Does God really punish people..?

I am not a bible expert and I cannot firmly give the bible verse that will answer your question. However, to my opinion, the term is not "punish" rather God will do the wrong doer something to learn for. What I mean, if someone did wrong to you, that person will experience the same thing as he/she did to you or even worse. The happening is not a punishment from God for doing something wrong, rather God wants that person to feel and realize what he/she did. That is why God's number 1 commandment is to love one another as you love yourself. Hence, never do something to others what you do not want others do unto you. Plus, any wrong you do to others will bounce back and even worse. As per my understanding then, it is not a mere punishment from God because I believe He does not punish. Whatever will happen to the person who did wrong is not a punishment from God, it is a consequence of what he did. I hope I made a sensible response my friend though I cannot give the biblical answer.

Dear chayapathys it is a nice question. If we look around we see that God does not punish people who do wrong, on the contrary they are enjoying life more than others. The righteous who are honest and truthful suffer. It appears they are suffering though they have done no wrong. After God created this world he went away. He went away to create another world. However, he said "Whenever and where ever there is a decline in religious practice,O descendent of Bharta (to Arjuna in Gita), and a predominant rise of irreligion-at that time I descend myself To deliver the pious and to annihilate the miscreants,as well as to reestablish the principles of religion,Imyself appear millennium after millennium "

It depends on which god you are talking about. I know that there are more then two religions where a god or gods punish people.

The God of the Bible is forgiving unintentional errors but punishes deliberate wrongdoers. Exodus 34:6-7 (Young's Literal Translation) 6and Jehovah passeth over before his face, and calleth: `Jehovah, Jehovah God, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in kindness and truth, 7keeping kindness for thousands, taking away iniquity, and transgression, and sin, and not entirely acquitting, charging iniquity of fathers on children, and on children's children, on a third [generation], and on a fourth.' Exodus 34:6-7 (New International Version, ©2010) 6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” Justice will be served!

You remind me of a debate I had with my uncle and his friends. I brought up the fact that God does not want us to kill (humans). My uncle brought up Cain. Although the Bible tells us that Cain was cursed, he asked me why was Cain rewarded with having his own city? He brought up my point that God decreed that no one touch Cain without being punished seven times. Thus, according to my uncle, Cain couldn't have been punished. When I got home I read that after killing Abel, Cain had seven descendants. The last descendant, Lamech's, had two wives. He killed a kid for insulting him and killed another man who attacked him. Then he bragged that if anyone harmed him, they would be punished "seventy and seven fold." After Lamech's two sons, there are no more. Yet, we see all of Seth's generations as we see other people in other parts of the Bible (including Canaan who is cursed by Noah). So I see that God has his own way of punishing and not seeming to punish. One more thing, I think that people who do evil and don't appear to be punished, might have actually distanced themselves from God because they are too much into worldly things. They will get their worldly things, but their judgement will be bitter and cruel. They will reap what they sew.

i have to believe that god is going to punish people, if i don't believe that the foundation my religion will collapse, god created this universe and created people to worship him and do as much as they can of good things, so if god didn't reward the gratefuls and punishs the sinfuls than the justice will not be achieved, i live by this opinion, if someone hurt me and i couldn't redeem my right i let it to god to do that for me, if god tell us this is the right way, take it, and some people choose go the other way, the logic say that punishment is the fair thing to do. i hope i didn't messed up because of my poor english.

Hi I dont think it is God who punishes us, God is too kind for punishing us.But what I feel that it is our own 'Karma' that leads to our punishment. There a saying-what you sow, so shall you reap. Whatever bad we do to others will surely rebound on us some time or the other, there is no escape.

People commit evil because they do not fully understand what it is. Everything you do in life will come back to you in time. This teaches you what your actions really mean. You learn. You understand. It has never been about punishment. It's about education. This simple action that returns everything back to us not only teaches us what our actions mean,it teaches us to love unconditionally. After all, that is what we all want back. Also realize, we could never learn all that can be learned in one lifetime.

I don't believe that God is the punisher of people. God is the healer of all things. It is what we do to ourselves that punishes us. We can not blame God for all of the wrong things in our lives.

In a way that God made the Universal rules and it's already in motion without change, yes, cause He created karma and my God, how much that works! It really do! All the time, no exception.

Before God punishing people or someone He warned first or reminded then if not obey He punish for the sake people learn from that sin. In the bible use the word Chastisement for God action to us.

When you talk about God having mercy, it is to who deserves it. His mercy is not just 'up for grabs'. Walk uprightly, and he considers you for his mercy. Have a nice day.

God dnt punish us.AS in Hinduism it is said that we suffer due to own Karma...God only gives Moksha not punishments or sufferings...

I am not a bible expert too just like others who have said this in the first line of their sentences. But here is what I can say. Yes, God is merciful. He does not punish while we are still living because He still await for us to ask for forgiveness and repent. This is the grace of God for us no matter how sinful we are on earth. The only time God punishes us sinners is when we die and we face judgment day. At judgment day, you can not ask for forgiveness anymore. It's too late. It is the time of recalling all the things you did while you were still alive. At judgment day, you will be immediately cast into hell when we do not deserve to receive God's grace in paradise because of our sins. This is all I can share. God bless.

Your question enters into a rather complex and tortured landscape. The answer depends on which concept of a god or gods you chose to embrace. The whole concept of a wrathful and vengeful god is central to the Abrahamic god of the Tanakh, the Bible and the Qur'an. It is from this stern paternalistic concept of a god that the idea of sin arises. Sin is not just any wrong doing. It is a transgression of the perceived laws of this father figure. The real problem comes when people do not rely on a god to punish these transgressions and take it upon them selves to met out punishment. No problem when the pronouncements are such things as, "thou shall not kill" but when they enter into punishing people for working on the sabbath of a particular religion or such things as "suffer a witch not to live" that the real evil starts to stem from religion.

I agree with maean_19. Whatever a person experiences in this life is a mere reflection of how he/she is living it. I believe that God does not want to inflict pain in his people. But it is people who inflict pain in themselves.

God does not punish anybody.