Whoever
thinks Manchester lacks colour has never been to Market Street on a Friday
afternoon!
Market
Street is the main shopping centre where, competing with the shops, buskers and
street traders, assorted street preachers take their stand.
On this
particular Friday, there are not just one, but TWO groups of preachers, both
with loudspeakers and a determination for everyone to repent. The first group
features a couple of visiting preachers from the States who talk a lot about hellfire
but very, very little about what we
actually need to do to avoid it!
Further
along the street two pairs of Jehovah’s Witnesses stand by their literature
carts, holding out books, brochures or Watchtower and Awake magazines with
serene smiles. They’ve been conducting this form of ministry since October 2013
and most people have got used to seeing them, passing by with barely a glance.
Occasionally, there’s a nod or a smile or an eager hand reaching to take the
proffered literature. Even more
occasionally, someone may stop for a chat – friendly or otherwise – but
communication is rarely, if ever, initiated by the witnesses who stand, quietly
and patiently during 4 hour stints.
Such a
lot has changed in Manchester over the years: so many colours, cultures and
languages, nationalities from all over the world. No wonder preachers view the city centre as
fertile ground – it certainly offers more potential than most churches these
days!
However, there’s a tactful way to
represent the Lord and a NOT so tactful way. A young Muslim family pass by as
one of the preachers starts dismissing the Koran along with the entire Islamic religion.
The husband stops, walks back to the Jehovah’s
Witnesses and takes a magazine…..possibly as a ‘statement’. Whether the
evangelists have noticed this small act of ‘defiance’ is debatable, but one of
their crew approaches the JWs and attempts to start a debate, only to be ambushed
by another man – unconnected with either religion - who wades in against the
evangelist!
The JWs are now free to distribute more literature without
hindrance and further hellfire threats.
Meanwhile
even more fire and brimstone is being breathed by the second group of
preachers, attracting quite a crowd. A blonde woman who claims to be a lesbian is
yelling fiercely at the main speaker who is just as fiercely yelling back at
her, both being roundly condemned by the other; the preacher to the hate crime
police, the lesbian to hellfire on Judgement Day. At least she’ll have company,
as (according to the speaker) most of us are going there anyway!
Or are
we? Will we all be engulfed by perpetual flames? Does hell as portrayed by many
denominations actually exist? In order to find the answers, let’s
examine the source of such beliefs:
Cue Ancient
Babylon, home of Nimrod and many uncanny practices still in use today.
Fortune-telling, omen-spotting, entrail-reading, runes, star-gazing and
communing with the dead all have their roots in this magic-obsessed city. Incidentally,
Babylon also invented the fiscal system, which, considering recent history,
some may regard as the ultimate nightmare!
Ironically, atheists’ refusal to believe in a separate, invisible soul is
backed up by scripture. Here, death is clearly shown to be a state
of total unconsciousness, a dreamless sleep from which, according to several
Bible verses (particularly the Lazarus account) people will ‘awake’ to a physical resurrection
when paradise is restored on earth.
“There is
no dichotomy [division] of body and soul in the O[ld] T[estament]….The
term nepeš [ne’phesh], though translated by our word soul,
never means soul as distinct from the body or the individual
person….The term [psy-khe’] is the N[ew] T[estament] word corresponding
with nepeš. It can mean the principle of life, life itself, or the
living being.” – New Catholic Enyclopedia
The Mosaic Law did not allow for any
form of spiritism whatsoever - in fact it was forbidden on pain of death for
the nation of Israel - and it wasn’t until Greece began to stride the world
stage that afterlife philosophies began to take root.
In the fourth century CE, the Roman Emperor Constantine, unable to quell the
rise of Christianity by other means and determined to unite his empire,
cunningly infused original gospel teachings with pagan beliefs such
as the immortality of the soul, the trinity doctrine, and – that
most terrifying concept of all – eternal hellfire! The Biblical word rendered
as ‘hell’ in many versions simply means ‘grave’ or ‘death’. (Hebrew
- sheol; Greek - Hades)
“The
belief that the soul continues its existence after the dissolution of the body
is a matter of philosophical or theological speculation rather than of simple
faith, and is accordingly nowhere expressly taught in Holy Scripture.” – The
Jewish Enyclopedia
Constantine’s ‘miraculous conversion’ marked the beginning of the Holy Roman
Empire from which the rest of Christendom developed, combining Bible accounts
with Babylonish rites and practices while keeping generations of adherents in
ignorance. The Dark Ages had truly begun and the Bible was unavailable to the
majority of people until the 16th century when William Tyndale
translated the Bible from the Latin Vulgate into English. His aim - for ‘even a
plowboy’ to understand scripture - was not appreciated by the church; hardly
surprising as, from the Vatican to house churches, Christendom has done more
than any other organisation to promote spiritistic practices. According to one
spiritualist I met some years ago, “the church already preaches life after
death – all mediums do is prove it!”
What harm does it do? Well, for one thing, the whole concept of life after
death is a cruel deception, especially for people who have lost a loved one.
Believing they can communicate through a spiritualist medium can lead to all
kinds of fraud and extortion; even if the medium is basically well-meaning, it
can still open the floodgates to a very dangerous world.
As for the churches, keeping the flocks in fear of everlasting torture has proved very lucrative, with masses for the dead, plenary indulgences, prayers and various fetishes swelling their coffers over centuries.
“….The
nether world…..is pictured as a place full of horrors, and is presided over by
gods and demons of great strength and fierceness.” – The Religion of
Babylonia and Assyria, Boston, 1998, Morris Jastrow, Jr)
But the worst sin to my mind is the reproach beliefs such as hellfire and purgatory
create towards the Creator. Would a loving Father, even a sinful human one, hold a
child against a fire until he screamed in agony? Is being damned to everlasting
torture even just for the amount of sinning humans can fit into their
three-score years and ten?
I doubt it.
No comments:
Post a Comment