First of all, I am not defending Calvin, nor am I a Calvinist per se. And regardless of your take on annihilation, EVERYONE whose name is not written in the Book of Life is cast into the Lake of Fire, regardless of the severity of their sins!
QUOTE: Calvin’s god was a Sadistic monster. It wasn’t incumbent upon him to create souls for no other purpose than to torment them eternally in hell.
Incidentally, you God creates souls knowing full well the majority will be tormented eternally in the Lake of Fire. How is that any different?
You also quote 2 Pet. 3:9 "The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”
Interesting choice. What does PERISH mean, tormented forever?
‘First of all, I am not defending Calvin, nor am I a Calvinist per se. And regardless of your take on annihilation, EVERYONE whose name is not written in the Book of Life is cast into the Lake of Fire, regardless of the severity of their sins!’
First of all, you need to reconcile the Revelation image with all the rest of Scripture. Not all of Revelation is literal. For example, here is the Revelation description of the birth of Christ:
“12 A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; 2 and she was with child; and she *cried out, being in labor and in pain to give birth.
[The Red Dragon, Satan]
3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: and behold, a great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads were seven diadems. 4 And his tail *swept away a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she gave birth he might devour her child.”
snip
“13 And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child. 14 But the two wings of the great eagle were given to the woman, so that she could fly into the wilderness to her place, where she *was nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the presence of the serpent. 15 And the serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, so that he might cause her to be swept away with the flood. 16 But the earth helped the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and drank up the river which the dragon poured out of his mouth.”
Do you believe that is literally what happened when Mary gave birth to Jesus? If not, why do you believe the lake of fire is literal? Revelation is written in imagery, in the Apocalyptic style. It is not all literal. You can’t say, ‘The parts that have already happened are not literal, but the parts that are yet to happen are literal’, because there is no indication whatsoever that that is the case. Rather, the entire book is Apocalyptic, & attempts to make certain parts of it completely literal is an error in interpretation.
“Incidentally, you God creates souls knowing full well the majority will be tormented eternally in the Lake of Fire. How is that any different?”
All the difference in the world. The God of the Bible gives people a choice. They can choose to accept His free gift of eternal life & live forever in heaven, or they can reject Him & suffer “eternal punishment”. If they reject Him, it’s of their own free will. They choose their destiny. Nothing could be more different than creating a sentient human, able to feel pain, agony, despair & torment, & giving that person no option but to suffer “eternal punishment”. Now *that* is Sadism.
Re: the term ‘perish’. If the Bible spelled out exactly what it means to ‘perish’ via the ‘second death’, we would not be having this discussion. But it doesn’t. It does indicate, as I quoted above, that in the ‘eternal darkness’ of damnation there will be ‘weeping & gnashing of teeth’. How can annihilated people weep? If, otoh, the ‘second death’ is eternal separation from God, the damned could both ‘perish’ in the spiritual sense & weep at the same time.
I’m about to log off for quite a while. Before I do, I want to leave you with a parable & some related thoughts. From Luke 16:
19 ‘“Now there was a rich man, and he habitually dressed in purple and fine linen, joyously living in splendor every day. 20 And a poor man named Lazarus was laid at his gate, covered with sores, 21 and longing to be fed with the crumbs which were falling from the rich man’s table; besides, even the dogs were coming and licking his sores. 22 Now the poor man died and was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom; and the rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and *saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom. 24 And he cried out and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus so that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool off my tongue, for I am in agony in this flame.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that during your life you received your good things, and likewise Lazarus bad things; but now he is being comforted here, and you are in agony. 26 And besides all this, between us and you there is a great chasm fixed, so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able, and that none may cross over from there to us.’ 27 And he said, ‘Then I beg you, father, that you send him to my father’s house— 28 for I have five brothers—in order that he may warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ 29 But Abraham *said, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.’ 30 But he said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if someone goes to them from the dead, they will repent!’ 31 But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’”’
Notice that once he is in ‘this place of torment’ (in which ‘flames’ are mentioned), the rich man still acts on the basis of free will. I.e.: an eternal perspective hasn’t made a Calvinist out of him; quite the contrary; he believes his brothers are capable of repentance if they so choose.
The answer to that is so eloquent:
“‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’”
Meaning, up to a certain point mankind had the admonitions of Moses & the Prophets. From these they could, if they chose, understand the absolute need for obedience to God & its relationship to judgment/afterlife.
Later, a ‘man rose from the dead’. Jesus. But as Abraham noted, people who refused to listen to Moses & the prophets would refuse to listen to Jesus as well.
But at least they had a choice. They were not created solely to suffer “eternal punishment”.