The Simple Experiment

Mmm. I can only respond with my own sense of reason, so, in the same spirit as your post, take this for what it's worth...

I don't see any reason why free will would require evil. The only candidate reason I can think of is that for our wills to be free, they cannot be restricted in any way, but if this were true, then we would definitely not have free will right now. We are restricted already in so many ways: by gravity and other physical laws, by our survival needs, by our biology - just by being stuck in a material body in this material world. If free will is impossible without restriction, and if we have free will, then why can't you and I lift off the ground and fly?

But if, on the other hand, we have free will and our wills are, as seems to be obviously the case, already restricted in certain ways, then restriction of itself cannot disqualify our wills from being free. And if, too, evil and its consequences are - as so many of us can testify that they are - in many cases utterly horrific, then what possible reason could an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God have for allowing it? That is, if, having free will, we are already restricted for what, let it be said, seem to be entirely unnecessary reasons - e.g. there is no obviously "necessary" reason why we should be subjected by gravity to be Earth-bound - then why should we not be restricted too from doing (or being subject to) evil when that restriction would have an entirely obvious and reasonable justification?

But OK, maybe there's another reason. Maybe, to be "genuinely" free, our wills need to be unrestricted not in a general sense, but only with respect to moral choices. Well, sure, you could assert that, but why would it be true? In what sense is it helpful to anybody, let alone to God's ultimate aim, for us to have this freedom? Isn't the ultimate aim for us to all end up in unconditional perfection, being unconditionally loving to one another? If we would have free will in that state, then doesn't that contradict the idea that free will requires the ability to choose evil (since we would certainly not have it in that state)? And if we wouldn't have free will in that state, then what makes free will so important anyway?

I mean, there must be something about God and Creation that I'm missing if anybody is to convince me that ditheistic moral dualism is not the correct metaphysical view. If God wants this state of perfection, then why in the world didn't He just set up the whole of Creation to be like that from the beginning, without even the possibility of evil? Seriously, these might seem like naive questions, but I think they deserve a good answer, and as yet I haven't encountered one.

On the other hand, the answer that I've come to, that of ditheistic moral dualism, comes up against the problem of evidence of the sort you've presented - people experiencing NDEs who don't say anything about the independent existence of evil, and who come up with some sort of theodicy, or, who, when negative NDEs are experienced, report that God in some sense "allows that" or "has set it up such that" a person might end up in hell, in some sort of "cosmically just" outcome.

So, I really don't know what to believe, but for the moment I'm sticking with the dualistic conclusion that I've come to.

Thanks, Morning Fog, for the thought-provoking post.


I don't know if I have an answer that will satisfy you, but I will share what satifies me....for the most part, anyway.

I think you, and many others are truly on to something when you say this life is a game. I call it ultra high definition virtual reality. I think the holographic universe theory is pointing us in the right direction. (A thought just occurred to me that perhaps the puzzle of "solving" reality or the mysteries of the universe are also part of the game. In some weird way, rediscovering truths we already knew may be immensely exciting.)

Try a thought experiment:

You are an eternal being. You are constantly immersed in the love, benevolence and understanding of the All-That-Is constantly. So much so there is literally zero distinction between you (in an ego sense, which I do not believe exists like it does here) and the All-That-Is.

Put yourself there, to the best of your ability. This world and all of its obligations, responsibilities and physical demands are gone. You are at utter peace. There is no danger. You will not die, starve, feel pain or even worry. All that is in all of creation is available to you at any and all times.

So, what growth takes place here? What do we learn? Are we or the All-That-Is evolving? Or is it a stasis?

What do you do with eternity? What do you do with all of creation at your finger tips? How do you expand and evolve? You create whatever it is you want to create. And you co-create. You share the experience of creation and evolution with all that exists within the All-That-Is. Perhaps you create....a game.

There are rules to this game. It'll be challenging, yet we set the difficulty level. Some may go all in. Some may only want a superficial experience of what the physical side of existence has to offer. I think there would be many worlds, with different rules and different challenges. And we delight in this. Just as there are those who delight in video games or skydiving or traveling to far off countries and immersing themselves in different cultures. We have absolute freedom because we have the ability to create whatever it is we choose to create. We even create the rules and limitations that we will *temporarily* live by. And the stricter the rules, the greater the limitations, the more challenging it is. It gives us a chance to flex our spiritual muscle, so to speak.

This includes the notion of evil. BUT, what is evil? Ask 100 different people and you'll get 100 different answers. If you cannot die, what is the meaning of murder? If physical existence was only meant to be temporary, what does it mean for physical existence to end? Nothing. They mean nothing, other than the experience gained by being murdered, or mudering another. Or being the parent of a murdered child. And experiencing life in the physical. Hunger, pain, sex, gluttony, greed. Or even exhilaration. Experiencing what it would even be like to die. Since we cannot die, we have no other way to experience the fear of impending death, or the exhilaration of dodging it.

Think about haunted houses, horror movies, roller coasters, again skydiving, bungee jumping,etc. these are all situations we deliberately put ourselves in for the sheer thrill of it. We love scaring ourselves with the fear of death, only when we know it is impossible (or at the very least incredibly unlikely).

Our true reality is no different. We know we cannot die. We know this physical experience is temporary and in the end ALL IS WELL. Something NDEers say all the time.

