An Augustinian Defense of Hell

Of all Christian doctrines, the doctrine of Hell is seemingly the easiest to attack, hardest to defend, and most shied away from by theologians, philosophers, and apologists. It’s seen as an outdated, despicable, morally horrendous scare-tactic that is a significantly embarrassing blot on the claim to believe in a perfect, loving, good God. It’s rarely discussed in a serious philosophical setting, except in the brief work of skeptical writers presenting arguments against its moral justification. Christians may offer some general responses to the sentiment behind these arguments, but for the most part are just content to pass by and focus on other, “easier” and less taboo topics. It is now somewhat standard fare for people to assume that Hell is a settled issue; it’s often just taken for granted that Hell is indefensible and morally repugnant and hence that it’s almost not even worth critiquing or defending.

G. K. Chesterton’s Heretics and the Importance of Creeds: An in Depth Review

 

I first encountered G. K. Chesterton midway through my sophomore year of high school, through his classic book Orthodoxy, which instantly became, and remains to this day, one of the greatest books I’ve ever read, on any subject. With Chesterton, the adage really is true for me that I would be willing to “read his grocery lists,” as it were. If he knows nothing else, Chesterton knows words. He knows their strength and influence. He knows poetry, imagery, language. Chesterton has a way with words that is so striking, and at times so overwhelmingly beautiful in their profundity and image creating power, that they make you wonder how a mere man could possibly have written them. But at the same time, his words are neither over exaggerated nor flippant, neither melodramatic nor superficial, but, in their verbal dexterity, reveal such plain truths and simple facts, that one wonders how any man could possibly not have written them in his own thoughts, how any man could possibly have missed it. Chesterton, above all, reveals common sense like a rising sun through a cloud of misty darkness. Chesterton delighted in paradoxes, because he knew that paradoxes are the signature of truth. Chesterton showed fairy tales to be as obviously true as truisms, because most often, fairy tales are truisms. Chesterton made banalities seem as bright and exciting as a newborn star, because Chesterton knew that the facts easiest to overlook and forget are the facts that are so common that no conscious thought is given to them at all. And that was the whole intellectual power of Chesterton: he gave thought to those ideas and assumptions which are very often left untouched by the mind; he gave words, and stunningly magnificent words at that, to the unspeakable truths which we all know, which we all hold in our hearts but which seem to us so delicate and indefinable that we never thought them possible to express, until Chesterton does so.  When I read Chesterton,