Your View of Hell

i couldnt live forever. not in a human body. ive been here a short time compared to most but a long time for me. 13 years by itself was too much to begin with.

i tried to commit suicide at 13. 15. 20 and right before i turned 22.

the bible does not see suicide as a way to heaven. when im suicidal i think about the afterlife so much. id say this is the main thing that has halted previous thoughts of suicide turning into actions. sure some maybe say "thats a GREAT thing" but i feel as if they only say that from the "other side" POV. the selfishness of others wanting you to be here.

mental illness is very tormenting.

i can easily say i will most likely go by suicide. its more of a question of WHEN i guess by now.

No one has proof? But of course there are those who have died (officially documented) and come back to life with accounts of what they experienced on the "other side"... so that would be proof as best anyone has, right? The problem is, just like with the original concept of a hell (versus a heaven or a place with God rather than absent of God) is that you either believe or you don't. It's one's choice... so to believe the accounts of those who have experienced and returned or to just believe without that...it's up to yourself.

No, nobody has proof. Near death experiences? A few things wrong with using that as proof. One would involve a quote from the bible about dying once. Another would be quotes from the bible about when the ascension takes place. Another would be the great variances in the experiences people who had an NDE. Another would be the question of how an NDE may actually be a dream. But the main problem is that this is just people saying something happened. There are thousands of people who swear they have been abducted by aliens. Is that proof of life on other planets?
The fact is that none of us know one way or the other. Some of us believe... what we were taught or what we want to believe. Some of us looked for the proof and found none but did find logical reasons to believe that religious beliefs are from the mind of man. It doesn't really affect me if people choose to believe. The logic and rationalizations about which parts of religious texts that believers choose to believe is curious.
NDE are interesting though. I'd love to believe that consciousness survives the death of the body.
Decoding The Mystery Of Near-Death Experiences : NPR
BBC News - Near-death experience 'all in the mind'

Hell.....I'm not sure. My rational mind says no, no hell. But my fears say yes a hell. I am afraid of going to hell if I commit suicide. But I don;'t believe it a hundred percent. But that indecision is part of what keeps me alive. Good, or not? I don;t know.

Maven, i also think since i believe life is eternal, there would be a point where we'd all be forgiven in the end.

I believe hell is very real. And I believe I was headed that way at one point. Doctors say it was just a vivid dream but I think differently.

I wont go into details but during a major health issue and a near death experience of mine I felt like I went to hell. And there was nothing. Blackness all around. Left with my thoughts and only my thoughts, I had no body but could see hear and feel. Could see hear and feel nothing though. Just black everywhere. That was my biggest fear up to that point. That there would be nothing after life.

It got me closer to my faith. That moment I realized there IS more after death, it doesn't end when your body does, and I don't want to be stuck in nothingness for eternity.

From what I was always told, hell is your biggest fear. If you're afraid of nothing after life, you get nothing after life (if you go to hell that is) if you are afraid of dogs, you get attacked by dogs after life, if you are afraid of clowns, you are surrounded by clowns after life. I don't know if that is true but it's what I experienced. My biggest fear was always that there would be nothing after life. When I experienced it, it made me believe there was a possibility of something greater as well.

Does anyone know the actual quote in the Bible that says suicide is a sin? I've never heard it quoted.

I'm not sure if there's a hell...I do kinda believe that if I check out of this life without seeing it all the way through that I'll have to come back and go through it again, until I've learned whatever lessons I was supposed to learn.
If there is a hell, I think it's got to be like depression. Feeling alone and cut off and in despair, with no escape. Physical torment doesn't scare me half so much as that kind of mental agony.

Thank you for this, I do agree.
I don't think there is anything otherworldly about the "near death" experience (very well can fit into what we know of the mind's workings)--and, anecdotal (from my experience)---I have experienced watching myself from above when under stress, had visions similar to those described by "near death" again with great stress, and I take this as a way of the body protecting itself. In fact (makes me chuckle a bit now, so long ago, remembering (because there were other dreams/thoughts that accompanied that time) saying to myself "Boy am I glad I am not religious, I would think this was a religious experience, whew, at least I can put That aside." I think one of my biggest problems with the God experience is that God is man-centered and therefore, I believe, man made to explain what we are as yet unable to explain (humans hate non-answers, too large a mystery etc, causes anxiety and fear of the "other" sometimes resulting in great violence to what we do not understand, lashing out in our own inner terror projecting it outward)---and I cannot in good conscious deem myself more intrinsically important than any other animal, plant, tree, or stone for that matter on the planet. I care for people because I am one, seems natural.
...Really just meant to say thanks.