We, from our purely human perspective say "how can this be so?" How can everyone be ok, when I can look around me and see that it is not.

Surely, if you were able to enter into the universe of the Halloween movies, none of the characters would tell you everything is all right. People are being killed by a crazy man in a mask!! But you would laugh and say, none of this is real! None of you are really going to die. It's just a movie.

So it could be the same from the perspective of the other side.

So, other than sheer entertainment (which I have a strong intuition that it is), why else would we do this?

To learn and grow through these experiences. To practice love and most importantly, forgiveness. It's like tying our spiritual arms behind our backs, and going into the boxing ring. We deliberately challenge ourselves to become more.

Now, to what end? I don't know. Maybe there isn't one and never will be. Who says there has to be some sort of limit on evolution? In any sense? I think it's an incredibly human way to think, when we believe that evolution has some sort of end point. Like there could ever be some point in the future some species could stop and say "we made it!".

So, evil, from this point of view, serves the purpose in challenging us. Learning to love and forgive in spite of the pain and suffering we must endure.

And what of the "supernatural" evils? I posit that they could be a few things. One) a creation in their own right. Lesser evolved beings who are only beginning their evolutionary journey. Perhaps their journey is one so vastly different from our own, we could never understand it. Two) it is another illusion, created by ones specific creation choices in the development of their own "game". Perhaps when people experience these entities, it is all part of their challenge. Will they give in and follow? Will they resist and overcome? Three) they are a misunderstanding of reality on the part of our ever so limited physical brains. They are something being interpreted incorrectly by a brain that has no point of reference for such a thing. Truly, when we understand something more fully, we can literally witness it change before our very eyes. We see things in a new light, and cannot understand how we saw what we initially did. It could be a combination of all three, plus who knows what else exists in the fullness of reality?

So, evil acts by humans exist to benefit us. What?!? Sounds insane, right? But step outside of an earth centric view, into the eternal nature of all creation, and the concept of evil suddenly changes. Moreover, with the expanded view of time and reality, we can see that while evil seems to triumph in the temporary, love ALWAYS wins. It always does. Hitler met his end. His ideas have all but died, and we are a better species for the understanding and growth in compassion the holocaust gave us. Stalin is gone and his brutal regime has ended. Same can be said for any and all men (or women) like him. And we, as a human species have grown and evolved. We too have become more than we were. There will always be a Hitler, a Pol Pot, a Dick Cheney. But in the end, they NEVER win. Love rules the day, and we are better for our experiences. And in my mind, this transforms their victims. They were not helpless beings being sent to the slaughter meaninglessly. Their purpose was far higher than ever given credit for. Their sacrifice, their suffering, their courage to face this challenge leaves me in utter awe. How incredible these beings are, to have endured such suffering for the good of all creation. And such beauty these beings radiate. These horrifying events transform from being senseless suffering and murder, into an act of immense love. A gift from these souls who endured so much, so that we could all become more. Nothing humbles me more than this.

I'll end this here, even though This is all more complex than I've provided for here. But I've said a mouthful already.
 
Really?!? What's my prize? Please be a million dollars, please be a million dollars...

Nope. Just the internet. ;)

I simply appreciated what you had written, as I was trying to convey (pretty much) the same thing with my earlier post.
You had communicated it much clearer than I could ever hope to have.
 
(I'm not satisfied when I use the word "love" in this context because it is so much more than our typical definition of said word)

Yes. I wholeheartedly agree. We say love, but it's really almost laughable how truly bereft of meaning that word is to describe literally the nature of all reality. IMO, there is no word that can truly, fully describe the true nature of love. It's something that must be felt to be known. Martin Luther King, Jr was an incredibly wise man, and was so far ahead of his time, it boggles the mind, but he knew what love was all about. Some of my favorite quotes of his:

"I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant."

"I am convinced that love is the most durable power in the world. It is not an expression of impractical idealism, but of practical realism. Far from being the pious injunction of a Utopian dreamer, love is an absolute necessity for the survival of our civilization. To return hate for hate does nothing but intensify the existence of evil in the universe. Someone must have sense enough and religion enough to cut off the chain of hate and evil, and this can only be done through love."

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."
 
Hi @Morning Fog and @Vault313,

I'm going to respond to both of your posts at once because I perceive - as Morning Fog verifies from his perspective - that you are essentially trying to communicate the same ideas.

To start with: I very much appreciate your perspectives and your attempts to resolve the problem of evil in a way that makes sense and that is - in another sense - perhaps comforting or at least optimistic and confidence-inspiring. I especially appreciate Vault313's extended post which goes into a lot of detail in this respect. And I would very much like to be able to say, "OK, well, that settles it, I can now put to rest the problem of evil, you guys have resolved it for me". But, unfortunately, I can't. I have a rational mind (as, I believe, do all of us), and I don't believe that that is by accident (for any of us) - and so, whilst I can accept that there are levels of rationality beyond our capacity to comprehend in this human form, I also believe that, at the very least, except where that seems impossible, thus pointing to a paradox unresolvable at our level of understanding and only resolvable through a higher awareness/logic, our metaphysical propositions should be consistent and plausible.

