Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the
soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28
It is objected that
the ultimate loss of a single soul means the defeat of omnipotence. And so it
does. In creating beings with free will, omnipotence from the outset submits to
the possibility of such defeat. What you call defeat, I call miracle: for to make
things which are not Itself, and thus to become, in a sense, capable of being
resisted by its own handiwork, is the most astonishing and unimaginable of all
the feats we attribute to the Deity. I willingly believe that the damned are,
in one sense, successful, rebels to the end; that the doors of hell are locked
on the inside. I do not mean that the ghosts may not wish to
come out of hell, in the vague fashion wherein an envious man 'wishes' to be
happy: but they certainly do not will even the first preliminary stages of that
self-abandonment through which alone the soul can reach any good. They enjoy
forever the horrible freedom they have demanded, and are therefore
self-enslaved: just as the blessed, forever submitting to obedience, become
through all eternity more and more free.
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