If there’s one thing that everyone seems to agree on, it’s that Hell sucks. So why is it that you can’t help but feel a slight pull toward the fiery pits of the underworld? A bodily beckon toward God’s hotel of damnation? We’ll tell you why: It’s because Bosch made it seem so freaking bangin’ in all his trippy rave paintings of it. It’s a misrepresentation that has made many stray from the light. Here’s how to get your head screwed on straight and fear Hell even though Hieronymus Bosch made it look so goddamn sick.
Think about what torture would actually feel like.
It’s not all weird bird people who look like they’d have awesome party drugs down there in the depths. Having your body used as a drum set by a squirrel in an adorable red balaclava may seem like your version of an epic Friday night, but it’s actually bad! Imagine if you were on fire. That would hurt sooo much.
Remember the demons might not hang out with you.
So Bosch made Hell look like a sick-ass anarchist queer nightclub, but much like Earthly queer nightlife, just because it looks cool in pictures doesn’t necessarily mean you’d have fun there. You may get through the front door of Hell, but that’s no guarantee that the avant-garde demons and abominations will include you in anything besides torturing you (which you can act like you’re in on, but it just comes across desperate). You may just end up standing awkwardly in the corner with the serial killers and Lincoln Project founders waiting for your daily flaying, and you can’t even pretend to go on your phone because you don’t have a phone (another reason Hell is bad).
Try to lead a good life for non-fear-based reasons.
If fearing Hell isn’t working for you because Bosch made it seem too awesome, then try to lead a morally upstanding life for reasons other than avoiding damnation. Give freely, lift your fellow humans up, step in to lend a helping hand whenever the opportunity presents itself. Still dead set on going to Hell because you want to see that person whose whole body is a head and use their tongue like a waterslide? Fine! Just start ordering delivery during storms and tipping 15%.
So if you want to fear Hell even though damnation sounds cool (because it has word ‘damn’ in it) and salvation sounds more like a Burt’s Bees kiosk at Walgreen’s, then try these approaches to demystifying a Boschian hellscape. Have fun in Heaven which art tells us is a bunch of clouds so basically like being on a plane? Fun!
