Is Hell Coercion? Do People Really Choose It?
Many a skeptic rejects belief in the God of the Bible in part on the idea that the threat of Hell is somehow a form of monstrously unjust coercion: "Come ta Heaven and nobody gets hoit, see? Heh-heh-heh!"
On the surface, and especially from the POV of a disaffected college student, a demographic with whom this view is especially popular, those who hold it would seem to have a point. We live in a consumerist world where there are always more and more and more choices, always new and improved, always luring us with the promise that one of them or some combination of them is somehow, some way, the mystic portal to the personal utopia that fits our sensibilities and desires perfectly that we dream of and seek out in every pleasure and convenience.
So we are always looking for that one more choice than we have, and if it doesn't work out, then there has to be another, and then another, and then another, until we find that choice that will cause reality to conform to us and our desires without us having to compromise in the least or put in any effort to meet it even one millionth of the way.
As CS Lewis said about the constant desire of man to create this new choice by marrying Heaven with Hell in his preface to The Great Divorce:
In some sense or other, the attempt to make that marriage is perennial. The attempt is based on the belief that reality never presents us with an absolutely unavoidable "either-or"; that, granted skill and patience and (above all) time enough, some way of embracing both alternatives can always be found; that mere development or adjustment or refinement will somehow turn evil into good without our being called on for a final and total rejection of anything we should like to retain.
In such a cultural context, the idea of a stark binary choice, like good vs. evil, light vs. darkness, Heaven vs. Hell, is not merely passe or lacking in countercultural edginess and chic, but downright primitive and barbaric. (And worse yet, far too demanding and difficult.)
But on closer examination, have they not noticed that if the choice of Heaven vs Hell really is not a choice but coercion, then aren’t ALL choices coercion?
Your federal, state and local governments build and maintain roads for you. They then give you a choice – drive on the right side of the road in safety or drive on the left side of the road and die in a head-on collision. Is this not, by this new standard, coercion on the part of your governments?
You are on your rooftop in a flood and a helicopter comes. They lower a rescuer with a basket to you and the rescuer says, take my hand and live or refuse and drown. Is this not, by this new standard, coercion on the part of the rescuers?
But what about a less dramatic scenario:
You have a choice between strawberry and vanilla ice cream. If you choose the strawberry, by definition you don’t get the vanilla, or if you choose vanilla you don’t get the strawberry. In choosing one flavor, are you not, again by this new standard, being threatened with the loss of the other flavor and therefore being coerced? You could try eating both at the same time but then it would not be either flavor – they would be mixed in your mouth and would be “strawnilla” or “vanberry” or something, but not pure strawberry and pure vanilla in your mouth simultaneously. (Do not take this example lightly -- this could be hellish agony to someone whose dream is to have both flavors in their purest state in his mouth at the same time. I am only half-kidding...)
So it seems even nature and the laws of logic are, by this new standard, cruelly coercing us.
Maybe it’s time to recognize that the choice between eternal joy and eternal agony is not only a real choice after all but a no-brainer and we should act accordingly, or we should just admit that there is no such thing as choice, only coercion, coercion everywhere we look, and we should just sit around crying in some safe space with stuffed animals about how nature and logic are so mean to us and they should just stop it.
God is very much all-or-nothing. He wants the very best for you; therefore you get all of Him or none of Him. You cannot have just the parts of Him you happen to like any more than a man can be somewhat dead or a woman can be somewhat pregnant. You tell God to go away, He, being the source of all that is good, will grant your wish -- but this requires that all good things go with Him when he leaves as surely as the sun disappearing takes its rays with it. It cannot disappear but still leave those rays behind for your pleasure and convenience. Saying this is coercion is like firing the cook and complaining that he is starving you.
And finally, if Hell really is coercion and not a real choice, then why do so many people choose it – not only in the life to come but even here on Earth, as if they’re whetting their appetites for it?
(If you really don't believe people choose Hell on earth, you just have not looked around...)
