The new heavens and the new earth are a material universe (or at least, that is what seems to be taught in the bible). And being material implies being temporal. (At least, I have no concept of what something material but atemporal would be like.) Furthermore, the language in the bible seems to directly teach that the new heavens and new earth will be temporal (at least, when it says things like “forever and ever” it appears to be indicating an endless duration, not some timeless state).
Assuming annihilationism is false - in hell their existence is still something that is good, even something that they desire. (The Scholastic theory of good and evil holds that the existence of any substance is good in and of itself, and especially so for human beings as persons.) On the traditional view (or at least, certain forms of it) their wills are hardened so that, even experiencing torment, they don’t want to stop existing - what they really want is to keep on sinning. So they do, and so they continue being punished for it.
(If that traditional view of the continued value of the existence of the damned is false, that seems a strong reason to believe in annihilationism.)
That is your opinion. How do you know God does not still create the non-elect primarily for their own sake, and only secondarily for the sake of the elect? Are you saying we can’t make that distinction? Or that it is definitely the other way around? How do you justify that claim?
I recognize that that is your judgement. Obviously, I don’t share it, and I’ve explained why.
Nobody is “in the middle” in the afterlife. How does that work? I’ve given some possibilities already:
Your response to them was:
To which I must reply, I’m sorry you feel that way, perhaps you could flesh out what doesn’t make sense (or, since you are looking for an explanation that’s “at least self-consistent”, point out where the internal inconsistency lies). The last once, as I’ve mentioned, requires a grasp of Molinism to make sense of it.
It’s called “retributive justice”. C. S. Lewis is as good a place to start on it as any.
Eternally rejecting God, the ultimate good.
Or your judgement of good and evil is flawed.
Yes, I am serious.
As for you, if you don’t believe that God exists because of the evidence you see, that isn’t rejecting God. (Unless - and to be clear, I am in no way suggesting this is true - you were willfully dismissing the evidence or deceiving yourself in some way so that you could ignore God’s existence and the moral requirements that would imply for your life.) So no, I don’t think you deserve eternal torment or annihilation because of your intellectual judgement about God’s existence.
If I am right, however, then at some point - be it in this life or after - you will have the opportunity to accept God’s authority and his moral requirements, or reject them. And at some point it will become too late to change your mind about it. And as I see it, rejecting God, who is the ultimate good and of infinite worth (and, if annihilationism is false, continuing to do so forever), is a very grave wrong indeed.
The reason those in hell are being made to suffer eternally (or are annihilated) is not for the benefit of the elect. Instead, it is the just punishment for rejecting God. The benefit of the elect is the (again, only secondary) reason those people were created, not the reason for their punishment. So the story (which I have not read, only heard of the premise) does not appear analogous to me.
Because we’re responsible for our own free choices. God’s foreknowledge of our choices does not cause us to make them.
The justification is the good that he brings from those circumstances, which is unique and different from (i.e. with value incommensurable to) the good that he could have brought about without those circumstances.
How do you know? Do you have a reasonable level of understanding of Molinism? Have you read the reasons for believing the Molinist position, objections to it, defeaters for the reasons for it, responses to the objections? I have (to the best of my ability and resources) and judge it to be a very reasonable position. But as I said, I don’t have time for a crash course explaining why.
Identity of indiscernibles is actually a widely rejected view in philosophy, so this is far from as odd and mystical as you assume. But I don’t have time to get into that, either.
How so?
No, the real world is not like that, since human free will and divine providence are perfectly consistent with each other. (See again: Molinism.)