I am completely amazed that I am about to make an attempt to defend the book by Mary K. Baxter called “A Divine Revelation of Hell” for the simple reason that I would love for it to not be true. It is hard to read because it is very disturbing if it is true. From the first day that I began to read it, many years ago, I desperately wanted to find any solid biblical reason to not have to believe it.

I therefore was very interested to see what any of you might have to say on this subject since Peggy (bless you) brought it up, and was hoping that someone among you could prove scripturally that it is off base.

I considered the arguments being waged against it along with those of the web sights that have gone before to discount her - such as the one called “The Heavenly Hash of Mary K. Baxter” and I was rooting for the side that wanted to show that she is maybe making this up.

However, the more I thought about it, the more I found myself coming up with sound biblical reasons to refute many of the arguments that were given against her. I will share those momentarily.

From the beginning, I had been unable to come to any conclusion in my heart about this book even after much prayer and seeking for an answer. So I left it unresolved until further information could be obtained. Though if truth be told, I was leaning towards not believing her.

It was Bill (“23 Minutes in Hell”) Wiese and his testimony that made me take another look at Baxter and begin to believe that she may be telling the truth after all. I find Wiese to be very believable and he wholeheartedly endorses Baxter and has worked together with her to get their stories out. (I believe him along with Dr. Maurice Rawlings, Ian McCormack, Howard Storm, Howard Pittman and others.)

I agree with those who have noticed that Baxter writes with a simple-minded, childlike way in the book. While there is perhaps room for improvement in her style, this alone doesn’t convince me one way or another as to her believability. The Apostle John, for example is not a scholarly sounding writer when writing about our Lord. He has been called the “one syllable man…” Because when writing about the most important person ever born, coming out of the realms of eternity into time and dwelling among mankind, John describes Him with a string of mostly one syllable words:

1. In the beginning (exception 1) was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2. The same was in the beginning (exception 2) with God.

3. All things were made by him; and without (exception 3, you get the idea…) him was not any thing made that was made.

4. In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

5. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

6. There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.

7. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.

8. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

9. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

10. He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

11. He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

12. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

13. Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

14. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us…

None of the above reads like the words of a serious scholar (John was, after all, a fisherman) nor is it in a style that we would expect from one claiming to be speaking for God, and describing important eternal truths. Yet I believe it to be from God. I have learned that God has chosen the foolish things in order to confound the wise. He does that sort of thing on purpose. It would therefore be more surprising if He deviated from that rather than continued to operate in that manner.

Now let me share my views about some of the arguments against Baxter.

One argument is that Baxter claims that Jesus quoted scripture to her that was not perfectly consistent with how it appears in the Bible. This does not bother me when I consider examples in the Bible itself where other scriptural quotes are not exact. We could get carried away on this with numerous examples to point out how many times this occurs throughout the scriptures. Rather than do that, let’s just try one. Here is the writer to the Hebrews “quoting” from the book of Psalms:

5. Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:

Now, let’s read it the way it reads in the Old Testament:

6. Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: (HUH!?)

The two are so different as to almost seem like a mistake. If we argue that quotes must be word for word perfect, than we have some problems with many scriptures. But we know that you have to go to other areas of scripture, in this case about the servant and the boring of his ear to the doorpost and all that in order to understand how this all applies to Jesus.

Also it was suggested that Jesus would never quote a verse of scripture and then not finish the whole scripture. Yet we know this to be untrue when we consider that Jesus began His ministry by doing this very thing. Jesus was in the temple reading from Isaiah to the congregation and in the middle of a verse of scripture, He stopped reading, delivered the scroll back to the keeper, and said that the scripture that He had just read was fulfilled in their ears. Yet He had only read the first half of the verse. When we humbly approach God with a willingness to learn from Him, He is ready with an answer for us that will make sense.

God has demonstrated His preferred method of teaching knowledge in this very regard. He said that those people to whom He would teach knowledge must obtain it a certain way. But also in this same passage, He has stated that those who will not obtain knowledge this way will by this same method, fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken. Woe! Kind of like a double edge sword that brings life to some and death to others, you know?

9. Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts.

10. For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:

11. For with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people.

12. To whom he said, This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear.

13. But the word of the Lord was unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little; that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.

This means that God purposely scattered His truth like a puzzle, all over the place in His scripture. It requires His help to put it all together. He has the authority to say what part goes with what other part. And it may not always seem to us like an obvious connection. This even suggests that the idea of “context” may not always be as important as it is often made to seem. Sometimes scriptures are not dependant on the context where God has placed them for their understanding and teaching. Paul knew this for example when he quoted a very obscure scripture about muzzling oxen that were treading the corn and he applied this to himself saying that it was permissible for him to be fed off of his work for the gospel. If some were hearing Paul today, they might argue that he has taken this scripture completely out of context and made it say something crazy.

I’m not saying that this proves that Mary K Baxter is telling the truth. But merely that her quotes of scripture that she attributes to Jesus are not inconsistent with the scriptures, in my opinion.

Baxter is criticized for her claims that prior to the resurrection of Jesus, paradise was located near to hell and had some sort of prison cells containing people that Jesus would rescue from there. Yet this sounds consistent with this:

8. Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men.

9. Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?

As for hell and paradise being near to each other prior to the resurrection, true, Abraham spoke of a great gulf between them but that doesn’t mean that they couldn’t have been near enough to communicate with each other since they obviously were doing so. It merely means that this great gulf made passage between the two realms impossible.

Another point of contention is that although Jesus has promised never to leave or forsake His people, yet it appeared to Mary Baxter that He did in fact leave her in hell so she could experience what that would be like. Bill Wiese has also said that when he visited hell, it was taken out of his mind and memory that he was a Christian, in order that he would have the same experience that any lost soul would have in the way of hopelessness. Both have said that God wanted them to be able to experience this in order to warn others who do not believe in hell. If this is really God, then I think it is permissible in the strict interpretation of that scripture to give these kinds of exceptions for the stated purpose. God has the authority to interpret what He has formerly said. Remember Peter being told to rise, kill and eat animals that God had previously said were not to be eaten. And the disciples of Jesus were picking and eating grain on the Sabbath day which was not permitted. Yet Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath. God knows what He has said and what lies within the acceptable boundaries of interpretation. He can do what He wants. It just may be that at this late stage of the game, He has chosen to reveal things to us about hell that have for many generations been kept hidden.

If I may, perhaps a better argument against this whole situation would be to sight where Father Abraham discounts the rich man’s plea to send Lazarus to his brethren at home on earth, to warn them. The rich man's position is that if one rose from the dead with such a story of where he had been, surely they would believe. Yet Abraham merely said that they have Moses and the prophets and let them hear them. The rich man then says that they don’t believe Moses and the prophets and Abraham says then neither will they believe though one rose from the dead. That right there does more to make me feel like this story is to be questioned rather than other things that I have heard. What do you think?

So, has that changed for our day? I don’t know. But I look at it like this: If Mary K Baxter and Bill Wiese and others like them with similar stories are just making it all up, and I believe them, what will happen as a result? On the other hand, if they are not making it up, but God really has given them these experiences and told them to warn others and I choose to not believe them, what could happen to me then?

One of the biggest areas of discomfort among us Christians, including myself, is the suggestion that even Christians were among those that Baxter encountered in hell. How is this possible? There are warnings in the books of Hebrews and Jude that are directed to us who believe and they speak of the consequences of beginning correctly with God even as the Children of Israel began right in their journey out of Egypt , but then left off following God and lost their confidence in Him. With whom was God angry but with those who believed not? Etc. The very warning is using examples of those who started out right with God but did not end up “saved” in the end. It even uses angels as an example of how you can go from being right with God at one point and then become condemned in the end. How much more saved could you be than to be one of God’s own angels? Yet there’s a whole heaping bunch of them that are lost forever. Jesus warned us that if we do not forgive our brother than neither will God forgive us our sins. Was that just a meaningless threat? God also warns us in His word not to be many teachers because teachers receive a greater judgment than run of the mill saints. Yet look at all the teachers everywhere teaching whatever they want to as if there is no consequence to being wrong in what they are teaching. Baxter is sighted as having visited these kinds of examples in hell: A Christian who refused to forgive someone, or a teacher of the word who refused to teach what God instructed him to. If these kinds of things cannot actually lead to hell then God warned of them for nothing, wouldn’t you think? It would seem kind of pointless to have said anything at all if it’s not possible to suffer the stated judgments contained in the repeated warnings. Such as when Jesus said whoever hates his brother without a cause or calls him good for nothing, is in danger of hell fire.

One of the biggest points in her book that initially made me think that Baxter was making this stuff up was when she said that hell was shaped like a woman lying on her back. I thought that this was the most ridiculous thing I’d ever heard. I thought that there could not possibly be any scripture to back up such an idea– until I came across that scripture where it speaks of hell becoming enlarged.

11. Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them!

12. And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither consider the operation of his hands.

13. Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst.

14. Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it.

15. And the mean man shall be brought down, and the mighty man shall be humbled, and the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled:

16. But the Lord of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and God that is holy shall be sanctified in righteousness.

What is amazing to me is that Baxter never even mentions this verse in her book. At least not that I recall. It was some time later that I discovered this verse and had to go get her book out again and read that part again. I was completely amazed that the bible calls hell a woman. That is, a woman that has a mouth that she can open – Exactly what Mary Baxter describes in her book!

Finally, my other big problem that I initially had with this book was the suggestion that Satan and demons appeared to be in positions of which they do not seem worthy. They should be at the bottom of the heap, not the ones dishing out torments, right? Yet there is the following kind of scripture that seems to uphold even this idea of cruel tormentors:

…for the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty.

Someone there is being cruel to someone else.

