The word "hell" was mistranslated from the words "sheol" and "hades." These words simply mean the unseen place that people go when they die. A place of endless torment after death is never represented anywhere within the Hebrew texts, because it was never a Jewish doctrine. Jesus, being a Jewish Rabbi, would never have preached about a place of eternal torment. Another word mistranslated as hell, is the Greek word "gehenna" which in Jesus' day was the Valley of Hinnom. Here's a picture of it.

http://www.what-the-hell-is-hell.co...

The words "everlasting," "eternal," and "for ever and ever" were mistranslated from the the Hebrew word "olam," and its Greek counterpart "aion," which mean a set period of time. In other words not eternal.

Many modern scholars are beginning to speak the truth about this now. One example is Dr. G. Campbell Morgan. This is what he says in his book <God's Method's With Men>

"Let me say to Bible students that we must be very careful how to use the word 'eternity.' We have fallen into great error in our constant use of that word. There is NO word in the whole Book of God corresponding with our 'eternal,' which as commonly used among us, means absolutely without end."

There are plenty of examples which demonstrate what he is saying. Here are a few.

<Jude 1:7> tells us that Sodom's punishment is eternal while <Ezekiel 16:53-55> tells us it is not.

<Zephaniah 2:9> tells us that Ammon will become a wasteland "forever" while <Jeremiah 49:6> tells us that it will be restored.

<Deuteronomy 23:3> (King James Version) An Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD; even to their tenth generation shall they not enter into the congregation of the LORD for ever.

Does forever mean ten generations?

<Habakkuk 3:6> (King James Version) tells us that "the everlasting mountains were scattered" while <Habakkuk 3:6> (New International Version) tells us that "The ancient mountains crumbled and the age-old hills collapsed."

Everlasting mountains are not allowed to crumble.

The Aaronic Priesthood was to be an "everlasting" priesthood.

Exodus 40:15 (King James Version) And thou shalt anoint them, as thou didst anoint their father, that they may minister unto me in the priest's office: for their anointing shall surely be an everlasting priesthood throughout their generations.

That is until it was superseded by the Melchizedek Priesthood (Hebrews 7:14-18).

To fear the LORD is to hate evil;
I hate pride and arrogance,
evil behavior and perverse speech.

David would agree with this interpretation

<Psalm 34:11-15> Come, my children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the LORD. Whoever of you loves life and desires to see many good days, keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies. Turn from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it. The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their cry;

<Isaiah 45:22> Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.

<Ephesians 4:6> one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

<Phil 1:6> Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:

<Psalm 106:1> PRAISE YE the Lord. O give thanks unto the Lord; for he is good: for his mercy endureth forever.

<Neh 9:29-31> You warned them to return to your law, but they became arrogant and disobeyed your commands. They sinned against your ordinances, by which a man will live if he obeys them. Stubbornly they turned their backs on you, became stiff-necked and refused to listen. For many years you were patient with them. By your Spirit you admonished them through your prophets. Yet they paid no attention, so you handed them over to the neighboring peoples. But in your great mercy you did not put an end to them or abandon them, for you are a gracious and merciful God.

<Rom 8:38> For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

<Psalm 145:8> The Lord is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy.

<Dan 9:9> The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against him;

<Heb 13:5> Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.

<Psalm 139:7-10> Wither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art their: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art their. If I take the wings of the mourning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.

<Lam 3:22> It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.

<Psalm 64:9> And all men shall fear, and shall declare the work of God; for they shall wisely consider of his doing.

<Psalm 65:2> O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come.

<I Tim 2:3-4> For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our savior. Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.

<Rom 14:11> It is written: `As surely as I live,' says the Lord, `every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.'

<John 12:32> I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.

<I Cor 15:22-23> For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn...

<I Cor 15:28> And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.

<Phil 2:9-11> Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

<Rom 11:29-3>2 for God's gifts and his call are irrevocable. Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now[a] receive mercy as a result of God's mercy to you. For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.

<TCE> I think there are some difficult points to understand in the Bible's use of "eternal", "everlasting", etc.

< "Let me say to Bible students that we must be very careful how to use the word 'eternity.' We have fallen into great error in our constant use of that word. There is NO word in the whole Book of God corresponding with our 'eternal,' which as commonly used among us, means absolutely without end." >

Although I would never, never claim that all Bible translations are created equal, I do firmly believe that God intended for the Bible to be translated into very many languages, and that the Holy Spirit takes part in that work.

In the first five or six centuries of Christianity there were six theological schools four of which (Alexandria, Antioch, Caesarea, and Edessa, or Nisibis) taught universal salvation. The school of Ephesus accepted conditional immortality (annihilationism). The school of Carthage or Rome taught endless punishment of the wicked. You can guess which one won.

Early Christian universalist teachers include Clement of Alexandria 150-215 AD (who was venerated as a saint up until the 7th century when they disenvenerated him), Origen 185-254 AD St. Gregory of Nyssa in the 4th century, and St. Isaac the Syrian in the 7th century. Furthermore, the earliest doctrinal statements such as the Apostles Creed and later the Nicene Creed (325 AD) never taught of an eternal place of punishment.

In 325 AD Roman Emperor Constantine formed and presided over the Council of Nicaea which established core beliefs (The Nicene Creed) and formed Canons of the faith. Although the Nicene Creed of 325 did not mention an eternal hell over the centuries doctrines were formed and anyone or anything that stood in the way of church leaderships’ plans was either removed, destroyed or banished.

Augustine of Hippo (I will not refer to him as a saint) was instrumental is establishing the eternal hell myth as a core belief of Christianity in the early 4th century. By the time the 6th century rolled around the doctrine of universal salvation was hardly a footnote. If you think this was all God's doing ask yourself why God would first decide to save everybody and then decide to burn most people in hell forever. Ask yourself what the politicians in power had to gain from the hell idea.

Happily, in recent times it seems that the pendulum is swinging back in favor of the truth. Some recent developments include

- 2004 Conservative Protestant bishop Carlton Pearson was declared a heretic by the Joint College of African-American Pentecostal Bishops when after examining the evidence he broke with tradition and formally declared his belief in the doctrine of universal salvation. He has since formed a church called the New Dimensions Church which in 2008 was merged into All Souls Unitarian Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, one of the largest Unitarian Universalist congregations in the world.

- 2005 Roman Catholic Archbishop Murphy O'Connor reiterated that Universal Salvation was entirely compatible with Catholic teaching and expressed his personal hope for universal salvation.

- 2007 The Christian Universalist Association was founded. This distinguishes the modern Christian Universalist movement from Unitarian Universalism.

- 2008 Russian Orthodox Bishop Hilarion of Vienna in his presentation at the First World Apostolic Congress of Divine Mercy, argued that God's mercy is so great that He does not condemn sinners to everlasting punishment.

- Some modern biblically-based teachers of universal salvation include Thomas Talbott, Stephen Jones, J. Preston Eby, Bill and Elaine Cook, and Tony Salmon.

Ask yourself which is the true God of love. The one described by the 16th century clergyman Jeremy Taylor,

"Husbands shall see their wives, parents shall see their children tormented before their eyes…the bodies of the damned shall be crowded together in hell like grapes in a wine-press, which press on another till they burst"

or the one described by one of the original founding fathers of Christianity.

"All men are Christ's, some by knowing Him, the rest not yet. He is the Savior, not of some and the rest not. For how is He Savior and Lord, if not the Savior and Lord of all?" - Clement of Alexandria

That everybody returns to God in the end. Nobody is forgotten

<<<<<playground player>>>> Do people who actively reject Christ get dragged kicking and screaming into Heaven?>

Absolutely not. There are plenty of churches that would like to drag us kicking and screaming into hell though. God never forces us to do anything. Did Jesus use his divine power to force everybody on earth to comply with God's dictates? We have free will. Everything that happens to us is of our own making ... at least on the spiritual level. Having said that even Hitler knew to take his hand out of the fire. Who would choose eternal torment?

<<<<<playground player>>>> Are notorious and unrepentant evildoers saved?>

Of course. They don't stay notorious evildoers forever.

<Psalm 22:27> All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the LORD: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee.

That doesn't mean that they don't have to work through the consequences of their actions. One way this is done is through reincarnation as taught by the Jews among others. The church doesn't like the idea of reincarnation because the "one shot deal" that <OCF> mentioned is a far more scary idea better suited to control people.

<<<<<playground player>>>> If everybody is saved whether they believe in Jesus Christ or not, then why should it be necessary to proclaim the Gospel?>

The Gospel is there for everybody whether we proclaim it or not. The purpose of any religion or spiritual path is to shorten the Journey and lessen our suffering. If we all have eternity to return to God what difference does it make how many or how few choose God in this lifetime?

You have to understand that the Jewish doctrine is ancient. The kabbalah is thought to precede the Torah by thousands of years. According to Jewish doctrine "gilgul neshamot" is the concept of reincarnation, and hell is nothing more than separation or distance from God. It's not a place. It's a condition, and a temporary one at that.

The physical universe is the manifestation of that inward condition. It seems real. It's a place of separation where God is nowhere to be found, and it's a place of suffering. Everything physical is by definition finite which is what makes it a concealment of the infinitude of the Divine.

It's easy to see ourselves as frail and fleshly bodies lost is a vast universe where everything kills us. It's easy to see ourselves as vulnerable and disconnected. Like nobody cares and our existence is irrelevant. We see ourselves this way because we have forgotten what we really are. This is most likely the "hell" that Jesus spoke of.

<1 John 2:15> Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

If we choose the world we choose separation from God. It's that simple.

<1 John 5:18> We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the one who was born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot harm him.

One who has awakened spiritually does not continue to make poor choices. The devil who is the god of the physical universe can no longer deceive him/her.

<1 John 5:19> We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one.

The devil rules earth. Personally, I've come to believe that the devil is the ego.

<1 John 5:20> We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true—even in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.

<7> Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.>