Who's Going to Hell?

We have all heard pronouncements of condemnation by conservative and Religious Right Christians announcing God's judgement of an eternity in Hell on persons and minority groups whose "lifestyle" they don't agree with.  This is usually based on a cherry-picking of Old Testament Law that corresponds with their own cultural biases and used in the service of prejudice and bigotry to villify, exclude, and persecute those who don't fit the cultural and social norms of their religious denomination, sect, or movement.  I would like to take some time to explore why this is a gross misrepresentation of the "Way of Christ" given in the teachings and stories of Jesus in the Gospels.  Once I have covered this, I would then like to look at what the Gospels would tell us if we did take the metaphor of Hell literally.  What if Jesus is actually going to send some people to Hell?  If it were true that Jesus is indeed literally going to pass judgement on each of us in the next life, then, given what and who he condemns in the Gospels, who would he send to eternal punishment and suffering?

Unfortunately, the history of Christianity beginning with the Holy Roman Empire founded by Constantine is rife with the use of the literalization of Hell by those in power to control and in many cases oppress.  Both Church Authority and Christian States have used the threat of damnation to enforce compliance to their rule.  

Christian Monarchs of Europe and Britain followed the precedent of the Holy Roman Empire and reinterpreted Christianity as an ideology to reinforce their legitimacy and political control.  This is best seen in the doctrine of, "the Divine Right of Kings".  This creed held that those in power have Divine sanction and to question or oppose them is to question or oppose God Himself.  The reasoning was that if God controls and directs the activity of man, then anyone who comes to power must have been put there at the will of God and have His authority.  So, anyone who defied or questioned those in political authority were defying God and could be threatened with punishment not only in this life, but also with eternal punishment in the next.  Christianity became in many cases a gospel of control and oppression rather than transformation and life

However, the literal Hell narrative is not the point of the writings of the New Testament. I would argue that this narrative takes the scriptural texts out of context and is not faithful to the intent of the authors.  A literal interpretation points to an actual afterlife where one's identity and memories live on without a body, where one is sent to either one of two regions, one of bliss, or one of torture, depending on one's moral behaviour. This is figurative language used to discuss what is legitimate and laudable and brings "life" as opposed to what is destructive and brings a kind of "death".  Actions stemming from love, compassion, and inclusion create a circle of life where further actions in the same vein are encouraged to grow, a wholeness that continues on even after the individual is gone.  The same is true of the vicious cycle that can be produced by actions of selfishness, hatred, and exclusion.  It is these cycles of "good"or "evil" that create patterns of behavior that continue on after the individuals are gone that are a kind of afterlife, one that can be a heaven, or a hell.

So, what about all those references in the Gospels to an afterlife, you might ask.  To begin with, you have to remember that Jesus was a Jewish Rabbi and wisdom teacher who belonged to post-exilic Rabbinical Judaism.  He and his early followers saw themselves as thoroughly part of that religion and tradition.  Wisdom teachers in that tradition frequently used the telling of popular stories, parables, and myths with their own twist in order to make a point, or bring a different perspective to light.

Epic of Gilgamesh

One of the best examples of this from the Tanakh, the Hebrew Scriptures, is the story of Noah, which is a retelling of the story of the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, fragments of which have been found on tablets dated around 2,000 B.C., and which was also retold by the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians.  This story was never meant to portray a factual account of some literal historic event.  Its importance is in the way it was retold and interpreted by the Hebrew people.  
http://www.skeptic.com/reading_room/flood-myths-who-believes-in-noahs-ark-and-why/
Secondly, one needs to be aware that an afterlife was not a theme in the Rabbinical Jewish tradition that Jesus and his followers belonged to.  After death was only sheol, the grave.  The Hebrew tradition and the Tanakh is all about the people's Covenant and relationship with God in life.  I can only imagine that they steered clear of any suggestion of an afterlife in reaction to the prominent place the idea held in the religion of their oppressors in Egypt.  As a result, the closest thing to an afterlife in the Tanakh is where Elijah is taken up to heaven in a whirlwind.  However, he didn't experience a life beyond death, he just didn't die.

There are only two references in the Old Testament that could be said to refer to an afterlife and these are Persian influenced references to a resurrection in some future time rather than an immediate transition to another conscious reality at the point of death. The first is: “Thy dead shall live, my dead bodies shall arise, awake and sing, ye that dwell in the dust, for thy dew is as the dew of light, and the earth shall bring to life the shades” (Isaiah 26:19); and the second: “And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to reproaches and everlasting abhorrence” (Daniel 12:2).

