Archpriest Georgy KLIMOV, Lecturer at the Department of Biblical Studies, MTA:

God didn't create hell

- Hell, or fiery hell, in Orthodoxy is opposed to the Kingdom of Heaven. But if the Kingdom of Heaven is eternal life and bliss, it turns out that hell is also eternal life, only in torment? Or something different?

- To answer this question, we need to agree on terms, that is, on what we understand by life. If we understand God by life, because He is Life and the source of life (John 1.4), then we cannot say that hell is life.

On the other hand, if Christ Himself, pointing to those whom He condemns at the Last Judgment, says: “These will go into eternal torment,” and the word “eternal” here is meant in the sense of “time that never ends,” or maybe “that something that goes beyond time”, then it can be assumed that if a person experiences torment, experiences suffering, it means that he is alive, his life goes on.

Therefore, we can say that, indeed, hell is what the soul, united with the body, inherits after the Last Judgment, forever.

The Orthodox understanding of hell was formulated quite fully back in the era of the Ecumenical Councils, when great church teachers lived, and since that time it has not qualitatively changed.

The only question that concerns Orthodox theology when we talk about hell is the question of apocatastasis, the possibility of universal salvation. The foundations of this doctrine were formulated by Origen (III century).
However, it was never recognized as a teaching Orthodox theology. But in every generation the doctrine of apocatastasis finds its adherents, and the Church has to make constant explanations about its unfaithfulness.

The difficulty in clarifying this issue for many is due to the fact that the Holy Scripture clearly states: God is Love.

And it is impossible to understand how Love can go to ensure that Its creation, called out of non-existence also by love, is sent to eternal torment. The doctrine of apocatastasis offers its own version of the answer.

Resurrection of Christ; fresco, Greece, 17th century. Image from chslovo.com

- In Psalm 138 there is a line: "If I go down to the underworld (hell), and there you are." Can there be somewhere in the world created by God such an area where there is no God the Creator?

– The feeling that God is everywhere and fills everything with Himself, with His presence, was also among the Old Testament Jew, and the Christian also has it. According to the Apostle Paul, re-existence or that eschatological fulfillment that we are waiting for is indicated very simply: “There will be God of all kinds in all” (1 Corinthians 15:28) But then what question should be asked: God is everywhere, but how do I experience Him? and perceive?

If, as Love, if I subordinated mine to His good and perfect will, not out of duty or coercion, but out of desire and love, then my communion with Him will indeed be paradise. After all, the state of bliss, happiness in itself is experienced by a person only when what he wants is realized.

In paradise, only the will of God will be carried out. Actually, paradise is paradise because there will be only one divine will in it. And a person will perceive this place as a paradise only in one case - if his will completely and completely coincides with the Divine will.

But if everything is wrong, if my will does not agree with the will of God, if it deviates from it even one iota, then paradise for me immediately ceases to be paradise, that is, a place of bliss, pleasure. After all, there is something that I do not want.

And, remaining a paradise objectively, and for others, for me this place becomes a place of torment, where it becomes unbearable for me from the presence of God, because His light, His warmth does not warm me, but burns me.

Here we can recall the expression of St. John Chrysostom: "God is good because He created Gehenna." That is, God, in His love for a person and in the freedom given to him, makes it possible to be either with God or without Him, depending on the state of the soul, and for this, in many respects, a person is responsible himself.

Can a person be blessed with God if his soul wants revenge, is angry, lustful?
But God did not create hell, just as He did not create death. Hell is a consequence of the distortion of the human will, a consequence of sin, the territory of sin.

Fra Beato Angelico, The Last Judgment (detail). 1431.

How did the devil get to heaven?

- If to stay in paradise you have to be in agreement with the will of God, then how did the serpent-devil get into paradise, which really walked around there (not yet cursed to crawl on its belly), not even embarrassed by the presence of God?

“Indeed, on the first pages of the Bible we read about how Adam and Eve converse with God in Paradise, and this communication with Him “in the voice of the coldness of the tonka” was blessed for our forefathers. But at the same time, there is someone in paradise who does not perceive paradise as such - this is the devil. And he tempts Adam and Eve with evil in Paradise.

Theology does not say how the devil got to heaven.

There are suggestions that for the devil who inhabits the serpent, perhaps this place was not yet literally closed, there was no finality in deciding his fate.

Because God, perhaps, expected a change from the devil. But the deception of a person by the devil entails the final curse of God against the devil. After all, before that we never hear words of a curse in relation to him. Maybe God, as loving his creation, still gave him the opportunity to stay in paradise? But the devil did not take advantage of this opportunity for good.

Hell and Heaven are not "places" but states

The fact that paradise is not a certain territory or an external state objectively independent of a person, but a state directly connected with his self-consciousness and attitude, according to the interpretation of some biblical scholars, is said in the first chapter of the Gospel of John, in the prologue: “In Him was life, and life was the light of men” (John 1:4).

It was thanks to communion with the Lord, eating from the Tree of Life, that the ancestors felt paradise - paradise, that is, life and light, which were an integral part of their being, the breath of life that Scripture speaks of.

But the next verse: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:5), already speaks of the time after the fall, when God, the Divine light for man, becomes an external object, since he left human nature: the Holy Spirit leaves person. And man becomes mortal, because he is no longer able to contain God within himself.

Darkness in this verse can also mean a place where there is no God, not objectively, but by perception. Here you can draw a parallel with another gospel passage - from the Gospel of Matthew (6:22-23): “The lamp for the body is the eye. So if your eye is clear, then your whole body will be bright; If your eye is evil (dark), then your whole body will be dark.”

And then this: “So, if the light that is in you is darkness, then what darkness!” What is Christ talking about here? Perhaps about the same thing as heaven and hell, how light and darkness begin in the person himself here on earth. In the Gospel of Luke, Christ already quite definitely says that: “The kingdom of God will not come in a conspicuous manner. For behold, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20-21).

There are no similar words about hell in the Gospel, but, based on the logic of the Gospel, this also applies to hell.

It can be said that hell does not come in a conspicuous way. And hell is within us.

Of course, in the texts of the Gospels and the Old Testament, there is often a sensual, detailed description of hell. Here we must understand that these are in a certain sense anthropomorphisms, something adapted to human perception.

If we look at how the holy fathers talked about hell, we will see that they always removed from the agenda these sensually detailed creepy images with frying pans, iron hooks and salt lakes.

Basil the Great wrote about hellish torment that those who do evil will rise, but not to fry in a frying pan, but “to reproach and shame, in order to see in themselves the abomination of those sins that were committed, for the most cruel of all torment is eternal disgrace and eternal shame.

John Chrysostom, known for his penchant for literal interpretation, commenting on the words of Christ about the gnashing of teeth and the unsleeping worm, about eternal fire, does not in any way refer to the images themselves, but says: “It is better to be subjected to countless lightning strikes than to see how the meek face of the Savior turns away from us and doesn't want to look at us. And for Chrysostom, hell comes down to the fact that God turns His face away from you. And what could be scarier?

Is it possible to improve in hell?

- The Gospel parable of the rich man and the poor Lazarus says that the rich man, having ended up in hell after his cruel life, repented and asked the forefather Abraham to send a message to his relatives so that they would repent. Does this mean that repentance is possible in hell?

— The question of repentance is the key question of salvation.

When the Lord sends sinners to hell at the Last Judgment, He testifies that a person is condemned not even for his sins, but precisely for his unwillingness to repent for his sins, for his unwillingness to correct.

After all, it would seem that there was an unbeliever, but then the Last Judgment came, Christ came, everything was revealed, repent, and then you will be saved!

But it's not so simple. It is no coincidence that the Church constantly says that the time of earthly life is allotted for repentance.

There is a teaching of the Church about the so-called mortal sins. They are called so, of course, not because a person needs to be killed for them.

The point is that, committing a mortal sin and not repenting of it, a person dies each time for eternal life, each time as if he takes poison, but refuses the antidote - repentance.

Pieter Brueghel the Elder, "Mad Greta" (1562). Image from enc.vkarp.com

Having decided to do so, he crosses a certain line, goes beyond that point of return, after which he can no longer repent, because his will, his soul are poisoned by sin, paralyzed.

