Honestly, I think it is disingenuous, and the argument is loaded. Namely, if a believer does effectively communicate the notion that God has some universal, eternally-true standard of morality, then the person making the argument can spring the trap:
If that standard of morality exists, we don’t know it. God hasn’t told us. The Bible is very definitely, historically the word of mankind. The standards it espouses have been relentlessly fought over by different religious factions with their own interpretations, and what’s more, they’re internally self-contradictory.
The idea that religious people need the threat of hellfire to behave just doesn’t stand to scrutiny, since so many of them have no problems professing an interpretation of God’s morality to justify whatever behavior they want.
The sad thing is, all of the nuance aside, the answer is very simple.
If there is a good place, the good people will go there.
If there is a bad place, the bad people will go there.
If there is no place, we all will go there.
“The Kingdom of heaven is within you.” So the Kingdom of hell, too. “Ye shall tell a tree by the fruit it bear” so maybe what is manifest is what the collective sub/consciousness has created within them. Plus, things in theory seldom look exactly like what we envision. We are humans, we forget it don’t know about every single variable that either already exists or can arise.
But this is largely based on the kabbalist understanding of God, and I’m just beginning to scratch beyond the surface layer of wax, which is thick for reasons. Watching things play out around me also makes me understand how and why things became occulted (hidden).
Otoh, “free will” runs smack into constraints, natural and imposed. But that’s not much different than cells in a petri dish or in a human host, maybe.
Honestly, I think it is disingenuous, and the argument is loaded. Namely, if a believer does effectively communicate the notion that God has some universal, eternally-true standard of morality, then the person making the argument can spring the trap:
If that standard of morality exists, we don’t know it. God hasn’t told us. The Bible is very definitely, historically the word of mankind. The standards it espouses have been relentlessly fought over by different religious factions with their own interpretations, and what’s more, they’re internally self-contradictory.
The idea that religious people need the threat of hellfire to behave just doesn’t stand to scrutiny, since so many of them have no problems professing an interpretation of God’s morality to justify whatever behavior they want.
The sad thing is, all of the nuance aside, the answer is very simple.
If there is a good place, the good people will go there. If there is a bad place, the bad people will go there. If there is no place, we all will go there.
Even a child can understand, right?
“The Kingdom of heaven is within you.” So the Kingdom of hell, too. “Ye shall tell a tree by the fruit it bear” so maybe what is manifest is what the collective sub/consciousness has created within them. Plus, things in theory seldom look exactly like what we envision. We are humans, we forget it don’t know about every single variable that either already exists or can arise.
But this is largely based on the kabbalist understanding of God, and I’m just beginning to scratch beyond the surface layer of wax, which is thick for reasons. Watching things play out around me also makes me understand how and why things became occulted (hidden).
Otoh, “free will” runs smack into constraints, natural and imposed. But that’s not much different than cells in a petri dish or in a human host, maybe.
Idk it’s early and I’m just waking up.