Annihilationism
by Dr. Norman Geisler
(from Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics, Baker, 1999)

Annihilationism is the doctrine that the souls of the wicked will be snuffed out of existence rather than be sent to an everlasting, conscious hell. The existence of the unrepentant will be extinguished, while the righteous will enter into everlasting bliss.

I don’t accept traditional doctrine of hell (eternal life of punishment), sometimes it is assumed I must either be universalist or annihilationist (I am neither). I object to being labeled an annihilationist primarily because the term annihilation is a straw man. Not only is the word annihilation absent from the scriptures; it is not even part of the human experience. In science class, I learned that matter is apparently neither created, nor destroyed (annihilated). According to scientific knowledge, if someone detonated a large thermonuclear weapon on my head, all the particles and energy of me would still be floating around for a very, very, long time. If one were to be more verbally accurate, one would perhaps describe me as destroyed. One might say that I was annihilated, but only using the word as hyperbole; because annihilation means to cause to cease to exist (materially) in the universe.

Only God could truly annihilate something materially or nonmaterially, but I don’t know if anyone has actually suggested that he intends to do so. (If metaphysically, then he would have to also annihilate parts of the scriptures.) I am not talking about the wicked being snuffed out of existence; I’m just talking about the wicked being snuffed out personally, becoming unaware of their existence, in other words, dead as a doornail. With this contention of terms before us, let us examine the support Geisler provides from scripture for annihilation, before we conclude, as Dr. Geisler did in Answering Arguments from Scripture, that:

When examined carefully in context, none of the above passages proves annihilationism. At some points language may permit such a construction, but nowhere does the text demand annihilationism. In context and comparison with other Scriptures, the concept must be rejected in every case.

No, the texts do not demand annihilationism, Geisler is the one demanding annihilationism, he doesn’t look to these scriptures for what they plainly state. Instead Geisler is engaged in setting up and knocking down a straw man. Its annihilation or nothing, novelty verses tradition, there is no search for the black and white truth.

"The Second Death." Annihilationists point to the Bible references to the fate of the wicked as "the second death" (Rev. 20:14) in support of their view. Since a person loses consciousness of this world at the first death (physical death), it is argued that the "second death" will involve unconsciousness in the world to come.

"Everlasting Destruction." Scripture speaks of the wicked being "destroyed." Paul said: "This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power" (2 Thess. 1:7b-9). Annihilationists insist that the figure of "destruction" is incompatible with a continued, conscious existence.

"Perdition." The wicked are said to go into(KJV) or (NIV) (2 Peter 3:7), and Judas is called the "son of perdition" (John 17:12). The word perdition (apoleia) means to perish. This, annihilationists argue, indicates that the lost will perish or go out of existence.

There are many more scriptures than that, which do not fit Geisler’s model of hell, which will be discussed later. For now my argument centers around the meaning of a few common words like life and death; and the meaning of quite a few scriptures in reference to these things. For God only has immortality (I Tim 6:16), Sinners do not have eternal life (Romans 5:23), but it is the gift of God brought to light in Christ Jesus, (II Tim 2:10), I affirm the serpent lied when he said, "Ye shall not surely die." (Gen 3)

The above argument also mentions several words which are actually one. It is a Greek word: Apoleia, from apollumi; destroy; destruction; perdition; perish; lost; etc. etc. etc. But I don’t need a lexicon or Strong’s Concordance to understand what Jesus meant by apoleia, because the Lord Jesus Himself used the word in a context where I need have no doubt what He meant by it.

The Lord Jesus used it this way, "If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee, for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish (apoleia) and not that thy whole body should be cast into Gehinnom (Hellfire)." (Matthew Ch. 5) Jesus here uses apoleia to describe the condition of a severed hand or plucked out eye; something that is Insensate, Unconscious, Dead. So whatever the lexographers like to say about it not meaning annihilation(straw man), it does involve the idea of loss of sensation(the hand) and of perception(the eye) and of continued consciousness of those members.

A severed hand or eye cannot go on living without its source of life, the body. When the body dies. the body is no longer conscious. So it is when a soul is destroyed; when it is truly severed from its source of life, (God) it cannot go on living, but withers and dies, it is not snuffed out of existence, but as a plucked out eye can no longer carry on the action of sight, and a body once dead is unconscious, so a soul, when finally cut off from God, can no longer go on being a working vessel of the higher order of life, which is conscious being.

In Acts 17:28 Paul is addressing the unredeemed, affirming that, "in him we live, and move, and have our being;" Acts 17:28. If by him we have our life, movement, and being; then to be utterly without him is to have neither life, nor movement, nor being. The reason I mention that they were unbelievers is that Geisler is going to try to tell us that this condition we call life is actually, "spiritual death" which, in his view constitutes the very essence of death - eternal life without God..

In the traditional doctrine, hell is where death must be re-defined as eternal life of punishment. Where death is non-death, a fate, perhaps, worse than death, but certainly, death is not dying, nor life living. They construe Life and Death to be mere symbolic constructions reflecting eternal bliss or eternal torment. This voids the scriptures, the only reason this is necessary, is to defend the ancient and truly damnable heresy; that man’s soul is innately immortal, and will live forever. "Ye shall not surely die." saith the serpent. (Gen 3)

When examined carefully in context, none of the above passages proves annihilationism. At some points language may permit such a construction, but nowhere does the text demand annihilationism. In context and comparison with other Scriptures, the concept must be rejected in every case.

Of course none of the passages prove annihilationism. As I pointed out before, demanding that one prove annihilation is a straw man. There are no proof texts for the doctrine of the immortal soul, there are only contradictory texts. It is very easy to say none of these texts prove annihilation, but what do they actually teach then?

As I will show, none of his texts demand or prove the traditional doctrine of hell (eternal life of punishment) in fact, many texts are exclusive to the idea. There are no texts which exclude my understanding of eternal punishment, which is the second death (as will be demonstrated); or of temporal punishment (hell, if you please)

Separation, Not Extinction. The first death is simply the separation of the soul from the body (James 2:26), not the annihilation of the soul.