He is the living dead. He can realize that God exists and God has truth, and light, and life, but he has already spent all of himself on sin and has become incapable of repentance.

Repentance does not mean to say: Oh, Lord, forgive me, I was wrong. True repentance means to take and change your life, from black to white. Even if it's grey. And life is lived and spent on sin. Fortunately, she was gone.

We see examples of impenitence in the Gospel. When the Pharisees and Sadducees go to John the Baptist to be baptized on the banks of the Jordan along with all the people, he meets them with the words: “Blood of vipers, who inspired you to flee from future wrath?” (Matthew 3:7).

These words, according to the interpreters, are not a question of the Baptist, but his statement that they, going to him, can no longer repent. And therefore they are the offspring of viper, that is, the children of the devil, who, like his angels, are so rooted in evil that they are no longer able to repent.

And to the rich man from the parable, Abraham says: “A great chasm has been fixed between us and you, so that those who want to pass from here to you cannot, nor can they pass from there to us” (Luke 16:26). There is nothing Abraham can do.

Whom did Christ bring out of hell?

The parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus, told by the Lord Himself, was told by Him before His Resurrection.

And we know that after His Resurrection, Christ descended into hell and brought out everyone who wanted to go with Him.

In one of his epistles, the apostle Peter says that Christ also preached to the spirits in prison and all sinners, washed away by the flood since the time of Noah, but repentant, brought out of hell.

"Descent into Hell"; icon of the 14th - 15th centuries, Pskov; Image from enc.vkarp.com

There is no contradiction here. Man is warned that sin is the way to death. We have time for repentance - all our lives.

Until the Last Judgment, the Church also prays for the departed, those who did not have time to repent during their lifetime. And we believe, we hope that God hears our prayers.

But we also believe that after the Last Judgment there will be no time for repentance.

If the unrepentant remain, then the devil won?

—But if the image of God in man is indestructible, can a moment come when repentance is impossible? If a person cannot repent, then there is nothing of God left in him, and the devil, of course, did not win, but still won back a “piece of territory”?

—When we talk about the image of God, we need to understand how it is expressed. There is the image of God and there is the likeness of God. Image combined with likeness makes a person worthy of God. Their combination speaks of the agreement of the will of man with the will of God.

The image of God is in every person, the likeness is not in everyone. Creating man with His word, God says: “Let us create man in Our image and in Our likeness (Gen. 1:26) and the image here is that which is invested in man from the beginning and is indestructible, his divine qualities are eternity and freedom. Similarity is the potential that a person must reveal himself.

We can become like God through the fulfillment of the commandments, by living according to the will of God.

As having in himself the indestructible image of God, a person chooses by his free will - to hell or to heaven. We cannot stop our existence.

It would be possible to say that the devil won before the coming of Christ. And the victory of the devil was expressed, first of all, in the fact that every soul, both the righteous and the sinner, descended into hell. But after the Lord trampled down death with death, one can already ask, and St. John Chrysostom once raised this question - why did the Lord leave the devil, because it would be possible to grind him into powder and not torment anyone else?

The devil was "allowed" to man, as to Job - so that a person would have the opportunity to grow in goodness, to resist evil, freely choosing God, that is, preparing his soul for life in paradise, where there will be every God in everyone. Or freely reject God.

We said that heaven and hell begin here and now. Are there really few people here on earth who, having the image of God in themselves, do not at all strive to become like God, do without God, do not want to be with Him?

And although a person really cannot live without God, live a real, genuine life, he often consciously arranges for himself a life where there is no God, and lives calmly. And separates himself from what God has prepared for him. But if on earth he does not want to be with God, what reason is there to think that he will want to be with the Lord after death?

In the conversation of Christ with Nicodemus there are such words: “He who believes in Him (the Son of God) is not judged, but the unbeliever is already condemned, because he did not believe in the name of the Only Begotten Son of God” (John 4:18). And further Christ will say: “The judgment consists in this, that light has come into the world; but the people loved the darkness rather than the light, because their deeds were evil” (John 4:19).

What do these words tell us? It is about the fact that a person chooses for himself who he should be with and how he should live. The unbeliever has already been condemned, but the unbeliever is not in the sense that he has never heard anything about God, did not know, did not understand, and therefore did not believe, and suddenly it turned out that He exists.

And an unbeliever in the sense of knowingly did not believe that he knew about God and about Christ as the Savior. And he condemned himself with his unbelief.

Domenico Beccafumi, Inferno, 15th century. Image from enc.vkarp.com

Are prayers heard from hell?

What exactly do people in hell suffer from?
- Hellish torment lies in the fact that the passions that exist in us cannot be satisfied, and this feeling of dissatisfaction in the perspective of eternity will become unbearable.

A person who has not resorted to God for the healing of his passionate, sin-damaged nature will always long for something passionately and will never have the opportunity to fulfill his desire.

Because passions are not satisfied in hell, God will not create conditions there that a person is used to using on earth.

The Gospel of John says that he who does the will of God "does not come into judgment, but has passed from death unto life" (John 5:24). That is, in fact, it is the person himself, his will, his passion or freedom from it will determine where to go, to hell or heaven. Like joins like.

“Can a sinner pray in hell?” Or does he have such a desire there?

—If we call prayer simply an appeal to God, then judging by the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, and from the many testimonies of the Patericons, such a prayer is possible. But if we talk about prayer as about communion with the Lord and its effectiveness, here, also judging by the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, one can see that such a prayer is not heard in hell.

Hell in the form of the mouth of the devil; miniature from the hymnal by Henri de Blois, ser. 12th century. Image from enc.vkarp.com

One can recall the words of Christ: “Many will say to me in that day: Lord, Lord, did we not cast out demons in Your name” (Matthew 7:22). This can also be understood as prayer, but it is not effective. Because behind her there was no real fulfillment of the will of God, but there was only self-love. And therefore, such a prayer is not able, probably, to change a person. A person who has not cultivated the Kingdom of God in himself, has not sought it, has not worked on it, I don’t know if he can wait for what he asks.

- What is the difference between hellish torments before the Last Judgment and after?

- After the Last Judgment, all people will be resurrected from the dead, the spiritual new body of man will be recreated. Not only souls will appear before God, as happens before the Last Judgment, but souls reunited with bodies.

And if before the Last Judgment and before the second coming of Christ, the souls of people were in a premonition of heavenly bliss or hellish torment, then after the Last Judgment, in its entirety, a person will begin to directly experience the state of either heaven or hell.

Can those who are in hell see each other's suffering?
– There are revelations on this subject in patericons, for example, in the story of how Macarius the Great, walking through the desert, saw a skull, which, as Macarius discovered, turned out to be the skull of an Egyptian priest. The saint began to question him, and the skull told about his bitter torments.

The ascetic, clarifying, asked: “Tell me, does anyone else have more severe torments than you?” Skull says, “Of course there is. I stand on the shoulders of one bishop." And then he starts talking about it.

These testimonies have not been given to us in vain. You can slightly open the veil of the secrets of hellish torment, imagine the shame when there will be nowhere to hide from the exposure of your sins.

- Why in the hymns of Great Saturday, when the descent of Christ into hell is remembered, there are the words “And from hell all is free”?

- We sing it in the sense in which we say that "Christ saved us all." The coming into the world of the God-Man, His sufferings, death, Resurrection, the sending down of the Holy Spirit on mankind do not depend on the will of the person himself. But it depends on the will of a person whether to accept this common gift of salvation for all, so that it becomes his personal gift, or to reject it.

Therefore, we say that Christ descends into hell in order to save everyone. But who is he saving?

We know from Tradition that Christ, after His Resurrection, brought the Old Testament righteous and repentant sinners out of hell. But we have no information that Christ brought everyone out. And if someone did not want to go to Him?

We also have no information that Hell has been empty ever since. On the contrary, Tradition says otherwise.

– The Church has an understanding of the non-linearity of time, which is expressed in the fact that we do not remember, for example, the Nativity of Christ, which was 2013 years ago, or the very Resurrection that took place in Judea about 2000 years ago, but we experience these events here and now.

