This topic was begun in “Gehenna (1) – Valley of Unquenched Fire”. Part 2 here is the continuation and conclusion. Part 1 should be read first; most of the material in (1) won’t be repeated here in (2).
Gehenna was a location, a historical place. It’s a proper noun. As such, it is better left untranslated, rendered as “Géhenna” (transliterated from the Greek Gé-en-na). Gehenna isn’t a common noun.
Historians have located the steep Gehenna valley/ravine below the SW wall of ancient Jerusalem. It was in the territory allotted to the tribe of Judah (ref Jsh.15:8), and converges with the Kidrón valley.
The term Gehenna came from the Old Testament (OT) valley of the son of Hinnóm, which occurs 13 times in the OT. The 13 OT occurrences of Hinnom (Strongs h2011, Hebrew noun) are: Jsh.15:8 (2), 18:16 (2); 2Ki.23:10; 2Ch.28:3, 33:6; Ne.11:30; Je.7:31-32, 19:2, 6, 32:35 (39:35 Septúagint/LXX). Hinnom means lamentation. Hinnom is Ennom in the OT Greek LXX.
Cambridge Bible Lk.12:5 “The Valley of Hinnom…was a pleasant valley outside Jerusalem, which had first been rendered infamous by Molech worship, then defiled by Josiah with corpses; and lastly kept from putrefaction by large fires to consume the corpses and prevent pestilence.” This valley also became a prophesied place of slaughter, filled with human corpses. (see Part 1 for particulars.)
Traditionally, the ravine later became a place of refuse. Barnes Notes Mt.5:22 “It was necessary to keep fires continually burning there. The extreme loathsomeness of the place, the filth and putrefaction, and the lurid fires burning by day and night, made it one of the most appalling and terrific objects with which a Jew was acquainted.” Jews knew. Gehenna also became interpreted as imagery…for “hell”.
There are 12 New Testament (NT) occurrences of the term Gehenna (Strongs g1067, Greek): Mt.5:22, 29-30, 10:28, 18:9, 23:15, 33; Mk.9:43-47; Lk.12:5; Ja.3:6. Eleven occurrences are the words of Jesus found in the gospel accounts (mostly in Matthew). The sole exception is Ja.3:6 (figurative).
The term Gehenna doesn’t appear in the book of Acts, nor in any of Paul’s letters, nor in other epistles (only once in James)! That may seem like a strange omission?! But Gehenna was traditionally the Jerusalem dump. It wouldn’t have the same significance in the foreign cities of the NT epistles.
What about “hell”? In several of our Bible translations, there are four original language terms commonly rendered as “hell”…Sheol (h7585), Hádes (g86), Tartaróo (g5020), Gehenna (g1067). All four are places or realms. All four are proper nouns (according to Oxford Dictionary), not common nouns. Proper nouns are better left untranslated in English. e.g. in Young’s Literal Translation (YLT) they’re untranslated. “Hell” is too general a word to use for specific terms. The above four are specific terms. Steve Gregg All You Want To Know About Hell, p.86 “The English word ‘hell’ isn’t a translation, but an interpretation.”
Sheol is the Hebrew OT term for the place of the dead. The root meaning of sheol is ‘unseen’. Sheol corresponds to Hades in the Greek LXX and NT. YLT leaves the term Hades untranslated. YLT doesn’t use the word “hell”. Again, both Sheol and Hades are better left untranslated.
The KJV OT often rendered Sheol as “hell” when conveying the fate of those who were bad or wicked! ref KJV: Ps.9:17; Pr.5:5, 7:27, 9:18; Is.5:14, 14:9; Ezk.31:16-18, 32:27. (In the OT, death and the realm of Sheol may be the result of God’s judgment.) Yet the KJV often rendered Sheol as the “grave” when portraying the fate of those good or righteous! ref KJV: Ge.37:35 (Jacob); Jb.14:13 & 17:13 (Job); Ps.88:3; SS.8:6 (ironically); Is.38:10 (Hezekiah). Also cf. KJV Ho.13:14 with KJV 1Co.15:55.
In so doing, the KJV is biased. There is a Hebrew OT term which means grave, h6913 qéhber, noun. It occurs 67 times in the OT (also translated as sepulcher, burying-place.) e.g. Ex.14:11; 1Ch.34:28; Jb.5:26; Nah.1:14. It ties to bury h6912 qabár, verb. Also, a less used OT term for grave is h6900 qeburáh, noun, occurring 14 times (e.g. Ge.35:20; Ezk.32:23.) But Sheol/Hades was an unseen realm…not a grave.
