I have a few objections to this argument. First, I will focus on premise one. I do not see any reason why sad events, especially such events that are rendered as gratuitous evil, have to contain “good features”. In other words, an omnibenevolent, omnipotent, or omnipresent being is not automatically committed to construing every bad, evil situation or event with a perspective of good. I think that the God of the Judeo-Christian worldview is presented as emotive and relational. Thus, I do not see why this God would have to render events of gratuitous evil as containing “good features”, or is in need of proving that there are more “good features” outweighing the “bad features”. I think God can render these sad events as legitimately sad or as evidence of evil without compromising any of His omibenevolence, omnipotence, or omnipresence.

Now a common follow up objection will likely be, why then would God allow any of this evil in the first place? This brings me to my main objection to this argument, which is against premise two. I think that God was justified in creating beings with free will so that He could have relationship with them. In creating beings with this capability of free will, God created beings with the capacity for evil. I also think God was justified in having there be consequences for when free will is utilized against His will – for evil. Thus, I view these instances of sad events, evil, or even gratuitous evil as evidence of what is often termed as “original sin”. I do not think God views these events as good or as containing more “good features”, but rather as results of the reality that our world is not existing as it was intended to be – the consequence of exercising free will outside the will of God as conveyed in Genesis. In short, I am challenging premise two by suggesting that God views the presence of evil as evil, but also as a justifiable consequence.

To close, I will also defend that God can operate in such a manner and still remain omnibenevolent. I think God, in full recognition of the evil that is quite abundant in the fallen state of our world, would not have been justified in allowing humanity to suffer the consequences of evil for the rest of eternity. Thus, from a Christian perspective, God conquers death and evil and freely offers every being the opportunity of choosing, via faith, an eternity void of the consequences of evil – life as it was intended to be. However, this does not mean that evil, even gratuitous evil, will cease to exist on earth. Yet, the omnibenevolent, omnipotent, and omnipresent God manages to remain just and good by redeeming humanity from its justly deserved earthly consequences that were brought about by evil corrupting things as they were intended to be. Thankfully, from this perspective, things will not always remain this way.

Hi FordFestivaPhilosophy,

In response to your rephrasing of premise one, I don’t necessarily think it changes the overall meaning that much and could attribute some more clarity, so I appreciate the suggestion. For reasons I will touch on a bit later, I would still want to keep the inclusion of “misinterpretation” in there somewhere.

I understand how from what I posted, it could seem that the only criterion I am considering for evidence in the Bible is it’s direct mentioning of something, in this case, hell. With my original intent being to refute the modern, western Christian conception of hell, I think showing that such an interpretation is not actually mentioned directly in the Bible is a worthy thing to consider. This also brings in the commentary from @Ben Hancock regarding the valley of Himnon. I briefly mentioned awareness of this inclusion in the Bible and perhaps did not do it enough justice. While it is likely true that the mentioning of Himnon is not to draw attention to the specific valley itself, and that it very well could be paradigmatic for something resembling hell, I still stand by the fact that I do not think the mentions of Himnon are meant to resemble hell as it is commonly viewed in modern, western Christianity.

That being said, I also see the concerns of premise two providing implications that could be problematic for Christianity – there not being direct mentions of the trinity, omnipresence, etc. To those concerns I would offer that in premise one, I chose to include “misinterpretation” because of the fact that I feel the references that are commonly used to affirm the existence of hell are likely being interpreted incorrectly when hell is viewed as a place of eternal punishment and separation from God. While I can conceive of a world in which I feel completely separated from God, and that would likely be on par with the worst possible thing I could imagine, I do not think such a world actually exists (in reality), because I do not think there actually exists (in reality) a world in which we will be separated entirely from God. I could conceive of it, yes, but I believe it would be a false conception. I felt that “in reality” was implied, but I understand the critique of the original premise being too strong.

