Can we really go to heaven?

[Mr. Splib]

This is my first post. A friend suddenly passed away and at his funeral service the pastor's message turned on a light for me. He described heaven and God as "pure." Only those who accepted Jesus as their savior could have their sins wiped away by his sacrifice and enter heaven as pure. But here is where I saw what can only be described as a "flaw" in this logic.

Most people envision a version of themselves entering heaven. Whether its with wings, with a halo, or whatever, I believe they see themselves entering heaven as the person they are now. If heaven is pure, then it is impossible for us to enter as ourselves. It is our thoughts, emotions, and desires as people that make us impure. We cannot be allowed to enter as we are. All humans are sinners. Letting us into heaven as we are makes heaven impure. What we are has to be wiped away upon going into heaven. Wiping away our emotions makes us cease to exist as the unique individuals we are now. What are we then in heaven?

My point is that we have to become completely different in heaven. The people we love and care about during our earthly lives won't be any more special to us in heaven than every other soul we meet since all of our uniqueness has to be washed away.

Mr. Splib

[Divine Insight]

He described heaven and God as "pure."

From my perspective this is just yet another contradiction among the myriad of contradictions contained in the Abrahamic or Biblical picture of "God" and "Heaven".

In those fables, it is said that 1/3 of God's angels turned against him and sided with Lucifer who was himself a fallen angel, etc.

Well, that could have never happened if Heaven was so "Pure". So clearly there are irresolvable problems with the Hebrew picture of God.

Having said that, I wouldn't run off to become an atheist just because the ancient Hebrews lied about God. There are far better spiritual pictures available.

For whatever it might be worth, there are mystical pictures of reality where life is not limited to just existence on Earth as a human, and then we move onto eternal bliss, or eternal damnation.

There are spiritual philosophies that suggest that we are all immortal by our very nature. No one ever ceases to exist. Nor was there ever a time when they did not exist. Yes, you will lose your "ego" (i.e. your individual identity in this life). But that's not what truly makes you what you are. You are not your association with this particular incarnation of being. But rather you are the entity that experiences that association.

Your friend, and eventually you and I, will indeed go on to experience other associations in other lives. We are an inseparable part of the universe. We can only return to that from whence we came. And because of that, there is nowhere to go other than to be what we ultimately truly are, a manifestation of reality. A reality that exists beyond our ability to define it or put it in a box.

You are infinite, eternal, and can neither be created nor destroyed because the true essence of your being is the essence of reality.

And once you realize this you'll also realize that there is no such thing as "impurity" because all that exists is reality, and reality cannot be "impure".

For what would reality be "impure" with respect to?

Purity is all that exists. Impurity is nothing but a mental judgement that we make in our mind.

Is donkey dung impure?

To the judgment of a human perhaps so, but to a fly donkey dung is pure heaven.

[cnorman18]

From my perspective this is just yet another contradiction among the myriad of contradictions contained in the Abrahamic or Biblical picture of "God" and "Heaven".

In those fables, it is said that 1/3 of God's angels turned against him and sided with Lucifer who was himself a fallen angel, etc.

Well, that could have never happened if Heaven was so "Pure".   So clearly there are irresolvable problems with the Hebrew picture of God.

Having said that, I wouldn't run off to become an atheist just because the ancient Hebrews lied about God....

Better get your literature straight. Those fables do not come from the Bible, but from Paradise Lost, the 17th-century epic poem by the (Christian) English poet John Milton. 

For the record, the Jewish religion has no formal teachings about an Afterlife. It is not mentioned in the Torah, and we leave the matter to God. There is of course speculation, but it is acknowledged as being no more than that.

[Divine Insight]

Better get your literature straight. Those fables do not come from the Bible, but from Paradise Lost, the 17th-century epic poem by the (Christian) English poet John Milton. 

Thanks for the heads-up.

I've heard that story of Lucifer and the angels told by Christians my entire life. When I asked them where this was written in the Biblical cannon I basically got two responses:

1. It's contained in Revelations.
2. It's only in some versions of the Bible.

I couldn't find it directly in Revelations, but I have had other people claim that it's in there somewhere. And based on how vague some interpretations can be I wouldn't doubt that someone could imagine such a story being in there. After all they also claim that Jesus was prophesied just as it described in the New Testament, which is also a big fat lie. The actual prophesy of a messiah states clearly that he will be handed the Throne of King David by God to rule over the Jews, and that most certainly never happened to Jesus. So it's never clear when religious people are lying about their doctrines.

For the record, the Jewish religion has no formal teachings about an Afterlife. It is not mentioned in the Torah, and we leave the matter to God. There is of course speculation, but it is acknowledged as being no more than that.

Acknowledged by who?

That's the problem with religions. One person claims to "acknowledge" what they believe whilst not acknowledging what others believes, and that's how all the different sects are formed.

For example, Catholics not only believe in Heaven, but they also believe in Hell (or at least their Popes have been very insistent on this).

But there are many Protestants who renounce the concept of Hell.

So it's often hard to tell what's in any doctrine. Apparently people can make doctrine say whatever they want.

Just the same, thanks for the info, I'll look into that for sure.

[Divine Insight]

Ok, I just read up on "Paradise Lost". Evidently there are many Christians who believe that this story actually comes from the Bible, or was a meaningful "interpretation" of the stories.

Apparently what it appears to amount to is a poetic form of apologetic arguments.