Without, then, wanting to be rude or unkind, and strictly in the spirit of "trying to work out just exactly what this reality is all about and why", I'm going to list the inconsistencies and implausibilities that I perceive in your position(s). But first, here's what we do agree on: that love (in the most expansive sense) is a powerful force which, it seems, is capable of conquering evil, and with which we should identify and which we should develop within ourselves and those around us, and spread.

OK, that said, here's the list:

  • Morning Fog, you suggest that evil may be necessary in some sense which we cannot understand. And I tend to agree (with qualifications about the true meaning of "necessary"), except that I also believe that this notion only makes sense in the context of a dualistic metaphysic. Evil is "necessary" in this sense in that it has an independent existence - whose independence and existence we cannot understand. So, sure, let's agree that in some sense, evil is "necessary" and "incomprehensible", but why, then, would we want to retain a metaphysic in which this notion doesn't make much sense (that in which reality was created solely by an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God) rather than bite the bullet of dualism? But, OK, if I'm going to ask that question with that predicate, then I'm going to need to justify that predicate i.e. that this notion doesn't make much sense given the metaphysic you seem to want to affirm. Hopefully, I'll achieve that through the remaining points.
  • Morning Fog, you also suggest that "evil to somebody may be a blessing to someone else", and I agree that this applies to some extent, but I strongly disagree that it is universally applicable of all evil. There is, in my view/experience, some evil which simply has no apparent justification or positive consequence; which is purposeless other than to delight the one doing evil and to harm its victim. Now, you might want to argue: but on a higher level, there is always some benefit which we simply can't perceive from our perspective. OK, maybe. But, again, what sense does this make in any metaphysic other than a dualistic one? It seems entirely possible for an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God to have offered us (and Himself) any benefit He wants through any mechanism He wants; why then would He choose evil as that mechanism? If we accept a dualistic metaphysic, though, then this makes a lot more sense: yes, evil is awful, and no, we would not allow its existence if we had a choice, which we do not, but at least on some higher level we grow from having to (unavoidably, despite that we and God would choose to avoid it if we could) deal with it. In other words, what I'm saying is that given the choice between retaining a metaphysic with an omnipotent, omnibenevolent God whilst accepting the inexplicability (accept on some higher level) of evil, and switching to a dualistic metaphysic in which evil is explicable at our existing level of understanding, the latter is the more rational choice. Why would we accept the need for "mysteries" which we cannot understand when there is an alternative metaphysic with no such need?
  • Morning Fog, you write that when we understand love, "it makes all the evils we experience in this impossible short physical life feel like a damn mosquito bite". On the other hand, you also seem to put stock in the reports of NDErs. Unfortunately, many NDErs report the reality of hell, and that it can be a place of permanent residence. It is hard to reconcile the permanent suffering of hell with "a damn mosquito bite". Perhaps you discount those negative NDE reports, but, if so, then why do you not equally discount the NDE reports which describe the overwhelmingly powerful love in which you (and all of us, really) would like to believe exists, and which you (and all of us) would like to believe is ultimately and inevitably triumphant? Is consignment to hell in any sense a triumph for love?
  • Finally, to my main critique: both Morning Fog and Vault313 express the similar idea of (in Morning Fog's words) "God experiencing a limited experience though his/her/its creation" and which Vault313 elaborates on extensively in her post. Her main suggestion seems to be this: that a state of wholeness and perfection would be stifling or boring or lacking in growth or in some sense inadequate or unendurable, and thus that any being in such a state would drop out of that state into a state of imperfection which allows it to both grow and experience. OK, so, here are the problems that I see with this, expressed in the next couple of bullet points.
  • Firstly, the idea that a state of wholeness and perfection would be anything other than exactly what we would want to experience for all eternity! Why on Earth would we assume that it would be anything other than... well, perfect, and perfectly satisfactory? If we accept the reports of many NDErs at face value, then the love and unconditional acceptance in the afterlife is something that they would never want to leave, and would never feel dissatisfied with. So, there really doesn't seem to me to be much sense in the idea of a state of wholeness and perfection being dissatisfactory in any way, definitely not to the extent that a being in such a state would feel the need to introduce evil into its existence!
  • Secondly, the idea that a being in a state of wholeness and perfection would feel the need to "grow". What purpose could there be in such growth other than to develop towards the very state which it already possessed in the first place?! But OK, I'm assuming a state of perfection in the first place. Maybe there is no such thing, there is only "better and better". Fine, let's work with that: what plausible reason could a whole God have to better itself by introducing evil into its existence? I mean, I know that in the thread on Bernardo Kastrup's recent-ish Skeptiko appearance I expressed the idea of the One deliberately splitting into a duality of good/evil in order to facilitate its own evolution, in the sense of enhancing its capacity for (particularly and ultimately, positive) experience, through the arms race that occurs in war, but I see this as more of a toy idea because it seems to be particularly masochistic; it seems to be something that the One would do only if it were truly necessary, and I don't see the necessity. So, unless anybody can present a good reason for me to, then I simply can't accept that a Oneness which desired to evolve could find no way to do so other than by introducing evil into its existence.

OK, well, that's it. No offence intended, and no offence taken at equally critical responses. Thank you guys for sharing your perspectives.
 
