When did you become so interested in eschatology?
a small hobgoblin of consistency might point out that the post title should be "some" or "several" or "a few", instead of "a".
2: drat.
4: Haven't you learned yet, Michael, that I disregard the doctrine which teaches that titles have anything to do with that which they title, believing instead that their chief value is differential and only realized with respect to other titles?
What an amazing coincidence, then, that both the title and the post refer to the end times. And that the first paragraph would be rather confusing without said fortuitous title.
Naturally, sometimes the post and title will happen to be connected, or almost connected, semantically.
Surely those interested in such questions will be following along in Slacktivist [http://slacktivist.typepad.com/]
where Fred Clark is fisking his way through Left Behind at an excruciatingly slow but immensely enlivening pace! With copious comments by many . . . It really should be called The Last Stop Before The End Times.
Surely, sir, George Bush is the Antichrist.
m, I think the FX department fucked up on the bloody water thing
In LB, yes, the waters turned to blood. I think there was something about how for believers it turned back to water when they drank it. And I think they've turned back now. I'm not completely up to date though, read up to about #10 a couple of years ago. It was quite an effort.
The arguments over the details will be settled soon, 'cause the end times are right around the corner. Kevin-The-Dumpster-Gleaner told me so yesterday at length. The primary sign is the weather is all screwed up.
After the millienium, the sinners of course don't go to heaven, but are, along with Satan, "cast into outer darkness." This is supposed to be Hell 2.0: The Permanent Edition.
There is widespread disagreement on many points of eschatology, but among those who concern themselves with such matters, nearly all agree that there will be people in hell for all eternity -- because if not, then what's the point? (I have literally heard this argued: if there's no hell, there's no point in the Christian life.)
Man. By itself, eternal bliss just doesn't cut it?
There's also a school of thought that says if there is a hell, then there is no point to Christianity, because a God worthy of worship wouldn't allow anyone to suffer infinite pain for a finite transgression.
But that school of thought, as Adam says, isn't generally running around celebrating the idea that rivers turn to blood except for believers.
There must be a Hell, for if there were not then those in Heaven would be denied the pleasure of witnessing the suffering of the wicked.
But, wrt the blood -- don't good Christians already drink blood once a week?
Normally I'm a real live-and-let-live kind of guy on religious issues, because a big part of my own belief system is that I have no more clue what's going on Up There than the next yahoo, but a part of me very secretly believes - and I'm trying to say this quietly because, really, it's none of my business - that it takes being at least a little crazy to focus one's worship on an endgame scenario of earth-scorching conflict and many/most people trapped in eternal torment. It's a little too snuff-filmy for my tastes.
I don't wish to direct that at all Christians because there's also some really good advice in the Bible even if I don't believe the cosmological bits myself, and of course because I am a mealy-mouthed little liberal, but the ones who sit around praying for the end with very specific visions of what The End will entail? That's pretty fucked up.
It's quite common IME, for authoritarian christianists to argue that nobody can live an ethical life without the treat of supernatural sanction. That this speaks volumes about their own instincts rather than anyone else's seems to escape their notice.
cast into outer darkness
Out of curiosity, does anyone argue that this is non-existence, rather than torment, and thus a sign of divine mercy at the very end of The End?
There are at least a couple Christian viewpoints (admittedly not very common) with decent pedigrees which claim that the unsaved don't suffer for eternity. When I was growing up I knew people who were at least sympathetic to Origen's view that everyone will eventually be saved (i.e. the purification process of salvation can begin posthumously). And one of the stops on my descent towards heathenism was at annihilationism (the view that god will completely destroy the soul of sinners after a sufficent amount of suffering).
21
Most annihilationists read the "outer darkness" passage as referring to the complete destruction of the soul. As you say, this is supposed to be a sign of God's mercy. Interestingly enough, the orthodox response drew on Augustinian ontology to claim that non-existence was actually worse than eternal suffering.
There's also a school of thought that says if there is a hell, then there is no point to Christianity, because a God worthy of worship wouldn't allow anyone to suffer infinite pain for a finite transgression.
or so the mullahsdevil would have you believe.
