What about universalism?
Lamb Chopped
Shipmate
in Purgatory
Since it's already come up a couple of times on the "What is the Good News?" thread, I thought I'd make a nice new thread to contain all the distractions.
This is the place to argue about things like "Is Jesus a universalist?" and "What is God going to do with the people who refused Jesus, didn't hear of him, misunderstood, or did their best and simply couldn't believe?" All of that stuff goes here.
And I'll start it with the quote I couldn't fully answer on the other thread without massive disruption.
Okay, what you've got going on here is a logical problem.
Supposing we start, as we did, with Jesus calling himself that "narrow door through which we all pass to get to God" and enter his kingdom (paradise, bliss, salvation, however you want to phrase that final result).
This forces us to ask, as some of us did on the other thread: What of those who don't go through that door? What of those who, knowingly and of their own free choice, in full possession of the facts, still say "No, thank you" to Jesus' offer, and go on doing so to the very end of their lives--and after?
Given these postulates, there are only two things that can happen. Either God can say, "Too bad, I'm overriding your choice and substituting my own." In that case, God is violating consent and frankly, that's a hella scary universe to live in, for me. (It also doesn't match up with the God I see in the Bible and that I've come to know in my lived experience.)
The other option is the one everyone hates, which is the conclusion that some people might spend eternity outside the kingdom. Yeah, I hate it too. But I can't see any way around it.
Either God violates consent and overrides human free will, or the possibility exists that someone might choose to end up outside that narrow door.
That's where I am, logically speaking.
Now, I hope very much that everyone, all ten or twenty billion of us, whatever it is in the end, finally sees sense and does NOT choose to be outside. But I can't guarantee it. Humans are gonna human. If you give someone free will, by definition you're running the risk of them making a choice you don't like. You can do everything in your power to persuade them differently, but the ball is still in their court.
So personally speaking, I'm a wishful hoper. I hope nobody does that. But I have absolutely no guarantees to help me sleep better at night.
Please note that in all of the above, I'm only addressing the issue of those who know exactly what they're choosing and still choose that way. None of the other cases you're itching to bring up, and doubtless will, now that I'm done yakking.
This is the place to argue about things like "Is Jesus a universalist?" and "What is God going to do with the people who refused Jesus, didn't hear of him, misunderstood, or did their best and simply couldn't believe?" All of that stuff goes here.
And I'll start it with the quote I couldn't fully answer on the other thread without massive disruption.
Merry Vole wrote: »Following on from what @KarlLB said in response to @Lamb Chopped ; Why the 'or um, not' in "narrow door through which we all pass to get to God--or um, not".?
Why is it Good News -but with caveats -you have to read the small print. Only moderately good news. Why not Good News to the uttermost?
Okay, what you've got going on here is a logical problem.
Supposing we start, as we did, with Jesus calling himself that "narrow door through which we all pass to get to God" and enter his kingdom (paradise, bliss, salvation, however you want to phrase that final result).
This forces us to ask, as some of us did on the other thread: What of those who don't go through that door? What of those who, knowingly and of their own free choice, in full possession of the facts, still say "No, thank you" to Jesus' offer, and go on doing so to the very end of their lives--and after?
Given these postulates, there are only two things that can happen. Either God can say, "Too bad, I'm overriding your choice and substituting my own." In that case, God is violating consent and frankly, that's a hella scary universe to live in, for me. (It also doesn't match up with the God I see in the Bible and that I've come to know in my lived experience.)
The other option is the one everyone hates, which is the conclusion that some people might spend eternity outside the kingdom. Yeah, I hate it too. But I can't see any way around it.
Either God violates consent and overrides human free will, or the possibility exists that someone might choose to end up outside that narrow door.
That's where I am, logically speaking.
Now, I hope very much that everyone, all ten or twenty billion of us, whatever it is in the end, finally sees sense and does NOT choose to be outside. But I can't guarantee it. Humans are gonna human. If you give someone free will, by definition you're running the risk of them making a choice you don't like. You can do everything in your power to persuade them differently, but the ball is still in their court.
So personally speaking, I'm a wishful hoper. I hope nobody does that. But I have absolutely no guarantees to help me sleep better at night.
Please note that in all of the above, I'm only addressing the issue of those who know exactly what they're choosing and still choose that way. None of the other cases you're itching to bring up, and doubtless will, now that I'm done yakking.
Comments
That, of course, may involve some degree of agency and choice after death. Some people are uncomfortable with that, some are not. I’m not convinced the possibility is excluded by Scripture. Scripture can support a variety of perspectives here, I think.
For my part, I’ve mentioned on the Ship before that I tend to be Barthian on this question. Barth said, “I do not believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, reconciler of all.” (There are things there to unpack there, not least of which is exactly what understanding of “universalism” Barth didn’t believe in, but I’ll just let it go with the quote for now.)
