I’m separating this topic from the thread where it started here: Predestination: Mark Driscoll’s forked tongue - part 1

And this is the discussion thus far:

Sonia, in a sincere, non-mocking voice, and with all do respect…you’re understanding of justice IS faulty. FWIW, so is mine…and every single other human being to have ever walked this planet…save one. You’re view of justice may be closer to the LORD’s than mine, but it is still faulty. All of the judgements of the LORD are righteous and true, even if (and especially if they disagree with mine. I am not using this point to say that ECT is right or wrong, but that however YHWH judges, it is the right and perfect and just way.

I agree with jaxxen on your last post. This is why I choose not to get into debates about whether God would be just in sending people to ECT for the sins of this life. I admit that to me it doesn’t seem just, but I must also concede that my understanding of justice might be so faulty that I just can’t see it. Therefore I don’t dare pretend I know what would be a just punishment. BTW it seems that you are saying the same about your understanding of justice, which is why you simply choose to bow to scripture and humbly accept God’s decision.

IF ONLY scripture were clear on this. Yes, scripture seems clear when we look at our common English bibles BUT … and this is the earth shattering part … our English bibles take some huge liberties with certain key words (e.g. Gehenna, Hades, Tartarus, aionios [and its derivatives] , …) I am convinced that If our bibles translated these words in a more literal fashion there would be alot more people questioning if God really has determined that ECT is His ultimate plan for many.

But even if the bible was clear that ECT is the ultimate fate of many, this does not prove ECT is a just punishment for the sins of this life, as the everlasting aspect of ECT may only be due to an effort to keep up with the sins committed WHILE paying for the sins of this life. Also if the bible was clear that ECT was not the ultimate plan for many this would not mean ECT is not just. It may only mean that eventually all will turn to Christ and trust in His atonement for sin (ala Evangelical Universalism). (See also the text attributed to me in the opening post of this thread.)

Therefore, to answer the specific question entitling this thread (“Is ECT just?”) it is not enough to learn from the scripture what the ultimate fate of many IS. We need to learn from the scripture why it IS, in God’s mind.

But again I must assert, while I think this is a valid topic for discussion, Evangelical Universalism is compatible with either view.

Quite right, of course! – however we are to be always growing towards a better and better understanding of justice so that we can carry it out in our lives. We are not supposed to brush it off as some mystery beyond our understanding. We are supposed to understand justice and do it.

The fact that YHWH’s judgment is right and perfect is for some people a strong argument against ECT. They sense that it’s “wrong” even if they don’t know how to support that biblically.

I’m currently corresponding with a Calvinist friend on the subject of UR/ECT and here’s something she recently wrote to me:

And I wonder … do I really?
Are my views on justice outside of what the Bible teaches?
Do I have a “worldly” idea of what constitutes “justice”?
I should hope my ideas of justice have been informed by scripture. I’ve looked at this before, of course, but I’d like to take another and closer look.

(I also wonder if my friend is allowing her systematic theology and other outside inputs to guide her interpretation of scripture? For instance, as soon as we began discussing it, in order to study the subject she bought two books on hell by Calvinist theologians. – but that’s another topic.)

So, I’d like to explore in this thread what the Bible has to say about justice in general and see if it is applicable to the ECT/UR debate. No doubt there will be mixed opinions on that!

Sonia

Sonia, I agree that we kinda have to be philosophical and realistic in the sense that we are all bringing some baggage. It’s a cut to say that you’re unbiblical, unless of course, you are relying on un or nonbiblical texts. But I think you stated and mean that Calvinists / EU’s disagree on the meaning of God’s justice. It is true to say that it is a mystery, and yet to say that can also be a cop-out. The arguement can get real circulat, real fast. I’d like to contribute in this thread, but like I said before, I’ll be spread pretty thin. Maybe I can just peruse.

Firedup, can you elaborate on the terms you listed? I’m curious. In English, the word “eternal” is used regularly. Does it not mean “eternal”? Kinda like when a Calvinist says “all” doesn’t mean “all” If that’s the case, what about “eternal” as it relates to our future lives with Christ? Is it a different word?
Thanks,
Matt

I would argue it doesn’t mean eternal 90% of the time. In fact, I’ve actually seen the word “forever” used in English to denote something very similar to “long time” much more often. When you really think of it, “forever” may not be that bad of a translation of aionos. It is just that we should not take a figurative translation literally. I read the ESV Bible when I started out. I did not see ECT in it. I do not need the alternative translation. Because of this. You should ask my evangelical friend. I told him this. Then I accepted ECT. Not because I saw it in the Bible, but because I thought my friend and his church knew better and I was “reading something wrong”.