This is not an accurate understanding. There is a doctrine of the uniqueness of the sacrifice of Christ. It was done once, all and for all. But what happens on Great Saturday, on Easter itself, and on every church holiday is an opportunity to join this reality, which, as a given, already exists. Enter this reality, become its participants.

After all, we are “not guilty” that we were not born at the time when Christ walked the earth. But Christ brought salvation to every person, and gave every person "equal opportunities", regardless of time, to partake in the reality of his suffering, his triumph.

Christ Himself says: “The hour is coming and now it is”, “The time is coming and it is already”. At the liturgy, when a priest prays at the altar during the Eucharistic canon, he speaks of the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven in power, of the general resurrection, in the past tense. Why? Because the Lord has already given us all this as a reality. And our task is to enter into it, to become partakers of it.

The Church of Christ is the reality of the Kingdom of God on earth. Communion to the Church and to all that she is ready to give reveals to man the reality of Eternal blessed life. And only those who discover this reality in themselves can hope that it will be fully revealed in it even after the Last Judgment.

The kingdom of God has already come. But hell is not idle.

The image of a loving God sending people to hell is not easy to understand. Why does God, filled with mercy and grace, send people to eternal torment just because they did not believe in Jesus, even though they were good people, or had never heard of Jesus, or sincerely tried to find God? Is it fair? Is it right?

When people ask questions like this, they are appealing to what they mean by honesty. They see the problem from their human point of view. But it is not at all necessary that this point of view is absolutely correct. If God exists, and He does, then He is the One who establishes what is right and upright, but not us. We should go to the Bible, see what is true when considering the issue of sin and salvation, and then draw conclusions. The Bible tells us that God is holy, "Be holy, for I am holy" (1 Peter 1:16). Holiness - incorruptibility, perfection, purity and inability to sin, only God has all this. Holiness is a trait of God's character. His character is perfect, blameless, and He is the standard of all that is right and good.

The Bible also says that God is immeasurable, "Great is our Lord, and great is His strength, and His understanding is immeasurable" (Psalm 147:5). If the mind of God is immeasurable, God is immeasurable by nature.

The Bible tells us that God is love. “And we have come to know the love that God has for us, and have believed in it. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). God cares for us and cares about our well-being and our safety. His thoughts about us are immeasurable, just as love is immeasurable. This is the reason why God does not want anyone to go to hell, but for everyone to come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9).

The Bible tells us that God is righteous. “God is a righteous judge” (Psalm 7:12). Righteousness is a feature of His character, as are mercy and love. Righteousness presupposes justice, and justice presupposes the Law. This means that God will always do what is right, and He does it on the basis of the justice of the Law that He has decreed. God cannot do something unjust. God must do what is right, otherwise He will not be righteous.

Jesus said that “out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34). This also applies to God. He speaks from the abundance of His heart. God created the universe with the Word, "Let there be light" (Genesis 1:3), and He also proclaimed the law (Exodus 20 - Ten Commandments). The law of God is a reflection of God's disposition because it originated from God's nature, which is holy, perfect, righteous, and good. So, the law is the standard of perfection. It is perfect, and if we do not keep it, we are sinning against the God who gave it. To break God's law is to sin against God. Since there is a law, there is a punishment, because there is no law without punishment. This means that when we break God's law, we are subject to the condemnation of God's law. Since He is immeasurable, our crime against Him takes on the quality of immeasurability, because we have sinned before an immeasurably holy and righteous God.

Should God punish?

Yes, God must punish those who break His law, because it is right. Just as parents should punish a child who has done wrong (intentionally), God should punish those who do wrong. Judge for yourself, if God does not punish a person who has committed a lie, He will turn out to be unjust and unrighteous. He will break His own law - which He cannot do. But someone might say that parents punish a child temporarily, while God's punishment is eternal. Why such difference? The answer has two parts. First, God is eternal, but parents are not. Secondly, God is the standard of righteousness, but earthly parents are not.

Because God is immeasurable, when we sin, we offend the immeasurable God. This is extremely important. A sin that is committed is terrible, not because of the one who committed it, but because of the one against whom it is committed. In other words, sin is so incredibly bad because it becomes evil by the very fact against whom it is committed: the infinitely pure, holy, and righteous God.

Parents are not examples of righteousness. God appears. Parents use (should use) God's standards of righteousness in raising children. So, parental punishment is temporary because it is necessary for learning and correction, God's punishment is eternal because our sin is committed against the eternal God. This is the essential difference.

Can we please God on our own?

Can we curry favor with God by what we do (by being good, for example)? Can one who is limited please the Infinite? If this is so, then this means that the sinner, guilty before the immeasurable God, is able to please God by his own efforts. But, if he is a sinner, there are no such "good" works (which also become affected by sin) because they come from the sinner's heart. The Bible recognizes this because it says that our hearts are deceitful and utterly corrupt (Jer. 17:9; Mark 7:21-23).

But someone may object that if a person is sincere, he can do good deeds that should be pleasing to God. However, the belief that they should be pleasing does not mean that this is actually the case. Let us remember, from the Bible, that we cannot trust our own hearts (Jer. 17:9). This means that we cannot even trust our own sincerity. God is the Judge, not us. If we can please God by our own efforts or sincerity, this will mean that a limited person can appease the immeasurable God by doing good deeds. Thus, this would mean that sincerity is a worthy state of the heart. It's like saying, "God, I deserve to be with You because I've done good deeds and had a kind, sincere heart." Can any mortal who has ever committed sin do something good enough to please the immeasurable God? Answer: No. Galatians 2:21 says, “I do not reject the grace of God; but if justification is by law, then Christ died in vain.” In other words, if we can reach heaven with what we do, Jesus didn't have to die on the cross. Thus, God has determined that our works and sincerity are not good enough.

Finally, to anyone who is still of the opinion that we can please God by our efforts, we are obliged to ask the question: “How many good deeds must he perform in order to atone for the crime against the immeasurable God?” Is there a standard by which we can judge how many good works are required to atone for a particular sin? Does not exist. Thus, he remains in a predicament. If God must punish the sinner for transgressing against Him (violating His holy and righteous law), and our deeds cannot atone for sinning against God, how can we be saved from the great and righteous judgment?

The path of salvation.

The only way to avoid the righteous judgment of God is to accept the condition that God has set. This condition is based on Jesus. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16). Jesus is the only way to salvation. (John 14:6). Jesus is God incarnate. (John 1:1, 14; Col. 2:9). This means that the life of Jesus is of infinite value. His sacrifice is enough to cleanse a person from sins. It is able to satisfy the immeasurable justice of God's standard, which is equal to His immeasurable holiness.

The sacrifice of Jesus is the only condition accepted by God the Father. If you want to escape God's eternal condemnation, you must believe in Jesus and what He did on the cross. Without Him there is no hope of escaping Judgment. What should you do? Accept Jesus (John 1:12), believe only in Him, ask Jesus to forgive you for your sins (John 14:14). Believe only in Him!

“Then those who have now strayed from my ways will have pity, and those who reject them with contempt will be in torment.Those who did not know Me, receiving benefits during their lifetime, and abhorred My law, did not understand it, but despised it, while they still had freedom and while a place was still open to them for repentance,they will know me after death in torment.”(3 Ezd.9, 9-12).

Saint John Chrysostom(347-407) O inevitability punishment for unrepentant sinners, who spend their lives in carelessness and negligence about their salvation, and about eternity Gehenna fire says: Some say there will be no Gehenna because God is Humanitarian. But is it in vain that the Lord said that He would send sinners into eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angel(Matthew 25:41)? No, they say, but only for a threat, so that we could come to our senses. And if we do not come to our senses and remain evil, tell me, will God not send punishment? And will he not reward the good? He will repay, they say, because it is natural for Him to do good deeds, even above merit. So, the latter is true and will certainly be, but as for the punishments, they will not be?

O great treachery of the devil, o such inhuman love of mankind! For this thought belongs to him, promising useless mercy and making people careless.

Since he knows that the fear of punishment, like some kind of bridle, holds our soul and curbs vices, he does everything and takes all measures to uproot it, so that later we fearlessly rush into the abyss.