I could, by the same illogical reasoning, say, "The first death is the separation of the soul from the body, not the eternal torment of the soul." We cannot deny a second death’s being deadly to the soul, by simply affirming that the first death is not annihilation of the soul. James does not say what Geisler says, James says "As the body without the spirit is dead so faith without works is dead" These verses describe life and death better, "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." I do not say God extinguishes life; I say he takes it away, "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return unto God that gave it."(Eccles 12:7) . The spirit without the body is still life to the soul and after death both return to God for judgement of the soul (Heb 9). But in the second death the soul is destroyed with the body, As Paul noted, the word of God is quick powerful and sharper than a two-edged sword, even to, "the dividing in sunder of soul and spirit." And "For Tophet (the place of gehinnom) is ordained of old, for the king it is prepared, he hath made it deep and large, the pile thereof is fire and much wood, the breath of the Lord of Hosts, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it " At the second death the soul is destroyed (Matt 10:28) and I assume, as in the first death, the spirit returns to God who gave it, because the spirit without the soul is not a personal being, (add scripture) and a soul without the spirit cannot be a living soul.(cp. Gen 3) God does not annihilate life; he takes it away, he takes it back.

Be not mistaken, the first death is not "simply the separation of the soul from the body," the first death is the death of the body alone, this is manifest and true, the first death is the death of the body only. Geisler is trying to lead us to understand death in this way: that the first death is the separation of the soul from the body and the second death is the separation of the soul from God. But that is not an accurate portrayal of the first death or the other. In the first death, only the body is subjected to truly dying, the spirit returns to God who gave it and the soul goes to judgment.

But the second death is, as Jesus put it, this: "Fear not them that kill the body,(the first death) but are not able to kill the soul (implicit in this statement is the notion that God is willing and able to kill souls in just the same way bodies can be killed)... but rather fear Him which is able to destroy (apoleia) both body and soul in gehinnom." (Matthew 10:28) In the second death it is the soul and body which are destroyed. Not Just the body killed. Soul destruction is symmetrical to body destruction.

The Lord Jesus himself gave the sense of destroy (apoleia) in describing a severed hand or plucked out eye. And I don’t know how one can believe it means immortality or eternal consciousness, I noted, with little amusement, that when Dr. Geisler tries to define destruction (apoleia/apollumi) he resorts to incongruent analogies such as this. "The cars in a junkyard have been destroyed, but they are not annihilated. They are simply beyond repair or unredeemable. So are the people in hell.." This is an embarrassing error of logic, cars and souls should not be compared in this contex, one is a machine, the other a living thing, the effect of destruction on non-living things: trucks, rocks, planets, stars; is not congruent to the effect of destruction on living things: plants, animals, fungi, and souls of men.

Also Dr. Geisler is just wrong, junkyard cars are redeemable, it is just that people are not willing to pay the cost to redeem them. Our religious leaders must be spending too much time in their white towers, because if they didn’t they would know that truly unredeemable cars go to the smelter.

Some more logical logic:

A plucked out eye or severed hand has been destroyed, but not annihilated. It is simply beyond repair or unredeemable. So are the souls in hell. (Much better.)

An unredeemable junkyard car goes to the smelter, so go the souls to destruction.

In death, the body is no longer conscious (Ecclesiastes 9:6) and biological activity ceases, that is the definition of physiological death. But the idea of the body and soul dying together strongly implies both die similarly and conventionally.

Spiritual death is not an unredeemable condition, for we were all, "dead in trespass and sin" before we were redeemed, but as Geisler has said, the second death is an unredeemable condition, therefore I do not see how this metaphysical separation (for all, sinner and saint; live, and move, and have our being; in him), is congruent with the destruction of the soul Jesus spoke of, an unredeemable condition. The effect of destruction or death on metaphysical things (the idea of apoleia meaning "loss") may be at times distinct in that there is possible redemption from financial ruin, from losing something valuable, and indeed from conditions like"dead in trespasses and sin," The junkyard cars analogy does work better for "spiritual death," which is the broken, but not unredeemable state of man.

In him, because of him, for by him, all things consist, these are all true while we live and breathe, so to be "dead in trespass and sin" is not to be truly separated from God. If that were so, then how could Jesus dine with sinners? A redeemable condition cannot be the basis on which we determine the nature and reality of an unredeemable condition. The Apostle Paul also spoke of us (in Christ) as being "dead to sin" and "dead to the law" both good examples of this kind of figurative speaking Paul frequently uses. When we are "dead in sin," it is because sin has power over us which inevitably and invariably leads us on to death. But, when we are "dead to sin," sin no longer has any power over us. This deadness is only in a figure, because the true realization of this is by the promise in which Christ, "shall change our vile bodies" Those who are dead to sin might still commit a sin, but we are "dead" to Sin’s true power, which is ultimately death.

Scripture presents death as conscious separation.? Perhaps in some contexts but everywhere it is presented so, it needs to be examined carefully. Such as the above, with statements like "dead to sin" Geisler’s logic fails, because being "dead to sin" is not being literally sinless, nor literally dead, neither is being "dead in sin" being literally sinful or literally dead. One must ask: What exactly is being subjected to death? The body? If the body is subjected to death, it is as unconscious and lifeless as Lenin’s corpse. If we were to take Dr. Geisler literally, then we ought to treat corpses very differently indeed.

There is an assumption here made by Geisler that Genesis 3 demands the interpretation that Adam only died "spiritually" the very day he sinned; and that the continued living of Adam, beyond that very day must characterize the ultimate meaning of Death. There is no basis for such an unwieldy construction. To define death as a less desirable state of immortality contradicts scripture and turns the words of Jesus and His Apostles literally upside down. It makes the devil’s words true, "Ye shall not surely die." (Gen 3) What they do is make the whole of scripture twist and turn to aline up with their twisted tradition.

Some will insist on this interpretation of Genesis 3. But please, carefully consider the whole context and the implications of these important words: Genesis 3:22 And the Lord God said, "Behold the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil; and now lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and live forever-" (emphasis added) Man came to be made more in the image of God than at the first (the man is become as one of us) ironically by his sin. The knowledge of good and evil is something God possessed but man did not, God did not give this knowledge freely to man because God had experience with beings made in his image, that they do not necessarily do as he does, which is to always choose good over evil, knowing both. I believe God allowed us this because he wants us to be able to freely choose good and I believe that faced with the choice Adam faced, everyone who is born would rather risk death to be more like God, than risk nothing to be a more simpleminded creature who experiences only good and eternal life. God risks a lot in this, but he also stands to gain children who know good and evil, choose only good, and live forever, children that are truly like him.

The truth is, that when God barred the way to the tree of Life he was trying to avoid just what Geisler defends: eternal life in a state of rebellion and sin. Man’s traditions teach that the soul of man is immortal. The Scriptures teach, "Only God hath immortality" I Timothy 6:16. Genesis teaches that man was made in the image of God, true; but apparently not completely, he lacked "the knowledge of Good and Evil" (which we all posses to our doom) and he also lacked eternal life (which we will attain in Christ Jesus). Scripture teaches that Jesus "hath abolished death and hath brought to light, life and immortality through the gospel." (II Timothy 1:10). Remember it was the serpent who said, "Ye shall not surely die, And now Geisler affirms the devil’s promise of immortality of sin with his: "Ye shall not surely die. Ye shall die only ‘spiritually.’"