I recall listening to a song which told a story, and it started out with some lyrics like “Forever we learn, forever we die, forever we live a lie”. The characters got involved in some stuff that changed that, and because of simple time discontinuity it would be really difficult to take a literal meaning of “forever” there. It’s much closer to a meaning of “without seeing an end to it”, “continually”, “very long time”, which is fully compatible with the meaning of the Hebrew olam. Considering the use of olam in Jeremiah, I’m confident in my assumption that the language, especially in parables, is figurative.

Is ECT just? Well, that’s a can of worms. I’m inclined to say no. And the reason I say no is for two reasons.

One, if I cannot label ECT justice as unjust, then I can distinguish nothing (to me the chasm is too large), in which case everything is 100% meaningless, including the Bible, and everything else. That way leads to absolute meaninglessness, while I hold to the view that humanity generally can understand justice to a reasonable degree. In fact, I would say that ECT is closer to justice systems associated with the more broken, cruel, and fallen forms of humanity than the higher ones (i.e., a totalitarian state compared to a democratic state compared to Star Trek). ECT has prospered during some of the worst ages in humanity’s history where all sorts of atrocities have been committed and ECT-style punishments done on Earth. High order humanity, on the other hand, correlates with rehabilitation and crazy ideas like forgiveness. Of course, I see humanity as moving towards more human-centered justice programs, and the further I go there, the less ECT makes sense.

Two, if I were to take the second position and say “ECT is just”, I wouldn’t be able to justify it with anything. It would be a completely blank view, backed by absolutely nothing, making absolutely no sense in light of anything in this world. It’s about as logical as believing that a teapot rotates around Jupiter. ECT lives an dies by “The Bible maybe says so”, and I never found that as a satisfactory argument, because the Bible says different things to different people by the nature of the work, and a detached religion grounded in itself and circular reasoning is a false religion. ECT, being circular and ungrounded, is therefore a false view, as well. Views like ECT typically have to be heavily hammered into the heads of young children because of this.

“If God ordered ECT, would it be just?” is what I call a false hypothetical. Similar hypotheticals are especially popular among atheists “If God did not exist, would X change”. The problems with such is that they attempt to define the latter in terms of the former when there’s no logical progression to do so. In fact, this is a bit similar to “Can God create an object he can’t lift?” or “If God says a blue pen is red, does it become read?” or something. My first complaint is that the hypothetical itself is silly.

In an attempt to answer a question, I will go to the Euthyphro dilemma. Either things are just because God does them, or God does things because they are just. I utterly reject the former. And I believe the hypothetical, in fact, relies on the latter view. The former view has some very dire consequences, those being that there’s no reason to do or not do anything at all, and that sin does not, in fact, really exist. I.e., the things God defines as sin are arbitrary, and only He decided that they’re bad, but they’re not really bad. So a person can go around murdering with a clear conscience because these things are not really bad and there’s actually no morality. This kind of a view drives one to atheism really fast. Also, ECT (especially of the Calvinist variety) actually leads to the same conclusion from the selfish viewpoint. Since what you do does not matter, you’re doomed anyway, everything is allowed. Ugh.

So, no, things do not become magically just because God orders them. Euthyphro’s dilemma is, of course, a complex topic that I do not want to spend all day here but I only favor one horn of it. So, going from there. As such, assuming God is just, God would only order ECT if it was indeed just, so the question is not “if God ordered it, would it be just?” but simply “is ECT just?”. And it stays there.

Now, a different question, which I think is the one that you are really asking, is this. If the Bible said, in the most explicit and undeniable way, that God does ECT, would I buy it? No, I would not. I would much sooner reject Christianity than accept this as justice. I have rejected Islam and other religions on grounds of immorality and injustice. I distinguish religions by what they preach and nothing more. I chose Christianity over Judaism because of what Jesus taught (every serious Christian needs to take a look at Judaism). I have left room, in the past and still do, that if someone gave me a very good explanation of ECT, I would buy it. But only then, and such explanation has not appeared. The Bible is not explicit on ECT. ECT requires a highly literal reading and is not plain in all translations. All explanations of ECT rely on a huge amount of unbiblical assumptions. In other words, sure, there may be a potentiality. There may be a teapot rotating around Jupiter. I honestly have very little reason to believe in either. So I won’t.