How can we overcome it? Whatever we say from the Scriptures, opponents will say that it is written to threaten. But if they can speak in this way about the future, though very wickedly, then about the present and already fulfilled, they cannot. So, let us ask them: have you heard about the flood and the general destruction of that time? Was this also said for the threat? Hasn't this been fulfilled and actually happened? Do not the mountains of Armenia, where the ark rested, testify to this? And the remnants of it there are not preserved to this day for our remembrance?

Likewise, many spoke then, and for a hundred years, when the ark was being built, ... and the righteous one proclaimed - no one believed it; but since they did not believe the threat in words, were they suddenly punished in reality? And who brought such punishment upon them, will He not bring much more upon us? The atrocities committed today are no less than then.…Now there is no such kind of sin that would be left without action.

... If anyone does not believe in Gehenna, then let him remember Sodom, let him think about Gomorrah, about the punishment that has already been fulfilled and remains to this day. Explaining this, the Divine Scripture also speaks of wisdom: at the time of the destruction of the wicked, she saved the righteous, who escaped the fire that descended on five cities, from which, as evidence of wickedness, there remained a smoking empty earth and plants that did not bear fruit in due time(Prem. 10, 6-7). It is necessary to say the reason why they suffered so much. They had one crime, serious and deserving of a curse, but only one: they indulged in violent passion, and for this they were burned by a fiery rain. And now countless similar and more serious crimes are committed, but there is no such burning. Why? Because another fire is prepared, never extinguished. For He who showed such wrath for one sin, did not accept Abraham's intercession, and was not restrained by Lot who lived there, how will he spare us who do so much evil? This can't be...

To remind you also of the punishments of the Jews, listen to Paul, who says: let us not commit fornication, as some of them committed fornication, and in one day twenty-three thousand of them perished. Let us not tempt Christ, as some of them were tempted and perished by snakes. Do not grumble, as some of them grumbled and died from the fighter(1 Corinthians 10:8-10). If they have experienced such punishments for their sins, what will we not experience? Now we do not tolerate anything serious, but therefore it is especially necessary to be afraid, because we do not save ourselves for this, so as not to endure punishment, but to endure more if we do not improve.

Those did not know Gehenna and were betrayed by local punishments; and we, for the sins that we will do, if we do not tolerate anything deplorable in the present life, we will experience everything in the future. For, while those who had youthful notions suffered so much, would it be appropriate for us, who have received the most perfect teaching and commit far worse sins, to escape punishment? …How then, since they endured such punishments, do we who do the worst escape punishment? If they were punished then, why aren't we being punished now? Is it not clear even to a blind man that this is because punishment is being prepared for us in the future...?

At the same time, we need to think about what happens in real life, and we will not reject Gehenna. If God is righteous and impartial, as he really is,then why are some people here suffering punishment for murder, while others are not? Why are some of the adulterers punished, while others die unpunished? How many grave-diggers escaped punishment, how many robbers, how many greedy people, how many robbers? If there was no Gehenna, where would they be punished? Will we convince those who disagree that the doctrine of it is not a fable? It is so true that not only we, but also poets, and philosophers, and fabulists talked about the future reward and argued that the wicked are punished in hell...

Let us therefore not reject hell, lest we fall into it; for the unbeliever becomes careless, and the careless one will certainly fall into it; but let us unquestionably believe and often speak of it, and then we will not soon begin to sin. For remembrance of this, like some bitter medicine, can destroy every vice, if it lives forever in our soul. Let us use it so that, having been well cleansed, we may be worthy to see God, as many people can see Him, and receive future blessings through the grace and love of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Venerable Gregory of Sinai (1360) writes about eternal torment like this: “Eternal punishments are different, as are the rewards of the good. (Torment) takes place in hell, or, according to Scripture, in a dark and gloomy land, in a land of eternal darkness (see: Job. 10, 22), where sinners dwell until judgment and where they will return after the (final) sentence. Words: let sinners return to hell (Ps. 9, 18) and: death will feed them(Ps.48, 15) what else do they mean, no matter how the final determination (of God) and eternal condemnation.

The approaching night is, according to the word of the Lord, the future darkness, When no one can do(John 9, 4). ... Or ... according to the moral interpretation, this is continuous carelessness (about salvation), which, like a hopeless night, mortifies the soul with a sleep of insensitivity. Night (in the truest sense of the word) makes everyone sleepy and serves as an image of death by mortification. And the night of future darkness will intoxicate with the suffering of dead and insensible sinners.

Saint Theophan the Recluse (1815-1894) writes that “there are people who do not believe that there will be fire, a worm, gnashing of teeth and other bodily torments in hell awaiting sinners.

Okay, but what if they do? Whoever believes this loses absolutely nothing, even if there really were no such torments, and whoever does not believe will be struck by bitter, but late repentance, when he has to experience what he so frivolously rejected on earth ...

There were (and perhaps still are) wise men who imagined that the torment would not last forever; but there was not yet, it seems, not a single one who would completely reject the afterlife torments. A sense of truth exists in the most desperate sinners and prevents them from thinking so; even those invisible beings who give their revelations to spiritualists do not reject punishments in the future, but only contrive in every possible way to smooth out their fearfulness...

Every minute will turn into hundreds of years. Prophet David says that God has a thousand years as one day; therefore, and vice versa: one day is like a thousand years. If we accept this account, then even from one of our years 365 thousand years will come out, and from ten - more than three and a half million, and from a hundred ... and you will lose count.

... You forget that there will be eternity, not time; therefore, everything will be there forever, and not temporarily. You consider the torment to be hundreds, thousands and millions of years, and then the first minute will begin, and there will be no end to it, for there will be eternal minute. The score won't go any further, but it will stop in the first minute, and it will stay that way. It is, of course, when you hear or read somewhere the wisdom of clever humanists, the sin-loving heart seems to become more cheerful, and then, as you begin to think, all fears return again, and you come to the same thing: it is better to lag behind sin and repent, otherwise you can shortchange Yes, so much so that nothing can improve things. But it’s a decisive matter, it’s somehow impossible to argue about it, but we must argue with caution, and if we believe, then believe with such confidence that we have about what really exists or does not exist.

Venerable Elder Paisius (Velichkovsky) (1722-1794) writes: “Remember the endless torment that the sacred books speak of, the fire of Gehenna, pitch darkness, the gnashing of teeth, the tartar of the underworld, the worm that does not sleep; and imagine how sinners cry out there with bitter tears, and no one delivers them, weep, mourn for themselves, and no one takes pity on them, sigh from the depths of their hearts, but no one sympathizes with them; begging for help, complaining about sorrows, and no one heeds them.

Rev. Barsanuphius of Optina (1845-1913) speaks of hellish torment: “The wrong view of suffering in general is now very widespread. They are understood somehow too spiritually and abstractly, as pangs of conscience. Of course, there will be pangs of conscience, but there will also be torment for the body, not for the one in which we are now clothed, but for the new one in which we will be clothed after the Resurrection. AND hell has a definite place, and is not an abstract concept.

In the city of Kh. lived a young officer leading an empty, scattered life. It seems that he never thought about religious issues, in any case, he was skeptical about them. But here's what happened one day. He himself spoke about this as follows: “Once, when I came home, I felt bad. I got into bed and seemed to fall asleep. When I came to my senses, I saw that I was in some unfamiliar city. He looked sad. Large, dilapidated gray houses loomed bleakly against the pale sky. The streets are narrow, crooked, in places heaps of garbage are heaped up - and not a soul. At least one human being! As if the city was abandoned by the inhabitants in view of the enemy. I cannot express this feeling of melancholy and despondency, which seized my soul. Lord, where am I? Finally, in the basement of a house, I saw two living and even familiar faces. Glory to Thee, Lord! But who are they? I began to think hard and remembered that these were my comrades in the corps, who had died several years ago. They also recognized me and asked: “How are you here?” Despite the unusual meeting, I was still delighted and asked to show where they live. They led me into a damp dungeon, and I entered the room of one of them. “Friend,” I said to him, “during your lifetime you loved beauty and grace, you always had such a wonderful apartment, and now?” He did not answer, only with infinite longing looked around the gloomy walls of his dungeon. "And where did you live?" I turned to another. He got up and with a groan went into the depths of the dungeon. I did not dare to follow him and began to beg another to take me out into the fresh air. He showed me the way.