James 3:9 is not much related to this topic, in my view, but it is used by Geisler for the portion of his argument about man being made after the similitude of God. Which I have already beat to death.

Genesis 1:27 says that man was created in the image of God. Geisler wants me to believe that this somehow proves that death is consciousness and separation, and the hidden assumption is that man’s soul is immortal, and I Timothy 6:16 (For God only hath immortality) and related verses in Genesis chapter 3 are void.

Gen. 9:6 Again says that man is created in the image of God, and actually says, "Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man." God demanded death (which is indeed destruction of the image of God in man) as the most capital of punishments.

Geisler later asserts that because man is made in the image of God he would never annihilate that image, because he would be attacking himself. That has to be about the weakest argument I have ever heard on behalf of hell. We must agree that God intends to destroy that image he created (Matthew 10:28) if not annihilate it. I assert that when an image is destroyed it is an image no more. The Jews never thought God would suffer his temple to be destroyed either, Geisler doesn’t know God.

All men from Adam have the sentence of death abiding on them and we all know it(for the living know that they shall die Eccles (;. Objections raised by unbelievers that Adam and Eve didn’t actually die on that very day are not required by the text of Gen. 3 and attempts to redefine death in order to explain why Adam didn’t die the instant he bit into the fruit are completely uncalled for. Because Adam, knowing previously he had no expectation of death, and experiencing only good; in the day that he erred, the fact of death being assured to him; knowing now he was mortal; inwardly knowing it; knowing good and evil; his eyes having been opened; had he turned to the Creator incarnate and said "Ye Liar!"I had perhaps give heed to these objections. But no, truly, now he knew the truth of, "In the day ye eat thereof, Ye shall surely die." which does not require us to presume he meant, "In the day ye eat thereof, Ye shall that day die surely." There is not a hint that Adam doubted the word of God, once his eyes were opened, that very day, he saw plainly that he would have to die, as humans still do and all know inwardly. "And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred thirty years, and he died." (Genesis 5:5) God was right, the serpent lied Adam died.

What Paul said in the context of Romans 5:12-18 inclusive"And so death passed upon all men" makes it sufficiently clear that the death that we experience in the flesh is the death that truly reigned from Adam in our mortal bodies.

Though unable to come to Christ without the intervention of God, the "spiritually dead" are sufficiently aware that Scripture holds them accountable to believe (Acts 16:31), and repent (Acts 17:30).

Neither of these scriptures really make the point he is trying to make. The guard in Acts 16:31 witnesses something more miraculous than what most unbelievers ever get to see, and in addition, it is the Apostles themselves who then make him aware of the word of the Lord. Acts 17:30 actually indicates that God has overlooked the past ignorance of man, and now commands all to repent. I don’t see how these points buttress the basic argument that "spiritual death" is the second death.

Continued awareness, but with separation from God and the inability to save oneself—these constitute Scripture’s vision of the second death.

No what this constitutes is Norman Geisler’s very distorted vision to defend damnable heretical traditions. The passages that speak of death in a symbolic way, an allegorical way, or a metaphysical way (such as Eph 2:1) in no way define the very nature of death, the first death, the second death, nor exclude the idea of a soul being destroyed or dying in the conventional sense of the words. It becomes very easy to defend hell by the scriptures when we redefine death, generally, by such convenient terms as "spiritually" dead. Even though a man may be "spiritually dead" he is still a living soul until he dies. A Spiritual death, is not a real death, this is only a symbolic or metaphysical death reflecting our position towards God. This has no bearing on what death really is, or what Jesus said of destroying souls. There are only two real deaths: the first, and the second.

The second death is presented in scripture as something that is going to occur in the future, at a specific time, after this life on earth, and not, as with his notion of a spiritual death, a long time ago with Adam or since our own conception or perhaps continuing into the grave. Jesus Christ presents his own vision of the second death - fear ye him that hath power to destroy both soul and body in the Gehinnom of Fire. (Matt10:28)

For death to persist as a human condition in the incarnation of an eternal life of punishment would destroy the Justice of God. God demands death as the ultimate punishment (Deuteronomy 17:2-7) Geisler is from the school that says "hanging is too good for them." There is no mercy in eternal life of torment of fire and of worm, in fact it is a perfectly merciless act. If soul-death is unconsciousness, destroying souls is paradoxically merciless (in a finite way) and merciful (in an infinite way), so God is just and merciful. There could be fates worse than death, so man imagined eternal hell.

I will ransom them from the power of hell, I will redeem them from death. O death, I will be thy plagues, O hell, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from my eyes. Hosea 13:14 "Death and Hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death" (Rev 20) "And there shall be no more death," (Rev 21). To reconcile all this must mean the end of these things, they will continue to exist forever, but much as fossils exist, only as a memory, a momento of the distant past.

In Geisler’s view, death becomes eternally triumphant in hell, and hell is by no means destroyed. In his view no one is going to die at all, just tortured forever, but at the same time he wants to call that eternal state "Death," which the scriptures require, which makes his view self-contradictory. I cannot follow their ways, they all make no sense to me.

"Death is swallowed up in victory," (Cor 15) supposes that death needs conquering and I take the statement in Rev 21 "There shall be no more death" to be exactly how victory over death should be defined, no more first death, no more second death, no more spiritual death either. "He will destroy death forever" Isa 25:8 But Geisler in fact teaches the bible presents death as actually being life eternal plus torture.

Geisler’s vision of the true and ultimate death is a spiritual state only called "death," found among the eternally undying, souls who are utterly, yet imperishably, perishing in their own incorruptible corruption, they are the dead who cannot die, they are destroyed but not enough to destroy the image of God in them, this is the wisdom of man, but scripture reveals its true folly.

Destruction, Not Nonexistence. "Everlasting" destruction would not be annihilation, which only takes an instant and is over.

To make that statement true, the subject of annihilation would first have to become annihilated, and then become un-annihilated. Everlasting annihilation would mean the thing has to stay annihilated, that would be everlasting destruction. But again I will point out that I’m not suggesting the scriptures teach annihilation. I’m only asserting that when the scripture speaks of everlasting destruction it does not mean everlasting living. In Geisler’s view, everlasting destruction and the second death are defined as eternal life in a condition of metaphysical death experiencing literal torment (fire, worms, etc.).

