Heaven is unattainable.
You may think "what's the point of believing then? If I'm a good enough person I'll make it." If, as an atheist, you hate God by your rejection of Him at the time of your death, then you will not get to heaven.
As a baptised Catholic, I am not guaranteed to attain heaven either.
I must continually pray and seek forgiveness for my sins.
This is a simplification of the Church's teaching. There's so much more to talk about but I don't want to annoy anyone.
I respect the fact that I am on an atheist forum which is for you guys to talk to each and I don't mean to antagonise anyone.
God Bless,
Palko.

[Whateverist]

Personally I don't think the character Jesus in the bible had in mind any kind of life after death judgement replete with punishment and reward. All of that is allegory. While it is possible to read the bible to be saying stupid things -and God knows we've all heard such spew forth from the lips of the multitudinous ignorant- I refuse to come down to that dumbed-down level.

[Minimalist]

I suggest you read Revelation 20

Lucky for you then that said book was voted in to the canon - probably at the Council of Carthage in 397 since it is not part of the Codex Vaticanus.
Without it you would be at a loss.

I haven't got much use for documents which are voted on by committees. It would be like worshiping a Congressional Conference Report. Even Martin Luther thought it was a piece of shit...

In the 16th century, Martin Luther initially considered it to be "neither apostolic nor prophetic" and stated that "Christ is neither taught nor known in it,"[33] and placed it in his Antilegomena (his list of questionable documents), though he retracted this view in later life.

until it dawned on him that it would be useful for scaring the dolts.... a function which it still serves today.