So now that we've talked about heaven, we can't neglect the darker side of the

afterlife conversation. So let's talk about hell.

Michael mentioned a survey on the last episode by the Pew Research Center that

found that 72% of Americans believe in heaven. That same survey found that

only 58% of those people also believed in hell. I suppose like,

so fire or not as appealing of an afterlife to believe in as blissful reunion

with God and all your loved ones. I can understand why so many people are

ready to let that one go. But the consequences of letting go of that belief can

be very high and the fear that it's instilled to those of us who are taught

about hell as children is difficult to overcome. So where did this idea of hell

begin? The idea of hell is nothing new. Hell is a very old story that has taken

many names and many forms. We see stories of Hades and the underworld in Greek

and Roman mythology, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism all have respective

versions of a hell. Oddly enough though, it's not really mentioned that often in

the Hebrew Bible. After life in general isn't really acknowledged. There are

some mentions of shiol, a natural storage place for the dead and a passage in

Daniel mentions a judgment day. Hell begins to come up more in the new testament

once Jesus and salvation are introduced. We see hell and Satan with his pitchfork

and horns depicted through all of the arts from Dante's Inferno to Little

Nasek sliding down a stripper pole to lap dance on Satan himself. But are all

of these stories pointing at a literal place of eternal suffering where bad

people go when they die? That concept in all of its forms has created a lot of

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