I’ve decided to start a little series on Biblical literalism, since that seems to be at the heart of much of the disagreement in the church. I’ll admit now that I’m not a literalist. So much of the bible was clearly written to be taken as allegory, hyperbole, metaphor, etc. that I can’t imagine how annoyed the authors would be if they knew their words are being taken literally. On the other hand, I don’t believe in just throwing out passages that I don’t like. It’s quite easy to just ignore something we don’t like, but I think the Word of God is revealed most strongly when we find the Gospel hidden in a difficult passage. One of Luther’s great realizations happened when he did exactly this, his understanding of external righteousness came from studying a passage that he felt he just could not accept.
This brings me to my topic today, Hell. I don’t claim to be a Universalist, but I don’t feel a need to refute Universalism either. If Hell exists, I hope that no one ever goes there. My interpretation of the bible in its context suggests that there is something like hell that Jesus is talking about, my faith doesn’t rest on this idea, so usually I don’t bother with it. If the New Testament is read literally, there is no hell. Let me repeat that to make it extra clear, in a literal reading of the New Testament (in Greek) hell is not mentioned. Think I’m wrong? Well read on:
