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To: HarleyD; MarkBsnr; Dr. Eckleburg
I would also call kosta attention to the Orthodox position. The Orthodox look at hell as simply a place people go to be refined for heaven. Hence, presumably no one really stays in hell. This is somewhat similar to the Catholic view of purgatory but in the Catholic view, unlike the Orthodox view, there are some who never leave

FWIW, I have promised myself to be nicer to Protestants as it pains me that we are so far apart.

Second,

I believe Dr. Eckleburg stated that the Orthodox do not believe in hell. For all practical purposes, she is correct

Regrettably, she is not.

The Orthodox look at hell as simply a place people go to be refined for heaven. Hence, presumably no one really stays in hell

That is not correct either. The Orthodox position is very clear: when a person dies, his soul is separated from his body. At that point, the soul is judged, for it is "appointed for man to die once and then the judgment." [Heb 9:27] At that point, also the soul knows if it is destined to hell or heaven. But the souls will not be in either until it is reunited with the body at the Second Coming.

The Greeks also believe, that until the union of the souls to the bodies, as the souls of sinners do not suffer full punishment, so also those of the saints do not enjoy entire bliss

That is strange, but coming from Bessarion, perhaps not so. A little historical background explains why:

As his return to Greece, he found himself bitterly resented for his attachment to the minority party that saw no difficulty in a reconciliation of the two churches. At the Council of Florence, held in Ferrarra and then Florence, Bessarion supported the Roman church and gained the favour of Pope Eugene IV, who invested him with the rank of cardinal at a consistory of 18 December 1439. (Wikipedia)

The truth is the Orthodox very much believe that the saints (Mary, and others) are in heaven. We do not believe that all saved are yet, because they have died with some unrepentant sin. And neither are the unrepentant in hell yet.

It was St. Gregory of Nyssa, a student of Origen, who for a while taught false doctrine of universal salvation. But the Orthodox Church never accepted such a doctrine and +Gregory of Nyssa stopped teaching it at some point.

Other than that, it's good that you are consulting Orthodoxinfo.com, just be careful not to jump to any conclusions based on the writings of any isolated bishop.

8,012 posted on 10/02/2007 8:55:29 PM PDT by kosta50 (Eastern Orthodoxy is pure Christianity)
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To: kosta50; MarkBsnr; Dr. Eckleburg
That is not correct either.

I can only document what I read at the Orthodox websites and post the websites where I get the information from. If they are incorrect I would suggest you contact their webmasters. Otherwise, if there are multiple versions of the Orthodox view, then that would be similar to Protestants denomination. I'd be happy to go to the correct Orthodox denomination website that you prefer for my information.

But for you to say I'm wrong on my view without a legitimate reference doesn't help my understanding. Please provide me a source for your information and I will be happy to read up on it. I don't need some Greek father to read from. I'm sure that some tech-savvy Orthodox has been able to succiently condense the Orthodox position down to a few statements. If you don't agree with the Orthodox sites that I've provided fine; just provide me with someone else that condenses this down.

8,023 posted on 10/03/2007 6:04:56 AM PDT by HarleyD
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