As for parents that scare their children into obedience, they bring children up into a very warped and just plain wrong view on what hell is and evil is. Hell is not about God torturing people and people burning in a lake of fire, weeping and gnashing their teeth as they deal with the horrible pain that is inflicted on them - Hell is the final result of the guilt, suffering and torment that people experience in life and bring upon themselves from birth.

The whole idea is that we have a chance to be saved from hell by a Messiah, that there is hope so that we will not suffer in torment eternally. We are not condemned to hell for eternity due to disobedience by a higher power as punishment, we end up in a hell as a result of the evil and guilt that consumes us. We are on a downward slope to insanity and dementia from the moment we tried to be God, its the concept of the fall of man - the concept of original sin.

Sorry just had to get that last bit out..

I'm glad you did. Very well put!

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God does not torture you in hell. Hell is the absence of God, there you are awakened to the horror that you no longer have a guidance and love that you took for granted.

Do you know why there is a savior? Because when Moses brought down the 10 commandments that showed us the defining line of good and evil, we failed. Shortly after Moses had the commandments, the Jews started to worship a golden idol much to Moses's disbelief. I can almost hear it, "Are you people freakin kidding me?!" then he broke them. Humanity is very stupid. That gave the solution of Jesus, humanity failed to save itself, so now we have to have a sacrifice to atone for all of our sins, the only remaining requirement is to acknowledge this, how simple is that?

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Am I supposed to have some sort of disclaimer here?

Uh dude, read what I said again lol

Your confused.

Yes, I haven't read your other posts but I think I know what your trying to get at, some people think that hell is just a collaboration of all your bad experiences and evils you have did replaying forever the moment you die.

I just wanted to point out how stupid humanity was is all.

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Am I supposed to have some sort of disclaimer here?

Unless I'm mistaken, you obviously have very deep-seated religious beliefs that are Christian in flavor. I'm not sure if I've asked this before, but I am curious about your username: ZenMaster. I'm wondering how you can marry being a ZenMaster with being a devout Christian?

None of my damn business is, of course, an acceptable answer but you seem willing to share your other beliefs so I figured I'd ask.

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ZenMasteR: I think you missed the toke and talk section, this is the spirituality, sexuality and philosophy section :P

Great article, brought up a lot of things I have been thinking. The real questions I have are why did Jesus have to come at such a stupid time. And being the son of god or god why have a human sacrifice to forgive us our sins. He's god all he has to say is from this time forward I forgive you of your sins. Also if he forgave us of our sins then no problem everyone gets a E ticket to heaven. Right? Last all god has to do is appear in the heavens or whereever he see's fit and let us know he is there and stop wars, killing and all the scores of horrible barbaric atrosities that happen everyday. JUSY MY 2 CENTS

The real question is why would God need to get his Son involved at all. If God is perfect (not capable of making mistakes) then His creations (us) would also be incapable of making mistakes. Or if that isn't logical enough how about this one - why couldn't God just forgive us without the Jesus thing - wouldn't an all-powerful God just be able to forgive and have done with it - i mean if He is omniscient He would already know what fuck-ups we'd turn out to be so why not just go ahead and correct his mistake (or would that require Him admitting He is not infallible).

I have heard that God is all-knowing, all-loving and all-powerful. To which I call bullshit. If he were all-loving there is no possible way He'd allow the horrible things that happen in this world. And if he is all-loving then He either doesn't know about it (so He isn't all-knowing) or can't do anything about it (so He isn't all-powerful).

Hmmm. I could go on and on and on but i think you get the picture. OK one more... God can't be all-knowing/omniscient - otherwise He wouldn't keep acting all surprised when we screw up (ala The Big Flood)... wouldn't He have seen that one coming?

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or another question... why would an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving God create imperfect beings with desires and then demand we not only fight against those God-given desires but devote our life to praising Him? I mean what kind of a sicko would do such a thing?

Like training a dog to go the bathroom in the house and then getting upset when it does - just doesn't make sense to me.

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