John Edwards: What is Hell in Your Eyes
Seamus Degen
Mr. Kearns
English 10
10/13/14
The Abyss of Misery Hell, described by Johnathan Edwards is “a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath.” For this average teenager in America, my definition of hell is much different than the hell of 1953’s Johnathan Edwards. For me hell is a term used to describe the unknown. What I am trying to say is that there is no hell, it is just a floating concept created and used by some people. I believe that we, as humans created a place known as hell in order to scare and control other people. For example, in the past hell was a place that everyone wanted to avoid no matter where he or she was. Event thought groups of people might have been separated they still share similarities such as the Egyptian underworld and the Catholic purgatory. Both of these places used the concept of hell to alter the way people think so that they will lead to the positive actions and reactions. Also religious groups such as the Jewish do have a hell but it is used differently than the other thoughts of hell. To most non Jewish people they hear hell and think of a place of torment and fire, but for the Jewish it is called “Gehinnom” and it is not a place of punishment but a place of reconstruction. In fact, the Jewish believe that hell is just a way to purify the soul and is an extra step in reaching heaven. This might be translated differently because of the media and pop culture influences. With this alteration hell is drawn to be a horrible place where suffering never ends and can be avoided by making good decisions. The idea of hell is a good creation in order to help humans make good and positive choices but it is not real and is a scare tactic used by those in the past that have carried into the future. Going back to the idea I previously stated, the idea of death mixed with the unknown can create this concept of hell because when people don’t know what is what they need some sort of float that holds
Mr. Kearns
English 10
10/13/14
The Abyss of Misery Hell, described by Johnathan Edwards is “a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath.” For this average teenager in America, my definition of hell is much different than the hell of 1953’s Johnathan Edwards. For me hell is a term used to describe the unknown. What I am trying to say is that there is no hell, it is just a floating concept created and used by some people. I believe that we, as humans created a place known as hell in order to scare and control other people. For example, in the past hell was a place that everyone wanted to avoid no matter where he or she was. Event thought groups of people might have been separated they still share similarities such as the Egyptian underworld and the Catholic purgatory. Both of these places used the concept of hell to alter the way people think so that they will lead to the positive actions and reactions. Also religious groups such as the Jewish do have a hell but it is used differently than the other thoughts of hell. To most non Jewish people they hear hell and think of a place of torment and fire, but for the Jewish it is called “Gehinnom” and it is not a place of punishment but a place of reconstruction. In fact, the Jewish believe that hell is just a way to purify the soul and is an extra step in reaching heaven. This might be translated differently because of the media and pop culture influences. With this alteration hell is drawn to be a horrible place where suffering never ends and can be avoided by making good decisions. The idea of hell is a good creation in order to help humans make good and positive choices but it is not real and is a scare tactic used by those in the past that have carried into the future. Going back to the idea I previously stated, the idea of death mixed with the unknown can create this concept of hell because when people don’t know what is what they need some sort of float that holds