You might also want to read this short article on Luther's Bondage of the Will.. Its point is while we might choose to eat something like a Big Mac, it is not the same as choosing God.
That said, I have come to the point in my life where I will just let God be God when it comes to his kingdom. My understanding to the Christianity is that it is all inclusive, that the traditional belief in hell being reserved for those who are non-Christians is not even Biblical. I understand God's love and forgiveness is all encompassing. There is a hell, but it is empty. It is not about us choosing God. It is about God choosing us.
Fixed code - la vie en rouge, Purgatory host
Why do you feel it scary, LC?
None of us can have a full grasp of Jesus.
As we're discussing in other threads, however, it kind of depends on how much weight you give to Jesus' own teachings (so far as we have them). He definitely didn't come right out and say "All will be saved," so I'm not sure why we feel as if we can say that today. It's as if we now know something about God that Jesus didn't know, which is pretty hard to reconcile.
And we have Matthew 7:21-23: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
"Depart from me" doesn't really seem like "go to your room" as much as it does "go to hell*."
And of course there's this ditty oft quoted by Christopher Hitchens:
"We are the pure and chosen few,
And all the rest are damned.
There’s room enough in hell for you:
We don’t want heaven crammed."
Lord knows there are plenty of Christians out there who are convinced other Christians aren't going to make the cut. This is getting a little wide of the first thrust of this thread, though. But the rich young ruler? He knew exactly what he had to do and he went away disheartened, and Jesus didn't call after him at all. So was he like the son who told his father he'd do what was asked of him, but didn't? Or, was he like the son who told his dad he wasn't going to do what was asked of him, but did? I suppose it doesn't matter.
*And what of the afterlife? Judaism, as I understand it, doesn't have one. Heaven and Hell seem like pretty big reveals by Jesus, no?!
Modern Judaism and the Judaism - indeed Judaisms - of Jesus' day should not be assumed to be the same thing.
We have, if memory serves, Jesus being challenged at one point to come down on the side of either the Pharisees or the Sadducees, on the question of a resurrection of the dead, which rather depends on one of those groups believing such a thing would occur.
I don't think many adherents of Universalism believe in a waking up the other side of death and everyone finding everything instantly hunky-dory. Rather I think a more reasoned position might posit the continuation of the possibility of being made fit for the Kingdom of God in eternity. I think this is what @Nick Tamen is alluding to.
It seems to me that in fact none - or at least only a few - of us are fit for the Kingdom of God on our deaths. To just wake up there, as it were, as we are, we would end up doing to it what we have done to this one. There is the concept in Christianity of being perfected, putting off the old imperfect nature and taking on the new perfect one.
If this is a process that can be entered at any point, why would death be a cut off? Some Evangelicals like to scare people with the "you could be run over a bus tomorrow and then it's too late". But what if it's never too late? It must be an ongoing process for most of those already in it - why would it close to new entrants? Especially if opening it was so costly at Calvary.
What if Jesus' warnings about Hell need to be seen in the light of his response to "who then can be saved"? To which he answers no-one - except God can do the impossible - to make people able to function in the Kingdom of God. People, those beings who you can make touch anything if you put up a sign saying "wet paint - do not touch".
I'm probably burbling now.
That’s right. The Pharisees (from whom modern rabbinic Judaism is, as I understand it, largely descended) did believe in the resurrection of the dead; the Sadducees did not. And, of course, not believing in the resurrection of the dead isn’t really the same as not believing in an afterlife.
If Universalism is God's ultimate trump card, one wonders why all the fuss with everything else.
I think that wherever Jesus refers to people not being saved it's a parable of some kind which is primarily about ethics not a guide to the afterlife.
Possibly for very personal reasons. There was abuse in my childhood.
Picking up this one issue for a moment--
Yes, Judaism of Jesus' day certainly did have these concepts, at least certain parties. It's part of what Paul played on when he managed to divide his court room in Acts 23. I couldn't tell you how developed the concepts were, or in what directions; but Jesus was not revealing something unheard of and new.
ETA: Ack, I see Karl and others have already addressed this, but I'll leave it for the extra citation.
Gerard Hughes wrote a book called God of Surprises and early on he talks about the central paradox of eternal reward and punishment in Christianity. A small child is taught all about her loving Father in heaven and how good, kind and lovable God is. In Hughes' allegory, the child is taken to meet God, the kindly bearded old man who hugs her and asks if she's been a good girl this week and if she loves him more than anything else. Then this kind and loving Father takes the child into another room to show her a great pit of burning flames and tortured souls screaming and writing in agony. "You see what happens to anyone who isn't good and doesn't love me?" asks this great kindly God.
