My Emails to Dr. Hany Mina - 2

Email: 2
From: Dr. Hany
To: me

Sent: Wednesday, November 07, 2007 (I can't find the exact time)

Dear Peter

Thank you for your email.  And thank you for mentioning our Great Saintly Father Antonios Amin.  A Spiritual Giant and Thinker who taught many and now rests in the Glory of God forever.  Of course feel free to pass the 4-hour-links, and any material that I send you, to any friend.  I hope they are of use to some.  I attach the 4 links again with the summary article that I wrote when I sent them to arbible group.  I also attach the 43 page English summary of the 272 page book on Divine Justice, which I also attach as PDF files............

.........  The book as it stands has been approved by the late Anba Athanasius of Beniseuf, who wrote its Introduction, as you can see, and of course by Fr Antonios Amin who has been my spiritual father all the past 36 years and who has written the Introduction of my first book "God, Man and the Universe, 1992," because of which Fr Antonios Amin suffered much. 

Now regarding your question:

Is there hope [in Salvation] after death? 

The straight answer is that God did not give us a clear unequivocal answer of a yes or no.  All what people say on this matter is mere speculation.  There are hints that there is such a hope, in some verses, and others hint to the opposite (e.g. the wise and foolish virgins).  The words of Christ about the possibility of forgiveness "in this age or in the age to come ," when talking about blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, seem to some to make a hint, but do they?  Read 1Pt 3:19-20 and you will find that there has been an invitation (preaching) by Christ to those who were sinners in the days of Noah and not only those 8 persons who were in the ark, AFTER Christ was crucified and went to visit them in the Prison, hence after their physical death.  Read it carefully, it was Fr Antonios Amin who pointed this part to me.   Also when the parable speaks of remaining in the prison until "paying the last phils (penny)" and those who will be "beaten more and those beaten less, " St Isaac the Syrian comments, in his commentary "On Gehenna," by saying "all what could be measured must have an end."  Also St Paul tells us that eventually when the whole creation is "subjected to Christ," Christ will also be "subjected to the Father, so that God [the Father] would become ALL IN ALL" (1Cor 15: 28). This suggests that no part of the creation will remain "outside God" (=Eternally Dead).  However, having said all that, which is also discussed in a book by a Catholic Priest entitled "Dare I say all might be saved?"  Some theologians also say that Eternal Death (=separation from God eternally) cannot remain eternal for 2 reasons: 1) this would mean God has been defeated. 2) This means that Death would become ETERNAL, which is in a sense the DEIFICATION OF DEATH!!!!!!  3) the word ETERNAL does not mean "never ending," but it means all what belongs to the system that is "outside Time" as we know it.  Mere speculations, which I only mention as you wished to discuss the matter!

So, this is all a mental and intellectual exercise and brain storming acrobatics, which should not be used to conclude DOGMA, but remain as "opinions"and "speculations", or at best a "HOPE," but not certainty.   Bishop Kallistos Ware, the retired Oxford Univ. Chair Prof. of Orthodox Christianity (Greek Orthodox convert from Anglicanism) put it well by saying: "It is legitimate to hope that all might be saved [and that is why we pray for all who departed], but heretical to say that all MUST be saved... . As long as free will exists, Hell exists." Because God cannot force those who hate Him to remain in His presence eternally; this is against love and free will.  That is the reason St Isaac wrote that Hell may very well prove to be the kindest and most merciful condition, accepted by God, for those who cannot face His healing Light , Holiness and Love, because these attributes of God to them constitute a fiery furnace of shame and agony, when God's Love reminds them of what they reject and hate, hence they cannot tolerate.  Hell is man [and devil] made.   We hope that God has another solution, but if He does, He certainly did not tell us about it frankly.  So we must make the best of the one and best (even if not the only) chance of repentance and Salvation that we now have.

Hany

My Emails to Dr. Hany Mina - 1

This a series of Emails exchanged between me and Dr. Hany Mina of 

 http://copticorthodox-divinejustice.com/, primarily discussing Christian concepts related to the possibility of Salvation after Death.

I have recently decided that I'd like to share those emails with a wider audience, so I am posting them here with slight editing (mainly removing parts irrelevant to the discussion and names for anonymity)

Here goes nothing:

Email: 1
From: me
To: Dr. Hany

Sent: Wednesday, November 07, 2007 8:38 AM

Hello Sir,

first of all I'd like to introduce myself, my name is ..................

I apologize for the late email, .......

I had thought of sending you this email a long time ago, but I waited for an introduction from ..... for 2 reasons, the first is that I wasn't sure if you'll trust me, what with the sad general state of our coptic church, & I don't just mean the points of authority, but those who oppose them as well. The whole thing is quite ugly & bears more resemblance to a theocracy than to a church, quite frankly! & this has driven people to watch their words too closely, which is sad for a family in Christ, but has become a must in a way. 

How I heard of you is through 4 hours of your recorded voice, passed on by a friend that I assume he got from a friend. by the way I have them on the internet at my personal online storage space: .........................................
I hope you do not mind. Please tell me if you do & I will remove them, I just wanted to put them in a place where a couple of friends can download them.

Now why I wanted to email you, well I did have some questions, but it's primarily because of something that was hinted at in one of those hours & later hinted at by Fr. Antonious Amin. a few months before he passed away a friend was at his appartment, & I don't know what were they talking about but he asked Fr. Antonious if there is hope after death, & Fr. Antonious's reply was: Yes there is.

Now I see there must be, but at that time I was surprised he said so, after some discussion with my friends we reached a point where we agreed there must be hope after death, we just didn't know how. Then we remembered you hinted at that in one of those recordings when you said something about people dying in the old testament (& indeed, the new testament as well) not as punishment but -as you put it- God wanted to "get the naughty boy out of the room".

Since that time when I wanted to ask you I have searched for answers for quite some time, on websites & in online encyclopedias & I even ventured into Schaff's compilation of the writings of the Alexandrine fathers, but I have to admit I didn't get so far there.

Now my thoughts on the subject have developed, and I still need you to please get in touch with me & tell me what you had meant by that hint, what is the rest of the thought?

.....................................

Thank you.

God Bless