Hell
Hell, as a word, did not come from the Bible. The word is Germanic in origin and is, ironically, tied to Norse mythology, as a goddess named Hel oversaw the dead in Norse myth. In ancient and early medieval mythology, it was common for the name of the deity of death to also be frequently used to describe the realm of the dead. Therefore, just like Hades in Greek mythology, the name Hel could also be used to refer to both the Norse goddess of the dead and also her fiefdom of the deceased. Old English, with its ties to Germanic cultures and language, adopted the word hel, which transformed into the modern hell. To put it bluntly, when English translations of the Bible use the word, hell, the translators are using a newer and more familiar Germanic designation for the underworld instead of the original ancient Hebrew titles, such as Sheol, Abaddon, and Gehenna. Specifically, Gehenna is the designation that is most often replaced in the New Testament. With the word, Hell, and other non-Hebrew baggage put to the side, a discussion can be had of the original underworld envisioned by the ancient Hebrews, and the curious development of this concept over centuries.
Sheol
Sheol, Abaddon and Gehenna can be used somewhat interchangeably, but there was a clear hierarchy in regard to which of the three was the most all-encompassing term. Sheol was the broadest and most general description of the realm of the dead. It was used in the oldest books of the Bible, such as Genesis and Numbers, with Biblical figures talking of the dead being in Sheol and espousing beliefs that they, too, would eventually become an inhabitant of that place. Genesis contains a scene of Jacob grieving over the loss of his son. The text states, “All his sons and all his daughters sought to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, ‘No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.’ Thus his father bewailed him.” (Genesis 37.34-35, NRSVUE version). This quote presents the concept of Sheol as a neutral, all-encompassing, realm of the dead. At this stage of conceptualization, there was little talk of separation between the good and the bad in the underworld. All dead went to Sheol. On the all-encompassing nature of the place, both for the souls of the nobility and the common masses, the author of the Book of Isaiah vividly wrote:
“Therefore Sheol has enlarged its appetite
and opened its mouth beyond measure;
the nobility of Jerusalem and her multitude go down,
her throng and all who exult in her.”
(Isaiah 5.14, NRSVUE version).
Regrettably, most ancient authors of the Bible provided sparce information about the residents of the underworld, rarely describing their afterlife existence, or how they acted or felt. Some valuable insight, however, can be gleaned from the concept of the Rephaim that early Hebrews shared with their Canaanite neighbors. In modern English translations, Rephaim (or refa’im), is often replaced by the word “shades” in certain sections of the Bible that involve the Jewish underworld and its inhabitants. Take, for example, Isaiah 14. The rather difficult to read Orthodox Jewish Bible (OJB) English translation of this specific passage reads: “Sheol from beneath is astir for thee to meet thee at thy coming; it stirreth up the refa’im for thee, even all the attudei aretz (he-goat world leaders); it hath raised up from their kise’ot (thrones) all the melachim of the Goyim” (Isaiah 14.9, OJB version). A similar approach is taken in the Young’s Literal Translation version (YLT): “Sheol beneath hath been troubled at thee, To meet thy coming in, It is waking up for thee Rephaim, All chiefs ones of earth, It hath raised up from their thrones All kings of nations” (Isaiah 14.9, YLT version). In contrast, the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) and a majority of the other newer translations opt to use the word, shades, instead of Rephaim in the context of the underworld. The NRSV translation of Isaiah 14 reads:
“Sheol beneath is stirred up
to meet you when you come;
it rouses the shades to greet you,
all who were leaders of the earth;
it raises from their thrones
all who were kings of the nations.”
(Isaiah 14.9, NRSV translation).