Tartaroo was a holding place for angels who’d sinned. 2Pe.2:4 “God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into tartaroo [g5020] and committed them to pits of darkness [g2217] reserved for judgment.” also ref Jude 1:6; 1Enoch 20:2 with 1Enoch 21:9-10.
However, the concept of endless torment was unknown in the OT scriptures. (see Part 1 regarding mortal worms in Is.66:24.)
The 1995 Church of England Doctrine Commission said, “Hell is not eternal torment”. Bible scholar F.F. Bruce wrote, “Eternal conscious torment is incompatible with the revealed character of God”.
Torment forever in hell-fire doesn’t fit with Christ’s OT retributive justice or lex talionis principle. Rather, Christ’s capital punishment penalty was death. Ex.21:23-24 life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc. And Paul wrote in Ro.6:23, “The wages of sin is death”. Not eternal life in hell-fire!
Later it was the Roman Catholic theologian Augustine (354–430 AD) of Hippo, Algeria who promoted the idea of eternal torment in hell-fire.
Jesus’ NT warnings (regarding Gehenna) were tied to national judgment upon Jerusalem/Judea, with corpses strewn in the valleys. Even via “unquenched fire”. (see Part 1.)
God Himself is figuratively depicted as fire! Moses told ancient Israel in De.4:24, “The Lord your God is a consuming fire”.
A coal of fire purified the lips of the prophet Isaiah in vision, Is.6:6-7. Cambridge Bible Is.6:6 “Fire is both a symbol of holiness and an agent of purification.” Fire (and blood) purges and atones for sin & iniquity. Gill Exposition Is.6:7 “Thy [Isaiah’s] sin purged, or ‘atoned for’ or ‘covered.”
And there are verses in the OT which allude to a Sheol fire in the afterlife.
The Lord said in the song of Moses, De.32:22 “A fire is kindled in My anger, and it burns to the lowest part of Sheol [LXX Hades g86]; and consumes the earth with its produce and sets on fire the foundations of the mountains”. Perhaps this was the origin of volcanos? Fire was in the lowest part of Sheol/Hades. cf. Song Sol.8:6 “For love is as strong as death, jealousy is as unrelenting as Sheol [LXX Hades g86]. Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord.” Sheol/Hades was tied to fire.
In Lk.16:19-ff, Jesus told the parable of the rich man who’d failed to be a good steward of his wealth. Lk.16:23-24 “In Hades [g86]….he cried out and said…I am in agony in this flame.” There was a flame in that sector of Hades/Sheol; the realm of departed spirits beneath the earth’s surface.
Was the Gehenna valley also symbolic for the lowest part of Sheol/Hades? Over the centuries, Gehenna became the figurative place of spiritual purification for wicked Jews. The rabbis considered Gehenna a purgatory or a punishment where the wicked suffer until he’s atoned for his sins.
Jewish Encyclopedia: Gehenna “They are cast into Gehenna to a depth commensurate with their sinfulness.” Jesus’ words in Mt.13:42, 50 “Cast them into the furnace of fire; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth”. However, this happened to Jerusalem in 70 AD, prophesied in Ezk.22:17-22.
Jesus also spoke of those cast out into outer darkness in three NT verses, all in Matthew: 8:12 (cf. Mt.13:38 “sons of the kingdom”), 22:13, 25:30. Jude 1:13 refers to “blackest darkness”. It may be a location or a state of being/mind. It’s a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth”, of anguish and despair. 1Jn.1:6 wrote of those who “walk in darkness”. 2Pe.2:17 refers to a “mist of darkness”. To contrast, 1Pe.2:9 exhorts, “You should show forth the praises of Him [God] who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”
cf. Mt.13:42, 50 with Jesus’ words in Mk.9:49. “Everyone will be salted with fire.” Salt and fire both purify. Pulpit Commentary Mk.9:49 “There’s a fire which is penal, and a fire which purifies.” Mt.25:41-46 chastisement for not aiding the needy. (Eternal torment seems overly severe for failing to do this!) v.46 Dr. Spiros Zódiates “Kólasis conveys the notion of punishment for correction and betterment.”
Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 18:1:3 “Pharisees…believe souls have an immortal vigor, and under the earth there will be rewards or punishments…The vicious to be detained in that prison, virtuous souls to revive and live again.” The apostle Paul also referred to those “under the earth” (Php.2:10).
Traditionally, the aftermath of spiritual purification in lower Sheol was…the person ascends to the world to come (Ólam Hába/Gan Eden), or else undergoes destruction. Judaism 101: The Afterlife “The very righteous go directly to Gan Eden. The average person’s time in Gehinnom doesn’t exceed 12 months.”
