"Hell" Etymology & Thoughts

[WilliamL]

43 minutes ago, Still Alive said:

I beg to differ regarding the immortality of the human soul as well as the meaning of the worm and fire. I highly recommend reading all of the site in my sig below or at least some of it to get a feel. 

Also, the group, "rethinking hell" in Facebook is an excellent source of info.

 

Sigs don't show on this tablet, and I have nothing to do with FB. Please reply with a post of the site and I'll try to get to it.

[Still Alive]

1 minute ago, WilliamL said:

Sigs don't show on this tablet, and I have nothing to do with FB. Please reply with a post of the site and I'll try to get to it.

Here you go. It's also in book form, btw.

https://www.jewishnotgreek.com/

[WilliamL]

16 minutes ago, Still Alive said:

Here you go. It's also in book form, btw.

https://www.jewishnotgreek.com/

Thanks. In the meantime, how do you explain the "dogs and sorcerers and murderers" outside the descended New Jerusalem in Rev. 22:15? Does not this indicate evil souls?

[Dennis1209]

7 hours ago, Still Alive said:

Yes. Just to clarify, I don't lump Tartarus together with the others, regardless of it's being translated to the same english word. I consider it a bad translation, or at least one I disagree with.

I agree with you, but as we know, there are compromises in translations of the Bible. These translations can be subdivided into categories: most accurate translations, ease of reading and understanding, modern vocabulary, English structure, etc.

Below is the Youngs Literal Translation (YLT), emphasizing literal. It is way too long to explain why the translators of the 1611 KJV used “hell” for the various abodes. But it concerned Greek, Roman, and Jewish mythology and thought. As a Bible student who does not know Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic, I need to dig deeper with some tools to see these things.

With few exceptions, it takes nothing away from the KJV, NASB95, ESV, etc., gospel message and word of God.

and in the hades having lifted up his eyes, being in torments, he doth see Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom^[1]

but I will show to you, whom ye may fear; Fear him who, after the killing, is having authority to cast to the gehenna; yes, I say to you, Fear ye Him.^[2]

For if God messengers who sinned did not spare, but with chains of thick gloom, having cast them down to Tartarus, did deliver them to judgment, having been reserved^[3]

 

---

^[1] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (Lk 16:23). Logos Bible Software.

^[2] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (Lk 12:5). Logos Bible Software.

^[3] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (2 Pe 2:4). Logos Bible Software.

[Your closest friendnt]

1 hour ago, Marathoner said:

Right. 

We're discussing concepts of hell and torment. As for myself, I believe that the grave, called Sheol in Hebrew and referred to as Hades in NT Greek, refers to the disposition of the dead when this body of flesh perishes. That's before the end of things when the Lord resurrects the dead to be judged by Him.

I think that hell is synonymous with Gehenna, which refers to a place on this earth where refuse was burned outside of the city. The refuse itself doesn't constantly burn because it's reduced to ashes. The fire, however, is kept burning at all times. 

So, I do not think that hell/Gehenna is a place of perpetual torment for man. Both symbolize the lake of fire, that place where wicked men, Satan, and his angels (to include the false prophet and the beast) are cast when the judgment of the Lord is rendered. Men are destroyed --- it's the second death --- but it seems to me that Satan and his angels are not. They are not man nor like us so they burn perpetually. 

Note also that Hades was emptied of the dead when the Lord resurrected the dead to be judged. Hades will be cast into the lake of fire, so they are clearly not one and the same.

As for Hades? Torment might indeed happen there. That seems to be the case in my estimation. 

Jesus did not raised from Hell. He raised from the place of the dead from the default Inheritance for Mankind. The people were not given the choice as to choose their destination place after their death like to day where there two Inheritances for people after their death the Heavenly in Jesus Christ and the non Heavenly one which we call Hell which is synonymous to the place those who have refused to have their sins forgiven in Jesus Christ and died this way and Jesus has made the decision about them after their death that this is the place to spend their eternity.  There is not a chance to change their sircumstances as it was for those who died before the Cross and their sircumstances change upon hearing the good news and believe and they received the eternal life of Jesus Christ. We are after the Cross and the only chance for someone who has denied Jesus is while he yet lives.  

For someone to be in Hell indicates that he has died in his sins that he had denied faith in Jesus Christ and he refused to believe till he died. It is appointed to man to die and after that the Judgement of Jesus Christ.  Anyone who is in Hell has passed through the Judgement of Jesus Christ the Judgement of faith in him or his refused of him. So there was not a place before Jesus Christ Judgement as there was not Heaven for man before Jesus triumph over Death and Hades. The time Jesus Christ put an end to the authority to take the people by default upon their death. Jesus said all authority has-been given to me in Heaven on earth and in all things under the earth and that's where those who have refused to believe in Jesus Christ till the last breath will be found. In Hell because they were Judge by Jesus Christ because they had refused to believe in him. 