If one goes on not existing forever, then non-existence itself is an everlasting condition, an eternal loss. If I pluck out my eye and burn it, the destruction is everlasting. The eye does not need to go on seeing and the severed hand sensing for their destruction to be an everlasting destruction. If the souls of the damned are in such a condition to experience anything, even evil; I do not see how one could say they are destroyed at all; not in the sense that Jesus used the word destruction. Actually, it is torture that usually only lasts an instant and is over, how often one repeats the torture determines the cruelty.

What NONSENSE! That conclusion does not follow, and the analogy is completely incongruent: If my right eye undergoes everlasting destruction it would be safe to say it wasn’t a sensing eye anymore, everlasting destruction need not be an ongoing, never-ending process, in fact, it must be contrary to that. It is the result of everlasting destruction that is everlasting, as is the result of everlasting punishment (which is Capital Punishment). It does not require eternal life (consciousness) for a soul to experience everlasting destruction or punishment, all it requires is that the results are final and irrevokable, permanent loss of consciousness fulfills this requirement. My eye cannot go back into his socket once it is destroyed. So neither can a dead soul go back to being a living soul once it is destroyed. Our dead are resurrected, but a soul destroyed eternally will not ever be alive again.

And once more, contrary to what Geisler says: Junkyard cars are not beyond repair, unredeemable or even destroyed. In so much as they retain enough of the image in which they were manufactured to redeem; they are not unredeemable. Few are willing to pay the cost to redeem junkyard cars, but so long as they are junkyard cars they are redeemable. The cars that go to the smelter are unredeemable, no, not because they are annihilated, but because that image is destroyed. Someone could go into the junkyard and reconstitute one of those cars, but once in the smelter, things can only be remade, not redeemed. The Scriptures do not portray a junkyard, but a smelter. (Rev 20) (Isa30:33) (All Gospel references to Gehinnom)

In this paragraph Geisler misleads us as to the scripture II Peter 3:7, supposedly, clearly implying consciousness. An assumption of immortality is inherent in his statement about consciousness, therefore his clear implications are absent to an objective reader. Let’s actually read that passage starting a verse earlier, "Whereby the world that then was being overflowed with water perished. (Apoleia, again) But the heavens and the earth which are now by the same word are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of judgement and perdition (apoleia) of ungodly men" There is absolutely nothing in this verse or any of the surrounding verses that clearly implies consciousness for all eternity. Of course there is consciousness of punishment at judgement, and before execution, but nothing in that passage implies that we should understand the punishment itself to be eternal consciousness.

The cities of Sodom and Gomorrah are given as clear examples of suffering the vengeance of eternal fire, but those cities do not continue to burn. Throughout this II Peter there are many places that suggest the tradition is wrong. Such as verse 11 of this same II Peter 3 about the end of the world, "Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved..." which implies real destruction. Better yet, from chapter 2 verse 11 of this same II Peter," But these as natural brute beasts made to be taken and destroyed speak evil of the things they understand not and shall utterly perish in their own destruction." Here the implication is that there is a correlation between slain animals and the utter perishing of the wicked.

This one just about takes the cake, aside from reusing this truly pitiful analogy, this man has the audacity to use Jesus as a puppeteer would, by putting words in his mouth, now he does not put it in quotes, but the implication that Jesus said just what he says, is very apparent. Note that Jesus says "their worm" does not die, never that the "resurrected bodies" do not die, as Geisler inserts. Note that Jesus says "the fire is not quenched," never that the "resurrected bodies" do not burn, as Geisler implies. That is what tradition suggests to him all this implies. Jesus warned against traditions which make void the scriptures. (Mark 7:9) Ever since just about every theologian started studying the bible, certain passages are given little scrutiny, because the meaning of the passage has already been suggested and determined by tradition. What Jesus said was basically this repeated with little substantive variation- "it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes to be cast into gehinnom, into the fire that shall never be quenched. Where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." Men for ages have suggested that statement means something it does not say, they say it "clearly" means ongoing consciousness of torment.

The truth is this, Jesus did not just make up this saying, as if it were, "out of thin air." Jesus is quoting an old testament passage which leaves little doubt (for me, none) as to the meaning of this saying. Isaiah 66:24, "And they shall go forth and look upon the carcases of the men who have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh."

The Crucial thing in understanding this text (or any text) is the context: The context from verse 22 of Isaiah 66 is this, "For as the new heavens and earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. 23 And It shall come to pass that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. 24. And they shall go forth and look upon the carcases & etc. " Note the clear contrast between, "so shall your seed remain" and, "carcases," In Revelation 21 we find that the new heavens and earth are where, "There shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying," but Jesus also states that it is, "Where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." (Isa 66). The scriptures do not give any doubt as to the nature of the final reward of the wicked or of the duration of it’s place as a monument. And it apparently sits not terribly afar from the throne of God. The worms do as worms do, eat away, as does the fire burn up,(and remember graveyards are full-o-worms, and this is essentially a graveyard). The essence is consistent, the damned resurrected have become like destroyed flesh, that is what Jesus taught time and again.

I looked at both those passages and they refer obviously to the death of the flesh. Micah 7:2 "The good man is perished out of the earth." So Geisler is out of context here. As the righteous and everyone else perishes from the earth so shall the wicked perish for eternity, but the inheritors of life eternal, the imperishable, never perish.

That may be the case, I ‘m not an annihilationist anyway, but it certainly does firm up the fact that to perish means to die. If I die tomorrow, I will be snuffed out, and I will never again exist as a person in the world as long as the world continues. Yes, my spirit returns to God and I will exist, but the point is, to those who remain alive on earth all that remains of me is a lifeless unconscious corpse and I have indeed perished. Just as people disappear forever in this world, so shall it be with the inhabitants of the next for it will be that the wicked will be gone forever.

Again, he uses inanimate objects to prove a point about living beings. And he seeks to turn some figurative language into global generalizations. When you lose a penny, it’s one thing, but when you lose your soul, that’s entirely another.

The implication of lost is dependant on the context and the subject and the object of the losing. If I lose some money and it is not found, I may or may not have lost it entirely, because it may be found, but what if I never find it, or what if it fell into a furnace of fire? If I lose my right hand or eye, I’m not getting them back in this world. According to the misteaching of hell no one ever loses their soul, God just loses some souls, but the damned have to keep their souls, even the utterly corrupt, forever (in torture of fire, worms, etc.). Jesus clearly states that a man can lose his soul, and as Dr Geisler stated before, "Death is separation of the soul from the body." So it is with resurrected bodies, if they lose their soul, they die. This is consistent with scripture.