Outside of the Rabbinic Literature, there is a doctrine in Jewish eschatology of Resurrection, where in a future age the dead will rise from their graves to live again.  This idea was closely associated with the doctrine of the Messiah and would be a ready store of allusions for the Gospel writers who cast Jesus in the Messiah role.

Stories and myths about an afterlife in Jesus time, mainly came from other religions and traditions; the Egyptian stories of the Field of Reeds where the soul went to enjoy a continued existence without sickness or disappointment for eternity, or the Greek myths of Hades where there were different planes of existence the dead could inhabit depending on how they had lived their life on earth.  The Roman city of Sepphoris, the capital of the Galilee province, was a hotbed of Hellenistic culture.  This city was only five kilometers away from Nazareth.  Jesus and his audience would have been quite familiar with the Greek stories about an afterlife.

Like the good Jewish wisdom teacher he was, Jesus used the popular stories, myths and ideas his audience was familiar with, giving them his own twist to illustrate his ideas and perception of reality. The writers of the Gospels did the same thing using allusions to these stories in their metaphorized accounts of Jesus' life and actions.  Marcus Borg in his writing uses the example of the parable of the prodigal son to demonstrate how a story in Scripture does not have to be literal in order to illustrate truths.  No one would say that because the family in the parable were not literal historical figures and that the narrative told is not a recording of actual historical events that the point it was meant to illuminate is not "true".  Many Christians, however, do not seem able to accept metaphor and allegory in the Scriptures where the text is not clearly identified as being a parable.

So what references to these stories from other cultures and religions about an afterlife were made in the Gospels?  There is the example of Jesus' parable of the rich man and Lazarus in the Gospel of Luke.  In this parable, the rich man and Lazarus both die and experience an afterlife where they are judged and sent to different planes of existence dependent on how they had lived their life on earth like in the Greek myths of Hades.  This is obviously a parable and shows up in Luke among a collection of parables.  It doesn't make sense to interpret it as Jesus giving a science lesson on the actual workings of what happens when people die.  The point being illustrated is that wealth and luxury are not rewards from God to the righteous and that failure to look after the poor and suffering is worthy of punishment (or, at least, that's how I interpret it).

Part of the narrative of a non-figurative Hell includes the characterization of Jesus as having come as judge, to mete out punishment to the many, and provide salvation to the few.  In this theology, after a person has died and their personality and memories have passed into an alternate reality not observable by our own, Jesus is portrayed as sitting in judgment over the person on which level of Hades they will reside, or to decide if that person merits the Field of Reeds, Heaven.  

In modern conservative Evangelical Christianity, the deciding factor is what you have allowed yourself to be convinced is factual.  The first condition is that you be convinced intellectually that there is a literal God, an all powerful sentient being that can read your mind and presides over the alternate dimension experienced at death.  Secondly, you must be convinced that the legal system of this narrative is also true and just, and that you have transgressed against it and are deserving of punishment.  And thirdly, you must be remorseful about this transgression and wish to be pardoned.  One can then gain forgiveness by asking that Jesus' death be accepted as payment on your behalf.  However, one must refrain from a, "lifestyle", that is out of compliance with those Old Testament laws that whichever Christian denomination or sect you have joined have determined God still endorses as opposed to the others.  This is a somewhat convoluted theology which may be a helpful model for some people.  However, it is not reflective of the themes of judgment and salvation in the Gospels.

Judaism of the second Temple period thought of Salvation in more of a corporate than personal fashion.  The concept of Salvation was tied to the restoration of the state of Israel and rescue from national enemies.  This was especially relevant in Jesus' time with the conquest and occupation by Roman forces. The Jews of the first century expected to be rescued from foreign dominion. Looking to texts such Deuteronomy 4:32, Isaiah 40:1-2, and Jeremiah 31:27-40,  many believed that this would only occur after they suffered a purification process for past breaches of their covenant with God.  As such, they looked for an immediate earthly wrath and judgment by God on the people of Israel where, as John the Baptist put it, "every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire" (Luke 3:9).  This was an earthly process for the living and had nothing to do with one's existence after death.  In the Gospels, John the Baptist identifies Jesus as the awaited Messiah that would carry out this process on God's behalf.

"But one who is more powerful than I will come...His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.” (Luke 3:15-18)

The people asked John what they should do (to be saved from this immediate earthly purification).  His answer did not involve any of the Evangelical narrative above.  He told them that, "Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same".  To the tax collectors he instructed that they not, "collect any more than you are required to".  To the soldiers he advised, "Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely". 

