Actually i think great harm has been done by human beings that consider the threat of Hell to be more effective at keeping " believers within the fold". The promise of eternal happiness is not nearly as effective as the threat of eternal damnation.
Personally i have had many different thoughts about hell. I cannot believe in a loving god that would condemn his most loved creation to eternal damnation. It's a self-contradiction. Anyhow i have resolved this issue in my own little way.
I think that the confusion comes in who actually passes sentence. We have a vision in our minds that we will be pleading for our souls and a stone-cold god will sentence us. In fact i am sure many worry that they will be thrown into the fires of hell without understanding why.
I do not think that God will sentence us to hell. It will be ourselves.
Man is inherently good. We have within us a compass that allows us to figure out the difference between good and bad. I believe that at the moment of death our consciousness truly awakens. We will be able to see the absolute truth of our lives and its effects. We will be able to see our actions, thoughts and feelings for what they actually are. And we will feel pain. We will feel pain for all those things we did contrary to our conscience (unless we have already felt the pain in this world - occasionally we do pay our penance by accepting our wrongdoings in this world, however mostly we tend to justify those wrongdoings).
Anyhow the fires of hell are within us. Those fires are stoked every time we act contrary to our conscience. Our CONSCIENCE mind you, not our professed religion or doctrine. It's a fact that the truth hurts. And that is what hell is. When the truth will hurt. Because we will be unable to deny it.
Hell is actually Truth.. and truth hurts lies. Hell is the process of excorcism of those lies that we have internalised in our conciousness. However as any exorcism it has a beginning, a middle and an end.
I do not believe hell is eternal. It is the temporary phase of pain that the human mind has to go through when confronted with its wrongdoing.
Btw this is why i disagree with christian doctrine that man is essentially sinful (a theme parroted by many a mullah too nowadays). If we were inherently sinful hell would be the inevitable destination of all humans. Only if we are inherently good can hell be temporary. And i cannot believe that a loving God would condemn a soul to hell for eternity without parole or without the possibility of forgiveness. How could he be Al – rahim if there was no possibility of mercy.
Goodness is not a battle AGAINST our natures ( as some would have you believe ) but rather it is the battle FOR our nature. It is the battle to bring out our inherent goodness which gets suppressed in our ignorance and in the pain of this world.
That is why being honest feels good and gives peace. That is why taking care of your loved ones feels good and brings peace. Thatis why seeing happy people around you brings happiness and peace to your heart. It is a vile lie spread by salvation peddlers through the ages that humans are bad.
After all if we aren't inherently bad , then that means we can find our way to god through our conscience and WITHOUT the ministrations of some quack claiming to know the "will of god"... and that is a threat to ANY religious bureaucracy).