I really don't know how I feel about it. On the one hand, an afterlife hell makes no sense to me; I have experienced hell in this lifetime. I don't believe we need to wait until death to get there. I believe that hell after life is largely a human construct, and that in a lot of ways we make ourselves more important and central to the universe than we actually are.

Then again, despite being a skeptic, I want to believe in the mystical, and I do believe that there is something after we shed our physical bodies. I just think that as long as we are alive, I find it unlikely to be able to know the nature of it.

I don't know if there is or not. I grew up in a conservative Christian religious environment, but I've moved away from that in recent years. I had a terrible fear of hell as a child, but it wasn't really the church's fault. I had religious OCD. That went away when I became a teenager. Now, as an adult, I don't really fear hell anymore.

It isn't the Christian hell but apparently there is an entrance to some version of hell
Scientists reportedly discover gate to hell

I'm sure it's a volcanic vent.

Good call but we're trying to keep a sense of humor and perspective here. Aren't we?

Being forced to sit through awful show two and a half men on a continuous loop. The horror!

George, you asked about beliefs other than Judeo-Christian and their view of hell. Bhuddists do not believe in hell. Aslo, I'm not sure it's accurate to say Judeo-Christian regarding hell. I don't know if it's true, but I was told that there is no hell in the Jewish faith.

As for NDEs proving there is a heaven. Carl Sagan proposed an event that most humans have experienced that soumds a lot like NDE - going through a tunnel, bright light, people waiting for the person... Sagan suggested it sounded a lot like the birth process.

Thanks Liz. I have had Jewish friends but the subject of religion never came up in conversation. I think somebody mentioned Sheol? I was hoping someone who was a member of another religion might post. So far it seems only the Christian view has been represented.
I used Judeo-Christian in the historical sense as Christianity is an offshoot of Judaism.
I remember the NDE being compared to the birth process but I didn't know Sagan said it. Not surprising though.
I think it would be really interesting to have someone from the Zoroastrian religion chime in. That religion had a big influence on later religions such as Judaism and Christianity.

Don't Roman Catholics believe that Sheol is sort of between hell and heaven and people can be prayed out of it and into heaven? (Please, no throwing of stones at me if I am wrong, please!)

I said I wasn't going to respond any more, so forgive me for going back on that statement. However, I do want to comment on whether suicide is a sin. My understanding is that this belief is a tenet of the Catholic Church. I'm not sure about other faiths and religions. As far as I know (someone please correct me if I am wrong), no specific scripture in the Christian Bible condemns suicide directly. However, it can be inferred from the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" and other scriptures. I am hesitant to say much about this topic, though, for fear that my comments will push some folks over this edge.

Payne, I was raised a Catholic, but haven't been a practicing Catholic in over 40 years. Let me see what I can remember....

I don't remember the term Sheol, but Catholics do believe in purgatory. I didn't understand it very well as a kid so my explanation might be off the mark. My understanding was that purgatory was for folks who hadn't done anything bad enough to go to hell, but also hadn't been good enough to go to heaven. It's possible for people to earn their way out of purgatory and into heaven, but I don't know how that happens.

I have no idea if the Bible has any specific injunctions against suicide. I always believed that was more a particular religion's interpretation of the Bible. When I was a kid we were taught that suicide was a sin because the body was the temple of God. You were insulting God by distroying his temple.

I just read the article, very interesting! Thank you.

I will be locking this thread at this point, as we do not allow religious discussion here (even in the Sanctuary for Spiritual Support). This is also not a conversation about mental health, so it is not suited for the Other Mental Health Discussion forum either.

The original post was not against guidelines, but members discussing specific religions is against our guidelines.

If you would like to discuss such religious/spiritual things, members are actively encouraged to start a "social group" where you can discuss religion.

Thank you for your cooperation.