Use of the name, Rephaim, for ghostly underworld figures occurs in other sections of the Bible. Further instances include Isaiah 26.14, translated as “Dead — they live not, Rephaim, they rise not” (YLT version) and “The dead do not live; shades do not rise” (NRSV edition). Another example of this is in Proverbs 2.18-19, translated variously as “For her house hath inclined unto death, And unto Rephaim her paths. None going in unto her turn back, Nor do they reach the paths of life” (YLT version) and “for her way leads down to death and her paths to the shades; those who go to her never come back, nor do they regain the paths of life” (NRSV edition). Biblical descriptions of kingly shades having prominence in the underworld was paralleled in Canaanite writings, in which kings and legendary heroes were described as joining the ranks of the Rephaim in the underworld. Take, for instance, this reference to a certain King Kirta of Hubar, and his dynasty’s founder, named Ditan, from tablets found in the ruins of Ugarit (which fell around 1200 BCE):
“May Kirta be highly praised,
in the midst of the Rephaim of the underworld,
in the assembly of Ditan’s company.”
(Kirta, Tablet 2, Column 3, approximately lines 1-3).
Sheol, to reiterate, is the ancient term for the general Hebrew land of the dead. Both good and bad, and lowly and kingly go there. Heroic Rephaim shades retain some high status in the afterlife, but their authority and purpose in that underworld realm remain vague. For more specificity, one must delve into descriptions of Sheol’s subregions of Abaddon and Gehenna.
Abaddon
Abaddon and Gehenna are terms with connotations of punishment. Abaddon means “place of destruction,” which gave the title a natural ominous and negative feeling. Nevertheless, it was fairly synonymous with the less-imposing designation of Sheol, and the two titles were often paired together. For instance, of the underworld’s gluttonous and unending collection of human souls, it was said, “Sheol and Abaddon are never satisfied…” (Proverbs 27.20). The old biblical authors also made it clear that God’s omniscience included the realm of the dead, and that He was fully aware of what was occurring in the underworld. The Book of Job illustrated this idea:
“Sheol is naked before God,
and Abaddon has no covering.”
(Job 26.6)
Sheol and Abaddon were described with notable personification. It has already been mentioned how the underworld “enlarged its appetite” (Isaiah 5.14), how it is “never satisfied” (Proverbs 27.20), and how it can stir, rouse and be troubled (Isaiah 14.9). These insatiable themes continued in Proverbs:
“Sheol, the barren womb,
the earth ever-thirsty for water,
and the fire that never says, ‘Enough.’”
(Proverbs 30.16).
Yet, this personification is more neutral than diabolical. These descriptions of the realm of the dead emphasize the insurmountable and inescapable powers of death and decay over living matter, which is fated to be absorbed into the earth in the course of the natural and divine order. For more hellish descriptions and more focus on fire and sulfur, we must turn to Gehenna.
Gehenna
Gehenna was the closest thing that the ancient Hebrews had to the modern vision of Hell. Despite the hellish final result, Gehenna seems to have had a rather mundane origin story. Gehenna is believed to have been conceptually and etymologically tied to an ancient place called the Valley of Hinnom. In Hebrew, the Valley of Hinnom would be gē’ hinnōm, and was combined to gēhinnā in Aramaic, ultimately resulting in the Gehenna that was replaced by Hell in English texts.
In the beginning, Gehenna was merely a valley. It played host to underworld-related rituals involving fire, to be true, but it was still just an ordinary valley. In the Book of Joshua, Gehenna was stated to have been just to the south of Jerusalem. The text mentioned “the valley of the son of Hinnom at the southern slope of the Jebusites (that is, Jerusalem)” (Joshua 15.8) and this geographical positioning was reiterated with a later mention of “the valley of Hinnom, south of the slope of the Jebusites” (Joshua 18.16, NSRVUE version). Most importantly, Hinnom had a ritual spot known as Topheth (the Burning Place), where obscure rites involving fire were carried out in connection to the dead, the underworld, and the afterlife. Authors from later in the biblical tradition would claim that the ceremonies at Hinnom predated the arrival of the Hebrew people at Jerusalem, but large portions of the population, from all levels of society, were comfortable enough with what was occurring in Hinnom to embrace the fiery rituals for generations.
