The Role of Hell in the Gospel Message?

[mattrose]

Just to be clear, though it's not a big deal... you quoted 'Homer' and not 'Matt'

[Candlepower]

Oops.

Thanks for the claification, Matt. My bifocals must have slipped down my nose. It's hot here.

Homer, where you see Matt's name in my previous post on this thread, please insert your name.

[Homer]

Earlier on this thread I had commented to the effect that Thayer was being a bit disingenuous with his comments that suposedly prove that the teaching of hell was not part of the gospel message.

Candlepower replied:

I agree with you, Matt (Homer), that the brief accounts of evangelistic sermons by a few, in the Book of Acts, certainly don’t contain every thought expressed by the apostles as they went about preaching the gospel to the lost. But I don’t think Thayer is saying those brief accounts do contain an exhaustive record of that era.

I’ll give Thayer the benefit of the doubt and will assume he was not making an “assertion with evidence that is non-existent….” I don’t think he’s actually asserting what you think he’s asserting. I think he was careful to describe Acts as recorded history, and it seems what he said in sentence three is in terms of that recorded history. I don’t think he leaped to the unprovable conclusion that no Apostle ever preached "the torments of Gehenna."

I took a cursory look at Thayer's book and noticed he made the same type of deceptive conclusion with Jesus' words:

Though Gehenna occurs twelve times, the Savior actually used it only on four or five different occasions, the rest being only repetitions. If this is the word, and the revelation of this terrible doctrine is in it, how is it possible that Christ, in a ministry of three years, should use it only four times? Was He faithful to the souls committed to His charge?

Thayer can not possibly know how many times Jesus spoke of gehenna in three years. He bases his claims on the gospels having an account of everything Jesus said while it is obvious they are only a condensed version. And Thayer went on to use the "gehenna the burning garbage dump" myth as support for his arguments. Here are a few examples:

These wicked people should perish in a manner as infamous as that of criminals, whose bodies, after execution, were cast into Gehenna (hell), and burned with the bodies of beasts and the offal (waste parts (including those butchered animals), refuse, rubbish, etc.) of the city.

Here is a mixed reference, figurative and literal, to the valley of Hinnom, Gehenna, hell. There is a literal allusion to casting the dead bodies of criminals into the valley, to be burned in the perpetual or unquenchable fire kept up there for this purpose;

James says of the tongue, "It defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell" (Gehenna). 3:6. Here Gehenna, that place of filth and corruption and perpetual fires, is made a fitting emblem of the foul passions and corrupt appetites, set on fire by a foul and seductive tongue, which inflames in turn, to the defilement of the whole body.

I can not see how any Berean would be impressed with Thayer's work.

I'm very busy this week; I hope that I will have time soon to show why I find it implausable to believe the apostles never preached of hell; it is implied in their words.

[mattrose]

In large part, I agree with your complaint Homer. Scholars should be careful about making it sound as if what we see in Scripture is the sum total of what Jesus and/or the Apostles said. Clearly the words of Jesus that we are given in the 4-fold Gospel are highlights, carefully selected key points. The same goes for the rest of the New Testament. Each author selected certain topics and stories to write about particular to their purposes.

That being said, though his wording could be better, I highly doubt Thayer is actually insisting that Jesus only used the word Gehenna on 4 or 5 occasions. I think what he is getting at is that the Gospel authors didn't feel this was a key component of His teaching. They didn't emphasize it because Jesus didn't emphasize it. Luke didn't emphasize 'hell-fire' preaching in Acts because the Apostles didn't emphasize 'hell-fire' preaching in Acts on their mission.

And any argument against that is clearly an argument from near silence, isn't it?

[steve]

It is true that we don't have the complete sermons of all the apostles recorded in Acts. However, it seems that Luke has endeavored to preserve the germ of their messages. For us to suggest that any particular element was present in their preaching which is nowhere recorded in scripture would be a case of our importing our own ideas of what we think they ought to have said, and assuming they agreed with us. Thayer's (or anyone else's) statements about what the apostles "never" said should be understood with the implied qualification: "...as far as the record shows." Beyond the record, no one is qualified to speculate reliably.

[anochria]

Regardless of hell, it seems that there is certainly a place for judgment in our presentation of the gospel (and precedent in scripture) and that topic ought to evoke some fear. I'm not saying its a primary component to the gospel message, but I think in our haste to avoid fire-and-brimstone messages, we may be throwing some baby out with our bath water.

[Roberto]

Regardless of hell, it seems that there is certainly a place for judgment in our presentation of the gospel (and precedent in scripture) and that topic ought to evoke some fear. I'm not saying its a primary component to the gospel message, but I think in our haste to avoid fire-and-brimstone messages, we may be throwing some baby out with our bath water.

That's a good point. It always bugs me when people assume that because the word hell is not found, that the concept is not there in another form, such as in Acts where Paul speaks of the day of judgment.

[mattrose]

Surely 'Judgment' and 'Judgment Day' is part of the preaching message. I don't remember if anyone is this thread denied this. But I would assume that most everyone who makes the point that 'hell' isn't found in Acts has no problem with mention of judgment.

[Homer]

But how can we believe judgement was preached without mentioning consequences?

Unless we view the sermons in Acts as being no more than a synopsis of what was said then we must conclude that the apostles were extremely economical with their words. For example, in Acts 17 we find what is described as a sermon by Paul to the Gentiles at Mars hill, yet Luke records it in ten verses. That's less than a minute and a half of speaking, and he warns a future judgement of the world. Then we find in Acts 24:24-25:

Acts 24:24-25
New King James Version (NKJV)

24. And after some days, when Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was Jewish, he sent for Paul and heard him concerning the faith in Christ. 25. Now as he reasoned about righteousness, self-control, and the judgment to come, Felix was afraid and answered, “Go away for now; when I have a convenient time I will call for you.”

So Luke summarizes Paul's sermon, or evangelizing, of Felix and Drusilla with no more than part of one sentence! And we see that Paul again spoke of judgement to come in such a manner that Felix became freightened (emphobos, literally in fear, terrified). It seems obvious that Paul warned of the consequences of that judgement, and that he warned of hell, or something(?) equally terrifying. If not hell, what?

[Candlepower]

Homer asked

If not hell, what?

Total speculation, of course, but if Paul had some knowledge of the upcoming events of AD 70, he might have spoken to them about that. Since Drusilla was a Jew, it certainly would have terrified her. Just a thought.