One Of The Worst Heresies Of All

The worst heresy of all, against reason and God, is that God's existence and nature are inconsistent with the necessary truths of reason that cannot have been false and that all things depend on.  Varying degrees of theistic irrationalism are prevalent in evangelical circles, but the idea itself, despite being the ultimate philosophical error regarding God and his metaphysical relationship with the laws of logic, is seldom even understood to almost any extent by the same evangelicals who will espouse it when cornered.  Since logical axioms cannot be false and God is consistent with them, as is required for something to at a minimum be possible, theistic irrationalism of this kind betrays both reason and God.  Irrationalism, though, is far more multifaceted than just a direct denial of logical axioms.  Any contradiction (a metaphysical impossibility that is still often believed by the non-rationalist masses) or assumption (an epistemological error) is also a betrayal of reason.

Heresy in the context of Christianity is an idea that misrepresents God's nature.  Ultimately, all such misconceptions are heresies of different severities, but the word is more likely to be used in cases of extreme mischaracterization of God or Biblical theology--or when a tradition-embracing fool is frightened by anything different than their mere assumptions.  One person might think that any theological or broader philosophical doctrine that contradicts a traditional stance is heresy, but when it comes to the Bible, heresy is that which distorts or denies God's nature as conveyed by the text itself or elements of God's nature that would logically follow from its teachings.  Some of the worst are anti-theonomy and extensive legalism, the latter of which sexual prudery and gender complementarianism are but subcategories of.  Others include the likes of the prosperity gospel with all of its false and damaging aspects.

What is the absolute worst of them all, though, other than theistic irrationalism (which, again, is a betrayal of necessary truths that are reality whether or not all of Christianity is)?  The cursed doctrine that all unsaved people will be tortured endlessly in hell, with no relief or eventual end to their conscious existence, so incredibly contradicts the Biblical Yahweh's moral nature that it is not only obvious upon forsaking assumptions that the Bible teaches the contrary from start to finish [1]--with a very small number of possible exceptions, such as for demonic beings (Revelation 20:10)--but it is also the case that the Biblical God and the deity evangelicals think the Bible testifies to are enormously different.  Were it the case that someone was fated to suffer without end, it would truly be better for them to have never been born, if not in a moral sense, then at least in a personal sense.  The extreme philosophical significance of whether there is an afterlife and of what that afterlife consists of is practically never grasped by those irrational enough to remain attached to the unbiblical but standard position on the punishment of the unsaved in hell.

The true gravity of eternal conscious torment is not taken seriously even by many people who erroneously believe the Bible promises it to all unredeemed beings.  A slight annoyance stretched out over a week could be deeply frustrating.  Intense mental or physical pain that only lasts a day or two can be hellacious in its own way.  For a human to suffer perpetually for a limited number of sins with finite severity is a supremely terrible kind of fate that could only be worsened by the type of agonies involved, but the Bible clearly says this does not even reflect Yahweh's character.  The same Bible that promises that the wicked will perish (John 3:16, Ezekiel 18:4) and that offers eternal, blissful life as the gift of salvation (Romans 6:23) would lie if it meant anything other than that just that: that the unsaved will cease to exist as souls and the righteous and saved will enjoy life without end in a paradise uncorrupted by evil.  This is not liberal emotionalism.  It is what the Bible so plainly addresses as early as Genesis when God keeps Adam and Eve from eating from the tree of life and living forever (Genesis 3:22-24) and as late as Revelation when the general unsaved experience the second death (Revelation 20:14-15).

As I have elaborated upon many times [1], Mosaic Law, numerous statements about cosmic justice throughout the entire Bible, and the words of Jesus all directly, blatantly, consistently teach this grand juxtaposition between eventual annihilation and eternal life.  Justice is God withdrawing his sustenance of other beings away from those which have unrepentantly turned against him following limited torments for some or all, allowing them to be blotted out of the immaculate existence intended by the divine creator.  It is not mercy to kill the wicked instead of torturing them forever; the same God that only authorizes only a very small number of physical tortures to punish very precise sins, with very strict limitations on their duration and severity, would be a hypocrite to reveal that more than 40 lashes is evil (Deuteronomy 25:1-3 stops far short of what even contemporary American society so often does to criminals) and then torture that same person, if he or she is unsaved, forever after death.  The real mercy is in being offered eternal life when sinners deserve extinction without resurrection or the hope of reconciling to God, forfeiting pleasure and peace and experience altogether.  This is the good news of the gospel that the Bible and so much extra-Biblical evidence points to.

[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-truth-of-annihilationism.html