So, the, "Good News of Salvation", in this section of the Gospels, is that there is a way for the people of Israel to escape the coming earthly judgment and purification necessary before their salvation from foreign domination.  The key to this salvation is through practicing generosity, social equality, honesty and justice.

Now, let us turn to the subject of the title of this blog.  Given the teachings of Jesus and the stories about him in the Gospels, who would he, "send to Hell", or, more accurately, what behaviours did he view as meriting punishment?  To begin with, this would include those actions that are the opposite of those John the Baptist cited to the people as the path to save themselves from the Messiah's earthly purge: greed, such as not sharing ones wealth with those in need to the level of equality, corruption, such as using position to extort or take advantage of others, and dishonesty, such as giving false testimony.  

Jesus is given in the Gospels as affirming John's route to escaping the Messiah's judgment and as confirming his displeasure with those who do not follow this direction. One of my favorite sections from the Gospels comes from the 21st chapter of Matthew where, in response to the Chief Priests and Elders questioning of his authority, he tells them a parable about two sons. At the request of their father to work in the vineyard, one son says he will not go, but changes his mind and later does, while the other initially says he will go, but in the end does not. When the Chief Priests and Elders identify the first as doing what his father wanted, Jesus responds with one of my favorite verses, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did.“ 

Next, let us look at the parable that is given in the sixteenth chapter of the Gospel of Luke about the Rich Man and Lazarus.  As mentioned earlier, this is one of texts that literalists draw their narrative on Hell from.  However, it is obviously a parable using the Greek myth of Hades as a vehicle and is placed in the chapter between other stories told by Jesus that no one questions as being parable. 

In the parable, both a rich man, who lived in luxury every day, and the beggar Lazarus, who lived at his gate, die, are judged, and sent to different planes of existence dependent on how they had lived their life on earth like in the Greek myths of Hades.  The place where the rich man ends up is actually called Hades, ᾍδης, ου, ὁ, in the original Greek texts of the Gospel, the same word used in the original Greek myths.  Jesus does however give a Hebrew twist to the story by having Father Abraham the one in charge in the next realm.

Now, in the story, the rich man isn't so much presented as being punished for his greed and lack of humanity in not sharing his wealth with Lazarus, as much as being subject to a kind of cosmic Karma.  When the rich man asks Father Abraham for pity and relief from his torment he is told:

But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony." (Luke 16:25)

So it appears that Jesus is proposing that if you live in inequality where you reserve the good things in life for yourself, not sharing them equally with others, you will at some point experience bad things in proportion so that there is a balance.  Not quite the message we are used to in the popular representation of Jesus and his teaching.  However, the theme is quite a common one in Greek Myth and Tragedy.  In these stories, rising too high risks gaining the notice of the gods and being knocked off one's perch like Oedipus.  In this case, Jesus would seem to be condemning inequality and hoarding resources to live in luxury while others live in deprivation.

Aside from social inequality, the thing Jesus is least tolerant of in the Gospels is self righteous legalism.  He condems those who consider themselves to be better or set apart from others due to strict observance of moral and Religious laws and who believe by their adherence to the letter of these laws that they have reached the limits of what God, compassion and empathy, requires of them and can demand blessing and reward in return.  This way of thinking was exemplified in Jesus time by the Jewish sect of the Pharisees.  Jesus was in no way shy in his insults towards this group for this mindset and the actions it produces.

43 “Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and respectful greetings in the marketplaces.44 “Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which people walk over without knowing it.”45 One of the experts in the law answered him, “Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also.” (Luke 11:43-45 NIV)

27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness. (Matthew 23:27-28 NIV)

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. (Matthew 23:13 NIV)

All this condemnation aside, who might be worthy of punishment is not the point of the Gospels.  The principle aspect of Jesus' teaching is his portrayal of God, what is legitimate, as primarily compassionate, generous, merciful, and inclusive, and that we are called to emulate this nature.  The main issue Jesus has with the Religious Leaders and Authorities is that they claim to represent God while not demonstrating these qualities and for excluding others in God's name.

So, given all this, who would Jesus, "send to Hell", or see as first in line in deserving of punishment?  Ironically, it would be those of us who censure and exclude others and pronounce them as condemned to Hell for not following Religious Law, or not following it to the same degree as ourselves.  The, "kingdom of heaven", is manifest whenever we live under the authority of God, the authority of love, compassion, and mercy, and no one is excluded, not even legalists and pharisees.