If you suggest to about 98% of all Orthodox Christians, especially priests, that hell is not eternal, you will be the recipient of a wide variety of negative responses, ranging from raised eyebrows and “You’ve got to be kidding!” to the word “HERETIC” screamed at the top of the lungs while the person yelling it makes for the woods before he gets caught up in the lightening, he is sure is going to hit you at any moment for daring to utter such blasphemies.

Today, April 16th, 2023, is Holy Saturday in the Orthodox Church, and the prayers we chant in particular leave me gasping for air at the contradiction between what we sing and what we believe about the next life. Allow me to give you a few examples which I see in the standard Eight Tones of Orthodoxy, with notes about them in bold.

Troparia Of The Resurrection

Tone One

When the stone had been sealed by the Jews, While the soldiers were guarding Your most pure body, You arose on the third day, O Savior, Granting life to the world. (Uhhhhh . . . no! Not to the world. Only to the people who are fortunate enough to be born in the right era, the right place, and the right time to hear the Gospel of Christ and repent of their sins. The rest? The pagans who never heard? The unbaptized babies [according to Augustine]? Those who get tricked by the devil and false teachers? Meaaaah. Too bad!) The powers of heaven therefore cried to You, O Giver of Life: Glory to Your Resurrection, O Christ! Glory to Your Kingdom! Glory to Your saving plan, O Lover of mankind!

Tone Two

When You descended to death, O Life immortal, You destroyed Sheol with the splendor of Your divinity! (So Christ our God destroyed Sheol [Hell] by His divinity, and then, sometime in the sixth or seventh century, it was restored and put back into use again. I guess it was only a temporary destruction and only good for those who were living when Christ died?) And when from the depths You raised the dead, All the powers of heaven cried out: O Giver of Life, Christ our God, Glory to You!

Tone Three

Let the heavens rejoice! Let the earth be glad! For the Lord has shown strength with His arm! He has trampled down death by death! (During Pascha, we sing over and over again, “Christ is Risen from the dead. By death He trampled death. What is death? It is separation from He who is Life – God! That is why when Adam ate the fruit, he “died,” that is, he was separated from God by being cast out from the presence of God in Eden. So I ask you this: if Christ has trampled down death, then how do you possibly sing this and yet believe in a state of eternal death called “hell?”) He has become the firstborn of the dead! He has delivered us from the depths of Sheol And has granted the world great mercy.

Tone Four

When the women disciples of the Lord Learned from the angel the joyous message of Your Resurrection, They cast away the ancestral curse And elatedly told the apostles: Death is overthrown! (If death is overthrown, how can there be eternal hell. Period!) Christ God is risen, granting the world great mercy!

Tone Five

Let us, the faithful, praise and worship the Word, Co-eternal with the Father and the Spirit, Born for our salvation from the Virgin; For He willed to be lifted upon the cross in the flesh To endure death and to raise the dead By His glorious Resurrection! (If I had to go through the horrors of the Passion which Christ so lovingly endured for us, and then turn around and see BILLIONS [according to Roman Catholic soteriology] of souls be plunged into hell forever, I would consider my mission to destroy death a complete and utter failure!)

Tone Six

The angelic powers were at your tomb; The guards became as dead men. Mary stood by Your grave, Seeking Your most pure body. You captured Sheol, not being tempted by it. You came to the Virgin, granting Life. O Lord Who arose from the dead, glory to You! (Captured? Sheol? Nope. Not if eternal hell is true. Sheol is alive and kicking according to those who believe in eternal hell. Why do you sing this if you don’t believe it?)

Tone Seven

By Your cross, You destroyed death! To the thief You granted Paradise! For the myrrhbearers, you changed weeping into joy! And You commanded Your disciples, O Christ God, To proclaim that You are risen, Granting the world great mercy. (Eternal hell = death is NOT destroyed. Honestly, folks, do you really understand what the word “destroyed” means. Let me give you a picture of destroyed:

Honestly, do you really believe that hell is destroyed when you teach that it is running like a WWII bomber factory at full speed, its mouth open wide and receiving souls every day to torture them forever?

destroydĭ-stroi′

intransitive verb

1. To break apart the structure of, render physically unusable, or cause to cease to exist as a distinguishable physical entity:
2. To put an end to; eliminate.
3. To render useless or ruin.

Physically unusable. CEASE TO EXIST!

Tone Eight

From on high You descended, O merciful One! You accepted the three-day burial To free us from our sufferings! O Lord, our Life and Resurrection, glory to You! (Only the “elect” are free from their sufferings. According to Calvinist and Roman Catholic soteriology, it is the elect, who are chosen by the “inscrutable will of God” who shall be freed. The rest? Tough, pal!)

I love the Orthodox Church, the beauty of the worship, the hymns, the prayers, and everything that is Orthodox. When I first heard the phrase, “Christ our God, who alone loves mankind.” I almost started weeping. This is why I have such a problem with those who want to add eternal hell to the equation. It just doesn’t seem to fit with everything we sing and believe about Christ’s love for us and the victory of the Cross over death.