Where did the heathens go before Jesus?

[techs]

Ok, I'm not a bible scholar.
From my rudimentary understanding of Christianity, you can only get to heaven by believing in Jesus.

So did everyone go to hell before Jesus?

 

[OverVolt]

Yea sure sucks for them.

 

[zinfamous]

that's why Purgatory was invented, several centuries later.

It takes care of gray areas like this. Also the unbaptized infants, and such.

According to Revelations, Jesus rounds up all the souls in Purgatory, (after dispensing godly justice on the wicked world), and separates the saved from the damned, then carts the worthy along.

He also does this in Hell (The harrowing of Hell).

The Bible is full of crazy shit.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Who knows, just make something up...how do you think our world got stuck with religion in the first place?

 

[theflyingpig]

So did everyone go to hell before Jesus?

lol. It doesn't matter because Jesus and everything else in the bible is bullshit. I'll bet if you took the Twilight books back in time people would believe that shit too. People were stupid back then, and a few billion are still stupid enough to fall for the same shit their ancestors did. Only a few of us, the thinking men, have overcome this foolishness. Hopefully the rest of the world will open their eyes to the truth before it's too late. Everyone knows this.

 

[StageLeft]

Well really Jesus was post-Judaism,so prior to him he builds upon the Old Testament. In essence, when he came along the rules changed but prior there were other rules.

Only a few of us, the thinking men, have overcome this foolishness.

And yet there are surely millions of Christians who could outwit you without even trying, unless you actually think you are smarter than every last one of them.

 

[DangerAardvark]

Well really Jesus was post-Judaism,so prior to him he builds upon the Old Testament. In essence, when he came along the rules changed but prior there were other rules.And yet there are surely millions of Christians who could outwit you without even trying, unless you actually think you are smarter than every last one of them.

Right. All the Greeks are in Hades. The Norse are in Valhalla. And the Aztecs are rocking out with Quetzalcoatl, the bloody-dicked snake god. It all makes sense now.

Holy shit, my spell checker know the word "Quetzalcoatl".

 

[theflyingpig]

Well really Jesus was post-Judaism,so prior to him he builds upon the Old Testament. In essence, when he came along the rules changed but prior there were other rules.And yet there are surely millions of Christians who could outwit you without even trying, unless you actually think you are smarter than every last one of them.

I outwit them simply by knowing that the bible is bullshit. Everyone knows this.

 

[Crono]

Sheol. Same as after Jesus.

Sheol (death/the grave) itself wil l be cast into hell.

The counterpart for the righteous, heaven, itself joins with the new earth (physical universe).

So neither heaven nor hell (sheol, or hades being the greek word used in the NT) is complete until the resurrection of the just and unjust (yet future).

And faith in God is what saves, whether it was looking forward to Christ (faith in God was counted as righteousness, if you read account of Abraham who never saw the coming of Christ) or looking back on it in the times since Christ. The sacrificial system that God gave to the Israelites was emblematic, pointing to the redemption of human beings by His death on the cross. The blood of bulls and goats never did, and could never, take away sin.

 

[Lonyo]

Depends on who they were. Not all religious people believed in life after death, including some of the Jews.

Hell is a more modern thing as we perceive it now. Where people went before Jesus would depend on who you were talking to and what they believed.

 

[Whoozyerdaddy]

Ok, I'm not a bible scholar.
From my rudimentary understanding of Christianity, you can only get to heaven by believing in Jesus.

So did everyone go to hell before Jesus?

False assumption... you had to believe in GOD to get into heaven... Jesus came later.

 

[techs]

False assumption... you had to believe in GOD to get into heaven... Jesus came later.

So, basically Jesus tightened up the entrance rules?

 

[Whoozyerdaddy]

So, basically Jesus tightened up the entrance rules?

Not sure what you're getting at. Are you trying to recover your false assumption? Are you specifically attacking Christianity or are you openly attacking all religions? Heathens are not specific to Christianity y'know... 'heathens' are adressed in one way or another in all religions.

Where are you going with this?

 

[StageLeft]

Right. All the Greeks are in Hades. The Norse are in Valhalla. And the Aztecs are rocking out with Quetzalcoatl, the bloody-dicked snake god. It all makes sense now.

Holy shit, my spell checker know the word "Quetzalcoatl".

I'm just answering in one possible way. Also, as far as I interpret it, even the New Testament does not say that faith in Jesus is expressly needed in the obvious sense; somewhere in Romans it clearly states an "out" for those who, for example, live in the middle of bumfvck nowhere and have never heard of Jesus at all.

 

[techs]

Not sure what you're getting at. Are you trying to recover your false assumption? Are you specifically attacking Christianity or are you openly attacking all religions? Heathens are not specific to Christianity y'know... 'heathens' are adressed in one way or another in all religions.

Where are you going with this?