Also, some have interpreted or compared Gehenna to/as the “lake of fire”! Jewish folklore indicates the accursed Gehenna valley had a gate which led to a lake of fire. (Views differ as to the gate’s location.)
Wikipedia: Lake of Fire “Such a lake also appears in Plato’s Phaedo, explicitly identified with Tartarus, where the souls of the wicked are tormented until it is time for them to be reborn, and where some souls are left forever.”
The book of Revelation is full of hyperbole & symbolism; and contains more variant readings from the Majority Text than do all the other NT books combined! If our translation of Revelation is accurate…its lake of fire (at the bottom of or beneath Gehenna?) is seemingly the hell-fire of the afterlife.
“Lake of fire” occurs only in Re.19:20, 20:10, 14-15, 21:8. The beast, the false prophet, the devil, death, Hades, and those not written in the book of life (ref the list in 21:8)…are cast into the lake of fire. Re.19:20 “The lake of fire which burns with brimstone [g2303].” Brimstone is sulfur. Sulfur can purify. Sciencing: Ancient Uses of Sulfur “Roman purifying rituals included fumigating a building or personal belongings with the smoke from burning sulfur.”
Does the lake of fire torment, consume, or purify?
Re.2:11, 20:6, 14, 21:8 speak of a “second death”. Re.20:13-15 “Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.” Ellicott Commentary Re.20:14 “It is clearly figurative language, implying that Death, the last enemy is destroyed, together with Hades, who was personified as Death’s escort (Re.6:8). The lake of fire into which Death is thrown is the second death!…Very awful is that spiritual death.”
Also Expositor’s Greek Testament “Hades…naturally ceases to have any function.”
John wrote in Re.21:4, “There will be no more death”. Death will die, in other words. Paul in 1Co.15:26, “The last enemy to be abolished is death”. He indicated in 1Co.15:55, there will be no more sting of death. 2Ti.1:10 “Our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death.” Christ rendered death inoperative.
Some think the “lake of fire” means the second death for the incorrigibly wicked. The concept of the “second death” also appears in the early AD Jewish Targums (Aramaic OT paraphrases).
Targum Is.65:6 “Their punishment shall be in Gehenna where the fire burns all day…deliver their bodies to the second death.”
Targum Is.22:14 “This sin will not be forgiven you, until you die the second death.” Targum Is.65:15 “The Lord God will slay you with the second death.”
Yet based upon God’s principle of justice seen in De.19:21, “life for life”…there wouldn’t be a second death without a second life preceding it!
The Targum Neofití and fragments indicate the second death is the death the wicked die. Targum Je.51:39 “They shall die the second death and not live in the world to come [in Olam Haba].”
These Targum paraphrases may relate to a final destruction of any remaining wicked. More like an annihilation, an extinction…not everlasting torment through eternal life in hell-fire.
But is the second death a final separation from God…or was a spiritual purification meant?
The visions and near death experiences (NDE) many people have had of “hell”…are they true and valid? Is what they claim to see everlasting or temporary?
It’s hard to imagine ruthless leaders such as Genghis Kahn, Bloody Mary, Idi Amin…and Adolph Hitler together with the numerous disbelieving Jews killed during WW2… all being tormented together (with those Jews) eternally in fire!
Also the untold millions of gentiles worldwide who lived prior to Jesus and didn’t know God or ancient Israel…are they doomed forever? Is this reflective of a God of love (1Jn.4:8)!? Or…why visit or help (unsaved) widows and orphans now, if God intends to annihilate most of them anyway?
Interestingly, the futuristic prophecy of Je.31:38-40 indicates that…Gehenna will be holy! Je.31:40 “The whole valley [Hinnom/Gehenna] of the dead bodies and of the ashes, and all the fields as far as the brook Kidron…shall be holy to the Lord; it shall not be plucked up or overthrown anymore forever.” Cambridge Bible Je.31:40 “The valley of Hinnom, into which carcasses of criminals and of animals were cast.”
Today, it is a Jerusalem suburb with concerts and even fireworks nearby! Israel’s Ministry of Tourism wants you to visit “hell” (Gehenna), so to speak!
The good news for Christians…we won’t be hurt by a second death! Re.2:11 “He who overcomes shall not be harmed by the second death.” The saved don’t have to undergo it.
The afterlife for saved Christians will be wonderful…Thanks be to God! In addition, see the topics “Life and Death – for Saints” and “Rebirth to Physical Life”.
Bible Topic Exposition 