₦airaland Forum

I have read a number of posts on this site casting Christians about their God that makes people to burn in hell. But, how does a dead person whose body is here rotting on earth get thrown into hell? Even if it is the human soul that is cast into hell, what kind of fire in this hell burns the immaterial soul?

Ge. 2:7 the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Ps. 8:4 what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?
Ps. 8:5 You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.

Initially, God made man just like He made other animals. He later breathed into man the breath of life (Holy Spirit) and man became a living soul. Ps. 8:4 shows that the spiritual potential of man was just a little lower than that of angels. That is why man could relate very closely with God and angels. In fact, man had a spiritual body.

Ge. 2:16 And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden;
Ge. 2:17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”

Ge. 3:6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
Ge. 3:7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.

God warned man that the day he would eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, he would surely die. Satan deceived man into eating the forbidden fruit. As soon as man ate the forbidden fruit, his spiritual potential nose-dived. Having very low spiritual potential, the human soul could no longer stay in the spiritual body that God gave it and so separated from the body and became naked. Man wasn't even able to see the body again. Man still had some reasonable amount of spiritual potential remaining; this enabled him to create a body for the soul that was of plant matter--lowly earthly body.

Ge. 3:8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden.
Ge. 3:9 But the LORD God called to the man, “Where are you?”
Ge. 3:10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”
Ge. 3:11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree from which I commanded you not to eat?”

Ge. 3:21 The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.

When God came to interact with Adam and Eve as He used to do, Adam and Eve could not stay in the presence of God due to low spiritual potential. They hid themselves among trees because they had tree-like bodies. In end of that God's final interaction with Adam and Eve, God put the human soul in animal bodies, which are the human bodies of today.

2Co. 5:1 Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.
2Co. 5:2 Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling,
2Co. 5:3 because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked.
2Co. 5:4 For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.

The big problem is that when the human soul separates from the earthly body, which is what happens at the death of a human being, unless God clothes that soul with a spiritual body, the soul stays naked. unclothedness of the soul is hell. Without a body, the soul cannot do anything. It will just be floating. Apparently, evil spirits could do anything to that soul.

God gave His people the culture and instinct of abhorring unclothedness of the body. He knew that human beings will no longer know that they are souls and that the soul abhors unclothedness. When we see a human being walking about naked in the public, we know that that human being is lost. That is exactly how a soul without a body is lost.

Even the instinct of self preservation, that cringes at anything that could destroy the human body is due to the horror that the soul feels at the prospect of losing the body that covers it and becoming naked.

First amd foremost, Hell is not the same as the lake of fire that burns with sulfur and brimstone.
Hell is beneath, (grave).

The lake of fire that is being talked about in the Bible is not a literal "fire" but a final destruction of the sinful soul, the first death and the devil and his agents.cos the aforementioned cannot be destroyed by literal fire, like you pointed out since they are spirit/spiritual. Fire is just a symbolic representation of the final destruction which is the second death that places this above mentioned in a state of inactivity (final death) so an end comes to them eternally.

Hope this is clear enough.

What happens at the death of a human being?

The soul separates from the physical body. What happens to the soul depends on its spiritual potential.If the spiritual potential is sufficiently positive towards God, an angel of God clothes it with some form of spiritual body and guides it to Paradise, where it will stay till the time of first resurrection (Re. 20:5). If the spiritual potential is below the required threshold, the soul stays naked until the great white throne judgment (Re. 20:11). Souls that fail in the judgment are destroyed for good.

Re. 6:9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained.
Re. 6:10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?”
Re. 6:11 Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellowservants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed.

Here we see souls of people that had just been killed in the world. Initially, they are naked, but then each of them is given a "white" clothing or body. They wait in Paradise until the first resurrection.