Hi @Morning Fog and @Vault313,
  • Morning Fog, you write that when we understand love, "it makes all the evils we experience in this impossible short physical life feel like a damn mosquito bite". On the other hand, you also seem to put stock in the reports of NDErs. Unfortunately, many NDErs report the reality of hell, and that it can be a place of permanent residence. It is hard to reconcile the permanent suffering of hell with "a damn mosquito bite". Perhaps you discount those negative NDE reports, but, if so, then why do you not equally discount the NDE reports which describe the overwhelmingly powerful love in which you (and all of us, really) would like to believe exists, and which you (and all of us) would like to believe is ultimately and inevitably triumphant? Is consignment to hell in any sense a triumph for love? .
That is a bunch to digest Laird. Allow me to comment on this point first and perhaps when I have more time I will answer the others.
This one stood out to me the most anyway. What makes you think hell is a "permanent residence"? Where does that come from? I know many religions teach that to (IMHO) create fear and to usher in control to the common folk but I personally don't believe it. To me it is a lie. A lie I had believed for a long time. From my perspective, Hell is a state of mind and by acknowledging that we are loved beyond our comprehension (accepting Christ in the Christian world - which to me is the same thing) ... we can escape the hellish state in the afterlife. Again ... I am basing this on reading other people's experiences through NDEs, ADCs, and other seemingly spiritual phenomenon. And most of the negative NDEs I had read actually turned out well at the end of the experience.

However, If you have an NDE to share that suggests that we may suffer horrifically beyond our comprehension for an absolute eternity... by all means ... please share. I will be happy (well maybe not happy) to read it.
 
Hi Morning Fog,

I hope you aren't offended by my responding only to the part of your post that seems most relevant:

However, If you have an NDE to share that suggests that we may suffer horrifically beyond our comprehension for an absolute eternity... by all means ... please share. I will be happy (well maybe not happy) to read it.

Sure, no worries. Happy (not really) to share. These are the NDE accounts of hell on YouTube that I have personally bookmarked after watching them. As far as I recall, all of them support the idea that unless one calls out to God or repents in time, one is consigned there for eternity, but it's been a while since I watched most of them so I can't say that for sure for all of them. I had bookmarks of other similar YouTube videos which I've watched which unfortunately are no longer available. I have also watched others that I have not bookmarked. You can find many more if you simply search for them.

 
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Laird,
I always invite counter-opinions to my thoughts. The only time I get offended is when the only response is something along the lines of "that's stupid" or "pithy" (as I give Malf the side-eye for that one). I openly seek out counter points, to help me see the holes in my own thinking. So, definitely no offense taken.

First, on the issue of NDEs, I do take ALL accounts with a grain of salt. We all here would do well to remind ourselves that while these experiencers may have very well been to a dimension of expanded consciousness, they certainly aren't there now. And with that, all that they can recall is told through a human perspective with a human mind, and all of its limitations. Plus, you add to that the fact that often NDEs are filled to the brim with metaphor after metaphor. Do I believe Eben Alexander was really riding on the back of a giant butterfly? No. Do I think that the afterlife is full of grass that tastes like watermelon? No. There seems to be some sort of cross interpretation happening. Much like in dreams, where concepts are expressed in metaphor, so too are many NDEs. I'm not sure if this is really how the afterlife is, or if it's some sort of reckoning the brain is performing when trying to more or less translate a language it doesn't understand. So we must look upon all spiritual experiences as being subject to problems with perception. I think this is why we get so many different ideas.

Logic tells us that the NDE and even other spiritual experiences are some sort of halfway space. Things get really weird and difficult to understand and decipher. I think being "all the way dead" is likely vastly different than, a little bit or almost.


And I concur with Morning Fog re: hell. Nothing really appears to be a permanent state. And this can be applied to both the physical world and all the various interpretations of the spiritual realm. There's a saying: "This too shall pass". Meaning nothing is permanent. True reality, as it were, is sometimes described as nothing but a state of potentialities, by the spiritual "community" and theoretical physics, QM to be more precise. Whatever we envision for ourselves, will be. This goes back to us creating our own reality. Including hell. Why would someone do this? I don't know. I'd imagine it's a deeply personal issue for each individual. Self-worth is likely at play. This also harkens back to the notion of it being an "in between" state. Where the power of creation can be realized, but is being limited by a belief that is false. Essentially, they are creating their own limitations. They are not only creating their experience, but the limitations within that experience.

That's as far as I'm willing to venture a guess. Like I said, I'm almost 100% positive that "true reality" is complex and in some ways purposefully unknowable in our present state. My intuition tells me we have perhaps not even touched upon the tip of the iceberg as knowledge goes. Just like the human concept of love is woefully childlike, our understanding of true reality is probably downright embryonic!
 
Laird,
I always invite counter-opinions to my thoughts. The only time I get offended is when the only response is something along the lines of "that's stupid" or "pithy" (as I give Malf the side-eye for that one). I openly seek out counter points, to help me see the holes in my own thinking. So, definitely no offense taken.

First, on the issue of NDEs, I do take ALL accounts with a grain of salt. We all here would do well to remind ourselves that while these experiencers may have very well been to a dimension of expanded consciousness, they certainly aren't there now. And with that, all that they can recall is told through a human perspective with a human mind, and all of its limitations. Plus, you add to that the fact that often NDEs are filled to the brim with metaphor after metaphor. Do I believe Eben Alexander was really riding on the back of a giant butterfly? No. Do I think that the afterlife is full of grass that tastes like watermelon? No. There seems to be some sort of cross interpretation happening. Much like in dreams, where concepts are expressed in metaphor, so too are many NDEs. I'm not sure if this is really how the afterlife is, or if it's some sort of reckoning the brain is performing when trying to more or less translate a language it doesn't understand. So we must look upon all spiritual experiences as being subject to problems with perception. I think this is why we get so many different ideas.