When I considered all of this, it occurred to me that if the Book of Enoch is brought in to this, according to it, demons are the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim that were destroyed in the flood of Noah. These spirits are the hybrid product of the mating of fallen angels with mortal women. These hybrids covered the earth prior to the flood, (Genesis 6 giants in the earth) and would have been in various stages of development from very young (imps?) to very aged and powerful. Nevertheless, they all (that is their physical bodies) died in the flood and according to Enoch, they became mostly consigned to this earth where they would be known as evil spirits on the earth:

And now, the giants, who are produced from the spirits and flesh, shall be called evil spirits upon ⁹ the earth, and on the earth shall be their dwelling. Evil spirits have proceeded from their bodies; because they are born from men and from the holy Watchers is their beginning and primal origin; ¹⁰ they shall be evil spirits on earth, and evil spirits shall they be called. [As for the spirits of heaven, in heaven shall be their dwelling, but as for the spirits of the earth which were born upon the earth, on the earth shall be their dwelling.] And the spirits of the giants afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle, and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble: they take no food, but nevertheless ¹² hunger and thirst, and cause offences. And these spirits shall rise up against the children of men and against the women, because they have proceeded from them.

¹ From the days of the slaughter and destruction and death of the giants, from the souls of whose flesh the spirits, having gone forth, shall destroy without incurring judgment -thus shall they destroy until the day of the consummation, the great judgment in which the age shall be ² consummated, over the Watchers and the godless, yea, shall be wholly consummated."

Notice that it says that these demons are doing their evil without incurring judgement – at least for a period of time. I had to ask God about this and here is what I believe He told me. These beings were brought forth in the unenviable position of never having been given a choice of whom to serve. They were slaves to Satan the moment that they were conceived. They therefore would be in a very unique position among God’s other created beings, would they not? Are they evil? Absolutely! There’s not a kind or loving one in the bunch. But is it their fault? No. I think of it almost like the very significant story by Mary Shelley, called Frankenstein. Probably one of the most often remade movies ever, in other words more versions of that story than any other next to the story of Christ. Just thought I’d mention that. In the movie called “Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,” Robert De Niro plays the monster, and he is more able to express himself than most of the other versions’ monsters can. He is extremely wrathful against his creator because of his disposition. He cannot be saved nor can he love. Therefore he will destroy and hate to the fullest extent that he can. Seems like an apt description of a demon. One of the reasons for its hate is that it sees those who did have a choice and they did not make good use of that choice. It therefore understandably would take out its cruelty against such as end up where it also would dwell. Assuming God gives it the chance.

In those days they (demons) shall be led off to the abyss of fire: and ¹⁴ to the torment and the prison in which they shall be confined for ever. And whosoever shall be condemned and destroyed will from thenceforth be bound together with them to the end of all ¹⁵ generations.

Is it also in torment in such a place? Probably – but since it had no choice, its punishment would not be as great as one who did have a choice and did not seek God. Therefore, it may be within the scope of possibility that at least for a time, these demons may be the tormentors of others rather than receiving the torments themselves. The worst torments must be reserved for the fallen angels who were once in heaven and had no reason to rebel yet did so anyway. We have a chance for a great inheritance with Christ because we believe what we have never seen. It seems to be about what one did with what one had to work with. Demons had nothing to work with from the start.

I found some other passages from Enoch pertinent to our discussion (remember this would be prior to the resurrection):

¹ And thence I went to another place, mountain [and] of hard rock. ² And there was in it four hollow places, deep and wide and very smooth. How smooth are the hollow places and deep and dark to look at. ³ Then Raphael answered, one of the holy angels who was with me, and said unto me: 'These hollow places have been created for this very purpose, that the spirits of the souls of the dead should ⁴ assemble therein, yea that all the souls of the children of men should assemble here. And these places have been made to receive them till the day of their judgment and till their appointed period [till the period appointed], till the great judgment (comes) upon them.' I saw (the spirit of) a dead man making suit, ⁵ and his voice went forth to heaven and made suit. And I asked Raphael the angel who was ⁶ with me, and I said unto him: 'This spirit which maketh suit, whose is it, whose voice goeth forth and maketh suit to heaven ?' 7 And he answered me saying: 'This is the spirit which went forth from Abel, whom his brother Cain slew, and he makes his suit against him till his seed is destroyed from the face of the earth, and his seed is annihilated from amongst the seed of men.' ⁸ Then I asked regarding it, and regarding all the hollow places: 'Why is one separated from the other?' ⁹ And he answered me and said unto me: 'These three have been made that the spirits of the dead might be separated. And such a division has been made (for) the spirits of the righteous, in which there is the bright spring of ¹⁰ water.

(Could that be the water that the rich man asked Lazarus to dip his finger in?)

And such has been made for sinners when they die and are buried in the earth and judgment has not been executed on them in their ¹¹ lifetime. Here their spirits shall be set apart in this great pain till the great day of judgment and punishment and torment of those who curse for ever and retribution for their spirits. There ¹² He shall bind them for ever. And such a division has been made for the spirits of those who make their suit, who make disclosures concerning their destruction, when they were slain in the days ¹³ of the sinners. Such has been made for the spirits of men who were not righteous but sinners, who were complete in transgression, and of the transgressors they shall be companions: but their spirits shall not be slain in the day of judgment nor shall they be raised from thence.' ¹⁴ Then I blessed the Lord of glory and said: 'Blessed be my Lord, the Lord of righteousness, who ruleth for ever.'