With great difficulty, I finally got out into the street, went through several alleys, but now a huge stone wall rose before my eyes, there was nowhere to go. I turned around - behind me stood the same high gloomy walls, I was, as it were, in a stone bag. "Lord, save me!" I exclaimed in despair and woke up.

When I opened my eyes, I saw that I was on the edge of a terrible abyss and some monsters were trying to push me into this abyss. Horror gripped my entire being. "God help me!" - I cry with all my heart and come to my senses.

Lord, where have I been, where am I now? A dull monotonous plain covered with snow. In the distance you can see some cone-shaped mountains. Not a soul! I'm going. There is a river in the distance, covered with thin ice. There are some people on the other side, they walk in a line and repeat: “Oh, woe, woe!” I decide to cross the river. The ice cracks and breaks, and monsters rise from the river, trying to grab me. Finally I'm on the other side. The road goes uphill. It's cold, but in the soul there is endless longing. But here is a light in the distance, some kind of tent is pitched, and there are people in it. Thank God I'm not alone! I go to the tent. In the people sitting there, I recognized my worst enemies. “Ah, we finally got you, my dear, and you won’t leave us alive,” they exclaimed with malicious joy and rushed at me. "Lord, save and have mercy!" I exclaimed.

What is this? I am lying in a coffin, there are a lot of people around me, they are serving a memorial service. I see our old priest. He was distinguished by a high spiritual life and possessed the gift of clairvoyance. He quickly came up to me and said, “Do you know that you were a soul in hell? Don't say anything now, calm down!"

Since then, the young man has changed dramatically. He left the regiment, chose another activity for himself. Every day he began to visit the temple and often partake of the Holy Mysteries. The vision of hell left an indelible impression on him. The remembrance of death and hell is very beneficial for the soul. Remember your last, and never sin(Sir.7, 39)…

One Athos monk told the Optina elder the following: “In my youth I was very rich and led the most cheerful way of life. Happiness smiled at me everywhere. By my mature years, I became a very large manufacturer, I considered my income in millions. With excellent health, I never thought about life, retribution after the coffin seemed to me a fable.

One afternoon I fell asleep in my office. Suddenly I see clearly, as if in reality, a bright Angel, who, taking my hand, said: “Come, I will show you your place, which will be your eternal home.” I followed the Angel in fear. We descended into the valley. In the middle of it rose a cone-shaped mountain, from which clouds of smoke escaped, and screams were heard from the depths of that mountain. “Here,” said the Angel, “is the place to which you will move after death, if you live as you live now. The Lord commanded me to reveal this to you." The angel became invisible, I woke up. Rising, I gave thanks to God, who gave me time to repent. After that, I hastened to finish my business. He left more than a million money to his wife, the same amount to his children, and he himself retired to Mount Athos.

... At present, he has been honored with the rank of schema and with God's help I hope to avoid that place of torment.”

Rev. Anthony of Optina (1795-1865): "If all the sorrows, illnesses and misfortunes from all over the world were collected in one soul and weighed, then the torments of hell are incomparably heavier and more severe, for even Satan himself is afraid of hellfire."

Rev. Lawrence of Chernigov (1868-1950) repeatedly repeated how to feel sorry for unbelievers. He often sat and wept for the people who were dying: "God! How much is stuffed in hell, like herring in a barrel, he said. His sisters consoled him, and he answered, again through tears: “You don’t see, but if you saw how people suffer in hell, what a pity!”

The old man often said that souls go to hell like people from church on a holiday, and to heaven - like people go to church on a weekday. Father often sat and cried that it was a pity for the people who were dying ...

From the story of nun F., who was at the Elder’s cell for some time: “Sometimes, before a common meal, he said:“ I don’t want to eat, but I need to see you and talk, which awaits everyone. And he cried and mourned: “If you knew what awaits people and what we all have to do, how people are tormented in hell.”

Somehow they led the Elder’s mother to the church, walked slowly, not in a hurry (Batiushka was sick), and people followed him at a distance, one after another. The father paused and said: “This is how people go to heaven now, and into hell the way people flock out of the church. In the last days, hell will be filled with young men.”

Hegumen Nikon (Vorobiev) (1894-1963) in one of his letters he writes: “No one can imagine what horror, what torment those who fall into the hands of demons endure. Sometimes insane, empty people say: what will happen to others, so will we. Is this a consolation? Enough demons for everyone. Let them not be comforted by this.

How hard it is in prison with punks! And in hell with demons it will be a million times harder.”

Elder Paisiy Svyatogorets of Blessed Memory (1924-1994) in a letter dated April 4, 1966, he speaks of a supernatural event that happened to him (from the life of an old man): “At one time I asked God to go to hellish torment. Firstly, because I am not worthy to see His All-Holy Face, and secondly, in order for Him to honor His Kingdom with all those whom I, as a person, grieved, treated unfairly or condemned in my life. And the Good God allowed me to experience a small part of hellish torment. This went on for a week and I couldn't bear it. Thinking back to those days, I'm shaking. That's why it would be better for a person who goes to hellish torment not to be born».

From the book of the priest Alexander Krasnov "Spiritual Conversations and Instructions of Elder Anthony": “Somewhere in the early seventies, while serving Divine Liturgy, I was honored with the first vision. And it was like that. At that time, the general infatuation of people with the West began and, accordingly, the features inherent in the Slavs were erased - unpretentiousness, hospitality, non-covetousness. Acquisitiveness, just becomes at the forefront of a new view of the world, money and things are placed above morality, spirituality. And the worst thing happened is that the way of life of people who call themselves Orthodox, very often, strictly observing the rituals of the Church, becomes the same as that of the surrounding pagans! The same indiscretion in everyday life, the same desire for a career, for a high position in society. For children from believing families, joining the pioneers, the Komsomol, the party does not cause mental anguish. And the justification, after all, is at hand: “But how could it be without this, we do not live in the desert, among people. Well, it's a sin, so start to understand - everything is a sin, let's go repent. Such a light-hearted attitude caused great fears for the very possibility of salvation. I reread the Gospel, especially about the last times. Apocalypse, haunted the question of the desert into which people must flee.

And now I see a huge number of people walking, people riding. Some, it seems, do not go, some are feasting, others are fornicating, others are building dirty tricks on their neighbors, but it doesn’t matter how the river carries them forward. All of them are very different, here are the laity, and the clergy, and the military, and politicians, everything, everything. Most people just rush forward, and some go quietly. On their way they have a terrible abyss, an abyss to hell. It would seem that everyone should fall into it, but no. Most of the people, indeed, are flying down, I can see how they are pulled there, some cars, some feasts, some money, some expensive outfits. And some calmly cross this abyss, even say, over it. Some people do not fall, but fall into the abyss - the luminous men help to get over, support. Not only the rich fail, but also people who obviously do not have large means. But they all have one idol - the lust of the world.

It was terrible. From the abyss came not only a groan, but the howl of those who got there, and the stench. It's not just the smell, no. As a fragrance, there is no description, the fragrance is not from flowers, or grass, but the fragrance of grace, to that which is bestowed by the Lord from relics, miraculous icons, or something else. The stink of hell is not just a bad smell, like the smell of sulfur, it is a feeling of horror and irrevocable, in a word - hell.

Here is the desert. And there the hermits were seduced by the murderer, trying to arouse the passion for profit, lust, despondency. Many fell, many. At the same time, how many princes and the mighty of the world this was saved, and not just saved, but glorified by the Church in the saints - they had everything, but their heart did not belong to the corruption of the world, but to the heavenly ... "

Rev. Seraphim of Sarov (1754-1833) said: “It is terrible to read the words of the Savior, where He does His righteous judgment on unrepentant sinners: “These go into eternal torment; . If Satan himself is afraid and trembles of such torments, then in what state will unrepentant sinners be? And if the righteous is barely saved, where will the ungodly and sinful appear? (1 Peter 4:18).