Logic tells us that the NDE and even other spiritual experiences are some sort of halfway space. Things get really weird and difficult to understand and decipher. I think being "all the way dead" is likely vastly different than, a little bit or almost.


And I concur with Morning Fog re: hell. Nothing really appears to be a permanent state. And this can be applied to both the physical world and all the various interpretations of the spiritual realm. There's a saying: "This too shall pass". Meaning nothing is permanent. True reality, as it were, is sometimes described as nothing but a state of potentialities, by the spiritual "community" and theoretical physics, QM to be more precise. Whatever we envision for ourselves, will be. This goes back to us creating our own reality. Including hell. Why would someone do this? I don't know. I'd imagine it's a deeply personal issue for each individual. Self-worth is likely at play. This also harkens back to the notion of it being an "in between" state. Where the power of creation can be realized, but is being limited by a belief that is false. Essentially, they are creating their own limitations. They are not only creating their experience, but the limitations within that experience.

That's as far as I'm willing to venture a guess. Like I said, I'm almost 100% positive that "true reality" is complex and in some ways purposefully unknowable in our present state. My intuition tells me we have perhaps not even touched upon the tip of the iceberg as knowledge goes. Just like the human concept of love is woefully childlike, our understanding of true reality is probably downright embryonic!

Thanks, Vault313. I definitely agree that we have to take NDEs with a grain of salt, and with the reasons that you give for that suggestion.

That said, I'd like, if I may request it, for us to anyway take a closer look at the testimony of Bill Wiese in the video I shared in my last post. After first watching this video last year, I sent the following as part of an email to a couple of intelligent friends. Their responses didn't - to my satisfaction - resolve the question. If anybody is interested in offering their own resolution, I'd welcome it:

Laird in an email to friends said:
I can think of several different views to take on Bill's testimony in this video, yet I'm unable to decide which is correct. The specific opinion of yours that I'm most interested in is which, if any, of these (numbered) views you consider to be most likely to be correct, and, if none of them, then what you believe the most likely correct view actually is. (I realise that this is not an exhaustive list of possibilities, it's just a few of the main ones).


1. The whole thing is made up.

Problems:

* As Bill points out, it's hard to imagine that a guy in a comfortable job earning a lot of money would give it away to run around the world saying something that a lot of people are going to mock him for.
* Bill is supported by his wife. Of course, she could be in on it, but her support lends credibility.
* There are a bunch of other reports by a bunch of other people who have experienced similar things, and it's unlikely that they're all lying.


2. It's not entirely made up but significantly embellished.

Problems:

* Taking away any embellishments isn't going to reduce the force of the story that much anyway, so this alternative pretty much reduces to the first.


3. Bill's experience is exactly as he says it was, including that it was to a real place, and that God arranged it, but his Biblical framing is incorrect (and some other non-Biblical worldview within which all of this is consistent is correct).

Problem:

* Christ is a Biblical character, so, especially given God's involvement, an encounter with Christ implies Biblical reliability *unless* during that encounter, Christ had communicated something to the effect of "See here, Bill, the Biblical worldview in which you're interpreting the hell you've just experienced, the God who sent you there, and this encounter with me does not faithfully correspond to reality - here's the way it actually is"... which he didn't. (This is not a watertight assessment - it's possible to imagine reasons why a non-Biblical Christ would fail to communicate this, just not very easy to imagine plausible ones).


4. Everything, including the Biblical framing, that Bill says is true.

Problems:

* Many of Bill's defences to Biblically-related objections are very weak:

* For example, to the objection that it is inconceivable that a loving God would build such a place for humans, he responds that it wasn't actually built for humans, but rather for the Devil and his angels... as if this is any more compatible with a loving God! - particularly given Christ's injunctions to love your enemy and to turn the other cheek.

* For another example, to the objection that an infinite punishment for a finite crime is unjust, he responds that infinite punishment is justified by sins against an infinite God, but this strikes me as an ad-hoc rationalisation rather than a legitimate justification: surely punishment is proportional to harm caused, rather than to the character of to whom the harm is caused.

* Bill has a website, <http://23minutesinhell.com/>, with a FAQs section where you can read many of his other defences. His answer to #28, "Can’t God create another place for man’s soul besides hell?", seems to come down to "No, because He said He wouldn't" (actual quote: "God did all the creating He was going to do at creation (Gen.2:1). He will not violate His Word and make another place now"), but this is not an answer, it is an evasion: a true answer would have offered a plausible reason as to *why* God said that in the first place given the awful, unfair consequences implied by the question which He surely would have known.

