Heaven and Hell

Notes on Hillsdale Online Course on C. S. Lewis part 6

Lecturer Michael Ward

By Rev. Lonnie C. Crowe

Dualism is the belief that there are 2 equal and independent powers in conflict.  One is good and one is bad.

Good is choosing what is good in spite of personal references.

To say that one side is good brings in the standard.

Therefore, good is the one closest to the standard.

Good and evil are not equal and opposite.  Neither are heaven and hell.

The devil is not the opposite of God because the devil is a created being.

Michael is the opposite of Satan.

To be in hell is to be banished from humaness.

"We know much more about heaven than hell, for heaven is the home of humanity and therefore contains all that is implied in a glorified human life; but hell was not made for men." It is for ex-men.

"If the happiness of a creature lies in self- surrender, no one can make that surrender but himself and he may refuse.  I would pay any price to be able to say truthfully 'All will be saved." But my reason retorts 'Without their will, or with it?'...How can the act of self-surrender be involuntary?"

"The doors of hell are locked on the inside." Those in heaven become more like themselves, yet more united in love and worship.

"If all experienced God in the same way and returned Him an identical worship, the song of the Church triumphant would have no symphony, it would be like an orchestra in which all the instruments played the same note.  Heaven is a city, and a Body, because the blessed remain eternally different; a society, because each has something to tell all the others."

Union with God is a continual self-abandonment, a continual surrender of self.

Hell, in "The Screwtape Letters", is a government department.  Screwtape is a demon, a serious minded, pompous bureaucrat. 

In "The Great Divorce", hell is a sprawling gray suburb, with shabby shops and greasy, little streets. 

There must be a complete divorce from all evil.

"Our life as Christians begins by being baptized unto death."

"Our most joyous festivals begin with, and center upon, the broken body and the shed blood.  There is thus a tragic depth in our worship which Judaism lacked.  Our joy has to be the sort of joy which can coexist with that."  

"There have been men before now who got so interested in proving the existence of God that they came to care nothing for God Himself...as if the Good Lord had nothing to do but exist!  "There have been some who were so occupied in spreading Christianity that they never gave a thought to Christ."

Getting to heaven is both harrowing and hallowing.  The process involves both sacrifice and rebirth.