( there was a change in the default Inheritance of the world before Jesus Christ that was the Inheritance of Abraham and the people of God the Israelites who even though they were under the earth the God of the dead had no authority over them their God continued to be their God after their death and they were there waiting for the way to open for the Heavenly Inheritance in Jesus Christ after the Cross. Jesus said that Abraham knows of that day or my day and he rejoice the day when Jesus will descend to them after his death.  Abraham and David and John the Baptist they understood that the Messiah the Christ of God had to died first to descend to them there was not anyother way. And they understood that he will raised from that place to be sited on the right with God on his Throne. And that they will also inherit Heaven with him. As the Israelites inherit the Bosom of Abraham together with Abraham they understood that in Jesus Christ they will also inherit Heaven together with him. 

[Dennis1209]

6 hours ago, Vine Abider said:

Good question.  Maybe someone has a better response . . .

The writer (Steve Gregg) of that in-depth book I mentioned on the 3 views of hell, said he had no 100% solid conclusion.  He did say he was leaning a certain way, but did not give his opinion away, as he said that he couldn't be completely sure from scripture.  In discussions with other's who have read the book, the consensus is kind of the same - hard to nail down exactly, but one thing is for sure, no one should desire that fate apart from God!

My overall take away is that I basically dismiss the two extremes - eternal conscious torment and universal salvation - and have come up with something of a hybrid idea of proportional punishment and eventual annihilation.  And while I might give supporting verses to support that notion, I freely admit there may be other interpretations of relevant phrases and words in scripture. 

Good evening Vine,

My view is probably flawed, but the following is how I imagine it. Regardless of whether there are different levels or not, it is unimaginable to be eternally separated from God, with zero blessings, and no chances of repentance or forgiveness.

I could list a half dozen Bible verses that indicate different degrees of judgment, pain, and torment for those who rejected God, and I’ll use but two.  The Lord will eternally compensate righteously and fairly.  

Matthew 23:14 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses, and for a pretense make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation.

Luke 10:14 But it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment, than for you.

As far as the depths of Hell, it seems anyone below has no down, only up in every direction.

Revelation 9:11 And they had a king over them, which is the angel of the bottomless pit (ábyssos), whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon.

The only way I can rationalize it is by comparing the global prisons of today. Minimum, medium, and maximum-security jails and prisons. Levels of isolation, confinement, and punishment to fit the crime(s).

[WilliamL]

1 hour ago, Still Alive said:

Here you go. It's also in book form, btw.

https://www.jewishnotgreek.com/

Ok, so I read through it, and found it way wordy, and not proving it's case. Here's why:

First, I don't give a hoot what the Greeks taught, or really, what all the many quoted Christian commentators believe. All I care about is what the scriptures say.

The whole issue boils down to the meaning of G622: apollumi. Often, but by no means always, translated as the verb "to destroy." That is the meaning that this site clings to to make it's case. But that is not the only way it is used in the scriptures; it is often used to mean "to ruin, to mar, to perish." As used by Jesus in the case of the wineskins that were "G622/ruined" by new wine: not destroyed, still existing, but ruined: having become useless.

The same is true for souls: they can be ruined when they rebel against or fall away from the Truth of God, and therefore be lost/ruined/perish, but that doesn't intrinsically mean that they are annihilated. The fact that there will still be those murderers and sorcerers outside of the descended New Jerusalem is a clear witness of this. According to the reasoning of the site you posted, these should have long since become non-existent.

Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament

1 Verb Strong's Number: g622 Greek: apollumi

Destroy, Destroyer, Destruction, Destructive: strengthened form of ollumi, signifies "to destroy utterly;" in Middle Voice, "to perish." The idea is not extinction but ruin, loss, not of being, but of well-being. This is clear from its use, as, e.g., of the marring of wine skins, Luk 5:37; of lost sheep, i.e., lost to the shepherd, metaphorical of spiritual destitution, Luk 15:4, 6, etc.; the lost son, Luk 15:24; of the perishing of food, Jhn 6:27; of gold, 1Pe 1:7. So of persons, Mat 2:13, "destroy;" Mat 8:25, "perish;" Mat 22:7; 27:20; of the loss of well-being in the case of the unsaved hereafter, Mat 10:28; Luk 13:3, 5; Jhn 3:16 (ver. 15 in some mss.); 10:28; 17:12; Rom 2:12; 1Cr 15:18; 2Cr 2:15, "are perishing;" 2Cr 4:3; 2Th 2:10; Jam 4:12; 2Pe 3:9. Cp. B, II, No. 1.