I'm not fishing for anything. I always thought it quite strange that the Christian God would condemn many millions of people to hell who had never even heard of Jesus their whole life, and hence couldn't believe in him.
So, I wondered what the criteria for entrance to Heaven was before Jesus when no one could believe in him.

 

[Crono]

So, basically Jesus tightened up the entrance rules?

The rules never changed, it's just that more knowledge was revealed.

Faith in God has always been the condition. If you trust in God, you trust in His word. And until the time of Jesus, that had been the Old Testament or the direct word from God before then.

But even from the time of Adam, there was an expectancy of a messiah coming. The 3 fold prophecy given in Genesis addressed the fates of Adam and Eve (humanity), the universe, and Satan. Satan's fate would be that the seed (singular) of Eve would crush the head of the serpent (Satan). In other words, a descendant of Eve would be the one to deal the death blow to Satan.

Further on in the OT, most notably in Isaiah (which contains a whopping amount of messianic prophecies fulfilled in Christ) but spread throughout scripture, further details concerning the coming messiah and his role and attributes are given.

The Old Testament saints (believers) knew that a messiah would come, and they believed in Him. Even though they never saw His arrival, it was counted as righteousness or salvation from God. Just as we who come after Christ and have never seen Him yet still believe are accounted righteousness.

The issue I see you getting at is the sovereignty of God. If you believe God is the creator of the universe, then really He has every right to appoint some to salvation and condemn the rest to hell. When it comes right down to it, you are questioning whether a creator has full right to what happens to his creations. Or to use a biblical metaphor, whether a potter has right to create vessels for honor and vessels for destruction both using the same clay.

Really, everyone innately understand the sovereignty of a infinitely powerful creator over his creations, so it becomes far easier to deny the existence of a creator to begin with and live according to each person's own standard of righteousness (which leads inevitably to sin and destruction).

 

[Whoozyerdaddy]

I'm not fishing for anything. I always thought it quite strange that the Christian God would condemn many millions of people to hell who had never even heard of Jesus their whole life, and hence couldn't believe in him.
So, I wondered what the criteria for entrance to Heaven was before Jesus when no one could believe in him.

Oooo-k... so back to the false assumption then.

Please provide evidence that ignorance of Jesus is a barrier to the entrance of heaven.

 

[timosyy]

"For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built."
- 1 Peter 3:18-20

... Is how I imagine I'd answer the question posed in the OP.

Also, I think it's funny how this verse is directly above it:

"Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect..."

Heh . I actually enjoy reading [parts of] the Bible, just from an objective literary standpoint (I'm a sucker for that sweeping, epic style). It's a good story, if nothing else.

 

[Crono]

"For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built."
- 1 Peter 3:18-20

... Is how I imagine I'd answer the question posed in the OP.

Also, I think it's funny how this verse is directly above it:

"Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect..."

Heh

That quote is regarding the demons in the abyss. They were sent there for possessing men and attempting to procreate with women during the time of Noah. They are bound in the abyss until the time of the Great Tribulation.

 

[timosyy]

The fathers of the Nephilim mentioned in Genesis? Fun times.

 

[Crono]

The fathers of the Nephilim mentioned in Genesis? Fun times.

Nephilim just means mighty men. Essentially powerful men who existed at the time of Noah and the time that these demons were possessing people. The text is usually misread, as it doesn't exactly say that the product of the unions of demon possessed men and women were anything but regular human beings.

Demons are spirits only, anyway. The most they can do is influence the minds of people who are willing to allow them to do so. Demons don't have physical form, which is why the horned beings we typically imagine is a ridiculous concept.

If we could see demons, they would probably appear as dazzingly beautiful beings, because even Lucifer was originally the most powerful of God's holy angels and beautiful in the spirit form.

It's always the subtle evils that are the most dangerous.

 

[timosyy]

Was just wondering where you were drawing the connection to demons, then. The only mention I see of unnatural procreation in the time of Noah is in Genesis 6:4-- "The Nephilim were on the earth in those days--and also afterward--when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown." This is, of course, assuming "sons of God" refers to angels/spirits and not priests/holy men.

Otherwise, the only verse I see the originally quoted 1 Peter 3:19 correlating to is, well, 1 Peter 4:6-- "For this reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead." Which, to me, speaks more of men than demons.

Edit: Again, I don't purport to be a biblical scholar, I just read parts of it for fun every now and then.

 

[Homerboy]

that's why Purgatory was invented, several centuries later.

It takes care of gray areas like this. Also the unbaptized infants, and such.

According to Revelations, Jesus rounds up all the souls in Purgatory, (after dispensing godly justice on the wicked world), and separates the saved from the damned, then carts the worthy along.

He also does this in Hell (The harrowing of Hell).

The Bible is full of crazy shit.

Technically unbaptized babies went to limbo. IIRC they were there for eternity. It wasn't a bad or good place... just a place.

 

[child of wonder]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhonwrTJU_w

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

So, basically Jesus tightened up the entrance rules?

Heavens bouncer, they needed a new one I guess.