We continue with Jesus's words that reference a severe afterlife punishment.
In Matthew 25, we come to the parable of the "talents." A talent was a coin, not a special ability an individual has. In this parable, a master (symbolic of god) left his money in the care of his servants while he went out of town. Everyone invested the money and made more, except for one servant who was afraid of losing money and being punished for it. When the master got back, he called that servant wicked and said, "Take the talent from him and give it to the one that has ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have , even what he has will be taken from him. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Wow. Sounds a bit like prosperity gospel, doesn't it. Can't you see some preacher guilting someone into "investing in the work of the lord" or facing damnation? Then, what will happen to the money will be the lining of the preachers pockets. This parable is told slightly differently in Luke 19, with a king instead of a master. It end with the king (symbolic of god) saying "those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them....bring them here and kill them in front of me."
In the same chapter, we see the parable of the sheep and the goats. At the end times a king (representing Jesus/god) separates people into sheep on the right and goats on the left. The sheep were generous and benevolent to the poor, the sick, and imprisoned. The goats were not. The goats were told "depart from me, you who are cursed into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels." Also "they will go away to eternal punishment." This sounds suspiciously like Matthew has read Revelation. Plus, don't many atheists, and people of other beliefs, practice generosity and compassion? Does that mean they would get to heaven before christians who don't practice those things? This parable is not told elsewhere.
That finishes Matthew, the author of weeping and gnashing of teeth. For some reason, I used to think it was weeping and "wailing" and gnashing of teeth. Now let's look at passages in Mark that we have not covered before.
Mark 3:29 says " Whoever blasphemes against the holy spirit will never be forgiven, he is guilty of an eternal sin." I think the holy spirit is a fraud.
Other than telling the disciples to cut off body parts to keep from going to hell (gehenna), the only remaining verse of condemnation is 16:16, "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned." There is no outer darkness, and no weeping and gnashing of teeth mentioned in the whole book.
Next time we look at Luke.
No comments:
Post a Comment