"Eternal Hell"

excerpted from:
"Meditations On The Tarot:
A Journey Into Christian Hermeticism"
by Valentin Tomberg
from: Chapter VIII JUSTICE (p.180-181)

[To] live without love -- this is hell. And to live without love in the region of eternity -- this is to live in eternal hell.

Hell is the state of the soul powerless to come out of itself,
absolute self-centredness, dark and evil isolation, i.e. final inability to love.
(Nicolas Berdyaev, The Destiny Of Man)

This subjective state of soul is neither long nor short -- it is as intense as eternity is. Similarly, the blessedness that a saint experiences in the vision of God is as intense as eternity -- although it could not so last, since someone present at the ecstasy of a saint would time it as a few minutes. The "region" of eternity is that of intensity, which surpasses the measures of quantity that we employ in time and space. "Eternity" is not a duration of infinite length; it is "intensity of quality" which, if compared with time and thus translated into the language of quantity, is comparable with an infinite duration. Concerning this, Nicolas A. Berdyaev says:

In our life on earth it is given to us to experience torments that appear to us to go on for ever, that are not for a moment, an hour or a day, but seem to last an infinity... Objectively this infinity may last a moment, an hour, or a day, but it receives the name of everlasting hell... When Origen said that Christ will remain on the cross so long as a single creature remains in hell, he expressed an eternal truth.
(Nicolas Berdyaev, The Destiny Of Man)

What can one add to this, if not "amen"? Eternal hell is the state of a soul imprisoned within itself, where the soul has no hope of coming out. "Eternal" means to say "without hope". All suicides committed through desperation bear witness to the reality of eternal hell as a state of soul. Before committing suicide, the person who commits it experiences a state of complete despair, i.e. eternal hell. This is why he prefers nothingness to the state of despair. Nothingness is therefore his last hope.

Eternal bliss -- "heaven" -- is, in contrast, the state of soul which is filled with boundless hope. This is not a blissfulness which lasts for an infinite number of years; it is the intensity of hope which gives the quality "eternal". Similarly, it is the intensity of despair which imparts to the state of soul designated "hell" the quality of "eternal".

The anguish of Gethsemane which gave rise to perspiration of blood was eternal. This night, the night of Gethsemane, was not measured in hours. It was -- it is -- immeasurable, therefore eternal. It is due to its eternity that he sweated blood, and not because of the temporary, and therefore passing, trial. He knew eternal hell through experience, and as he came out of it, we have the "good news" that not only death is vanquished by the Resurrection, but also that hell is -- through Gethsemane. .... Origen himself knew with certain knowledge that there would be no "damned" at the end of the world and that the devil, also, would be saved.