If it is not, one must suppose that those populating Hell may eventually die, or that God will ultimately restore all immortal souls in the World to Come, i.e.
[13] In Christianity, Hell has traditionally been regarded as a place or state of punishment for wrongdoing or sin in the mortal life, as a manifestation of divine justice.
[opinion] [discuss] Examples include John 3:16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."
Philosopher Immanuel Kant argued in 1793 in Religion within the Bounds of Bare Reason that since morality lies ultimately in a person's disposition, and as disposition is concerned with the adoption of universal principles, or as he called them: "maxims", every human being is guilty of, in one sense, an infinite amount of violations of the law, and he consequently an infinite punishment is not unjustified.
[21] Jonathan Kvanvig, in The Problem of Hell (1993), agrees that God would not allow one to be eternally damned by a decision made under the wrong circumstances.
"[33] In Islam, Jahannam (hell) is the final destiny and place of punishment in Afterlife for those guilty of disbelief and (according to some interpretations) evil doing in their lives on earth.
[7] This introduces the question, (or at least the paradox), where sinners are said to be punished in Jahannam for their decision to sin of their own free will, but everything that happens in the world is determined by an all powerful and all knowing God.
[44] As with other Jewish writings of the Second Temple period, the New Testament text distinguishes two words, both translated "Hell" in older English Bibles: Hades, "the grave", and Gehenna where God "can destroy both body and soul".
From the sixth century BC onward, the Greeks developed pagan ideas for the dead, and of reincarnation and even transmigration of souls.
Christians picked up these pagan beliefs inferred by the Greek of immortality of the soul, or spirit being of a mortal individual, which survives the death of the body of this world and this lifetime, which is at odds and in contrast to the scriptural teaching that the dead go to the grave and know nothing and then at the end, an eternal oblivion of the wicked and an eternal life for the saints.
Scripture makes clear that the dead are awaiting resurrection at the last judgment, when Christ comes and also when each person will receive his reward or are part of those lost with the wicked.
Conditional immortality asserts that souls are naturally mortal, and those who reject Christ are separated from the sustaining power of God, thus dying off on their own.
This is seen in the texts making clear the alternatives at the end are to perish or to have eternal, everlasting life: And that the consequence for sin at the day of judgment when God will judge both the living and the dead when He appears is death, not burning forever.
God's gift is eternal life, very different from the penalty of sin: The mortality of the soul has been held throughout the history of both Judaism and Christianity,[45][46] with many biblical scholars looking at the issue through the Hebrew text, have denied the teaching of innate immortality.
One of the most notable English opponents of the immortality of the soul was Thomas Hobbes who describes the idea as a Greek "contagion" in Christian doctrine.
[49] Modern proponents of conditional immortality include as denominations the Seventh-day Adventists, Bible Students, Jehovah's Witnesses, Christadelphians, and some other Protestant Christians.
[51]Popular culture, for instance, the graphic novel series The Sandman, sometimes proposes the idea that souls go to Hell because they believe that they deserve to, rather than being condemned to it by God or Satan.
[52] Universal reconciliation is the doctrine or belief of some Christians that all will eventually receive salvation because of the love and mercy of God.
Neither does universal reconciliation commit one to the position that there is no Hell or damnation—Hell can well be the consuming fire through which Christ refines those who turn from him (Matthew 3:11).
It was traditionally claimed by some western scholars such as the Universalist historian George T. Knight (1911) and Pierre Batiffol (English translation 1914) that a form of universal salvation could be found among some theologians in early Christianity.
[citation needed] Some Greek Orthodox scholars do not count Gregory of Nyssa (AD 331–395) as a believer in Universal Salvation,[55] although many do,[56] given that multiple passages in his writings appear to explicitly affirm apocatastasis.
Recent examples of advocates for the position are Kallistos Ware, a Greek Orthodox bishop and retired University of Oxford theologian who states that many of the 'Fathers of Church' postulated the idea of salvation for all, and Saint Silouan of Mount Athos, who argued that the compassion and love of those in heaven and on earth will extend to eliminating suffering even in hell.
"[59] Verses that seem to contradict the tradition of complete damnation and come up in arguments also include Lamentations 3:31–33 (NIV), "For no one is cast off by the Lord forever.
With regards to the problem of hell, as one that can be traced to the more fundamental theological dilemma of God and the existence of good and evil, theodicy offers its own answers.
The main issue holds that if God is all good, powerful, and perfect, then how can he allow evil and, by extension, hell to exist?
[63] Some Roman Catholic theologians prominent around the time of the Second Vatican Council, such as Karl Rahner, Gisbert Greshake, and Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar[64] have at length discussed the possibility that any man may be led by a final grace to freely willed repentance if necessary at least at some point in the process of dying.
This possible process is described thus by the late Munich dogmatic Prof. Michael Schmaus:[65] If in terms of theology death is a meeting of a man with God in so far as God calls man and he answers obedience, readiness and love, it would be surprising if in the moment of dying the chances of taking position never were given, even contrary to the outward look.
We may assume that in the dissolving process of the earthly union of body and soul and with the progressing breakaway from earthly entanglements, a special awakeness accrues to man ... in which he can say yea or nay to God.Balthasar was careful to describe his opinion that Hell might be empty as merely a hope, but even this claim was rejected by most conservative Catholics, including Cardinal Avery Dulles.