{"id":53803,"date":"2025-05-19T19:16:02","date_gmt":"2025-05-19T17:16:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kernbeisser.ch\/the-problem-is-not-hell-and-the-solution-is-not-heaven\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T11:24:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T09:24:31","slug":"the-problem-is-not-hell-and-the-solution-is-not-heaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kernbeisser.ch\/en\/the-problem-is-not-hell-and-the-solution-is-not-heaven\/","title":{"rendered":"The problem is not hell and the solution is not heaven"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column width=”1\/1″][vc_column_text text_lead=”yes” uncode_shortcode_id=”307246″]Theological expressions that do not appear in the Bible in this way have arisen through debate and tradition. A debate is needed, but this debate should not be confused with the Bible itself.[\/vc_column_text][vc_column_text uncode_shortcode_id=”122156″]Heaven and hell are ideas of tradition. The ideas they express are not found in the Bible. Believers often suffer from the horror stories of hell for the rest of their lives. These ideas are thought to be found in the Bible, but this is more an assertion than a real statement. <\/p>\n

In these traditional stories, there is a vengeful, merciless and unpredictable God who throws the majority of his creatures into hell to torment them endlessly. Anyone who has to listen to such ideas for long enough becomes disoriented. You don’t read this directly anywhere in the Bible, but you have to believe it if it “sounds similar to this idea of hell”. If you ask at the beginning how this can be, objections and questions often disappear due to the pressure of the teaching and the community. <\/p>\n

Anyone who has experienced this may think that hell is the problem and heaven is the solution.[\/vc_column_text][vc_column_text uncode_shortcode_id=”208049″]<\/p>\n

The beginning<\/h3>\n

When considering this peculiarity, let us start at the beginning, with Adam and Eve. This is where the problem that is commonly described as the “fall of man” arose. There is a lot more that could be said about this, but let’s stick with the idea that hell is the problem. Were Adam and Eve shown hell as a punishment in paradise if they ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil? <\/p>\n

It’s not like that! Adam and Eve were threatened with mortality<\/strong>. The Elberfelder translation, for example, reads: “And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, ‘Of every tree of the garden you may eat as you please, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat of it, for the day you eat of it you will surely die'”.<\/em> (Gen 2:16-17). If we look at how it can be translated more precisely, the conclusion reads: “you will surely die”.<\/em> Man is not only confronted with the certainty of death, but also with mortality. Until the moment when man ultimately dies, after which he is dead, he will “be dying”.<\/em> That is our daily reality. <\/p>\n

If you ask what the Bible deals with, for example, you could say that the Bible takes human experience as its starting point. This is not pious at all, but sober. This human experience forms the background for the world view, image of God and image of man that develops in the Bible as an ongoing story. The mortality of man, his inadequacy and these other things are real challenges. The solution described in the Bible is not a religious endeavor, but an acquaintance with a living God who, through His works and His purpose, sets our lives free for Himself. This solution is called salvation. <\/p>\n

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Neither heaven nor hell<\/h3>\n

The idea of heaven and hell is a late flowering of human imagination. Adam was not threatened with hell and heaven is not the solution. The Bible describes it all quite soberly. Adam is confronted with mortality and therefore death. The solution to death is life, not heaven. <\/p>\n

The Bible is primarily concerned with death and the inadequacy of man (also called sin or missing the mark). The solution to these two things is an important theme of the Bible. <\/p>\n