Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: pbh@jake.tmc.edu (Patrick Haggood) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Satan savable? Hell temporary? Message-ID: Date: 22 Apr 91 08:13:01 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: Wayne State University Lines: 53 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu I was just about to argue that Satan could be saved. I was going to arge that the only thing keeping Satan from being saved was Satan. He made the mistake, he went to hell. His pride is the only thing keeping him from reconciling himself to God. Writings in revelations do not constrain him; revelation is simply the written record of what is going to happen. God knows everying, and knows that Satan won't reconcile, not that he can't. He simply won't. That's kinda what makes him Satan. Then, on reflection, I realized that we humans can get pretty philosophical about things we know nothing about. The bible doesn't mention *any* iota about angels and their futures, outlooks, whatever. The bible is for us, as was Jesus. For humans. Jesus' mission wasn't to save Satan or his horde. Just us. If there is a salvation plan for Satan, it obviously doesn't concern us otherwise He'd mention it. Personally, I don't think there is one because we are "above angels", not by our own value but in the value that God places in us. The universe was created for our sakes and is waiting on us to "get right" (that's really a paraphrase of scripture, but I can't remember the book). There's been a lot of debate on this issue; I remember one about how angels didn't have free will, only humans, and that's what made us special. Then I wondered how Satan could have messed up if he didn't have free will..... The bible is thick enough just trying to tell humans how to get back to God. Think how big it would be if it tried to explain God's entire creation and Why Things Are, too. Origen argued that Revelation was mere imagery and that Satan >can, indeed, be saved. > > Extrapolating then, we can expand that argument somewhat. If Satan >can be saved, why not the other souls languishing in hell? In this >model, then, hell would not be a permanent state, but a place which >you could escape from over the course of time (he did stipulate that >in some cases the time required for this transition would be quite a >long period... but when were talking eternity any finite time >constraint would be an improvement). > > Not that it really matters to me in the big scheme of things, I >just thought it was kind of interesting and wanted to know what you >all thought. -- Patrick B. Haggood Wayne STate University Detroit, MI Physics - Class of 1991 (-2?)