Ancient Hebrew people had a complicated relationship with the Valley of Hinnom, to say the least. On the one hand, many of the ancient Jewish inhabitants of the region, especially in the earliest times, reportedly showed great interest in the Valley of Hinnom and personally were involved in carrying out the valley’s unique fiery rituals for the dead. Certain Hebrew kings were said to have physically and financially supported the valley rituals and even God, himself, was sometimes described in Hinnom terminology. For instance, the Bible states, “For his burning place [Topheth] has long been prepared, also for the king; its pyre is made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it” (Isaiah 30.33) and also, “Thus says the Lord of hosts: So I will break this people and this city as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended. In Topheth they shall bury until there is no more room to bury” (Jeremiah 19.11, NRSVUE version).
Conquests and Changing Beliefs
In contrast to the societal beliefs in ghosts, Rephaim, and the various characterizations of the underworld, there was also a growing faction of theologians among the Hebrews that began to relentlessly chastise the era’s belief in spirits and the realm of the dead. This trend began approximately around the 8th century BCE and came to hold complete theological dominance by the 6th century BCE. Curiously, this reactionary theological movement occurred around the same time as the fall of the Kingdom of Israel to the Assyrians in 722 BCE and the subsequent conquest of the Kingdom of Judah by the Babylonians in 587 or 586 BCE. This led to the Babylonian Exile or Captivity period of Jewish history, which ended in 538 BCE due to the intervention of the Persian ruler, Cyrus the Great (r. 550-529 BCE). A great example of that movement’s anti-ghost and anti-afterlife frame of mind was written by the author of Ecclesiastes:
“But whoever is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. The living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no more reward, and even the memory of them is lost. Their love and their hate and their envy have already perished; never again will they have any share in all that happens under the sun. Go, eat your bread with enjoyment and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has long ago approved what you do. Let your garments always be white; do not let oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life that are given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do with your might, for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going” (Ecclesiastes 9.4-10, NRSVUE version).
Theologians and religious authorities at the beginning of the reactionary movement in the 8th century BCE were not as extreme as the author of Ecclesiastes had become by the postexilic period, but they nevertheless pushed back in varying degrees against beliefs of ghosts, spirits, mediums, necromancy, and other afterlife-adjacent topics. Leviticus, presumed to have been written around that period of reactionary backlash, contains several attacks on mediums and spiritualists, as well as those who sought their services. The text stated, “If any turn to mediums or spiritualists, prostituting themselves to them, I will set my face against them and will cut them off from the people” (Leviticus 20.6) and “A man or a woman who is a medium or a spiritualist shall be put to death; they shall be stoned to death; their bloodguilt is upon them” (Leviticus 20.27). Furthermore, Isaiah—another biblical text from that period—warned readers against people who made statements like: “’Consult the ghosts and the familiar spirits that chirp and mutter; should not a people consult their gods, the dead on behalf of the living, for teaching and for instruction?’ surely those who speak like this will have no dawn!” (Isaiah 8.19-22, NRSVUE version). These criticisms were ironic, for Hebrew kings like King Saul and King Solomon were associated with necromancy and sorcery. Solomon’s connection to sorcery comes largely from legend and folktales, but the Bible, itself, tells that King Saul (said to have ruled c. 1020-1000 BCE) had the Witch of Endor use necromancy to summon the ghost of the prophet, Samuel. The test described the scene:
“Saul swore to her by the Lord, ‘As the Lord lives, no punishment shall come upon you for this thing.’ Then the woman said, ‘Whom shall I bring up for you?’ He answered, ‘Bring up Samuel for me.’ When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice, and the woman said to Saul, ‘Why have you deceived me? You are Saul!’ The king said to her, ‘Have no fear; what do you see?’ The woman said to Saul, ‘I see a divine being coming up out of the ground.’ He said to her, ‘What is his appearance?’ She said, ‘An old man is coming up; he is wrapped in a robe.’ So Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the ground and did obeisance” (1 Samuel 28.10-14, NRSVUE version).