Like Not Having Been Born. Jesus said of Judas, who was sent to perdition, that "It would be better for him if he had not been born" (Mark 14:21). Before one is conceived they do not exist. Thus, for hell to be like the prebirth condition it must be a state of nonexistence.

This idea never entered into my thoughts concerning death, neither what Jesus said about it being more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah. I do not use the logic of those who say that before we were born we did not exist. I believe the opposite, but I don’t think I was conscious of my existence, I at least, have no knowledge of it now, if it ever was before me.

It Would Have Been Better…." When he says that it would have been better if Judas had not been born, Jesus is not comparing Judas’s perdition to his nonexistence before conception but to his existence before birth. This hyperbolic figure of speech would almost certainly indicate the severity of his punishment, not a statement about the superiority of nonbeing over being. In a parallel condemnation on the Pharisees, Jesus said Sodom and Gomorrah would have repented had they seen his miracles (Matt. 11:23-24). This does not mean that they actually would have repented or God would surely have shown them these miracles—2 Peter 3:9. It is simply a powerful figure of speech indicating that their sin was so great that "it would be more tolerable" in the day of judgment for Sodom than for them (vs. 24).

No real disagreement here.

This is logical, no one who now exists can be made eternally non-existent, but he is not comparing the proper terms in the first place, an existing individual is faced with either an everlasting state of conscious torture or an everlasting state of unconsciousness. These can be compared, they have much in common as both are everlasting states. Being tortured forever is not better than being dead.

In addition to the lack of any definitive passages in favor of annihilationism, numerous texts support the doctrine of eternal conscious punishment. A brief summary includes:

I have provided scriptures in addition to those he mentions and will later provide many more scriptures which void the traditional doctrine hell (eternal life of punishment) and uphold a different view.

The Rich Man in Hell. Unlike parables which have no real persons in them, Jesus told the story of an actual beggar named Lazarus who went to heaven and of a rich man who died and went to hell and was in conscious torment (Luke 16:22-28). He cried out, "‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’ 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"’ (vss. 24-25). The rich man then begged that his brothers be warned "so that they will not also come to this place of torment" (vs. 27). There is no hint of annihilation in this passage; he is suffering constant and conscious torment.

Notice how Geisler notes, "There is no hint of annihilation in this passage" but avoids noting that there is also not a hint in this passage of eternality, Not A Hint. So from the outset, taken literally, this passage does not prove the traditional doctrine of eternal life for wicked men. When Jesus refers to the rich man in hell he uses an entirely different word from all the other passages that talk of hell as an eternal fire(Gehinnom) here Jesus uses hades. And Hades is an entirely different thing (I will go into the differences and why they are not the same in Part 4).

Also, if Jesus’ other parables do not contain real characters, why do we then suddenly assume that these are real conversations, which took place literally, simply because a character is named? Jesus opens this parable in v.19 saying, "There was a certain rich man" which is the exact same formula for the parable which begins in v1 which is never suggested to be a history. It is completely plausible to assume that these are not real characters at all and that Jesus is pointing to his own resurrection of his friend Lazarus by naming his character Lazarus.

And noting how the rich man asked of Lazarus that, "thou wouldest send him to my fathers house(from the dead);" that they should repent and not duplicate his fate. But, said Abraham, "They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them." "But if someone rose from the dead,"they would repent. The Pharisees did not repent at the resurrection of Lazarus, proving Jesus point. And this is illustative of my point about Hell. "the Pharisees taught that there were three places: (1) Abrahams Bosom; (2) Under the throne of Glory; (3) In the Garden of Eden (Gr.Paradise). Speaking of death they would say, "This day he sits in Abrahams bosom." The Pharasees taught that two men may be "coupled together", and one sees the other after death, and conversations take place. Lightfoot works vol xii pp.159-61. People are more willing to believe Jewish fables about hades, than Moses and the Prophets and the very teaching of Jesus himself. Those to whom Jesus directed this parable were not his disciples, they were the, "the Pharisees" v15. And he said to them, "Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but god knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God." The context of the parable is Jesus noting how the Pharisees voided the God’s word about marriage by traditions. People believe all the Pharisee’s traditions about Abrahams bosom and hades torment but do not believe Moses, nor the Prophets, as to God’s ultimate Justice and Mercy:

"And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault, by a certain number." Deuteronomy 25:2

"the son of man...his breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish." Ps 146:4 "For in death there is no remembrance of thee. In the grave (hades-hell) who shall give thee thanks." Ps 6:5

nor the Son of God. "If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch and is whithered; and men Gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned." John 15:

Men who affirm the traditional doctrine of hell deny that, as thorns, "they are burned," according to them, they are simply "cast into the fire" and they are preserved forever (eternal life of punishment). Geisler uses this passage (Luke 16) to prove an eternal life of punishment and takes it as a direct teaching from Jesus reflecting literal conditions which he then supposes will exist forever. No one has to accept that interpretation. If the story here in Luke 16 is actually a reflection of reality it does no violence to my understanding of the scriptures, it only indicates that the wicked will be punished before their execution; and the "innocent" comforted, but it gives no fuel to the idea that this torment is eternal. Hades is eventually destroyed in the lake of fire, the second death (Rev 20). There is no indication this passage refers to the place Jesus spoke of as the final fate of the wicked, called Gehinnom, which only comes to be after a thousand years of Christ’s reign on earth.

In this debate, any mention the Parable of the rich man in hell from Luke 16 needs to be considered in context with what Jesus said immediately after he finished that parable. "...though one rose from the dead. 1 ¶ Then said he unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences (stumbling blocks) will come: but woe unto him, through whom they come! 2 It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones."

Hell apologists readily admit that the doctrine of hell is a stumbling block to unbelievers, what they fail to realize is that since their tradition is wrong, they are casting a stumbling block before people, contradicting the Lord, and bringing punishment on themselves for polluting the gospel of our Lord with the traditions of man. If my view is wrong, I have done no harm to the gospel. If the tradition of hell is wrong, then many ministers will have to answer for it, and will, some with many stripes and some with few. So do not take this lightly.

A Place of Weeping and Gnashing of Teeth. Jesus repeatedly said the people in hell are in continual agony. He declared that "the subjects of the kingdom will be thrown outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matt. 8:12; cf. 22:13; 24:51; 25:30). But a place of weeping is obviously a place of conscious sorrow. Those who are not conscious do not weep.