See DIE, LOSE, MARRED, PERISH.

[Your closest friendnt]

Gehenna was the garbage dump outside Jerusalem. As with all garbage dumps there was a smoothering fire and smoke.

This place before being used as a garbage dump it was the Temple of the God Mollox one of the Gods of the Canaanites. 

When the Israelites repented for worshiping Mollox, the place where they worship Mollox and offered their children by fire to him for obvious reasons they began to use that place as a garbage dump because no one wanted to have anything with that place.

That time in Jerusalem they punished the disobedient by death like by stoning and the worse punishment was after killing the sinner to throw his body in the garbage dump to be destroyed by fire. It was  understood that the Judge who order the death of that person had to also decide on whether that person deserved the extreme punishment to burn his body by throwing his body in the  Gehenna dump to be burned. 

The Jews and the Israelites did not burned their dead because they believed that those whose bodies are destroyed by fire they will not or they cannot be raised up from the dead on the resurrection day. 

They did not let the adulterous and other sinners to continue living among themselves and they killed them. But the one whom they killed and threw his body in the fire to be burned in the Valley of Gehenna they did not only got rid of him from amongs themselves by killing him  but also by burning him they got rid of him for evermore because they believed that those whom bodies are destroyed by fire they cannot come back or raised up on the day of resurrection. So this punishment to burned their dead bodies was very severe, and that's what they believed.  

The one who order their killing he also had the power to order their body to be burned in Gehenna (they did not build a fire for that, they used the fire going in the dump for the reason to get rid of him from their society forever. 

Jesus said that because he knew how much some of the religious people hated him and were thinking that when they kill him they planned to throw his body to be burned in the Gehenna dump so he cannot come back. Or he cannot be raised from the dead.  In other words Jesus was telling them that he knows what they are thinking and what they plan  for him. 

Edited November 16, 2023 by Your closest friendnt

[Still Alive]

15 hours ago, WilliamL said:

Thanks. In the meantime, how do you explain the "dogs and sorcerers and murderers" outside the descended New Jerusalem in Rev. 22:15? Does not this indicate evil souls?

Don't quote me on this, but I have a "theory" about that. To preface, I believe that nothing is going to happen the way we all have theories about it. Not the rapture or anything else. It's going to surprise us all, in the same way that Jesus surprised the Jews who expected him to come as a conquering king in the fashion of David. 

My theory is based on the "possibility of universalism": it is possible that those that accept Jesus will be the "government' in the next age, and only they will be able to enter into the new Jerusalem. The rest of mankind will live on the new earth (basically the same planet but with a wiped clean and rebuilt surface).

Or something like that.

That makes room for the concept of everyone being forgiven and saved, yet there are different levels of punishment an reward. 

To be clear, this is not my "belief", but It would also not surprise me if something like that is what actually happens. I used to really get into the  end times and "what is heaven like" arguments back in the 80's and 90's. I'm way over that now. I just work to make sure my lamp is full of oil and hope the bridegroom scoops me up to the wedding when he arrives. I'll let Him worry about the venue and what band is playing at the reception. 

[Still Alive]

15 hours ago, Dennis1209 said:

I agree with you, but as we know, there are compromises in translations of the Bible. These translations can be subdivided into categories: most accurate translations, ease of reading and understanding, modern vocabulary, English structure, etc.

Below is the Youngs Literal Translation (YLT), emphasizing literal. It is way too long to explain why the translators of the 1611 KJV used “hell” for the various abodes. But it concerned Greek, Roman, and Jewish mythology and thought. As a Bible student who does not know Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic, I need to dig deeper with some tools to see these things.

With few exceptions, it takes nothing away from the KJV, NASB95, ESV, etc., gospel message and word of God.

and in the hades having lifted up his eyes, being in torments, he doth see Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom^[1]

but I will show to you, whom ye may fear; Fear him who, after the killing, is having authority to cast to the gehenna; yes, I say to you, Fear ye Him.^[2]

For if God messengers who sinned did not spare, but with chains of thick gloom, having cast them down to Tartarus, did deliver them to judgment, having been reserved^[3]

 

---

^[1] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (Lk 16:23). Logos Bible Software.

^[2] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (Lk 12:5). Logos Bible Software.

^[3] Young, R. (1997). Young’s Literal Translation (2 Pe 2:4). Logos Bible Software.

Agree. I will throw out, though, that I think Jesus was using their own mythology to make his point in the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. I don't think it has anything to do with what the fate of the lost is like and probably has more to do with the five brothers, who they are, and what their inclusion in it means.