Theodore Sider

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Many of the current dilemmas of Theology are related to God’s Justice. Theodore Sider argues against a specific variant of the doctrine of Hell which questions God's Justice. The type of Hell Sider objects to is one bound in the Dichotomy of Heaven and Hell, due to the implication of its design. Sider further elaborates his position by speaking of the degrees of sins and what that entails in the ultimate calculation of who goes to Heaven and Hell. This takes aim at the criterion of Heaven and Hell and the dispensement of these states given that God is an active part in the process. Sider responds to critics by addressing shortcomings in his paper and finishes by assessing that a binary view of Hell falls short of justice on par with God’s attributes. …show more content…

He wishes to point out the inconsistencies in the Binary conception of Heaven and Hell. There is also an acknowledgment of Universalism and Calvinism as alternative interpretations of the doctrine of Hell, but outside of the scope of his paper. However, these are outside of the purvey of his paper for differing reasons. Part of the difficulty in accepting the traditional theory is the disproportionate, and arbitrary assignment of reward and punishment that needs to be enforced. This is further elaborated by introducing the existence of borderline-cases and the sharp divide in the sorting process of Heaven and Hell that is potentially incompatible with God’s perfect justice. The infinite rewards and punishments dispense for finite sins or merits doesn’t seem to address the issue of degrees of sins and merits. Which ultimately sort people into Heaven or Hell, but there would eventually be cases along a sharp divide between both these states. Which it becomes increasingly difficult to reconcile the dispensement of either …show more content…

He explores this idea by citing the Epistemicist viewpoint and contrasting it with his own view. Epistemicists would generally hold the viewpoint that borderline-cases are due to unsatisfactory predicates being use in the discussion and we should reserve a faith based criterion in which God understands. Theodore Sider argues that focusing solely on the predicates and allowing things to be decided by a faith-based criterion makes us lose the moral meaning of things. So a large part of that conversation then goes onto what common grounds can be used to eventually agree on predicates to use for

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