This is a decent unpacking of Hart's book, which is unfortunately very hard to find in the midst of an infernalist-majority world, so thank you for that!
It sticks out to me that your use of apophatic reasoning/"humble theology" seems to breach into a certain kind of willful agnosticism, which Hart warns against in his meditation on "Who is God?"
In fact, it seems like you overlooked this fact while you simultaneously pointed out the limitations and necessity of such analogical theologizing:
If we say that God's goodness is so immense that, for example with defending an eternal hell, we may view it as actually "entirely evil," you are right in saying something is amiss.
But is it our limited knowledge of the Good, or our decent into absurdist doctrine that has gone amiss?
We cannot speak of God through some kind of "analogy machine" which we can turn "off and on" as we see fit, to do so is to break down the very meaning of language--all is reduced to absurdity if we bring such irrational reasoning to its furthest limits.
Yes, we experience a limited amount of God's goodness, but God's goodness cannot be evil. That is just a long way of saying that we know nothing, and cannot know anything, about God's "goodness" (whatever that would actually be).
It is only a matter of time until ontological agnosticism must descend into the absurd.
From such an absurdist theological framework, yes, I can agree such an eternal hell is possible, but only on the grounds that such a God and a reality He has made is also just as absurd. Remember, all that we say on account of God and eternity must necessarily extend into eternity and speak of God's qualities.
Your resting as an agnostic in terms of infernalist specifics doesn't seem to be a fitting place to reside, at least for too long. Not doing one's intellectual homework does not consist in a substantial conclusion, it only amounts to being fine with leaving certain dots unconnected.
That's where I was, but such deep contradictions had lasting negative impacts in my walk with God, so I made a resolve to connect the dots from both an infernalist perspective, and then a Universalist perspective.
Let's just say that the picture that was drawn connecting the infernalist logic was one that was both horrifying and yet so simply lucid that I found the very demon that was tormenting me: one of "righteous" and "godly" hatred....or did I mean "love"...?
This is the demon that can spur a man on into a spiraling "pious madness" of sorts.
All's I can say is these dots be either better left unconnected and to stay a "practical universalist," or if this infernal ideology is to be pursued and defended, follow it to the very end to be so thoroughly disgusted that you find no need to defend such a God of Eternal Hell.
Yes, I call it "The Cult of Hell."
Thanks again for the food for thought!
PS. Hart, as I've learned, is himself in on the outskirts "academia as institutions," so I don't think resorting to his motives as liberally inspired makes too much sense, personally.
This is a decent unpacking of Hart's book, which is unfortunately very hard to find in the midst of an infernalist-majority world, so thank you for that!
It sticks out to me that your use of apophatic reasoning/"humble theology" seems to breach into a certain kind of willful agnosticism, which Hart warns against in his meditation on "Who is God?"
In fact, it seems like you overlooked this fact while you simultaneously pointed out the limitations and necessity of such analogical theologizing:
If we say that God's goodness is so immense that, for example with defending an eternal hell, we may view it as actually "entirely evil," you are right in saying something is amiss.
But is it our limited knowledge of the Good, or our decent into absurdist doctrine that has gone amiss?
We cannot speak of God through some kind of "analogy machine" which we can turn "off and on" as we see fit, to do so is to break down the very meaning of language--all is reduced to absurdity if we bring such irrational reasoning to its furthest limits.
Yes, we experience a limited amount of God's goodness, but God's goodness cannot be evil. That is just a long way of saying that we know nothing, and cannot know anything, about God's "goodness" (whatever that would actually be).
It is only a matter of time until ontological agnosticism must descend into the absurd.
From such an absurdist theological framework, yes, I can agree such an eternal hell is possible, but only on the grounds that such a God and a reality He has made is also just as absurd. Remember, all that we say on account of God and eternity must necessarily extend into eternity and speak of God's qualities.
Your resting as an agnostic in terms of infernalist specifics doesn't seem to be a fitting place to reside, at least for too long. Not doing one's intellectual homework does not consist in a substantial conclusion, it only amounts to being fine with leaving certain dots unconnected.
That's where I was, but such deep contradictions had lasting negative impacts in my walk with God, so I made a resolve to connect the dots from both an infernalist perspective, and then a Universalist perspective.
Let's just say that the picture that was drawn connecting the infernalist logic was one that was both horrifying and yet so simply lucid that I found the very demon that was tormenting me: one of "righteous" and "godly" hatred....or did I mean "love"...?
This is the demon that can spur a man on into a spiraling "pious madness" of sorts.
All's I can say is these dots be either better left unconnected and to stay a "practical universalist," or if this infernal ideology is to be pursued and defended, follow it to the very end to be so thoroughly disgusted that you find no need to defend such a God of Eternal Hell.
Yes, I call it "The Cult of Hell."
Thanks again for the food for thought!
PS. Hart, as I've learned, is himself in on the outskirts "academia as institutions," so I don't think resorting to his motives as liberally inspired makes too much sense, personally.