With that adjustment made to premise two in addition to the inclusion of “misinterpretation” in premise one, I do not think the implications are as problematic as originally thought. I would not consider, for example, the trinitarian concept of God to be a misinterpretation. While the actual concept of the trinity may not actually exist in reality in the same way that hell may not actually exist in reality, I think that the trinitarian concept is still very reflective of the character of God and could very well be the best that our minds can do to interpret the nature of God in this life. On the contrary, I would still argue that the modern, western Christian conception of hell that was originally being referenced in the post I was responding to not only fails to exist in reality, but is also a misinterpretation of the Bible.

Finally, though I do not know if I would commit myself to the annihilist view of hell, I do think that is a more plausible consideration than eternal suffering and separation from God. However, I think I am still more attracted to the view of hell that C.S. Lewis presents in “The Great Divorce” as mentioned in my original post.

Thanks for your objections and I look forward to anything more you have to say.

Hi Empedocles,

In response to your post, I wanted to give some push back on your second premise, “He [God] did create hell”. To the best of my knowledge, I do not actually think that there is any Biblical evidence for the fact that God created hell. Further, I think it is even worth considering that there may be reason to believe that hell is a human conception and a modern misunderstanding of what is contained in the Bible. Thus, I would like to propose that hell might only exist conceptually, and does not actually exist at all. If hell does not actually exist, then God did not create it, and He can still be all-loving

There are many interpretations of what hell is, if it does exist. However, I do not think it is right to group the term “hell” in with Judeo-Christian belief. For, I believe the Jewish faith does not promote the existence of hell. Rather they promote a belief in Sheol – a dusty abyss where everyone goes regardless of belief in God, righteous or unrighteous. Sheol translates to “grave” as opposed to hell, and from my understanding, is not eternal, nor absent from God (I can provide textual evidence for this belief from Job or the Psalms if you would like to discuss this particular topic further). From the Jewish conception of Sheol, the majority of souls eventually ascend into a heaven-esque representation of a resurrected Eden, with only the utterly wicked being sentenced to Gehinnom. Gehinnom is by some interpreted to be a bit more on par with the fire and brimstone renditions of hell, but even that is still murky and up for debate. Gehinnom does not translate directly to hell either, but rather represents a deep valley in Israel. The only Greek or Hebrew word that refers to “hell” is Tartarus, and this word only comes up once in 2 Peter to describe a realm where fallen angels, such as Satan, await judgment from God. However, this realm seems to be only for fallen angels, and not human beings. Thus, with this context in mind, it appears misguided to ascribe the concept of “hell” that I believe to be implied in premise 2 of the above argument to the Jewish faith, much less a concept of hell that was created by God.

Additionally, I think there are a fair amount of misconceptions about what “hell” actually is amongst Christians, and that the concept of hell may be misguided entirely that are not limited to the reasons previously mentioned. I understand that discussion of translation errors may seem unconvincing to some, so I would like to offer a reconceptualization of what hell is, if it does exist, that I am deriving from imagery C.S. Lewis portrays in The Great Divorce. In this novel, Lewis depicts hell as a dark gray city full of people who have chosen separation from God. How deep one is in this sort of hell relates to how much he is convinced that he is separated from God. The narrator of the story eventually comes to find that hell often appears large and inescapable to those who find themselves in it (as created by their minds), when in reality, the depicted city is, in reality, a tiny crack in the ground that is along the path to the “light” – what I understand Lewis to be depicting as heaven or the presence of God.

Thus, what Lewis appears to be portraying, and a thought that I find rather compelling, is that hell is a conception created in the mind of human beings who are convinced of their separation from God, and that does not actually exist. Separation from God could very well be the most miserable thing one could conceive of experiencing, thus the fire and brimstone types of descriptions seem apt if one were doomed to this condition for eternity. However, I do not see this conception of separation from God for eternity – hell – to be represented Biblically. And further, if Lewis is right, the existence of hell could very well be merely of human conception and not actually a truth about the world. Thus, from this understanding it can be gathered that if one believes hell to exist, he is the one who created hell, and it exists only within his mind. If it exists only conceptually within his mind, then God did not create hell because it does not actually exist at all.