Once again Geisler misleads, there is no hint in these passages of "eternal" torture. Lets look at all of them. They may allow such a construction, but none demand eternal life of torment. The phrase "there shall be the weeping and the grinding" occurs in seven places. Five of these places refer to, "the children of the kingdom," "the lord of that servant," other "servant"s and of, "many," who, "seek to enter in." Note also the phrase "outer darkness" in three of these passages. In all of these five passages it is clear that the subjects are apostates and the time is when the Lord has returned to the earth to administer his kingdom.

Matt 24:45-51 Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his lord hath made ruler over his household, to give them meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you, That he shall make him ruler over all his goods. But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; And shall begin to smite his fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Matt 25:28-30 Take therefore the talent from him, and give it unto him which hath ten talents. For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Luke 13:23-28 Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them, Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are: Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets. But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.

None of these passages induce me to agree with Dr. Geisler that " Jesus repeatedly said the people in hell are in continual agony." Once in chapter 16 of Luke, but not here. Even less to agree that the agony spoken of here is eternal. There is no mention here of the weeping being "forever and ever" nothing in these passages demand eternal consciousness. Geisler’s use of the scriptures is like a chef who adds chocolate syrup to a steak, he lumps together things that simply do not go together. These passages do not refer to hell, they refer to the thousand year kingdom of Christ, the second death does not occur until after the thousand years, so these passages do not refer to that either. Jesus refers in these to that occasion at the end of the age, when He and his servants shall have come, and when he will deal with the "wicked and unprofitable servants" and sits down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in his kingdom.

But...

The final two mentions of "the weeping and the grinding" occur in a single context and do not match the others, in that the kingdom is already established "out of his kingdom," and the furnace of fire is mentioned. . There is no hint of eternal consciousness. The fact that there will be weeping and grinding of teeth does not compel us to suppose that this is going to be going on forever.

I do not assume people would go quietly into a furnace, but I do doubt they would continue their noise and suffering there forever and these passages do nothing to change that. All the weeping and gnashing required can be accomplished in the interim between pronouncement of sentence and execution. Again, these passages do nothing to help the doctrine of hell.

The references to a furnace of fire in the last two passages (Matt 13) may or may not refer to the lake of fire and/or the second death. I have long believed that there are two "hells" one is for torment (hades), the other for perishing (Gehinnom), both involve fire, I believe the scriptures teach the wicked are tormented in hades then later destroyed in Gehinnom. All the passages that mention Gehinnom indicate the severed hand principle and those that indicate torture can be placed in a time prior to the appointed time for the wicked to actually perish. So the weeping and the grinding do not indicate what Geisler asserts, that is, an eternal state.

I would add that since the inhabitants of "hell" are visible to the inhabitants of heaven (Isa 66) it cannot be that there is continual weeping going on there forever, as Rev 21 states "There shall be no more death neither sorrow nor crying neither shall there be any more pain." Except in hell (sarcasm).

A Place of Unquenchable Flames. Jesus repeatedly called hell a place of unquenchable flames (Mark 9:43-48) where the very bodies of the wicked will never die (cf. Luke 12:4-5).

Again Geisler is hard at work playing puppeteer and inserting the part about "the very bodies of the wicked" There is nothing in either of these passages to support that statement, I already covered this before, Isaiah 66 CLEARLY indicates that these are "corpses" being eaten by "worms" not living people. It astonishes me that he could be so bold as to put words in Jesus mouth.

But it would make no sense to have everlasting flames and bodies without any souls in them to experience the torment.

But Dr. Geisler, it makes no sense for you to mention torment in connection with these passages, since the Lord Jesus did not mention torment once in these passages, why do you insist on inserting it? Because there is a knowledge filter called tradition, that only allows us to see what tradition suggests Mark 9 and Luke 12 say, but there is no mention of torture, nor of the "very bodies," nor of forever and ever, you only imagine it so. In fact, Jesus never once mentions torment in connection with Gehinnom, ever... not once.

A Place of Everlasting Torment. John the apostle described hell as a place of eternal torment. He declared that "the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever" (Rev. 20:10). Eternal torment indicates that the everlasting state of woe is conscious.

Actually you will find that John does not ever describe hell at all, what he does is tell us that "Death and Hell were cast into the Lake of Fire" What John does describe is the devil being cast into the lake of fire, "the devil which deceived them was cast into a lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet were thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." I take that at face value no more no less. If you continue reading Revelation 20 you will come to another description of the lake of fire where God Judges the dead and there you will find that there is not even a hint of torture but rather some very different language. One of the first principles of logic is that the inclusion of one is the exclusion of all others so when it says the devil is tormented it does not follow that we should assume all humanity is as well. Geisler ignores Rev 20:11-14 which show two very different punishments in this passage; the ill-judged dead experience: "the second death," and no torment is mentioned at all; but the devil is named and sentenced to be tormented forever, and when the Devil is cast into the lake of fire it does not say "this is the second death," but when men are cast in the lake it plainly states "this is the second death," so there is a clear distinction drawn here between their fates. Much clearer than the things Geisler claims are so clear.

A Place for the Beast and False Prophet. In a clear example of beings who were still conscious after a thousand years of conscious torment in hell, the Bible says of the beast and false prophets that "The two of them were thrown alive into the fiery lake of burning sulfur" (Rev. 19:20) before the "thousand years" (Rev. 20:2). Yet after this period the devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet [still] are" (Rev. 20:10, emphasis added).

Even if one assumes these are individual beings, just because they are named to a certain fate over a thousand years does not negate the fact that another fate is spelled out for others. I do not believe these are individual beings in any case, so their position in regard to this discussion does not give me any pause.

You will notice how Geisler notes [still] are" (Rev. 20:10, emphasis added) What he should have said was, "words added," because the critical terms, "[still] are," are a complete fabrication, not just added emphasis, they do not appear in the Greek text.

Not only were they "alive" when they entered, but they were still alive after a thousand years of conscious torment.

To complete the clause one could just as easily add, "were cast," instead of, "still are" None of this proves they will still be alive eternally. Just because they are still there, does not require that they know anything about it. Geisler’s conclusion is not demanded by the text. Though he is careful otherwise to avoid speaking of people in hell as being alive, here it is that he slips and reveals the true meaning of his doctrine, eternal life for the wicked, which simply cannot be true by the scriptures. That is why he avoids speaking of them as living and prefers terms like "conscious." Because it is impossible for sinners to enter life eternal without Christ. Yet he and all like him teach that everyone inherits eternal life, they just mix up and twist the meanings of the words. Woe to you who make darkness light and light darkness, who make life death and death life, these word games will not excuse you before Christ!

