Hell as an argument

[Calilasseia]

@Kevin_Levites

I theorize that the antecedents of Hell arose among primitive hunter-gathers for very specific reasons.

I believe that authority and social order were neccesary to prepare for the future, with a specific example being storing large supplies of food for the winter.

If everyone was good and selfless, then the community had a better chance of surviving the winter in ease and comfort. If everybody defies authority and only cares about themselves, then winter means starvation, disease, and death.

It seems–at least to me–that there are paralells between planning for a future of ease, health, and harmony when the year “dies” with winter and an afterlife of paradise if one is “good.”

When humans became aware of our own mortality, and this was coupled with the need for co-operative behavior with seflessness and authoritative leadership to survive winter . . . then this morphed into an afterlife predicated with heaven and hell based on one’s behavior in this life.

In many ways, we are still cavemen.

Please note that these are only my ideas, and–not being an anthropologist–I only claim that this is something I believe, and not something I know.

You may mot be an actual tenured anthropologist, but my first reaction upon reading this was “wait, this makes much more sense than the guff mythology fanboys come up with on the matter”.

I would even venture that it’s worth tracking down an actual anthropologist to run this by, and see if it makes sense to a professional - more kudos to you if it does of course!

It’s also worth tracking down the recent writings of Francesca Stavrakopoulou, to see if this thought of yours meshes with her ideas, as this sounds to me like just the sort of idea she would devise as an explanation for the “hell” meme, though to be fair, the exact details connected to the concept of a post-death difference of destinies based upon moral judgement are wildly divergent even across ancient civilisations. I’m pretty sure the Ancient Egyptians, for example, had a significantly different take on this.

Indeed, if memory serves, contemporary Jews themselves had a different view on the matter to the frankly diseased picture painted by American Christian fundamentalists. Again, I suspect Stavrakopoulou would subject their witterings to a well deserved hosing with the discoursive flamethrower. I’d pay for ringside seats for that spectacle.