Many a skeptic rejects belief in the God of the Bible in part on the idea that the threat of Hell is somehow a form of monstrously unjust coercion: "Come ta Heaven and nobody gets hoit, see? Heh-heh-heh!"
On the surface, and especially from the POV of a disaffected college student, a demographic with whom this view is especially popular, those who hold it would seem to have a point. We live in a consumerist world where there are always more and more and more choices, always new and improved, always luring us with the promise that one of them or some combination of them is somehow, some way, the mystic portal to the personal utopia that fits our sensibilities and desires perfectly that we dream of and seek out in every pleasure and convenience.
So we are always looking for that one more choice than we have, and if it doesn't work out, then there has to be another, and then another, and then another, until we find that choice that will cause reality to conform to us and our desires without us having to compromise in the least or put in any effort to meet it even one millionth of the way.
As CS Lewis said about the constant desire of man to create this new choice by marrying Heaven with Hell in his preface to The Great Divorce:
In some sense or other, the attempt to make that marriage is perennial. The attempt is based on the belief that reality never presents us with an absolutely unavoidable "either-or"; that, granted skill and patience and (above all) time enough, some way of embracing both alternatives can always be found; that mere development or adjustment or refinement will somehow turn evil into good without our being called on for a final and total rejection of anything we should like to retain.
In such a cultural context, the idea of a stark binary choice, like good vs. evil, light vs. darkness, Heaven vs. Hell, is not merely passe or lacking in countercultural edginess and chic, but downright primitive and barbaric. (And worse yet, far too demanding and difficult.)
But on closer examination, have they not noticed that if the choice of Heaven vs Hell really is not a choice but coercion, then aren’t ALL choices coercion?
Your federal, state and local governments build and maintain roads for you. They then give you a choice – drive on the right side of the road in safety or drive on the left side of the road and die in a head-on collision. Is this not, by this new standard, coercion on the part of your governments?
You are on your rooftop in a flood and a helicopter comes. They lower a rescuer with a basket to you and the rescuer says, take my hand and live or refuse and drown. Is this not, by this new standard, coercion on the part of the rescuers?
But what about a less dramatic scenario:
You have a choice between strawberry and vanilla ice cream. If you choose the strawberry, by definition you don’t get the vanilla, or if you choose vanilla you don’t get the strawberry. In choosing one flavor, are you not, again by this new standard, being threatened with the loss of the other flavor and therefore being coerced? You could try eating both at the same time but then it would not be either flavor – they would be mixed in your mouth and would be “strawnilla” or “vanberry” or something, but not pure strawberry and pure vanilla in your mouth simultaneously. (Do not take this example lightly -- this could be hellish agony to someone whose dream is to have both flavors in their purest state in his mouth at the same time. I am only half-kidding...)
So it seems even nature and the laws of logic are, by this new standard, cruelly coercing us.
Maybe it’s time to recognize that the choice between eternal joy and eternal agony is not only a real choice after all but a no-brainer and we should act accordingly, or we should just admit that there is no such thing as choice, only coercion, coercion everywhere we look, and we should just sit around crying in some safe space with stuffed animals about how nature and logic are so mean to us and they should just stop it.
God is very much all-or-nothing. He wants the very best for you; therefore you get all of Him or none of Him. You cannot have just the parts of Him you happen to like any more than a man can be somewhat dead or a woman can be somewhat pregnant. You tell God to go away, He, being the source of all that is good, will grant your wish -- but this requires that all good things go with Him when he leaves as surely as the sun disappearing takes its rays with it. It cannot disappear but still leave those rays behind for your pleasure and convenience. Saying this is coercion is like firing the cook and complaining that he is starving you.
And finally, if Hell really is coercion and not a real choice, then why do so many people choose it – not only in the life to come but even here on Earth, as if they’re whetting their appetites for it?
(If you really don't believe people choose Hell on earth, you just have not looked around...)