Hell

The Logic of Damnation

Jerry L. Walls

• Editore: University of Notre Dame Press
• Anno: 1992
• ISBN:
  9780268161637
• Argomento: Theology & Religion
• Categoria: Theology

Jerry L. Walls cogently argues that some traditional views of hell are still defensible and can be believed with intellectual and moral integrity. Focusing on the issues from the standpoint of philosophical theology, he explores the doctrine of hell in relation to both the divine nature and human nature. He argues, with respect to divine nature, that some versions of the doctrine are compatible not only with God's omnipotence and omniscience, but also with a strong account of His perfect goodness. The concept of divine goodness receives special attention since the doctrine of hell is most often rejected on moral grounds. In addition, Walls maintains that the doctrine of hell is intelligible from the standpoint of human freedom, since the idea of a decisive choice of evil is a coherent one.

1

HELL AND HUMAN BELIEF

I

The changing pattern of belief in hell is a piece of interesting sociological data as well as a fascinating historical and cultural development. My concern here, however, is with the question of whether the doctrine of hell is intellectually and morally defensible. Even more to the point, is it true? Given these concerns, data concerning what people believe about hell may seem irrelevant. Questions of truth are not determined by public opinion polls or majority vote.

On the other hand, we normally operate on the assumption that there is some correlation between what people believe and what is true. It is, arguably, a basic epistemological principle that if something seems true to normal thoughtful persons, there is at least prima facie reason for thinking it is true. And if something seems false, there is prima facie reason for thinking it false. On this sort of principle, what is actually believed about hell may in the end provide more than just interesting sociological data.

In this chapter, I shall explore this possibility by examining some suggestive arguments which move from observations about the phenomenon of belief/unbelief in hell to claims about the viability of the belief itself. These arguments are particularly relevant to my approach to the problems posed by the doctrine of hell for, as we shall see, they often hinge upon the moral implications of such belief. My aim in examining them is to see if there is some reason to think the phenomenon of belief about hell has any bearing on whether or not the doctrine is true.

II

Let us begin by considering an interesting argument against eternal hell, based partly upon the phenomenon of Christian belief on the matter, which was advanced several years ago by Charles S. Duthie. His case is a cumulative one which also involves the testimony of scripture and some emphases in contemporary theology which incline toward universalism. But what is most interesting for our present concern is Duthie’s appeal to what he calls “the witness of the Christian heart” or “the feeling of the Christian heart.”¹

Duthie has elicited the witness of the Christian heart by means of a question which he has put to other believers.

“Granted that the offer of the Gospel confronts man with a momentous choice and that the rejection of this offer may entail precisely this ongoing separation from God, both in this world and in the next, when you look honestly, into your own heart, remembering God’s gracious dealing with you and His purpose of good for the whole race—do you or do you not entertain the hope that somehow, in the end, all men, even the worst, will be reconciled with Him?”

Duthie reports that almost all Christians to whom he has put this question admit that they do indeed cherish that hope.

Now Duthie is aware that his appeal to the feeling of the Christian heart will strike some as subjective in the worst sense of the word. What credence should we give our feelings—however deep and sincere—when dealing with a matter of theological truth? Duthie recognizes the limitations of his appeal, but defends it as follows. “Although the last word cannot be with the Christian heart, what the Christian heart feels in this and in other matters must have some importance, since it is itself in some measure shaped by the Spirit of God.” Indeed, the hope for universal salvation “springs from a spirit so subdued and permeated, despite its sinfulness, by the wonder of the seeking love of God that it finds it intolerable to contemplate the final exclusion of any from the enjoyment of that love.”²

What Duthie is suggesting, then, is that virtually no Christians really believe in an eternal hell. This is not to deny that many Christians profess to believe that doctrine. But here we may draw a distinction between accepting a claim and believing it.³ To accept a claim is to be willing to affirm it or assent to it. One may do this even if he does not see the claim to be true. He may, for instance, accept it as true on the authority of another. On the other hand, one actually believes a claim only when it seems true to him. He does not merely accept it as a matter of conscious choice, but rather, he finds himself affirming it because it seems true to him.

There is, Duthie holds, a tension in the Christian heart with respect to the doctrine of hell which is parallel to a tension in scripture between passages which seem to support traditional accounts of hell on the one hand and passages which point to universalism on the other. The tension in the Christian heart may be ascribed to the fact that many Christians think they must accept the doctrine of eternal hell, but they do not really believe it. In their hearts, it does not really seem true. They find it “intolerable,” as Duthie puts it, to contemplate the idea that some will be finally excluded from God’s love.

It should be emphasized that Duthie ascribes the Christian hope for universal salvation to the influence of the Holy Spirit. Because the Christian’s heart is permeated by God’s love he cannot help but hope for all to be saved. Moreover, Duthie believes the movement toward universalism in contemporary theology reflects the movement of God’s Spirit. So what we have here appears to be a theological version of the principle that if something seems true or false to us, there is prima facie reason for thinking it is true or false. With respect to the case at hand, since Christians cannot really bring themselves to believe in an eternal hell, despite their efforts to accept the claim that it exists, there is prima facie reason to think the doctrine of eternal hell is false.