Unfortunately for the Hebrews who enjoyed participating in the fiery ceremonies at the Valley of Hinnom, their activities were too involved with ghosts and the afterlife to be seen with favor by the new theologians. Even worse, the ceremonies at Gehenna were eventually deemed to be ungodly and abominable by the new theological movement, especially due to the site’s ties to Canaanite deities, Baal and Molech/Moloch. This association was mentioned by the author of the Book of Jeremiah, who wrote, “They built the high places of Baal in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to offer up their sons and daughters to Molech, though I did not command them, nor did it enter my mind that they should do this abomination, causing Judah to sin” (Jeremiah 32.35, NRSVUE version). Nevertheless, to the disappointment of several biblical authors, a great many ancient Hebrews, including kings, continued to flock to the Valley of Hinnom, where the fire ceremonies continued. Reflecting this persistence, books of the Bible (including Kings, Chronicles and Jeremiah) contain frustrated denunciations against people who did not cease their activities at the Topheth (Burning Place) of Hinnom.
Speaking of the population in general, the author of the Book of Jeremiah contiued, “And they go on building the high place of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire—which I did not command, nor did it come into my mind” (Jeremiah 7.30-31). Similarly, several kings of Jerusalem were criticized and singled out by name. Of King Ahaz (c. 8th century BCE), it was said “he made offerings in the valley of the son of Hinnom and made his sons pass through fire, according to the abominable practices of the nations whom the Lord had driven out before the people of Israel” (2 Chronicles 28.3). Additionally, biblical authors had a list of complaints against King Manasseh (r. 697/697-642 BCE), such as “He made his son pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom, practiced soothsaying and augury and sorcery, and dealt with mediums and with wizards. He did much evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking him to anger” (2 Chronicles 33.6). On the opposite side, however, King Josiah (r. 640-609 BCE) whole-heartedly joined the new reactionary theological movement that focused solely on Yahweh (God) and his interaction with the living, deemphasizing all other aspects of spiritualism and the afterlife. Free of the Assyrian influence that had been present since the time of Ahaz, Josiah cracked down on religious practices that were not centered completely on Yahweh. This included the ceremonies at Hinnom. The Bible states, “He defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of Ben-hinnom, so that no one would make a son or a daughter pass through the fire as an offering to Molech” (2 Kings 23.10).
Such is the odd origin of the real Gehenna, which inspired the conceptualization of God’s fiery place of burning. The most apt hellish description of Gehenna from the Hebrew Bible that fits modern concepts of Hell was written by the author of the Book of Isaiah, who wrote, “For his burning place has long been prepared, also for the king; its pyre is made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the Lord, like a stream of sulfur” (Isaiah 30.33). Hellenized, Romanized, and Christianized Hebrews amplified the hellish fires and the punitive nature of Gehenna by making a connection to the underworld realm of Hades and the Greek mythological underworld prison of Tartarus. The new system of blissful heaven and torturous hell was illustrated in the Gospel of Luke’s tale of poor Lazarus and the rich man. It read, “There was a rich man…And at his gate lay a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who longed to satisfy his hunger with what fell from the rich man’s table; even the dogs would come and lick his sores. The poor man died and was carried away by the angels to be with Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was being tormented, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far away with Lazarus by his side” (Luke 16.19-23). As for Abaddon, the old designation that was synonymous with Sheol, it was brought back in Revelation as a personified angelic creature leading forces from the abyss. It was written, “They have as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit; his name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and in Greek he is called Apollyon” (Revelation 9.11). Hell certainly came a long way from the neutral realm of Sheol and the ceremonial fires in the Valley of Hinnom.
Written by C. Keith Hansley
Picture Attribution: (Cropped section from Christ in the Realm of the Dead, by Joakim Skovgaard (1856 – 1933), [Public Domain] via Creative Commons and the SMK.).
Sources:
- The New Oxford Annotated Bible: New Revised Standard Version With The Apocrypha (Fifth Edition, Fully Revised), edited by Michael D. Coogan and associates. Oxford University Press, 2018.
- The Oxford Companion to the Bible, edited by Bruce M. Metzger and Michael D. Coogan. Oxford University Press, 1993.
- The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson, translated by Jesse Byock. New York: Penguin Classics, 2005.
- https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095845912?d=%2F10.1093%2Foi%2Fauthority.20110803095845912&p=emailAWoU9sRmZUvMc
- https://www.etymonline.com/word/hell
- https://www.britannica.com/topic/Hel-Norse-deity
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ahaz
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Josiah
