Reply #8: Hell was not an original Jewish concept, but was borrowed from other

[Lydia Leftcoast]

Middle Eastern religions during the Babylonian exile period. (The concept of a flaming hell for the wicked was also in Japanese Buddhism by the twelfth century, which is about four hundred years before they had their first contact with Christianity, so I don't know where they got it.)

The early Jewish concept of life after death was vague and appears to have been a shadowy, featureless world, as when Saul goes to consult a medium who conjures up the spirit of the prophet Samuel.

I find hell to be an untenable concept, since the punishment doesn't fit the crimes. I've used this example before, but the idea of God sending people to hell for eternity for believing the wrong thing or for going swimming on Sunday (Horace Mann, the New England school reformer, stopped attending church after a preacher told him that his brother was in hell for drowning while swimming on a Sunday) is like the cult leader in Oregon who beat his eight-year-old daughter to death for "being bad."

As one commentator said, "What could an eight-year-old do to deserve the death penalty?"

And indeed, what could a human being do to deserve eternal punishment?