> I have no problem with this, but if the soul is nothing but some kind of cosmic ID card, what's the use of calling it a whole part of human nature? If there's no meaningful way to separate it from the spirit (that always got me, TV shows where a person sells his soul to the Devil (in a comedic situation) and never knows the difference, and no one points out the obvious flaw in that idea which is that *there's no person left after the soul is gone*), then why call them two separate entities?

I always assumed that the the bargain was that you sell your soul, and get good stuff while you're alive, and the devil collects his payment when you die. That was the Faustian interpretation, anyway.

On the other hand, how does that differ from simply dying unsaved? in both cased you go to Hell, which by all accounts is a quite unpleasent place. Of course Danté postulated degrees of suffering based on the sins committed. If, however, all sins are equal in God's eyes, how does this make sense? If you're one of the Hellbound anyway, what is there to frighten you away from such a deal? Or is it all good stuff while you're alive and then when you die, your punishment is exactly what it would have been anyway?

winter"Aiming for re-incarnation"mute