* There are other difficult to resolve implausibilities about the Biblical worldview that aren't raised in either Bill's video testimony or in the FAQs on his website (nor, to be fair, by Bill's experience - at least not directly):

* For example, that Christ's sacrifice serves any pragmatic (as opposed to symbolic or demonstrative) purpose - how does the crucifixion of God's son effect our salvation? If God wanted our sins to be forgiven, then why didn't He just forgive them? I read most of C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity a short while after watching this video, and his best attempt to offer an explanation was very weak - he even admitted that he thought it was a mystery, the belief in which was more important than the understanding of, and that his best attempt was merely that - an attempt. This is how his attempt went, in my summarised paraphrasing: God became man in Christ so that He could learn what He could not otherwise know: how to surrender, submit, suffer and die - but perfectly - so that He could then help us in this process. I find it weak because I see no reason why an omniscient God could not otherwise know this.

* I won't list any more because this email is long enough, and because I don't think the recipients of this email need convincing on this score anyway, but there are plenty.

* There is also empirical evidence that throws the Biblical worldview into question:

* For example, Dr Ian Stephenson's research into children who remember past lives strongly suggests that at least sometimes, people reincarnate, which is inconsistent with the Biblical notion of everybody living once and then being judged and sent to heaven or hell.
 
Just to be clear about why I'm highlighting this particular testimony despite that I agree that we need to take NDEs with a grain of salt: it is because Bill specifically describes it as one which he both understood to be literal and which he believes God communicated to him also was meant to be understood literally.
 
Thanks, Vault313. I definitely agree that we have to take NDEs with a grain of salt, and with the reasons that you give for that suggestion.

That said, I'd like, if I may request it, for us to anyway take a closer look at the testimony of Bill Wiese in the video I shared in my last post. After first watching this video last year, I sent the following as part of an email to a couple of intelligent friends. Their responses didn't - to my satisfaction - resolve the question. If anybody is interested in offering their own resolution, I'd welcome it:

Oh boy. Ok. I watched as much as I could literally tolerate. His "experience " is so chock full of bible passages, it was hard to discern between what he was claiming as his "experience" and what was bible verse. I'm honestly not inclined to give too much more time to this other than 1) he is either lying or he believes what he is saying but it was basically a horrible dream. 2) if this is absolutely the truth, I beg for annihilation over this "hell" or whatever "heaven" would be with the psychotic God that calls this "love" or "justice".

Honestly, it absolutely reeks of your run of the mill "fear God" bullshit evangelism (highly profitable evangelism, btw). I mean no offense to you, Laird, but few things really get under my skin like this type of stuff.

I would never serve or praise any kind of God that would use the piss poor example of unconditional love as that described in the bible or by this man.
 
Thanks, Vault313. I appreciate your assessment. For what it's worth, the independent (of one another) assessments of each of my friends were that this experience was likely truthfully reported but was in fact some sort of projection of the subconscious in what might be perhaps described as a Jungian sense (not that I have studied Jung, but one of my friends has).
 
Just a brief follow-up: I don't want it to seem that because I "liked" Vault313's assessment of Bill's experience, and of the Bible and the Biblical God, and because I didn't object to either, they are assessments that I can or do accept without qualification. In particular, I find it hard to dismiss Bill's experience as a lie, because so many other people report so many similar experiences (the videos I shared above being only a small sample), and I also find it hard to dismiss Bill's experience as a bad dream or "Jungian projection" given that, as with many other reports of visions/OBEs/NDEs, he reports being in a heightened state of awareness, not a dull, dream-like one. I also think that the Bible and the Biblical God can make some sort of sense (and avoid our contempt) if we adopt a dualistic metaphysic, even though in other ways the Bible would seem to be incompatible with dualism.
 
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Thank you Laird, Vault and Morning Fog for making this to such a constructive discussion!

I never answered you, Laird, when you wrote in the "Satan, NDE and the Bible"-thread, but I have been giving it a lot of thought. I really appreciate your honesty and willingness to share your own experiences.

(I've already written some of what I believe about good and evil in both the above mentioned thread and in "I think I've found an answer", so I'll try not to repeat myself to much...)

I haven't completely digested all the material in this thread, but I would like to add a thought:
What if it isn't good (or good and evil) that is fundamental to reality - what if consciousness is the sole thing being fundamental? (It doesn't matter for this chain of thought if you also think matter/energy is fundamental.)
Then, as I see it, good and evil are only the natural consequences of consciousness developing in the direction of either trust or fear (lack of trust).
There are feedback-loops in both of these processes. There is also the aspect of the processes transforming the person, making it look like the person IS evil or good. Someone on the trust-path, will have much easier to continue this path, naturally caring for everything it encounters, while the one on the fear-path walks a painful and destructive road with a harder and harder time to trust. I believe that these processes applies to all consciousness, be it human or other beings with abilities far beyond ours.
Someone well on the trust-path will not likely turn from it. Someone on the fear-path, on the other hand, will destroy what is around him/her and thus be forced to either change path or walk further on the road of pain, often involving more and more people. I think a human far down the fear-process will likely either give up (and accept the situation thus making a change in the trust-direction or commit suicide) or try to get control over more and more of the surrounding (people and events). The trust-process is far more stable than the fear-process. This is one reason why it think it will prevail in the long run.

So, yes, I believe that evil exists. Not as something in itself fundamental to reality, but as a natural consequence to a choice of action that is always possible to make. And though there is evil now, I don't see that it has to be this way - good works perfectly well without evil, but that would require that we all always choose the trust(->acceptance->love->forgiveness)-path when we act (and I know that at least I am not there yet...). And the existence of evil does not necessarily mean that evil has any power against what is good.

