The belief in heaven or hell, to me, seems utterly irrational. Hell is supposed to be the epitome of all our fears; a place where one is tortured in unimaginable ways for all of eternity. Yet, when one realizes the only reason we fear and feel pain in the first place, is our body’s natural survival instinct, it is clear that once you are dead, fear and pain are irrelevant. We fear that which may harm us or kill us, so once you are dead, what is there to fear? Our bodies feel pain to warn us of damage to our operating systems. Once you are dead, those operating systems have long since ceased to function, leaving nothing to even feel the damage.
The same is true for heaven. Heaven is supposed to be the place where every wish is fulfilled, every pleasure indulged, every whim attended to. Yet, pleasure exists only as a chemical reaction in the brain; evolved so that the species may have a better chance to propagate. For instance, we feel pleasure when we make love, because the more we procreate the better chance our species has to avoid extinction. So logically, we are more likely to procreate if that experience is also pleasurable. We feel pleasure when we eat or drink or consume things our bodies deem necessary because our bodies require nourishment, therefore, we are more likely to seek these things out if they are not only nourishing but pleasurable. What purpose does pleasure serve the dead, to whom procreation and nourishment are no longer necessary? Pain, pleasure, fear, hope, happiness, anguish, love, hate, all these things come to us not from some unquantifiable everlasting spirit, but from our D.N.A’s one and only directive: Replicate.
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I totally agree!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteWhen I mentioned this to one of my friends, who happens to be a seminarian, he replied:
"Hell is not some physical place of physical flames and torture. Ancient Hebrew poetic convention uses the image and Christianity has inherited that, but both Heaven and Hell are SPIRITUAL realities. Heaven is simply a being with, and Hell is a being separate from God. All the 'punishments' that go along with Hell are self-inflicted and are no more than that separation. Of course that separation does cause intense inner pain, and can think of nothing worse than to be cut off in such a way, but there it is..."
So ... make what you will of that, I guess ... LoL.
But what baffles me is that evangelicals, for instance, would disagree with him and say, no, we atheists ARE going to burn forever in flames of anguish! And then, my more moderate friends would say, no, there's no such THING as hell -- EVERYONE goes to heaven -- just because that's the way they WANT it to be!
Maybe if they'd all agree on ONE THING, I'd listen ... ;) hahaha ...