there is something I was going to post on the claim "people choose hell", a further insane argument in favor for the doctrine of everlasting torment.
I came across this quote in a forum:
"I just know that hell is real, and we have a choice as to whether or not we go there. What would really be cruel is for there NOT to be a choice."
I hope the poster is not offended, if he will read that I used this quote.
Think about these words, would it be cruel if there were no choice between everlasting bliss and everlasting suffering? Why would it be cruel? Who would choose everlasting torment rather than everlasting bliss, if he had actually a choice?
I will show where this argument lacks, both rational and scriptural:
They say, who refuses to believe in Jesus chooses willfully hell, and with hell they mean a place or state of everlasting conscious torment. This argument might halfway, though not at all fit on professed atheists, antichrists, Satanists but it doesn't fit e.g. on Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Agnostics and members of other religions.
Sincere Jews and Muslims might live a more pious life than many who profess to be Christians; they might love "their God" more than many Christians love God. According to mainstream Evangelical doctrine they will be sent to hell together with the Satanists.
The Muslim did not choose hell, he thought he would go to paradise and get 70 virgins, and if there were such a big choice, why should God at least not grant him the 70 virgins? According to the bible a woman can be bitterer than death (Ecclesiastes 7:26), then how much more 70 women? (Please forgive my cynicism).
The Jew as well did not choose hell, he thought he would spend eternity with the God of his fathers, with the prophets and with Abraham, but they say he willfully choose hell, but did he? – For me the answer is clear.
Concerning agnostics, esoterics or humanists, some of them just do not believe in a God at all, at least not in a personal God, but some secular people or esoterics believe in an afterlife, they hope to see their relatives after death etc.; you can't (willfully) choose hell, when you do not believe in hell or in a God who is going to send people there.
The humanist who tried to live a moral life according to his own moral conscience did not choose to suffer everlastingly hereafter. People who commit suicide did not choose to suffer hereafter without end - even worse than they did here.
To claim people willfully choose to suffer everlastingly is ridiculous and insane, well there might be Satanists and masochists who actually would willfully choose hell, but here comes the question, why should God grant their wish? Would God keep Satanists everlastingly alive suffering according to their wish while they blaspheme Him throughout all eternity?
These thoughts and claims, when thought to the end are grotesque, blasphemous and devilish.
And why the choice between heaven and hell and not between live and death?
Those who call themselves Christians often contrast heaven and hell, but the bible does this very rarely, not more than a handful of verses and only sheol and heaven.
Job 11:8 is the only verse where heaven and sheol are directly contrasted:
It is as the heights of heaven; what wilt thou do? deeper than Sheol; what canst thou know?
But sheol is not the type of hell as modern Christianity says:
1 Samuel 2:6
Jehovah killeth, and maketh alive; he bringeth down to Sheol, and bringeth up.
Scripture more often contrasts heaven and earth, life and death.
Deuteronomy 30:15-19
See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil, in that I command thee this day to love Jehovah thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, that thou mayest live and multiply, and that Jehovah thy God may bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it. But if thy heart turn away, so that thou wilt not hear, but shalt be drawn away, and thou shalt bow down to other gods and serve them; I denounce unto you this day that ye shall surely perish; ye shall not prolong your days upon the land whereunto thou passest over the Jordan to possess it. I call heaven and earth to witness this day against you: life and death have I set before you, blessing and cursing: choose then life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed.
Now if there would actually be a choice, why not the choice between life and death?
The bible does not teach the inherent immortality of men's soul or spirit, if God would grant men their choices why should He not grant them the choice of death if they want, why only the choice between heaven and hell, why not the choice between heaven, hell and death?
Why should the possibility to choose cease with death? If God respects the will of men, why no longer after death, if men can choose and God grants their wish, why should the people in heaven afterwards not have the choice to choose hell, if they see all their friends have chosen hell, why should the people in hell no longer have the choice to choose heaven?; to have a fair choice, you need to know all possibilities; and why should the people both in heaven and hell not have the choice to choose death, if they don't like both?
I think I have shown that the idea that people choose hell is preposterous, if there would be a choice, the choice would be life and death according to God's words in the Torah.
If there is actually a choice would be another topic; "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,…" (John 15:16).