I don't know if what I have written is understandable or makes sense to you, but I am afraid I can't write any clearer now, And if I don't post this I feel like I never will. So here I go...
 
Hi Morning Fog,

I hope you aren't offended by my responding only to the part of your post that seems most relevant:



Sure, no worries. Happy (not really) to share. These are the NDE accounts of hell on YouTube that I have personally bookmarked after watching them. As far as I recall, all of them support the idea that unless one calls out to God or repents in time, one is consigned there for eternity, but it's been a while since I watched most of them so I can't say that for sure for all of them. I had bookmarks of other similar YouTube videos which I've watched which unfortunately are no longer available. I have also watched others that I have not bookmarked. You can find many more if you simply search for them.



Oh boy. Where do I start? First I will say that there is no proof or even any strong evidence (at least from my perspective) that Hell is eternal from these videos even though they might have interpreted it that way. I suppose I could honestly say that there is no proof of the afterlife in general. However, there is strong evidence in that at least, not just from NDEs, but also from other experiences (OBEs, ADCs, mediums, past life regressions, etc. etc.). I have been reading books, testimonies, and videos of NDEs for a few years now. And I will say that the overwhelming majority of these experiences were all positive (Christian and non-Christian alike).

And, I'm sorry ... I have to take with a grain of salt anything that comes from Pat Robinson's 700 Club.

Anyway, here's what I take from these videos where they may have some consistencies from the other experiences I have viewed. These videos all had a Christian slant to all of them ... which is fine with me. A bunch of NDEs have a strong Christian component to them. I have a Christian background so I can certainly identify with that. So, when I view an NDE with a Christian slant ... I sometimes like to replace the word "Jesus" or "Christ" with love (again ... a word I am not satisfied with ... but I have to go with it for discussion sake). Anyway, when the word "love" is used instead of Jesus ... you we begin to see a more universal experience. So ... when the person says "I have to except "love" as my savior" instead of "Christ', things begin to make more sense where you can connect the non-Christian NDE experiences with the Christian NDE experiences.

As I said ... I was brought up Christian. And I still like to consider myself one. However, it is not the only way for the growth for your soul. Christ was simply an embodiment of love and for allowing love into your being, you are already raising your soul's vibration to where (I believe) can transcend your soul beyond any hellish experience after you pass on.

I still believe Christ was a real person and in respects to the embodiment of love, the son of God. However, most Christians (IMHO) don't understand fully Christ's mission. His mission was to help (save) humanity through His example. It is not about believing in Jesus and you go directly to heaven. It is the belief OF Christ and one must try to live by His example. That's where true "salvation" lies. And it may take close to eternity to get there, which may include a few incarnations to the physical world. However, that's okay. Our entire experience is a long journey. To what end? Who knows?

Think about it ... even from a Christian perspective. What will be the point to have a binary choice between heaven and hell? It never made much sense to me (even as a child) where we have an impossibly short physical life and during this ridiculously short life we have to make a choice. Quick make a choice now!! Jesus or no Jesus!! And if you choose the later ... you will burn, suffer in eternal anguish for an absolute eternity. And if you live with an indigenous tribe and you never even heard of Jesus ... well ... to damn bad! To hell you go! Does that really resonate with anyone???? Anyone? Even the evangelicals fail to grasp it fully. Believe me ... I have talked with many of them. Most of them really don't have a clue. They are like lemmings doing whatever their pastor tells them. It drives me nuts! So, if any of this hogwash is true then Christ's mission will be a complete failure if any one soul (even freaking Hitler) will have to spend an ETERNITY in any sort of Hell! Sorry ... rant over.
 
Thanks for weighing in, Mr Opti, and for your kind words. For the most part, you put forward some very sensible and holistic ideas. Rather than focussing on that with which I agree or see no fundamental problem then, I'd like to focus on that which gives me a little more difficulty:

What if it isn't good (or good and evil) that is fundamental to reality - what if consciousness is the sole thing being fundamental? (It doesn't matter for this chain of thought if you also think matter/energy is fundamental.)
Then, as I see it, good and evil are only the natural consequences of consciousness developing in the direction of either trust or fear (lack of trust).

Positing that consciousness is fundamental rather than that a duality is fundamental is just fine by me, so long as we accept (which you seem to) that somehow, a duality has arisen, and that (which I am not sure you accept) it exists at the highest spiritual levels. I have extreme difficulty believing that at these highest levels, spiritual/metaphysical evil is driven (merely) by fear or lack of trust. My experience of it at its highest (or, really, lowest!) spiritual level is that it is driven by delight in its own nature, and in the power which it wields over others. As far as humans go: sure, your hypothesis fits a lot of the time, at least for most everyday humans - but for some of the more extreme cases, especially those who explicitly make spiritual pacts with darkness, mere fear and lack of trust alone do not seem, in my view, to adequately explain what's going on. Again, in these cases, the motivation seems far more to be along the lines of greed, hunger for power and domination, and utter lack of concern for others except for the personal advantage that can be obtained out of them.
 