Some have suggested that I do violence to the scriptures in what I assert about the devil the beast and the false prophet, but I ask the reader this: If you think I have done any violence to the meaning of scripture in this, then you ought consider how much more violence Geisler has done. In contradicting the Lord. In adding to his words. In ignoring absolutes: God only hath immortality.

A Place of Conscious Punishment. The fact that the wicked are "punished with everlasting destruction" (2 Thess. 1:9) strongly implies that they must be conscious. It is no punishment to beat a dead corpse. An unconscious person feels no pain.

Geisler gets a lot of strong implications from weak evidence, like I said before, if you are going to punish someone with everlasting destruction then they have to be and stay destroyed. Like a plucked out eye.

One cannot suffer punishment without existence.

That assumes only non-existence, if one possesses "existence" (life would be the better word) and is punished subsequently and loses "existence"(life would be the better word) one can suffer the worst punishment I can think of (short of eternal torture). Capital punishment in the next world is an eternal punishment. An unconscious person may feel no pain, but they can before they lose consciousness. There is no pain in the new heavens and earth, and there will be a Gehinnom in the new heavens and earth. The wicked will have all the pain they require before and during their execution at which time they will still be conscious.

"And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault, by a certain number." Deuteronomy 25:2

God has shown us that corporal punishment should not be meted out without limits. We call that cruelty.

Annihilation would not be a punishment but a release from all punishment. Job can suffer something worse than annihilation in this life.

Job was wrong. Does anyone on this earth believe that capital punishment, is actually, "a release from all punishment?" When I look at a prison I might think that, but never at an execution. We say we can suffer "a fate worse than death" while we live, but that is an illusion. Here, Geisler has plainly contradicted himself. "Further, nothing cannot be better than something, since they have nothing in common to compare them. So nonbeing cannot be actually better than being. To assume otherwise is a category mistake." Oops! Which is it then, Geisler can’t have it both ways. Is death better than life or is life better than death? Temporal suffering with Eternal life, is always better than temporal pleasure and everlasting death, but the wicked will not go unpunished.

No, it is not as he says. Any life with any gross amount of suffering which comes to an end and is followed an afterlife of eternal bliss; cannot be worse than any amount of temporal bliss followed by loss of personal being for all eternity. Their loss is greater punishment than any temporal pain, since the righteous lose nothing, and they lose their very souls, a very great loss indeed. God is also justified in that they suffer sufficient corporal punishment in the afterlife before they are executed.

A Place That Is Everlasting. Hell is said to be of the same duration as heaven, "everlasting" (Matt. 25:41). As the saints in heaven are said to be in conscious bliss (Luke 23:43; 2 Cor. 5:8; Phil. 1:23), so the sinners in hell are in conscious woe (cf. Luke 16).

Again, contexts are blurred and near-lies are told, hell is never said to be of the same duration as heaven, hell is destroyed in the lake of fire, which is the same duration as heaven (Rev 20, Isa 66). Geisler looks at Matt 25:41 and sees hell, I see an everlasting fire, to some it may seem like there is no difference, but that is only because people are trained to think about these passages in a predetermined way. In this manner of looking at the scriptures the text is not so important as the tradition that explains it.

Luke 16 (even taken literally) refers to conditions prior to Jesus even finishing his mission on earth (the crucifixion), whereas Matt 25:41-46 refers to "when the son of man shall have come in his glory" v31. But, if we are to extend the hades of Luke 16 into eternity, what then shall we do with the Gospel? Because the Gospel according to "Abraham" is this: "in thy lifetime thou receivest thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted and, thou art tormented." So one does not need Jesus to enter into eternal life; one only needs to suffer unjustly.

Matt 25:42 Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: ...46 And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal. This passage does not mention hell, Geisler suggests it does, but it does not say hell is everlasting, or else were the scripture not true, "O hell (hades) where is thy victory?" It says "everlasting fire" and "everlasting punishment" neither of these concepts exclude Capital punishment, which is an everlasting punishment.

That fire, the "everlasting fire" is the fire of God, look what Jude said in verse 7 of his epistle, "Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire." Those cities stopped burning long ago, but the punishment, the destruction, and the fire are everlasting, eternal.

Philosophical Arguments

For Annihilation. In addition to biblical arguments, many annihilationists offer philosophical reasons for rejecting everlasting conscious punishment. Granting a theistic perspective, most of them, however, are a variation on the one theme of God’s mercy.

Annihilationists reason that God is a God of mercy (Exod. 20:6), and it is merciless to allow people to suffer consciously forever. We kill trapped horses if we cannot rescue them from burning buildings. We put other suffering creatures out of their misery. Annihilationists argue that a merciful God would surely do as much for his creatures.

Against Annihilationism. The very concept of an ultimately merciful God supposes that he is the absolute standard for what is merciful and morally right. Indeed, the moral argument for God’s existence demonstrates this. But if God is the ultimate standard for moral righteousness, we cannot impose our concept of justice upon him. The very idea of injustice presupposes an ultimate standard, which theists claim for God.

I agree that we cannot impose our sense of Justice on God, but God did not leave us alone in the world wondering what justice is, we ought to look to his word to find out what is right, "He hath shown thee, O man, what is good and what the Lord requires of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God." Micah 6:8. If God expects us to do justly then it follows that he thinks we do know what his standard of justice is. Though we are not immortal like God, we do know the difference between good and evil, and as scholars are fond of saying, sinners are judged by "the light that is given them." We do have this light from God and every man, by this light, knows what is mercy and what is not mercy and what is justice and what is not justice.

Geisler tried to dodge this one, his argument is basically, God can do whatever he wants, and what God does is good, simply because God did it. But what Geisler implies, that God defines mercy by a completely different standard, and justice by a completely unequal punishment, is beyond my understanding. Geisler suggests that what we judge is merciless, can be merciful by God’s standards, thus erecting a god, the most capricious and tyrannical individual in the universe, he may redefine justice and mercy by any standard, since he is the measure of everything. Eternal torture: Justified!

But the scriptures say he has shown us what he requires Micah 6:8. If we don’t know what mercy and justice really are, then how do we know what anything really is, since Geisler believes God’s idea of mercy is defined beyond human reason. I deny this sinister god, the fact that we know right and wrong is what makes us accountable to God’s ultimate standards. It’s not ironic that Geisler forgets what the real implication is that man did eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; because he also forgets that man never ate of the tree of life either.