For those who have silenced their conscience and walked in the lusts of their hearts, there is no mercy in hell; there is no mercy there for those who have not done mercy here. They will then hear the gospel words: child, remember, as you perceived the good in your belly(Luke 16:25).

In this temporary life, the culprit can still somehow evade punishment: either through chance or through friends, but there is one of two things: either move away or come! The mouth of God, like a double-edged sword, will decide everything at that terrible moment, and there will be no return. The righteous inherit the Heavenly Abodes, while the sinners go into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”

The elder also spoke about how it is now necessary to take care of one’s own salvation in the most thorough way, “until the favorable time for the purchase for eternity has passed, and he recalled the words of the Apostle Paul: Behold, now is an acceptable time, behold, now is the day of salvation(2 Cor. 6:2), when we can still repent and love our Savior.”

To those who are of little faith and still doubt the reality of hellish torments, the Lord, in His goodness, gave a true witness through His servant Nikolai Aleksandrovich Motovilov, who at one time was miraculously healed from relaxation by Saint Seraphim of Sarov, about the existence of Gehenna fire, tartare and the undying worm. S. A. Nilus in the book "The Servant of the Mother of God and the Seraphim" cites the memoirs of Motovilov himself about these events in his life:

“At one of the postal stations on the way from Kursk, Motovilov had to spend the night. Left completely alone in the room of the travelers, he took out his manuscripts from the suitcase and began to sort them out by the dim light of a single candle, which barely illuminated the spacious room. One of the first he came across was a note about the healing of a possessed maiden from the nobility, Eropkina, at the shrine of St. Mitrofan of Voronezh.

“I thought,” writes Motovilov, “how it can happen that an Orthodox Christian woman, partaking of the Most Pure and Life-Giving Mysteries of the Lord, is suddenly possessed by a demon, and, moreover, for such a long time as more than thirty years.” And I thought: “Hell! This cannot be! I should have looked, how dare a demon possess me, since I often resort to the Sacrament of Holy Communion!..” And at that very moment a terrible, cold, fetid cloud surrounded him and began to enter his convulsively clenched lips.

No matter how the unfortunate Motovilov fought, no matter how hard he tried to protect himself from the ice and the stench of the cloud creeping into him, it entered him completely, despite all his inhuman efforts. The hands were exactly paralyzed and could not make the sign of the cross, the thought frozen in horror could not remember the saving name of Jesus. A disgustingly terrible thing happened, and for Nikolai Alexandrovich a period of gravest torment began. In these sufferings, he returned to Voronezh to Anthony. His manuscript gives the following description of the torment:

“The Lord vouchsafed me to experience for myself truly, and not in a dream and not in a ghost, the three torments of Gehenna. The first is a fire that is unlit and inextinguishable by nothing more than by the grace of the Holy Spirit alone. These torments continued for three days, so that I felt burned, but did not burn. From all over me, 16 or 17 times a day, this Gehenna soot was removed, which was visible to everyone. These torments ceased only after confession and Communion of the Holy Mysteries of the Lord through the prayers of Archbishop Anthony and the litanies ordered by him in all 47 churches of Voronezh and in all monasteries for the sick boyar, the servant of God Nicholas.

The second flour for two days was fierce Gehenna tartare, so that the fire not only did not burn, but could not warm me either. At the request of his Eminence, I held my hand over the candle for half an hour, and it became completely sooty, but did not even get warm. I wrote down this authentic experience on a whole sheet, and to that description with my hand, and on it with candle soot, I put my hand. But both of these torments of Communion gave me at least the opportunity to drink and eat, and I could sleep a little with them, and they were visible to everyone.

But the third torment of Gehenna, although it still decreased by half a day, because it lasted only a day and a half and hardly more, but the horror and suffering from the indescribable and incomprehensible was great. How I survived from her! She also disappeared from confession and Communion of the Holy Mysteries of the Lord. This time Archbishop Anthony himself communed me with them from his own hands. This torment was the indestructible Gehenna worm, and this worm was not visible to anyone else, except for myself and His Eminence Anthony; but at the same time I could neither sleep, nor eat, nor drink anything, because not only I myself was full of this most vile worm, which crawled in me in everything and inexplicably terribly gnawed my whole inside and, crawling out through my mouth, ears and nose, again returned to my insides. God gave me strength on it, and I could take it in my hands and stretch it. Of necessity, I declare all this, for it was not without reason that this vision came to me from above from the Lord, and no one can think that I dare to call on the Name of the Lord in vain. No! On the day of the Last Judgment of the Lord, He Himself God, my Helper and Protector, will testify that I did not lie against Him, the Lord, and against His Divine Providence, the deed that He performed in me.

Shortly after this terrible ordeal, inaccessible to an ordinary person, Motovilov had a vision of his patron, the Monk Seraphim, who consoled the sufferer with the promise that he would be healed upon opening the relics of St. torment.

Only after more than thirty years this event took place, and Motovilov waited for it, waited for healing through his great faith.

Here is another piece of evidence Hieromonk Seraphim (Rose) in an appendix to the book Soul after death- "The great dispute between believers and unbelievers": "On Easter Monday, after midnight, I went out before going to bed in the garden behind my house. The sky was dark and strewn with stars. It seemed that I was seeing him for the first time, and that a distant chant was coming from him. My lips softly whispered: “Exalt the Lord our God and bow down at His footstool” (Ps. 98:5). A man of holy living told me that Heaven opens at such hours. The air was filled with the scent of the flowers and herbs I had planted. "Fill heaven and earth with the glory of the Lord."

I could well stay there until dawn. I was, as it were, without a body and without any earthly attachments, but fearing that my absence would disturb those in the house, I returned and lay down.

Sleep has not yet taken possession of me; I do not know whether I was awake or asleep, when suddenly a strange man appeared before me. He was deathly pale. His eyes were as if open and he looked at me with horror. His face was like a mask, like a mummy. Shiny dark yellow skin was tight around his dead head with all its hollows. He seemed to be breathing heavily. In one hand he held some strange object that I could not see, and with the other he held his chest, as if in pain.

This creature filled me with dread. I silently looked at him, and he at me, as if waiting for me to recognize, despite all the strangeness of his appearance. The voice said to me: “This is so-and-so!” And I immediately recognized him. Then he opened his mouth and sighed. His voice came from somewhere far away, like from a deep well.

He was in great pain, and I suffered for him. His arms, legs, eyes - everything showed that he was suffering. In desperation, I wanted to help him, but he signaled me with his hand to stop. He began to moan so that I went cold. Then he said, “I didn't come; they sent me. I'm shaking non-stop, my head is spinning. Pray God have mercy on me. I want to die and I can't. Alas! Everything you told me before is true. Do you remember how a few days before my death you came to visit me and talked about religion? With me were two other non-believers, like me, friends. You spoke and they laughed. When you left, they said: “What a pity! An intelligent man, but he believes in the nonsense that old women believe in!

Another time, and more than once, I said to you: “Dear Photius, save money or you will die a beggar. Look at my wealth, but I want even more. You then said to me: “Have you signed an agreement with death that you can live as long as you want and have a happy old age?”

And I answered: “You will see how old I will live! Now I am 75, I will live more than a hundred. My children have no need. My son makes more money than he should. My daughter married a wealthy Ethiopian. My wife and I have more money than we need. I'm not like you, who listen to priests: "Christian end of life ..." and so on.

What good is the Christian end to you? Better a full pocket and no worries ... Giving alms? Why did your so merciful God create the poor? Why should I feed them? And you are asked to feed the idlers in order to get to Paradise. Do you want to talk about Ray? You know that I am the son of a priest and I know all these tricks well. The fact that the brainless believe them is good, but you are a smart person, you are confused. If you continue to live as before, you will die before me and will be responsible for those whom you confused. As a doctor, I tell you and affirm that I will live one hundred and ten years ... "

Having said this, he began to turn this way and that, as if he were on a brazier. I heard him groan: “Ah! Wow! Oh! Oh!". He was silent for a while, and then he said: “That's what I said, and after a few days I was dead! I was dead and lost the bet! In what confusion I was, what horror! Lost, I sank into the abyss. How I have suffered hitherto, what torment! Everything you told me is true. You won the bet!