Hughes points out that this may be a caricature but it is the way many people grow up thinking of God as a monstrous Jekyll and Hyde and the role fear plays in many decisions and motivations for Christian behaviour. It's easy enough (in the same caricatured way) to think that those destined for Hell are only those who refused the opportunities offered to them all through life or that they knowingly chose 'damnation,' but what about our own personal culpability or collective responsibility for the evil and suffering caused to others? And if there is no afterlife, no Judgement Day, no answering for sin, does that mean those who knowing destroyed lives or were responsible for crimes against humanity got away with it, went unpunished? How will the victims be vindicated or compensated for the evil done to them?
If we refuse to forgive others, does that mean we will find ourselves unforgiven? Some years ago, the philosopher Jacques Derrida came to Cape Town to speak on apartheid as a crime against humanity and he chose to talk about forgiveness (as part of his book titled Questioning God) in a crowded hall of anguished and silent South Africans. Who is able to forgive the unforgiveable? He mentioned all those murdered, all those whose lives were destroyed and who were now dead. Only the victims have the right to forgive their killers and torturers, and the victims are dead. Many of the perpetrators are dead. The harm is irreparable and unforgettable, unending. No human punishment can restore what was annihilated in violent death. And so long as that terrible evil goes unpunished, there can be no repentance or forgiveness. No monetary reparations or recompense could ever be enough. So, in search of justice, forgiveness and healing or 'redemption', argued Derrida, we turn to God as the ultimate witness and arbiter. Only God can forgive the unforgiveable and that is why we continue to speak of the impossible unconditional act of reconciliation that is the Cross.
If that’s the price to pay for having my own sins and crimes go unpunished then it seems one that is eminently worth paying.
For example the Urantia Book appears to teach a form of Universalism, but the point appears to be of growth - after death, mortals continue developing/growing/learning. The only difference between the "believers" and the "unbelievers" from this world is the speed at which you grow and your starting position. Everyone (or almost everyone, I'm not exactly sure if the teaching is that some are so stubborn that they don't go anywhere) gets to the destination eventually, the journey is just more difficult for some than others.
I'm not very familiar with Christian Universalism but I think there are similar thoughts.
I'm sure many would agree with you. Not least because all these concepts no longer have much currency in most Western or post-colonial societies. And most people don't consider themselves as individuals guilty for atrocities committed or wars conducted by their governments. or armed forces.
What prompted Derrida to raise God-concepts and older questions of forgiveness and expiation, though, was what he hinted at during his talk in South Africa and called only the "Unmentionable," namely the Algerian War of Liberation that lasted from 1954 until 1962 which has never been openly spoken about in France until recently. Those (the pied-noirs French settlers and harkis -- Moslem allies of the French -- as well as Algerians subjected to military atrocities) who suffered did not forget or forgive for 60 years and Derrida implied that the psychic wounds were as raw as the day the war ended. Silence and secrecy are not forgetting, and Derrida argued that entire nations can be haunted by their own unspeakable past.
Of course this means nothing to those who cannot imagine needing to be forgiven for doing terrible acts of torture and brutality, or needing to avenge the deaths of loved ones or a bombed city, the need to call for a Nuremberg or Truth Commission to seek justice after national or global trauma. It's simply an abstract unimaginable and one's own individual sins or crimes remain the key preoccupation.
At that point, something like the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that even if imperfect opens up the silence is more important than dealing out retribution. Or so it seems to me, though I have no real stake in the matter. (Some of my family are white South African.)
Well, I'm saying that God's forgiveness and reconciliation has happened, the narrow door has been flung open for all of us (sentimental and improbable as that may sound). Riffing a little on what @Nick Tamen offered as a third option earlier: 'Barth said, “I do not believe in universalism, but I do believe in Jesus Christ, reconciler of all,” ' I can live with any number of contrarities, doubts and contradictions around the narrow door and the possibility of universal salvation.
Though I'll come out in hives if I have to talk about Purgatory, a second chance and refinement.
In complete agreement here. I need to find more accurate language for what I meant by 'punishment' or consequences of a crime against humanity. In the back of my mind I was thinking about Hannah Arendt, “Human beings are unable to forgive what they cannot punish, and they are unable to punish what has turned out to be unforgivable.” Questions around deterrence, punishment and retribution pushed to an utmost extreme in the face of radical evil.
If there were transcendence, Love would have nothing to forgive in it, it's not for Him to. Any more than it is here below. Except for developmental therapeutic purposes, as the penultimate Rogerian parent, in so far as that can be done for us here below. Every victim/izer would be restored, restituted, developed, healed, therapied, saved fully in the hereafter. There would be no unreconciled loss. All would be well. For all. As Barth believed above. I hold no contrarities, doubts and contradictions based on any human expression from two thousand years ago onwards.
I think the aspect of loss, more generally, is suggested in your subsequent post: I've always been drawn to the idea of the saved eternally losing "aspects of self" in heaven as a consequence of their life on earth (so not being about purgatorial expiation). It seems to satisfy some of the requirements of retribution. The challenge is in imagining what heavenly loss could possibly compensate for murder, torture, brutality... (Although, when it comes to the afterlife, I'd say imagination is the biggest challenge we have.)
