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October 10, 2011 at 11:33 pm (This post was last modified: October 10, 2011 at 11:37 pm by IATIA.)
(October 10, 2011 at 11:20 pm)Godschild Wrote: Your talking about Greek mythology not christian doctrine.
What is the difference between Greek doctrine and xtian mythology?
You do know that Zeus does not acknowledge your god or rituals anymore than we do? You also know that your rituals and mythology were hijacked from Zeus and company, among others?
And Zeus is not happy about that at all! Neither is Hades!
(October 10, 2011 at 11:40 am)Rhythm Wrote: The Book of Enoch is great for that sort of narrative. Apparently there are keys to those gates.
You know that Enoch was one of a select few that got to go to heaven and return? He also had to partake of the same book/scroll as the others before making the journey. I am thinking blotter acid!
You make people miserable and there's nothing they can do about it, just like god.
-- Homer Simpson
God has no place within these walls, just as facts have no place within organized religion.
-- Superintendent Chalmers
Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. There are some things we don't want to know. Important things.
-- Ned Flanders
Once something's been approved by the government, it's no longer immoral.
-- The Rev Lovejoy
(October 10, 2011 at 11:24 pm)Epimethean Wrote: Right, and because xtian "doctrine" borrowed liberally from anywhere it saw fit, the mythology got messed up. The Greeks had a nice system before that. They knew that gods sucked. Then came the ones who pretended otherwise, the silly bastards.
Funny how Greek mythology has fallen flat on its face and christianity is still going strong. The Greeks like all other cultures have taken from the OT not the other way around.
God loves those who believe and those who do not and the same goes for me, you have no choice in this matter. That puts the matter of total free will to rest.
The Greeks had the common sense to stop playing with fairy tales when they grew up as a culture. Unfortunately, the weak minded never stop clinging to them.
But wait: Are you suggesting that Zeus came from the OT? LOL!
(October 10, 2011 at 11:37 pm)Godschild Wrote: Funny how Greek mythology has fallen flat on its face and christianity is still going strong. The Greeks like all other cultures have taken from the OT not the other way around.
And so did hundreds of other religions before that and so will yours. All the rituals and stories come from those old religions, so what makes yours any different. SAME story and SAME rituals. DIFFERENT gods. That is the story of ALL the religions. Only the names and places change.
I like to think mankind is getting smarter, then a xtian comes along.
You make people miserable and there's nothing they can do about it, just like god.
-- Homer Simpson
God has no place within these walls, just as facts have no place within organized religion.
-- Superintendent Chalmers
Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. There are some things we don't want to know. Important things.
-- Ned Flanders
Once something's been approved by the government, it's no longer immoral.
-- The Rev Lovejoy
It's just slow evolution. First there was numenism, then came more concrete forms of deism, then polytheism, then monotheism. We're slowly growing up as a species, though kicking this last bad habit is tough for many who have religion programmed into their genes.
It's true that tartarus and hades are not the hells we envision. These two are places literally within the bowels of the earth. Hades being a sort of upper level. A dull place devoid of joy or mirth. There is a mention of a sort of separation into two hades, believe the subject of the narrative was abraham. Tartarus is of course "the lowest hades". To give this whole thing a visual feel; hades is a flattened globe beneath our world, at the bottom of which is a "an abyss", a shaft without end leading down to tartarus. You know the reason that the tartarus verse seems so lonely? It was decided that the Book of Enoch was non-canonical. Which is unfortunate, because it's an interesting narrative itself (and is of course found in aramaic fragments on the dead sea scrolls). It's a sort of celestial supermax under the gp. "The Hole", if you will. You cannot remove tartarus from any mention of hades because they are inseparable concepts. One is a part of the other.
Gehenna would be the place we envision when we think of hell. In fact, hell itself is from an entirely different mythology that did not contain a hades, or a tartarus within the same. It did have a gehenna, and that was an easily absorbed mythology. Gehenna is "the lake of fire". It's interesting to point out that this is possibly derived from an actual place. This is the place of punishment, the final stop for unrepentant sinners. Gehenna is fairly well represented in the new testament, as is hades (and by extension tartarus).
All of this was subsumed under the title hell for a long while. It had alot to do with the native cultures that christianity encountered as it crawled across the map. The first beliefs to be incorporated are the ones with analogs in the native population. As the first doctrines absorbed they form a core piece of it. This is of course our understanding from cultural anthropology and studies of comparative religion. European christianity has traditionally been very heavy on the hell bit, and there were reasons for that. As such, this is the hell the believer inherits.
However, one could take the concepts of hades and tartarus as seperate from gehenna. There's no problem at all with separating them like this. It was intended. The trouble is that it does nothing to remove the idea of torture, torment, or punishment from either concepts. You're either burning in gehenna, or shambling about hades whilst ash rains on your head awaiting resurrection or judgement (being thrown in gehenna). All the while the shaft leading to tartarus is there beneath you where demons are held in torment and lie in wait to pour out onto the earth.
Sounds downright pleasant.
Thanks for sharing all the info, but when it comes down to it all forms of tartarus means to cast down to separate from. The demons were cast to the earth for their first punishment when they rebelled in heaven, the lake of fire is their finial destination where they will be destroyed. Yes hell as we understand it will be a terrible place, good reason to avoid it I think. Still no torture for humans but I agree torment and punishment are for real. The Book of Enoch was not made a part of the Bible because it did not qualify, now why, I do not know, haven't studied that, maybe I will be able to some day.
God loves those who believe and those who do not and the same goes for me, you have no choice in this matter. That puts the matter of total free will to rest.