Oh boy. Where do I start? First I will say that there is no proof or even any strong evidence (at least from my perspective) that Hell is eternal from these videos even though they might have interpreted it that way. I suppose I could honestly say that there is no proof of the afterlife in general. However, there is strong evidence in that at least, not just from NDEs, but also from other experiences (OBEs, ADCs, mediums, past life regressions, etc. etc.). I have been reading books, testimonies, and videos of NDEs for a few years now. And I will say that the overwhelming majority of these experiences were all positive (Christian and non-Christian alike).

And, I'm sorry ... I have to take with a grain of salt anything that comes from Pat Robinson's 700 Club.

Anyway, here's what I take from these videos where they may have some consistencies from the other experiences I have viewed. These videos all had a Christian slant to all of them ... which is fine with me. A bunch of NDEs have a strong Christian component to them. I have a Christian background so I can certainly identify with that. So, when I view an NDE with a Christian slant ... I sometimes like to replace the word "Jesus" or "Christ" with love (again ... a word I am not satisfied with ... but I have to go with it for discussion sake). Anyway, when the word "love" is used instead of Jesus ... you we begin to see a more universal experience. So ... when the person says "I have to except "love" as my savior" instead of "Christ', things begin to make more sense where you can connect the non-Christian NDE experiences with the Christian NDE experiences.

As I said ... I was brought up Christian. And I still like to consider myself one. However, it is not the only way for the growth for your soul. Christ was simply an embodiment of love and for allowing love into your being, you are already raising your soul's vibration to where (I believe) can transcend your soul beyond any hellish experience after you pass on.

I still believe Christ was a real person and in respects to the embodiment of love, the son of God. However, most Christians (IMHO) don't understand fully Christ's mission. His mission was to help (save) humanity through His example. It is not about believing in Jesus and you go directly to heaven. It is the belief OF Christ and one must try to live by His example. That's where true "salvation" lies. And it may take close to eternity to get there, which may include a few incarnations to the physical world. However, that's okay. Our entire experience is a long journey. To what end? Who knows?

Think about it ... even from a Christian perspective. What will be the point to have a binary choice between heaven and hell? It never made much sense to me (even as a child) where we have an impossibly short physical life and during this ridiculously short life we have to make a choice. Quick make a choice now!! Jesus or no Jesus!! And if you choose the later ... you will burn, suffer in eternal anguish for an absolute eternity. And if you live with an indigenous tribe and you never even heard of Jesus ... well ... to damn bad! To hell you go! Does that really resonate with anyone???? Anyone? Even the evangelicals fail to grasp it fully. Believe me ... I have talked with many of them. Most of them really don't have a clue. They are like lemmings doing whatever their pastor tells them. It drives me nuts! So, if any of this hogwash is true then Christ's mission will be a complete failure if any one soul (even freaking Hitler) will have to spend an ETERNITY in any sort of Hell! Sorry ... rant over.

Thanks, Morning Fog, I really appreciate you taking the time to watch all of those videos and offer your view - there was quite a lot of material to sit through, so you were very kind to make the effort.

Re your final paragraph ("rant"! Really, it was perfectly on point) on Christianity: all of this makes a lot of sense, and it is for reasons like these which you raise that despite that I think that there's a lot of truth in Christianity, I have never been able to accept it - at least in its mainstream version - as the whole truth. One possible interpretation of the Gospels that I'm quite intrigued by, but which I haven't really explored much, is that of Paramahansa Yogananda, as reviewed in this article: The Yogic View of Jesus Christ. The basic contention is that Christ and his teachings are not just compatible but identical with the Indian yogic tradition.

Your observation that all of these videos had a Christian slant is of course undeniable. I have viewed one video of a hellish NDE which was not specifically Christian - it was based more in Buddhist mythology, in particular involving Yama, Lord of the Underworld. Unfortunately, when I researched it, I found that it was likely to be a forgery rather than a genuine account (and, indeed, the narrator was not the person who - supposedly - had the original experience, and the original experiencer was not even identified). One possible confounding factor is that in the English-speaking world, Christianity is the dominant religion, and thus, YouTube, which we access in the English language, is going to predominantly offer to us videos slanted to the Christian perspective.

Regarding your conclusion that "there is no proof or even any strong evidence (at least from my perspective) that Hell is eternal from these videos even though they might have interpreted it that way", I of course don't take issue with it as far as it is an honest expression of your opinion. That said, in most cases, that interpretation is the reasonable interpretation: it was quite clear to the experiencers in most of these experiences that they would (have) end(ed) up in his/her hellish experience permanently but for the fact that s/he had either called to God/Christ in time, or had been subjected to grace. As we all seem to agree, NDEs have to be taken with a grain of salt, and shouldn't necessarily be taken literally, but I'd like, if I may, to relate this back to my original argument, which was that permanent residence in hell is far from compatible with a mere mosquito bite. OK, so, let's grant your conclusion that these NDEs are not literal, and that the literal way that they are interpreted by their experiencers (i.e. that they were lucky not to have been permanently consigned to hell) is mistaken. Does this really make much difference to my point? What omnipotent, omnibenevolent God, given the choice to provide a positive, uplifting NDE of grace and unconditional love, would instead choose to scare the hell (in so many words) out of a vulnerable soul by making it seem like that person could potentially end up in a position of unimaginably awful, eternal suffering? In other words, how do these hellish NDE experiences - even if they are not to be interpreted literally - not pose serious problems for the view of an unopposed, unconditionally loving divinity which you and Vault313 would like to promote?
 
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