I think the work of Milton is quite telling actually. Because it just shows how it is indeed human nature to create such elaborate and creative stories in an attempt to support religious myths. Had Milton written his story back in Biblical times (around the same time as Paul) it probably would have ended up becoming part of the Biblical Cannon. At least the Christian Biblical Cannon.

It's a very detailed story that is being told "matter-of-factly" as though it actually happened, even if it truly was written as apologetic fiction.

So, yes, the only reason it didn't end up becoming part of the Biblical cannon is because it was written too late for that. But not by much! Had it been written even just a few hundred years earlier it still may have ended up becoming part of the biblical cannon.

The only difference between fictitious poems and the biblical cannon is,.... well,.... nothing.

[Goat]

Better get your literature straight. Those fables do not come from the Bible, but from Paradise Lost, the 17th-century epic poem by the (Christian) English poet John Milton. 

Thanks for the heads-up.

I've heard that story of Lucifer and the angels told by Christians my entire life. When I asked them where this was written in the Biblical cannon I basically got two responses:

1. It's contained in Revelations.
2. It's only in some versions of the Bible.

I couldn't find it directly in Revelations, but I have had other people claim that it's in there somewhere. And based on how vague some interpretations can be I wouldn't doubt that someone could imagine such a story being in there. After all they also claim that Jesus was prophesied just as it described in the New Testament, which is also a big fat lie. The actual prophesy of a messiah states clearly that he will be handed the Throne of King David by God to rule over the Jews, and that most certainly never happened to Jesus. So it's never clear when religious people are lying about their doctrines.

For the record, the Jewish religion has no formal teachings about an Afterlife. It is not mentioned in the Torah, and we leave the matter to God. There is of course speculation, but it is acknowledged as being no more than that.

Acknowledged by who?

That's the problem with religions. One person claims to "acknowledge" what they believe whilst not acknowledging what others believes, and that's how all the different sects are formed.

For example, Catholics not only believe in Heaven, but they also believe in Hell (or at least their Popes have been very insistent on this).

But there are many Protestants who renounce the concept of Hell.

So it's often hard to tell what's in any doctrine. Apparently people can make doctrine say whatever they want.

Just the same, thanks for the info, I'll look into that for sure.

It is acknowledged by all the mainstream rabbi's of the Orthodox, conservative and reform branches, as well as the Reconstructionist and Humanistic Judaism.

[Nickman]

This is my first post. A friend suddenly passed away and at his funeral service the pastor's message turned on a light for me. He described heaven and God as "pure." Only those who accepted Jesus as their savior could have their sins wiped away by his sacrifice and enter heaven as pure. But here is where I saw what can only be described as a "flaw" in this logic.

Most people envision a version of themselves entering heaven. Whether its with wings, with a halo, or whatever, I believe they see themselves entering heaven as the person they are now. If heaven is pure, then it is impossible for us to enter as ourselves. It is our thoughts, emotions, and desires as people that make us impure. We cannot be allowed to enter as we are. All humans are sinners. Letting us into heaven as we are makes heaven impure. What we are has to be wiped away upon going into heaven. Wiping away our emotions makes us cease to exist as the unique individuals we are now. What are we then in heaven?

My point is that we have to become completely different in heaven. The people we love and care about during our earthly lives won't be any more special to us in heaven than every other soul we meet since all of our uniqueness has to be washed away.

Mr. Splib

No where in the bible does it say that people go to heaven. The inheritance is the earth. This is found in scrpture many times over. Heaven was not a place for man in Judaism. It was gods abode and not attainable by man.

You made the comment that we are all sinners, but I disagree. You may be a sinner but I am not. When a person gets past the fear and reward mentality of god and religion then life starts to be amazing and you are empowered to be the best you can be for you, no one else.

[Mr. Splib]

I guess that depends on what you consider a "sin" to be. From a strictly religious perspective, if you don't believe in god then you can't sin. I was referring to morality in general. We all do things that are considered wrong by society, or hurt others.

[Nickman]

I guess that depends on what you consider a "sin" to be. From a strictly religious perspective, if you don't believe in god then you can't sin. I was referring to morality in general. We all do things that are considered wrong by society, or hurt others.

Of course we all do, but that doesn't make them universally wrong or god by some god standard. What may be considered ok in the USA such as wearing shoes in your house is wrong in Japan. Society molds what is acceptable and what isn't. Further than that we have our own personal morality we get from our upbringing and our experiences.

[Jon Hall]

What we are has to be wiped away upon going into heaven. Wiping away our emotions makes us cease to exist as the unique individuals we are now. What are we then in heaven?

My point is that we have to become completely different in heaven. The people we love and care about during our earthly lives won't be any more special to us in heaven than every other soul we meet since all of our uniqueness has to be washed away.

Mr. Splib

Hi Mr. Splib, this is my first post too. Sorry to hear about your friend who passed away. It prompted an interesting train of thought for you!

You suggest that in order to be pure like God we have to be wiped clean of all our emotions, and therefore our uniqueness. However, this idea hides the premise that all our uniqueness as people comes from our sin, so a group of sinless people would be all the same. That is a pretty dismal view of human nature.

The Bible teaches something quite different. We each have an original design in the image of God (Gen 1:26), and each design is unique. Sin, far from creating our individual characters, is merely the corruption of the true characters God gave us. So, in the end we will find that in heaven (or, more properly, in the New Earth), each person wiped clean of sin is gloriously different, whereas in hell, everyone looks the same.