The burden of proof is on you, and I haven’t seen any good proof yet. And you need to prove every thing you use in your explanation.

Everyone deserves ECT? Death is ECT? Destruction is ECT? Punishment is according to the status of the victim? Love is conditional and only towards certain people? You can’t just pull this out of thin air, you need some biblical or logical support for it. I’ve seen none. ECT can arise from a few certain verses. But it cannot be explained by any verses. I find that strange, and very suspicious, and if that is not proof of a faulty translation/interpretation/extrapolation, I don’t know what is.

Jaxxen wrote:

These terms are extensively analyzed in most books on biblical Universalism. Numerous threads on this site get into it.

I am not sure why you bring up the English word “eternal”. Are you equating it with “aionios”? It is my understanding that the root word “aion” should be rendered “age” with the meaning of derivative words based on this basic definition. It is not clear to me why the word “eternal” should pop up at all in regards to the Greek word “aion” unless we choose a meaning for the word “eternal” that is not one of time duration but quality (i.e. coming from God). In this case “eternal” is not the same as “everlasting” in reference to the future (or past for that matter). You may have noticed that I almost always intentionally avoid using the word “eternal” on postings here because its meaning in English is ambiguous. Instead I used words like “everlasting”, “never-ending”, and “forever” to denote a state of being that never ends.

See also:
“THE GREEK WORD AIÓN – AIÓNIOS, TRANSLATED Everlasting – Eternal IN THE HOLY BIBLE” at tentmaker.org/books/Aion_lim.html ,
“The Power of Life and Death in a Greek Four Letter Word–Aion” at tentmaker.org/books/PowerOfL … rWord.html and
“Does “foreverS and everS” Make Sense to You?” at what-the-hell-is-hell.com/He … orever.htm

It is interesting to note that even if the English word “eternity” or “forever” is used in relation to time duration, it still does not necessarily denote a never-ending period of time, as BirdOfTheEgg eludes to. Consider:
e.g. “My boss is taking an ‘eternity’ to get back to me about the new budget.” OR “I have been waiting on this line ‘forever’ to get concert tickets.”

I believe all the other terms are sufficiently covered here:
“Hope Beyond Hell” at hopebeyondhell.net/blog/pdf/ … ridged.pdf .

Firedup wrote

Hello everyone, this is a fantastic subject to open up!

I started thinking more deeply about the meaning of justice and its implications for ECT after a sermon in our A29 church (Reformed) on Justice and Mercy. Our pastor was talking about how true Biblical justice was DOING justice while fallen man’s idea is usually GETTING justice. We were reoriented to the nature of true Biblical justice as “restorative” rather than punitive. Prison sentences were NOT fulfilling justice but were simply consequences brought to bear.

It was pointed out that God’s intention is to restore the sinner back to his original purpose so therefore that is the true meaning of the word justice. It would include even a reconciliation between victim and perpetrator. It was firmly stressed that anything less would not be true Biblical justice. Returning people to their “right-useness” or righteousness was the goal we should have (as imperfect as it will always be on earth).

I was astounded by the clear connection between God’s temporal pattern for “restorative Justice” and that of God’s ultimate justice. How could they be any different? Keller, in his book Generous Justice, explains how God’s intention is for Primary Justice, meaning restoration and right relationship with everyone else, while Secondary Justice is bringing consequences to bear on wrong doing (what he calls “rectifying justice”). He never makes the connection that with his doctrine of ECT in place God ends up with Secondary Justice (inferior) for all eternity!

As far as never-ending punishment, I would ask how does that fulfill any kind of justice as defined as “righteousness” or “right-useness”? How does sin, evil, hatred, and death cycling forever within billions of human beings accomplish justice? How does allowing sin to perpetuate forever reflect a holy God?

Also the Bible says that the wages of sin is death not consignment to an eternal state of more sinning.

BOTE wrote

Well said!

BirdOfTheEgg’s post above is so awesome, I actually had to copy it to a notepad and have shared it with people.

I am 100% in agreement with everything said there. I really can’t add anything of value here. I just really wanted to show my appreciation for that post.