The two English constructions exemplified in Let’s get the hell out of here (type G) and They beat the hell out of him (type B) differ both syntactically and semantically, but in both the taboo expression has the force of an intensifier. History (through a corpus investigation) reveals that the B-construction started as a literal exorcism (beat the devil out of someone), where the hell substitu...

W. Matthews Grant's "Dual Sources Account" aims at explaining how God causes all creaturely actions while leaving them free in a robust libertarian sense. It includes an account of predestination that is supposed to allow for the possibility some created persons ultimately spend eternity hell. I argue here resources Grant provides understanding why might permit end up hell are, two different re...

How can it be determined whether a patient has consented to electroconvulsive therapy? Under what circumstances should therapy be given against a patient's will? Peter MacDonald addresses these questions from a medical, ethical and legal perspective. This article is available in Osgoode Hall Law Journal: http://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/ohlj/vol22/iss4/3 MEDICAL, ETHICAL AND LEGAL CONSIDE...

Ādam pictured the zabāniya as duplicates of the angel of death who, according to the Quran (4:97, 32:11), seizes the souls of sinners when they die and interrogates them about their wrongdoings. This is also how later tradition pictured them: as black creatures who appear at the moment of death to pull people’s souls out of their bodies and drag them into hell, where they torture them.2 However...