When I lived in the world where you are now, I was an intellectual, I was a doctor. I learned how to speak and how to make myself listen, how to make fun of religion, to discuss everything that caught my eye. And now I see that everything that I called fairy tales, myths, paper lanterns is true. The torment that I am undergoing now is what is true, it is a worm that does not sleep, it is a gnashing of teeth.

Having said this, he disappeared. I kept hearing his moans, which died away in the distance. Sleep began to overtake me when I felt the touch of an icy hand. I opened my eyes and saw him again in front of me. This time he was even worse with a smaller body. He became like a baby with a shaking old head.

You who bear in your hearts God, whose word is Truth, the only Truth, you have won the argument between believers and unbelievers. I lost it. I tremble, sigh and have no rest. Truly, there is no repentance in hell! Woe to those who live on earth as I lived. Our flesh was drunk and laughed at those who believed in God and eternal life; almost everyone admired us. They treated you like crazy people, like crazy people. And the more you tolerate our ridicule, the more our rage grows.

Now I see how the behavior of bad people grieved you. How could you endure with such patience the poisonous arrows that flew out of our mouths when you were called hypocrites, deceivers of people. If those of them who are still on earth could see where I am, if they could only be there, they would tremble for every deed. I would like to appear to them and tell them to change their path, but I do not have permission for this, just as the rich man who asked Abraham to send the poor Lazarus did not have. Lazarus was not sent so that those who sinned might be worthy of punishment, and those who walked in God's ways might be saved.

Let him who is unrighteous still do iniquity; let the unclean be still defiled; the righteous still do righteousness, and the holy one still be sanctified(Ap.22, 11).

With these words, he disappeared.

Saint Ignatius Brianchaninov(1807-1867) cites in the Fatherland a story about a vision of an old man who saw with spiritual eyes how black horsemen appeared for the soul of a dying rich man, and when he began to call on the Lord for help, they told him that it was too late: “A certain old man once came to the city to sell baskets of his own making . Having sold them, he sat down - it happened not intentionally - at the entrance to the house of a certain rich man who was already dying. Sitting there, the old man saw black horses, on which were black and terrible riders. Each of these riders held a fiery wand in their hand. When they reached the door of the house, they dismounted, leaving their horses at the entrance, while they themselves, one by one, hastily entered the house. The dying rich man, seeing them, exclaimed in a loud voice: “Lord! Help me". And they said to him: “Now have you remembered God when the sun has darkened for you? Why did you not seek Him until this day, while the day was shining for you? But now, at this hour, there is no longer a part of you, either in hope or in consolation.

Let us give a few more testimonies about the afterlife torments of the souls of unrepentant sinners, revealed to us by the Lord for our admonition, but having the fear of God and the memory of death, fearing to fall into a hyena, we bypass it ...

The dream was like reality.

I walk and see a hilly area with a plot of land a hundred by a hundred meters, fenced off by some kind of fence. There was also an entrance. Apparently, it was possible to enter and exit. There was a crowd of people in the corner. They were all naked. They stood close to each other and seemed to be waiting for something. I heard a voice from somewhere. He sort of explained to me:

— These are pigs in the form of people. They go to slaughter, they are processed.

All these people were with emasculated entrails. Everyone's skin was pink. Two boys of indeterminate age were playing at the entrance. They pushed each other, naughty and jumped. The boys were also naked and emasculated. In the corner at the entrance, a man in his 60s was sitting on the ground, leaning his elbow on his knees. It has also been processed. He looked at the children playing and said almost crying:

- They play, fools, and do not know that they are playing the last minutes. They were fond of sex and sodomy. Now they will be led to the slaughter.

He sighed bitterly, lowering his eyes. And behind this "corral" for cattle, there were thousands more people waiting for their turn. I was surprised that the entrance is open, and no one runs away from there. The voice warned:

— Terrible torments await humanity, inheriting the behavior and deeds of the Whores of Babylon.

I woke up in fear and still see, as if in reality, these unfortunate people ...

(Hieromonk Tryphon "Miracles of the last time", book 4, Vladimir, 2005, p.210).

There was darkness and fire there, demons with charters ran up to me and showed all my bad deeds, and said: “ Here we are the ones that you served us on earth". And I myself read my deeds, they are written in large letters, and I was horrified by my deeds. The demons fire out of their mouths, they began to beat me on the head, and fiery sparks drank into me. I began to scream from unbearable pain, but, alas, only I heard faint moans, like chickens, they said: “Drink, drink”; and when the fire shines, then I see them all, they are terribly thin, their necks are stretched out, their eyes are bulging, and they say to me: “So you came to us, friend, you will now live with us, you and we lived on earth and no one they did not love, neither the servants of God, nor the poor, but only fornication and pride, they blasphemed God, listened to apostates, and reviled Orthodox pastors, and never repented ...

... When I was in hell, they gave me all sorts of worms, living and dead, and decomposed, and smelly, and I shouted and said how I would eat them, and they told me: “I didn’t fast when I lived on earth did you eat meat? You didn't eat meat, but worms; I didn’t keep fasts, for this you eat worms here, ”and instead of milk they gave all kinds of reptiles, reptiles and all kinds of toads ...

... I was very frightened and trembled with horror, it seemed to me that I had already been there for a century, and it became very difficult for me, and they continue: “You will live with us and suffer forever, just like we do.”

Then the Mother of God appeared and it became light, the demons all fell, and the souls all turned to the Mother of God: “Queen of Heaven, do not leave us here.” Some say: "I suffer so much." Others: "But I suffer so much." And the third says: “But I suffer so much, there is not a drop of water.” And the heat is unbearable, and they themselves shed burning tears. And the Mother of God wept very much and said to them: “They lived on earth, then they did not call Me and did not ask for help, and they did not repent to My Son and your God, and now I cannot help you. I cannot transgress the will of My Son, and the Son cannot transgress the will of His Heavenly Father, and therefore I cannot help you and there is no intercessor for you. I will have mercy only on those suffering in hell, for whom the Church prays and relatives pray for their relatives, and ... who did good deeds and deserved mercy while living on earth.

(“Testimony of Claudia Ustyuzhanina”, M., 2000. pp. 9-10).

…Then the Lord said: — We will continue your journey.

We went further. We went to such a place that a strong fire burns people. And people get up and fall, fall and get up, get up and fall. Hot. And when they are hot, they run out into the snow. And here the frost is strong, two hundred degrees. They freeze and go back to the fire. Again - they get up and fall and again go into the cold. So they will be tormented forever, endlessly, and there will be no end to their torment. Prayers don't go there. None. We went further. The Lord said: “I am leading you where people suffer and suffer. There they lie face down in the dirt, one left hand under them, the right hand raised. They lie and cry:

“Lord, enlighten our relatives so that they pray for us. If not, then send them to some country so that they find a person, so that the person teaches them how to pray for us. Lord, if not so, then take from them the most dear, beloved person whom they love and pity, and they will remember him - and they will remember us. Lord, if this is not so, if they do nothing for us, then punish them with fire, burn everything from them, destroy them, or punish them with thieves, so that everything is taken from them and delivered to the end.

The Lord said: “Child, how people are tormented and how they ask God and the Most Pure Mother, and no one hears them, and their relatives do not pray for them, and they ask for punishment to their relatives.

We went further. The Lord said: “Let’s go, I’ll show you where the worm eats people… And there the two-horned worm grinds people. Then we went, where people are hung by the arms, and by the legs, and by the eyes ... I asked: - For what, Lord, do people suffer? - For envy, for hatred, for greed, for stinginess, and no one prays for them, it is very difficult for them. The Lord said: “Come, I will show you where the abyss and the abyss are, where people will never come out, the earth is shaking, and people are suffering, there will be no end to their torment.

It is terrible to say that I was with the Lord in hell all the time and I cried all the time and I felt sorry for these people. The Lord said: Don't cry. They didn't know me and I don't know them. They did not ask Me and rejected Me.

They did not pray to Me and did not honor My Mother, they did not honor holidays, they worked on holidays. Now they are tormented in fiery hell. They rage in the lake of fire.