20: A friend of mine likes to say that if the threat of hell is the only thing keeping the fundamentalists from becoming murderers, rapists, etc., then maybe we're better off that they believe that stuff.
As for me, I think that social conditioning and law enforcement keeps immorality within reasonable limits in most societies. No need to bring God into our little problems.
It's quite common IME, for authoritarian christianists to argue that nobody can live an ethical life without the treat of supernatural sanction.
What the hell kind of treat is supernatural sanction? Are there safe words in hell?
It is difficult for me not to see belief in hell as a simple failure of compassion on the part of some Christians.
The Lotus Sutra describes the life of Bodhisattva Never Disparaging, who whenever he met a wrongdoer, said "I will never disparage you, because you too will become a Buddha." It seems like some Christians have doctrinal barriers to acting with this level of compassion.
27: Sure there are safewords. You can yell "Red" or "Rutabaga" but no one pays any attention. And while we're on the subject, has anyone noticed that the standard god as commonly promulgated has the same personality profile as the standard domestic abuser?
29: Why, Biohazard, there's an extremely shitty theology book by Rita Nakashima Brock called Journeys by Heart that takes up that very theme. Brock attempts to develop a "theology of child abuse" -- kind of an awkward locution for those of us in theology circles, because "theology of" usually refers either to something good ("theology of the environment," "theology of liberation") or to some traditional theme ("theology of the cross").
Which is not to say that it would be impossible to write a good book on the topic -- it just seems not to have been done quite yet.
29: Yep.
28: While we're on the subject of compassion, Happy MLK Day, everyone.
28: If I were to attempt a theodicy of hell, I'd probably do it by arguing for the idea that a) 'hell' means nothing more than eternal separation from God with no hope of reunification (i.e., no active punishment); b) that such an eternal separation, as painful as it might be, would be better than not existing at all; and c) that permitting this hell is the necessary result of respecting human freedom.
I think such a position could be made intellectually defensible. But still, no gloating. Whatever the purpose of hell, it surely wouldn't be to make believers feel better about themselves.
I remember MLK for being so gosh-darned articulate.
32 is fairly standard in Catholic circle, no?
32.--That was what I believe the Mormon version of hell is. A couple of true schmucks get thrown into outer darkness, but that's reserved for traitors like Judas and former believers who deny their faith...like me.
What the hell kind of treat is supernatural sanction?
They force feed you chocolate ice cream until you hate the stuff.
32: This was pretty much the line I was given being brought up in the Church of England. I've no ida how orthodox it was, either in that denomination or any other. I failed to see the problem with non-existence, however, as do the Buddhists, for example, and as did the ancient Greeks, who I was studying at the time I packed the whole thing in.
34: Nowadays, yes. But there was also a long tradition, from Tertullian to Aquinas and probably beyond, where seeing the enemies of the faith suffer was part of the reward of heaven. In Tertullian's time, such sentiment seems more justified.
"idea", not a mountain in Crete. I can't spell today.
...better than not existing at all...
What's the down-side to non-existence? I can't see any and especially as compared to "eternal separation, as painful as it might be".
37: But in Aquinas' time and probably beyond, gratuitous barbarism.
Doesn't one of the cast of prophetic thousands somewhere in the Old Testament have a vision of the afterlife in which the faithful are living on the green side of a river (of fire?) and the faithless and wicked live on the other side, eternally thirsty and pleading with the faithful to give them water?
I recall sensing in childhood that a big part of many people's expected afterlife was getting to point and laugh.
34: Possibly. I don't actually know Catholic teaching on this one except that there's supposed to be a hell. The general attitude I picked up is that whether other people are going to hell is God's problem, not yours, and shouldn't you be more worried about your own soul than pointing and laughing?
39: I don't know. In Augustinian ontology (wave-hand), existence all by itself is a good. Non-existence isn't. So existing would win hands down. Personally, if I'm contemplating eternal suffering and non-existence, I'm pretty sure my intuitions on either of those aren't to be trusted at all.
29 and 30 make me want to reference Alice Miller. But it's a long time since I read "The Drama of the Gifted Child". Did anyone notice she has a new book out? I saw it on the shelves last week but had not heard anything about it.