This also raises questions about the whole idea of eternal punishment. (eg does some form of punishment also exist in heaven?)
And, of course, I recognise that postponing all the difficult questions to the afterlife is a luxury "those who cannot imagine needing to be forgiven for doing terrible acts of torture and brutality" can afford to indulge in.
Is 1 Corinthians 1:2 clear in that regard? "To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all who in every place call on the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours:"
Is not loss merely an example of harm? I am harmed if you take my stuff away. I am harmed if you lock me up and prevent me from engaging in ordinary life. I am harmed if you whip me, or beat me, or execute me. I am harmed if I am forced to labour for free at some task that serves the public good.
{{{LC}}}
As I understand the standard 'Orthie' line, if there is one, is that out and out dogmatic statements of Universalism are heretical but that pious hopes and expectations that things may work out that way aren't.
I think I'm right in saying that some of the Fathers even prayed for the Devil and the demons to be 'saved' - although I suspect that's one of these paradoxical and hyperbolical things they used to say to emphasise a point rather than something actually done in practice.
We mention Bishops in our litanies and not Old Nick.
Hey, hang on a minute ... 😉
Meanwhile, to further erode any sanctity I have I'll repeat the gag I always make whenever Derrida makes an entrance on these boards.
Derrida?
He's got Foucault to do with it.
I'll get me coat.
The intolerable shirt of flame.
@Lamb Chopped
Yer takes yer choice. Yer pays yer money. You pay your dues. You pay for what you have taken. Restorative and retributive. To the victim and society. That's fair. That's right. And then you pay extra, you pay in full, with generosity. With apology. In public. With a hi-viz coat. That's right too. With punitive equality. Because that's fair.
And of course I'd vote for your therapy, but that ain't gonna happen, any more than transformative justice is.
But I find it more worrying that we continue to make casual arguments around intentionally traumatic human experiences, or that we equate these with the trivial.
A more common definition is that punishment is the imposition of a penalty or deprivation for wrongdoing. And then there's God's punishment of sin / sinners, which is one of the topics of this thread.
Interesting. You must know some very gracious people.
I suppose it makes a change from 'rebuking' them or 'binding' them and so on, as often happens in charismatic circles.
And weren't the Fathers (and Mothers) also 'quite ordinary people' for all the things they wrote or taught?
Loss is often painful - it may also sometimes be harmful. That may depend on how painful it is and what sense you make of it, or how it impacts your future personhood.
If the sense you make of the loss of a grand parent, for example, is that you should never get close to anyone because eventually you will be left again - I think it would be reasonable to say that experience had harmed you.
And I believe Doublethink is talking about the psychological definition of punishment, which relates to a person's future behaviour. I'm not sure to what extent that applies to the current discussion.
And even if it is, I would think loss of liberty, which is what imprisonment is, brings psychological damage or injury.
Yes, the ultimate form of which is traditionally labeled Hell—fire that brings eternal torment, with weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. The description given in the parable of Lazarus and the rich man (often named Dives) has:
Sounds like a description of physical or psychological damage or injury to me.
And if after mortal death everyone is faced with the bright light of God’s love to walk through, in whatever form, surely our consciousness will burn with the pain of our unrepented sins?
I see the torment as self-inflicted.
As for universalism, I like the idea that as we are all a mix of good and evil, the good will prevail in the afterlife with the bad being somehow blocked, but what about people who ‘sell their souls to the devil’?
If, in all His below, above the beyond the infinite power, He cannot be the ultimate Rogerian parent, as any Father should be, to those many of us who ‘sell their souls to the devil', then He's worse than incompetent.
He's evil. Worse than any devil we make up.
This seems to be assuming that the worst of wrongs done in this life are so significant as to echo down throughout eternity demanding recompense. But it might not be that way. Perhaps, given the unimaginably infinite nature of heavenly eternity, even the worst of Earthly torture and brutality is of no more lasting import than a primary school Chinese burn.
"Surely" seems to be doing a lot of heavy lifting there. I don't see why that's "surely" the case at all.
What is redemption if not a "buying back" what was freely handed over? Isn't that the point of Edmund and Aslan in tLtWatW?
So for example:
If I search for "water definition" online I get "a colourless transparent odourless liquid that forms the seas, lakes, rivers, and rain and is the basis of the fluids of living organisms".
If I tell you that water conducts electricity and sound that's not a definition. ("Water is H2O" could be either a statement or a definition depending on context.)
Anyway, potato, potahto.
My point remains: you ought not to inflict deprivation or loss on another person without sufficient reason.
Emergent Christians have understood this for decades. Christianity is having eternal life, living as if one did. That's why I'm still Christian.