How should we evaluate Duthie’s argument? There is something undeniably moving in Duthie’s appeal to the hope for universal salvation which stirs in many hearts. The wish for a happy ending to the human drama is quite natural, like the preference for a happy ending in a good novel. If the doctrine of eternal hell is true, it spoils the hope for a fully happy ending. Moreover, there seems to be something perverse in not wishing for a happy ending which will embrace all persons. Those who do not share the hope for universal salvation appear to be lacking in love or sensitivity.

However, this is not necessarily the case. We can properly distinguish between regretting the doctrine of eternal hell and hoping it is not true. Both of these emotions, I would suggest, spring from feelings of empathy and compassion. Both are expressions of love and sensitivity. The difference is that the former is compatible with believing conclusively in eternal hell, whereas the latter is not. One cannot coherently believe that something is certainly true while simultaneously hoping it is not. Of course, one can believe something is possibly true, or probably true, while hoping it is not, but that is another matter. My point is that the feelings of those who hope the doctrine of eternal hell is not true are virtually the same as the feelings of those who conclusively believe the doctrine but wish it were not true. And many Christians, I am inclined to think, are in the latter category. They do not merely accept the doctrine of eternal hell, but truly believe it. They cannot help but believe the doctrine is true, but they heartily wish it were not.⁴ If negative emotions or even mixed feelings about the doctrine are not necessarily a clear sign of hope that it is false, the expression of those feelings cannot alone be taken to indicate lack of belief in the doctrine.

Moreover, Duthie’s argument is still open to doubt even if feelings of regret over the reality of eternal hell cannot be distinguished from those involved in the hope that no one will be finally lost. The compatibility of hoping for something while believing it is not very likely to happen blocks any direct argument from the existence of a widespread Christian hope that none will be finally lost to the conclusion that Christians “deep down” do not really believe in eternal hell. So Duthie’s informal poll will not so easily settle the issue of belief.

It should be noted that our way of construing the feelings of the Christian heart in this connection may have implications for our concept of God, assuming those feelings are inspired by God. If our feeling is taken as one of hope, this may suggest that God does not know whether or not all will be saved, but hopes they will. If God inspires us to hope, and as Descartes held, is not a deceiver, it must mean he does not know of any for whom there is no hope. On the other hand, if God knows all will not be saved, presumably we would not be inspired to hope for universal salvation, for that would raise in us a hope which God knows will not be fulfilled. Another possibility is that God knows all will be saved and is revealing this to us indirectly by inclining us to hope for it. (This is what Duthie seems to be saying). All of these possibilities have implications for our understanding of divine omniscience.

Another problem with Duthie’s argument, however, is that it relies mainly on the testimony of contemporary Christians. It is probably the case, from what we know about their theology, that most believers of earlier ages would not have considered universal salvation even a remote possibility, so they would not have been inclined to hope for it. To the contrary, as Richard Bauckham points out, it was the “conviction of many earlier theologians that the blessedness of the redeemed would actually be enhanced by their contemplation of the torments of the damned.”⁵ Here is another striking example of the gulf between classical and contemporary attitudes toward hell, for most modern Christians would probably find this notion abhorrent and even unworthy of rebuttal. However, we should at least wonder what motivated such a view and suspect that our tendency to dismiss it out of hand indicates that we have overlooked something of importance.

The idea that the contemporary movement toward acceptance of universal salvation is a reflection of God’s own Spirit suggests that Christians of former generations were insensitive to God’s direction. Or it implies that God revealed himself progressively on this matter because Christians of earlier ages did not have the moral maturity necessary to accept the full message of the gospel. Perhaps the love of God did not “permeate” their hearts to the degree that it does ours, or they were less responsive to it. Otherwise, it seems more than a bit odd that God would wait until recent times to lead the church to such an important truth as universal salvation.

But this is far too favorable to both modern sanctity and modern theological judgment. Modern sanctity does not seem to surpass that of former times, and contemporary theology has departed from traditional views in a whole host of different directions. It would be implausible to suppose that all of these reflect God’s own movement.

This is not to deny that important truths, which have been obscured or hidden in earlier theological thought, may become clear at a later time. If universalism is such a truth, it must prove to be more than an intellectual trend in recent and contemporary theology. It must survive careful theological scrutiny; it must be shown to be biblically sound. The witness of the Christian heart cannot alone tell us whether such will prove to be the case.

This point is further established by the fact that the witness of the Christian heart is divided. As Duthie remarks near the end of his article: “Do what we may, we cannot banish from the Christian consciousness the strong words of our Lord about fire, about darkness, about it being better for a man never to have been born.”⁶ So the witness of the Christian heart does not provide unanimous or consistent support for universal salvation. Rather, there is an inescapable tension at this point.

