Week 9: Chapter 8 — Hell

1.Lewis opens by saying that the doctrine of hell is 'one of the chief grounds on which Christianity is attacked as barbarous' and that he would pay any price to remove it, 'if it lay in my power.' How does this admission shape the way you receive his defense of the doctrine?

2.He offers a famous definition: hell is the condition of a soul that has successfully achieved total self-enclosure — a creature that has, through a lifetime of choices, become permanently curved in on itself. How does this definition connect to what Lewis said about the Fall in Chapter 5? What does it say about the long-term trajectory of repeated self-assertion?

3.Lewis argues that hell is not God's revenge on sinners but the end-state of what they have chosen — and that God respects human freedom enough not to override even a choice for self-destruction. He says, 'the doors of hell are locked on the inside.' Do you find this image persuasive? Does it change how you think about divine love and human freedom?