God and Hell cannot simultaneously exist

Hey, SperoAmicus, sorry about the delay in my response – I've been busy with various Christmas related affairs. If you do indeed "flake out", no worries, we can just copy and paste what we have so far into a new debate. I want to preface my arguments my admitting that I am not 100% clear on your defense. So, if I misinterpret anything, please let me know! You seem to argue that God's love is like is similar to romantic love and in romantic love, it is essential that the love be mutual. Thus, God does not force us to love him and if we don't love him, we go to Hell, which is essentially an absence of God. If that is your argument I have a few responses (numbered and lettered for ease of debate). 1a) This is a completely ad hoc response. You do not have any external evidence suggesting that "Knowledge of God' is eternal life" or that God's love actually does work this way. The only thing you provide is a biblical quote which is poetic not literal and called into question by the very nature of this debate (i.e. we're trying to decide if God exists and if he doesn't then the Bible is called into question). Instead, you have invented a response that happens to fit the evidence we see without providing additional evidence for this response. As long as we allow ad hoc responses, nothing can EVER be proven wrong. 1b) That being said, it seems very likely to me that God's love does not work the way you describe. God's most common moniker is "God the father", indicating parental and not romantic love. In parental love, the love does not need to be requited; instead the parental figure often does things for the child against the child's will because it is in the best interest of the child. A parent doesn't care what the child thinks about running into the street or if the child agrees with that decision, the parent just does what is best for the child. Seeing as God is the "father" and his potential status over us would be more than equivalent to the status of a parent of a child, it seems more likely that God has paternal love. If God has paternal love, then your theodicy fails we are again faced with the paradox I have presented. 2) This argument is a false dichotomy. You are arguing that if God does not force us to love him, then people will go to Hell. I do not see why this must be so. Why can't God create a world in which everyone is free, yet everyone freely accepts God? Sure, this may seem unlikely to a puny human mind, but a requirement of omnipotence is that the being can do anything which is not logically contradictory. So unless you can demonstrate that freedom and complete acceptance of God are, by necessity, in contradiction, the response cannot fly. 3) Your argument assumes that God forcing someone to love him would be worse than Hell. This just seems false. In most definitions Hell is the worst possible state one can be in. A forced love cannot, by definition, be worse than this. So, this is not in our best interest. Why doesn't God just wait and see who will love him freely and who won't and then only force those who don't love him freely? Then he can have the best of both worlds. 4) This answer begs the further question of why God would create a world like this? God knew when he promised to himself not to force people to love him that it meant people would go to Hell. So, are still faced with the same question. So, those are some of my thoughts. I look forward to your response!