Duthie’s argument does attempt to suggest which direction Christians should take to avoid the dilemma, namely, that they should interpret the words of Christ in such a way that they are not committed to accepting the doctrine of eternal hell. Only if this can be convincingly done will the witness of the Christian heart support universal salvation with clarity and constancy.

Another interesting argument, reminiscent of Duthie’s, comes from the pen of Dutch theologian Hendrikus Berkhof. He suggests the possibility that hell is not eternal punishment, but rather, a means of purification, so that all will eventually be saved. He goes on to remark:

I know that to many this sounds strange and heretical. But the attitude of these ‘many’ is often strange and cruel; they would immediately warn their nonbelieving neighbor when his house was on fire, but they believe at the same time that he is rejected forever and they seem to be easily reconciled to this fact. Or do they perhaps not really believe it? I think so and I hope so. How could we as a Christian minority live in a de-Christianized world if it were not for the fact that we may believe that God in his mercy knows what to do with all this lack of willingness and power to believe?⁷

Berkhof, like Duthie, starts from the fact that many Christians do not really believe in eternal hell, and moves subsequently to the thought that perhaps hell actually is not eternal. Berkhof, however, does not rely on the explicit testimonies of Christians to establish this fact, but infers it from the attitude and behavior of Christians toward unbelievers.

There is something quite telling about Berkhofs point, for a belief which does not manifest itself in our behavior does not amount to much. Since I profess to believe in hell, I have often wondered what it would take convincingly to show this belief in my life. If I am in a supermarket, should I stop all my fellow shoppers and urge them to believe in Christ, lest they be damned? If I am at a concert, should I stand on my seat during intermission and warn everyone within earshot of the wrath to come? While these scenes may strike us as silly, I submit that such actions would be at least plausible for a person who took hell with utter seriousness. For surely, if I knew the concert hall were going to collapse before the concert ended, it would be appropriate for me to warn everyone of the impending danger.

However, such analogies break down. Let us go back to Berkhofs analogy that we would feel it incumbent upon us to warn our neighbor if his house were on fire. How is this different from warning him about hell? In the first place, if his house were on fire, he would certainly want to know about it. And second, he would surely consider it a real danger and would immediately react to it. However, these assumptions do not necessarily hold with respect to hell. It is very likely that our neighbor has already heard about hell and knows as much as he wants to know. He does not consider it a real danger and would not react with anything like the same decisiveness with which he would react if informed that his house was on fire.

Of course, it could be argued that our neighbor must not know enough about hell or he would consider it a real danger, and accordingly react. Although I am inclined to agree with this, I do not think it supports Berkhofs analogy. My point is that the seriousness of damnation and salvation cannot be instilled in a moment in the same way that a person can be alerted to the fact that his house is burning. This suggests that we should persist in trying to convert our neighbor, but it does not mean we are insincere in our beliefs if we decline to warn him of hell in much the same manner as we would warn him if his house were on fire. But perhaps this is all Berkhof meant to imply anyway.

However, there is a deeper problem in Berkhofs argument. He inferred that the attitude of most Christians shows that they do not really believe in an eternal hell, which perhaps indicates that the doctrine is in fact unbelievable. And if it is unbelievable, if it does not seem true to most Christians, it is probably false.

The problem for Berkhof is that this critique has implications which he presumably would not want to embrace. If sound, it cannot be restricted to the doctrine of hell but extends to Christianity as a whole. Consider the following words of Kierkegaard.

Christianity teaches that … every individual, whatever in other respects this individual may be, man, woman, serving maid, minister of state, merchant, barber, student, etc.—this individual exists before God—this individual who would be vain for having once in his life talked with the King … this man exists before God, can talk with God any moment he will, sure to be heard by Him; in short, this man is invited to live on the most intimate terms with God!… Verily, if there is anything that would make a man lose his understanding, it is surely this!⁸

Elsewhere, Kierkegaard observes that men’s lives poorly express what they claim to understand, and he remarks that “one involuntarily exclaims at the sight of a disproportion at once so sorrowful and so ludicrous.”⁹

Indeed, there is the rub: that such a disproportion exists between the extraordinary teachings of Christianity and the ordinary lives of most people who profess to believe it. What a robust claim it is that we live before God and are able to know him as Father. And what a puny difference this knowledge makes to most believers.

Is it not tempting to think that Christians do not really believe what they profess? If they really believed they could talk to God at any moment, and be heard by him, would they not pray more often, and more earnestly? And if they really believed in the Holy Spirit, wouldn’t they live in the Spirit more consistently?

What these questions point up is that being a Christian is not a simple matter. The Christian message can be deeply disconcerting and thoroughly taxing if one believes it enough to let it shape his life. Is the demand too severe? Does it make the message itself incredible? If we admit the validity of Berkhof’s inference with reference to hell, we might easily conclude t...