For many nonbelievers, the idea that God could punish his “children” with eternal “torture” is just too much to accept. They reject the notion of hell, often saying that they simply will not believe in such a God, as if their personal aversion to judgment and possible condemnation can somehow change reality. In responding to such a challenge, one can quickly be made to feel that we’re defending the … indefensible? We know that God can appear harsh, and that he will someday judge us, but is he actually callous and uncaring? The exact opposite of what one would view as a “loving father?”
There is, of course, no emotionally satisfying answer to this challenge. There is no way to make someone feel good about a place of suffering, whether it is an earthly prison or the eternal suffering that characterizes hell. So, are we then left with the choice of either rejecting the existence of hell, on the one hand, or simply sounding unloving by saying something along the lines of “it is what it is?” Is there a middle ground, in which we can make some intellectual sense of why there is such a place, even if the teaching remains jarring and harsh?
In the temporal realm, no one disputes the need for prisons. Depending on the severity of the crime, the goal in incarcerating an offender may vary. For some, the focus will be on rehabilitation, by attaching unpleasant consequences for criminal behavior while holding out hope for a change of heart, and then, a change of behavior. Many low-end offenders can benefit from programs that are made available to the inmate along with incentives to encourage pro-social behavior. For the most violent offenders, on the other hand, there is another purpose: to incapacitate them, so they can no longer prey on the innocent.
In both cases, it is also true that confinement is additionally meant to punish. This point bears emphasis. Justice at its most basic level punishes evil and rewards good. But in our temporal worldly system, the punishment we speak of is, in essence, the incarceration, the very same act that accomplishes the separation. We do not first separate inmates from society and then inflict additional punishment; there are no medieval tortures that await them, no mistreatment that is deliberately inflicted to further the pain these inmates feel, no chain gangs to make their daily lives unbearable. In a very real sense, the punishment is the product of the incarceration, not an additional purpose.
Indeed, it is for this reason that some would argue that prisons today do not provide adequate punishment for wrongdoers. Such people feel that justice would be better served if additional punishments were inflicted. But this criticism does not – indeed, cannot – apply to the eternal. Why? Because forcible separation from God is the worst thing that can befall any soul. I repeat: eternal separation from God is the worst outcome that can possibly be imagined. There is nothing more that can be done, nothing that can increase the pain that such a soul would experience. By the same token – and this is the salient point – there is nothing to be done that would lessen the pain. When one fully grasps what it means to spend eternity separated from God, there is no way to make such an outcome more bearable.
Consider for a moment of what the pain of separation consists. In a prison setting, being prevented from exercising any real control over the activities of one’s day, and one’s movement, would be bad enough. But being unable to spend time with others, being forcibly torn from one’s family and one’s closest friends – this indeed is torment. Imagine for instance a newlywed knowing that his lovely bride will be 80 before he is released. Or a new mother knowing that her vulnerable child will have to grow up without knowing her. This is anguish, pure and simple.
Move now to a still deeper level. Even for the most hardened of criminals, there are people to whom they are attached, with whom they wish to spend time, even if they are simply fellow inmates. These others have some quality, some set of attributes, which makes them attractive, which makes their companionship desirable. That is why solitary confinement is such an extreme form of punishment. We were meant for fellowship and forcing someone to remain isolated is a harsh punishment indeed.
Now, consider the soul facing eternal separation and eternal alone-ness, isolated and embittered, aware of but forcibly separated from the God against whom their rebellion rages. What a human being feels on a limited and temporal basis, such a soul feels magnified a million, a billion …. an infinity of times. And such a soul is not experiencing separation from a limited and flawed human being, but from the source of all life, of all beauty, goodness and truth, of all joy. Can we even find words to describe what such infinite emptiness feels like?
No, God does not actively torture people in hell. But he does not change his nature to suit those who in rebellion to his law shake their fist at him. While he desires that all will accept the gift he has offered through the life, death and resurrection of Christ, he does not override the free will of those who choose to remain committed to their sinfulness. The separation that he imposes at the end of such a life, just though it is, is a horrible thing indeed.
But it is not torture. It is the nature of things.
Recommended Resources:
I Don’t Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist (Paperback), and (Sermon) by Norman Geisler and Frank Turek
Stealing From God by Dr. Frank Turek (Book, 10-Part DVD Set, STUDENT Study Guide, TEACHER Study Guide)
If God, Why Evil? (DVD Set), (MP3 Set), and (mp4 Download Set) by Frank Turek
Why does God allow Bad Things to Happen to Good People? (DVD) and (mp4 Download) by Frank Turek
Al Serrato earned his law degree from the University of California at Berkeley in 1985. He began his career as an FBI special agent before becoming a prosecutor in California, where he worked for 33 years. An introduction to CS Lewis’ works sparked his interest in Apologetics, which he has pursued for the past three decades. He got his start writing Apologetics with J. Warner Wallace and Pleaseconvinceme.com.
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