I'm not really qualified to talk about this but from my recent reading of the Quran it seems that
(a) there's a hell, and it's nasty, and there's lots of fire involved;
(b) at least some commenters think that a soul's stay in hell is finite, that Hell functions as a sort of limbo for paying for sins, after which the soul moves to better places. Not sure how orthodox this view is, but it does make sense of the finite wrongs/infinite punishment issue, which always bothered me.
I thought the muslim hell involved ice, too.
When considering the end times, it's important to keep in mind the teaching of his holiness, Curtis Mayfield, viz., if there's a hell below, we're all going to go.
39 - Unfortunately, Ted Chiang's "Hell is the Absence of God" does not seem to be available on the Internet.
Blasphemy girl says that the literal end of the world means that some dead bodies will manage to stick around in a clump, perhaps to give rise to some form of life in a far future; others will be cast into the outer darkness of space to become space dust.
Also, MLK is effectively a saint, far more so than the nonentities the church has been busy canonizing in the last few years.
MLK is effectively a saint
How many posthumous miracles has he performed?
How many posthumous miracles has he performed?
He singlehandedly stopped mail delivery all across the United States today, a feat not even Mr. Coldmiser has been able to accomplish. Also, his name suddenly appeared on certain street signs in almost every medium- to large-sized city in the country.
Do those count?
You don't need to do miracles. You need to do miracles *or* be martyred.
Although, if you want miracles, his turn from civil rights leader to racist apologist is quite impressive.
B, you need to have proof of a posthumous miracle to be canonized. Martyrs can be venerated without one.
Was he martyred for the Church? Let's recall that he wasn't a Catholic.
I'm slightly wrong -- martyrs can be beatified without a posthumous miracle, but not canonized. Given the recent history of the Church's free hand with the sainting powder, though, I'm sure someone could come up with something.
Although, if you want miracles, his turn from civil rights leader to racist apologist is quite impressive.
Um, what?
Referring to the current use of MLK by opponents of affirmative action as someone who would have disapproved terribly of such an egregiously racist practice, I believe.
54s the problem, of course. Then again, the church has made non-Catholics into saints, I think. And Edith Stein certainly wasn't martyred for the church.
racist apologist
Only LB truly understands me.
Don't worry, B.Ph.D., it was clear to me that you were calling affirmative action opponents racists. I am sure you and LB are not the only people who hold such views. I guess I give you credit for not being mealymouthed about it.
Not all opponents of AA are racist. Some are merely misinformed, and some are inadvertently racist as a result of plain ignorance. However, using MLK to argue against AA is racist.
Sorry, Idealist, but LB's still my #1 girl.
However, using MLK to argue against AA is racist.
Or just so criminally disingenuous that whoever does it should be bashed in the head with a trout.
Trout aren't hard enough. Perhaps a frozen king salmon. Whole.
Hey speaking of fish I fried catfish tonight and it got rave reviews from both female members of my household, both of whom were skeptical about how much they would like fried catfish.
My mom won't eat catfish because she refuses to eat anything that lives in the Schuylkill River.
She just figures any animal that could live in an environment like that must have something wrong with it.
My mother has pooh-poohed catfish as well: "muddy-tasting" was her warning.
Seemed to me to taste more of buttery fried goodness than of mud.
I'll have to taste it for myself, then!
To be fair, the buttery fried part isn't the fish itself. Not that catfish isn't a tasty vector for fried butteriness, because it is.
Catfish isn't bad, as freshwater fish go.
What do you have against freshwater fish, you weirdo?
Saltwater fish tend to have less of a "fishy" taste. As a rule, I like them better.
Catfish is muddy depending on when and where it's caught. You also have to skin it, which isn't easy.
I don't think that the fresh-vs.-salt generalization about fishiness holds. Take mackerel or cod, for example.
If a fish is just a little bit bad (a day or two old) you can often rescue it by scraping off all the brown fat just under the skin. That's what spoils quickly, and lean fish store a lot better.
You don't need to do miracles. You need to do miracles *or* be martyred.
I'll take a.), please.