"And it shall be, if the wicked man be worthy to be beaten, that the judge shall cause him to lie down, and to be beaten before his face, according to his fault, by a certain number." Deuteronomy 25:2,3 Forty stripes he may give him, and not exceed: lest, if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee.

This is devastating to the whole "human dignity" argument, in this place God voices his concern that beating a man above forty stripes would make him "seem vile" or I’ll paraphrase, "lose dignity" There is no room for dignity in the eternal torture chamber of Geisler.

Annihilation would demean both the love of God and the nature of human beings as free moral creatures. It would be as if God said to them, "I will allow you to be free only if you do what I say. If you don’t, then I will snuff out your very freedom and existence!"

And what does hell do? It says, "God loves you but if you don’t love him back he is going to torture you forever. And where is this "freedom" in hell, he supposes they really want to stay there(in other writings). A minute ago Geisler was saying annihilation was a "release from all punishment." Again Geisler cannot have it both ways. As far as eternal hell protecting God’s love from being demeaned, I honestly don’t have words to describe how utterly absurd that is, it could only come from a theologian.

This analogy is so incongruent it barely merits comment. Your hell is like a father telling his son to become a doctor, but when the son chose instead to be a park ranger the father tied him up and put him in the garage to be tortured slowly forever and ever.

Eternal suffering is eternal testimony to the freedom and dignity of humans, even unrepentant humans.

This is an grisly fantasy Geisler supposes must be true so he defends it with high and mighty statements like this. Sounds nice, but is not true. He wraps eternal torture up with the ideas of freedom and dignity when his hell plainly has neither. Only a theologian, in his white tower, could speak of this eternal hell he defends as upholding human freedom and dignity.

That scripture does not say all that, it only says man was created in God’s image, that’s it. But Man is not immortal, man did not eat of the tree of life. They make statements like this, but this Idea, that because we are made in God’s image, he somehow cannot or will not kill us, is found nowhere in scripture. He talks about not imposing our standards on God, but he does it all the time!

No, God is not killing them to alleviate their pain, it is their punishment. Animals are innocent, God is not killing the sick; the people God kills are guilty. We do kill humans for crimes and so will the lord.

Apparently, Geisler thinks sending the image of God into an eternal torture chamber to be half eaten by undying worms is something God has no problem doing with his image "respect for their dignity" notwithstanding. Forty stripes he may give him, and not exceed: lest, if he should exceed, and beat him above these with many stripes, then thy brother should seem vile unto thee.

God can snuff out his image in man if he wants, this is no law. Shall sinners bear the image of God for all eternity? I think not, this line of reasoning is a priori. What’s all this nonsense about freely chosen? If we return to his earlier reasoning isn’t it like the father whose son did not do what he wanted. Didn’t he read his own scriptures? Because they really, really, want in the kingdom: Luke 13 "for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; "

Since free choice is morally good, being part of the image of God, then it would be a moral evil to take it away. But this is what annihilation does: It destroys human freedom forever.

Absolutely not, it destroys only those humans, not human freedom itself. Remaining humans are free and truly bear God’s image (including immortality). So when he says it would be moral evil to take free choice away don’t be too impressed. He talks about not imposing our standards on God, but he does it all the time! God would never do this, God would never do that, and I say, Where is it written?!? "Hath not the potter power over the clay?"

The premise of this statement is a lie. And it’s a lie the devil himself has concocted. For God "only hath immortality" I Timothy 16:6. Jesus said, "And I give unto them Eternal life, and they shall never perish" John 10:28. " That being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life." Titus 3:7 "For this corruptible must put on incorruption (body) and this mortal must put on immortality(soul)." I Cor 15:53 Eternal life is not something one is born with, but it is the gift of God. But not only does this hell tradition give this special gift to everyone (including sinners) this tradition also turns this gift into an everlasting curse by which men are held forever in a chamber of horrors, of necessity, designed, planned and created by God. This nonsense about attacking himself in effigy and God acting against God is just a bunch of Theo-babble mumbo-jumbo which sounds impressive but has nothing to support it but the wisdom of the men who espouse it. Just a bunch of man’s empty a priori reasoning, formulated for the express purpose of defending their own authority, the authority of their useless seminaries, and the authority of a traditional interpretation of a few scriptures. We should rather follow all the scriptures no matter what they say, and not formulate our own ideas into systems of Theology.

Geislers logic applies better to the tradition of eternal hell, there can be no degrees of punishment in an eternal hell, if I roast you at 345 degrees for ever and ever, and your neighbor at 500 degrees forever and ever, where is the difference? If I stick you with needles at a rate of 30 times a minute and your neighbor at 6000 times a minute, where is the difference, in that you both will be stuck for all eternity? Matthew 5:22 is not about degrees of punishment, if it were, then those who call their brother a fool are due for worse than Hitler. Matthew 5:22 demonstrates that God looks not on the outward but on the inward. The Jews justified themselves based on outward observance of the law, while Jesus taught that hearts are also judged. Revelation 20 only says men are judged by their works, but I do not deny that there is equitable punishment meted out before execution. If hell is life eternal in torture, then there can be no greater or lesser punishment. A little Eternal torture is a lot of eternal torture and is the most merciless, overdone punishment one could never imagine.

Conclusion

The doctrine of annihilation rests more on sentimental than scriptural bases. Although there are some biblical expressions that can be construed to support annihilationism, there are none that must be understood this way. Furthermore, numerous passages clearly state that the wicked will suffer consciously and eternally in hell.

Of course I think this is all wrong, all distortion, my conclusion (if this were the end) would be this. The doctrine of the eternal torment conscious souls of men rests more on traditional than scriptural bases. Although there are some biblical expressions that can be construed to support the eternal torment of the wicked, there are none that must be understood this way. And in light of all the contrary evidence the concept must be rejected in every case.

Here is God’s justice for those who sin against him, Geisler asserts that we judge some more crimes more heinous based on the greatness of the people they are committed against, in other words, sins against an infinite god deserve infinite punishments

De 17:2 If there be found among you, within any of thy gates which the LORD thy God giveth thee, man or woman, that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of the LORD thy God, in transgressing his covenant,

3 And hath gone and served other gods, and worshipped them, either the sun, or moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded;

4 And it be told thee, and thou hast heard of it, and enquired diligently, and, behold, it be true, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel:

5 Then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman, which have committed that wicked thing, unto thy gates, even that man or that woman, and shalt stone them with stones, till they die.

6 At the mouth of two witnesses, or three witnesses, shall he that is worthy of death be put to death; but at the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death.

7 The hands of the witnesses shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterward the hands of all the people. So thou shalt put the evil away from among you.