Alma, the highest religious leader, is talking to the church, who by now has started to get inflated with pride. He asks them really thought provoking and probing questions about their souls, and their attitudes towards their own salvation. He mentions specifically whether the people can remember how God delivered their ancestors' souls out of hell by changing their hearts.
In this verse, the chains of hell certainly are at least a metaphor for what it's like when you lack God in your real, physical life. The metaphor most likely extends to later, as well - being dragged down to everlasting separation from God. Life outside of the Celestial Kingdom kinda fits this definition, as does the suffering you must endure to pay for your own sins if you fail to allow Jesus to bear the burden for you.
Alma 12:11
Alma is talking to Zeezrom, a sneaky, crafty lawyer who was trying to disprove Alma's words. Alma explains that people who harden their hearts get less knowledge, until they gradually know nothing about God and spirituality, and essentially allow themselves to be taken captive by the devil and led by him to destruction: and that is the definition of the chains of hell.
ANSWER:
It definitely sounds like these hell-chain thingies are very much a thing that happens while people are alive. It sounds like they are a metaphor for Satan's influence on you.
Satan wants to destroy us and thwart God's plan. He doesn't want us to repent. He wants us to be miserable like himself. He doesn't keep his promises, and he doesn't offer anything worth having, anyway. Sometimes I wonder why evil even exists. This is especially true when I'm trying to get inside the mind of a character in a novel I'm thinking about and creating in my mind: what is the motive of a villain? Why are they evil? I don't relate to it. I mean, I understand some things about it, but I really don't get wanting to be or do evil. It's not logical, and it's really weird.
No comments:
Post a Comment