(Monk Joasaph "Noah's Days" / schema-nun Sergius of Vilnius "The Spiritual Journey of a Blind Girl to the Underworld" / M., 2006. p. 100-101).

Dear visitors of our Orthodox island! Often children (and not only) ask us uncomfortable questions that we cannot answer. And Archpriest Maxim Kozlov, a comprehensively educated priest, just gives very good answers to very difficult questions. Therefore, we advise you to familiarize yourself with the following 5 questions and answers, which we have placed below.

26. God knows everything in the future; so He knows who will sin and who won't anyway, so why are we given the chance then?

- The Holy Scripture says that the Lord wants everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the Truth, and He sent His Only Begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but gain eternal life. Salvation, as an opportunity, is given to each of us precisely as an opportunity - after all, every moment of our life, in every situation, the Lord is with us, so that we are like a thief on the cross, who even one minute before death could change and say: “Remember me Lord, when you come into your kingdom” – and hear: “Today you will be in paradise.” There are no people predestined to perish or predestined to salvation, but if the first is true, then the second is also true; if we are not computers, and not refrigerators, and not televisions, but beings that have in ourselves the image and likeness of God's freedom, then it means that we are saved not by force, but by assisting God who saves us. There are great words of one of the saints: "God does not save us without us." Try to think carefully about these words. Christ saves us, but not without our answer and not without our effort.

27. Why doesn't the Lord forgive sinners in hell?

“Because sinners don’t want it themselves. Because those who are in hell are those who voluntarily decided in evil, they are those who lived their lives saying: “No, I don’t want, Christ God, I don’t want either Your salvation or Your sacrifice. My sin, my passion is dearer and more pleasant to me. Go away from me!" God does not force anyone, neither in this life nor in the Hereafter.

28. What do you need to do to get to God?

- What to do? The Lord says this: “Whoever loves me keeps my commandments.” This is the way to go to God. Only if we fulfill not just as a promise, as the pioneers once promised: we will do this and that, as the Communist Party teaches, as bequeathed ... and so on. And let us love these commandments themselves precisely because they teach us to love God, Christ, and neighbors. If we do not just work out a lesson, like hirelings and slaves who are afraid to die, but with joy because of love, then this path will lead us to Christ.

29. What is faith in God?

- Faith. The most important thing in it is to believe that the Lord exists. But simply to know, to understand with reason that God exists, this is not enough for the Orthodox and for the Christian in general. After all, it is said that demons also believe, that is, they know that the Lord exists, but at the same time they do not depart from sin, therefore, knowing is not enough, you need to trust God, trust the will of God both in good properties and in bad ones, and when we are praised , and when they blame, and when we are healthy, and when our health leaves us, and when we are loved, and when we are scolded, to know that the Lord is always with us, that more than what we can endure, he will not give us a test. And the third thing: to be faithful to Christ, fidelity is also an obligatory property of an Orthodox Christian, faithful and resolute at all times, and decide: either be faithful to the end and lose everything in this life, or maybe life itself, or have everything, but deny Christ. This loyalty is brought up from a small point: here, there is a fast, you walk past an ice cream stand, you want to eat a portion, but you want to be faithful to Christ and refuse: “I will be faithful to Christ and will not eat what pleases me.” Here is a neighbor sitting, whom I passionately want to pull more painfully by the pigtail, but I will restrain myself and will not do this, for Christ's sake. That's what faith is: confidence, trust, and loyalty.

30. Why do some people not believe in God?

- Some do not believe because they did not have the opportunity to know and love God and the Orthodox faith. But the words of the Apostle Paul apply to them, which he addressed to the pagans, saying that they have their own law in themselves - this is the law of conscience - and they will be judged according to this law. This is the law of conscience, the natural moral law that every person has. He is the voice of God in our soul, and the one who acted in essence, according to the truth of God in his life, means that he can still be saved and meet Christ. But there are people who do not believe because they do not want to believe. And we can say that these people rather believe, feel that there is a God, they know it, but they rebel against this faith, against this knowledge, or because this faith prevents them from living the way they want, that is, according to their own will and according to to one's own desire, or because it turns out to be uncomfortable, inconvenient, interferes with it. After all, ask yourself how often it happens that we believe exactly as much as faith does not prevent us from living. In this sense, we are sometimes even worse than unbelievers.

I do not believe that the Lord will allow eternal torment of people in hell. He is the ideal of love and mercy, how can he allow eternal (!) hellish (!!) torments of people? You won't gain so much in a lifetime to end up being tortured forever.

Hieromonk Job (Gumerov) answers:

Dear Oleg! Since the afterlife is divided into heaven and hell, your letter inevitably implies a statement that you do not directly make: after the end of history, all people should be in paradise. In response to your letter, the question inevitably arises: where should Divine Justice place the people guilty of the brutal extermination of tens of millions of people (the leaders of the most odious totalitarian regimes of the 20th century). Where will Justice put people who, with sophisticated and vile cruelty, killed schoolchildren, pregnant women, helpless invalids? How do you imagine in paradise the life of those who left this world with unhealed ulcers of their criminal conscience, in spiteful enmity with God. Life in paradise will be built on the principles of perfect love. How is the harmony of a blissful life possible in Heavenly Kingdom with the participation of those whose soul has become stagnant in a state of satanic malice?

Speaking of heaven and hell, it is unacceptable to be guided by a simplified legal view that has nothing to do with the laws of spiritual life and a correct understanding of the nature of good and evil. Heaven and hell begin already in the human soul. The saints, having cleansed themselves and sanctified themselves by deeds and deeds of love, were so united with God while still on earth that they experienced heavenly bliss inside. The Kingdom of Heaven for them is the absolute fullness of joy that began here. For others, sin and crime have become the meaning of life. They rejected Divine love, trampled on His commandments, and consciously chose darkness over light. Hell for them is just the logical conclusion of what they had during their lifetime. If they, having free will, chose darkness, then how can they be forcibly sent to paradise?

The two exclamation points after the word "hell" show that you object to hell on principle. But then the whole system of spiritual and moral life is destroyed to the ground. If a person, risking his life, saved others, and the criminal who made cruelty and killing people his profession receive the same reward (paradise), then good and evil are equalized. The fundamental difference between them disappears.

In the letter, there is one exclamation point after the word "eternal". Perplexity about the eternity of hell again reveals a narrow legal understanding of the issue. Hell is eternal not because Divine Justice so desires, but because the soul fused with sin remains so forever. And if she remains like this forever, then the gates of paradise are forever closed to her. If on earth, in spite of Divine calls to repentance and in spite of the edifying examples of the saints, sinners choose darkness with unwavering perseverance, how will they be transfigured and corrected in hell, being deprived of the guiding grace of God. If hell were to re-educate sinners, they would be saved without Jesus Christ, who is the only way to salvation.

The denial of hell testifies to the damage of human nature. This reveals a hidden or open reconciliation with sin and the incompleteness of our faith. The Son of God, having belittled Himself, united with our limited human flesh, took upon Himself all the sins of perishing humanity. To save us from eternal death, He drank the full cup of bitter suffering, sorrow, humiliation and went to a most painful death. Why are we not horrified by the cynicism with which humanity, like the prodigal son, offends the greatness and holiness of its Heavenly Parent? The Holy Fathers, fully aware of the vile essence of sin, marveled at Divine long-suffering. Let us never think of this lawlessness, to call God unmerciful! Oh, how wonderful is the mercy of God! Oh, how marvelous is the grace of God and our Creator! What a power that dominates everything! What immeasurable goodness<Он>our nature in us, sinners, again raises to re-creation! Who has the strength to glorify Him? He raises up the one who transgressed His commandment and blasphemed Him, renews the foolish dust(St. Isaac the Syrian. Ascetic Words. Word 90).

The Savior of the world, by His death on the Cross, deprived the devil of power over the human race and destroyed the power of death. From the power of hell I will redeem them, from death I will deliver them. Death! where is your pity? hell! where is your victory?(Hos. 13:14). After the Resurrection of the Savior, people themselves drive themselves into hell, choosing darkness, not Light.