Reading: Hades, Sheol and Gehenna (ISBE Article)

Hades and Sheol

hā´dēz ( Αἵδης , Haı́dēs , ᾅδης , haı́dēs , "not to be seen"): Hades, Greek originally Haidou , in
genitive, "the house of Hades," then, as nominative, designation of the abode of the dead itself. The
word occurs in the New Testament in around five to ten verses depending on the version.

1. In Old Testament: Sheol

In the Septuagint Hades is the standing equivalent for Sheol, but also translates into other terms
associated with death and the state after it. The Greek conception of Hades was that of a locality
receiving into itself all the dead but divided into two regions, one a place of torment, the other of
blessedness. This conception should not be rashly transferred to the New Testament. For the latter
stands not under the influence of Greek pagan belief, but gives a teaching and reflects a belief
which models the idea of Hades upon the Old Testament through the Septuagint. The Old
Testament Sheol, while formally resembling the Greek Hades in that it is the common receptacle of
all the dead, differs from it. On the one hand, it differs by the absence of a clearly defined division
into two parts. On the other hand, it differs from the emphasis placed on its association with death
and the grave as abnormal facts following in the wake of sin. The Old Testament thus concentrates
the partial light it throws on the state after death on the negative, undesirable side of the prospect
apart from redemption. When in the progress of Old Testament revelation the state after death
begins to assume more definite features and becomes more sharply differentiated through
dependence on the religious and moral issue of the present life. This is not accomplished in the
canonical writings by dividing Sheol into two compartments, but by holding forth to the righteous the
promise of deliverance from Sheol, so that the latter becomes more definitely outlined as a place of
evil and punishment.
2. In the New Testament: Hades
The New Testament passages mark a distinct stage in this process, and there is, accordingly, a true
basis in Scripture for the identification in a certain aspect of Sheol - Hades - with hell as reflected in
the King James Version. The theory according to which Hades is still in the New Testament the
undifferentiated provisional abode of all the dead until the day of judgment, with the possibility of
ultimate salvation even for those of its inmates who have not been saved in this life, is neither in
harmony with the above development nor borne out by the facts of New Testament usage. That
dead believers abide in a local Hades cannot be proven from 1 Thessalonians 4:16; 1 Corinthians
15:23, for these passages refer to the grave and the body, not to a gathering-place of the dead. On
the other hand, Luke 23:43; 2 Corinthians 5:6-8; Philippians 1:23; Revelation 6:9; Revelation
7:9; Revelation 15:2 teach that the abode of believers immediately after death is with Christ and
God.
3. Acts 2:27 and Acts 2:31
It is, of course, a different matter, when Hades, as already in the Old Testament Sheol, designates
not the place of the dead but the state of death or disembodied existence. In this sense even Jesus
was in Hades according' to Peter's statement (Acts 2:27, Acts 2:31 - on the basis of Psalm 16:10).
Here the abstract sense is determined by the parallel expression, "to see corruption". None the less
from a comparatively early date this passage has been quoted in support of the doctrine of a local
descent of Christ into Hades.
4. Revelation 20:13,14; Revelation 6:8; Revelation 1:18
The same abstract meaning is indicated for Revelation 20:13. Death and Hades are here
represented as delivering up the dead on the eve of the final judgment. If this is more than a poetic
duplication of terms, Hades will stand for the personified state of death, death for the personified
cause of this state. The personification appears plainly from Revelation 20:14: "Death
and Hades were cast into the lake of fire." In the number of these "dead" delivered up by Hades,
believers are included, because not all the saints share in the first resurrection, but only those
"beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God," i.e. the martyrs. A similar
personifying combination of Death and Hades occurs in Revelation 6:8 ("a pale horse: and he that
sat upon him his name was Death; and Hades followed with him"). In Revelation 1:18, on the other
hand, death and Hades are represented as prisons from which Christ, in virtue of His own
resurrection, has the power to deliver, a representation which again implies that in some, not
necessarily local, sense believers also are kept in Hades.
5. Luke 16:23
In distinction from these passages when the abstract meaning prevails and the local conception is
inactive, the remaining references are more or less locally conceived. Of these Luke 16:23 is the
only passage which might seem to teach that recipients of salvation enter after death into Hades as
a place of abode. It has been held that Hades is here the comprehensive designation of the locality
where the dead reside. Here it is divided into two regions, "the bosom of Abraham" and the place of
torment, a representation for which Jewish parallels can be quoted, aside from its resemblance to
the Greek bisection of Hades. Against this view, however, it may be urged, that if "the bosom of
Abraham" were conceived as one of the two divisions of Hades, the other division would have been
named with equal concreteness in connection with the rich man. In point of fact, the distinction is
not between "the bosom of Abraham" and another place, as both are included in Hades, but
between "the bosom of Abraham" and Hades as antithetical and exclusive shown by the "great
chasm" between them. The very form of the description of the experience of the rich man:
"In Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torment," leads us to associate Hades with pain and
punishment. The passage, therefore, does not prove that the saved are after death in Hades. In
further estimating its bearing upon the problem of the local conditions of the disembodied life after
death, the parabolic character of the representation must be taken into account. The parable is
certainly not intended to give us topographical information about the realm of the dead, although it
presupposes that there is a distinct place of abode for the righteous and wicked respectively.
6. Matthew 11:23
The two other passages where Hades occurs in the teaching of our Lord (Matthew
11:23 parallel Luke 10:15; and Matthew 16:18 ) make a metaphorical use of the conception, which,
however, is based on the local sense. In the former utterance it is predicted of Capernaum that it
shall in punishment for its unbelief "go down unto Hades." As in the Old Testament Sheol is
a figure for the greatest depths known (Deuteronomy 32:22; Isaiah 7:11; Isaiah 57:9; Job 11:8; Job
26:6 ), this seems to be a figure for the extreme of humiliation to which that city was to be reduced
in the course of history. It is true, Matthew 11:24, with its mention of the day of judgment, might
seem to favor an eschatological reference to the ultimate doom of the unbelieving inhabitants, but
the usual restriction of Hades to the punishment of the intermediate state (see below) is against
this.
7. Matthew 16:18
In the other passage, Matthew 16:18, Jesus declares that the gates of Hades shall
not katischúein the church He intends to build. The verb katischuein may be rendered, "to
overpower" or "to surpass." If the former be adopted, the figure implied is that of Hades as a
stronghold of the power of evil or death from which warriors stream forth to assail the church as the
realm of life. On the other rendering there is no reference to any conflict between Hades and the
church, the point of comparison being merely the strength of the church, the gates of Hades, i.e. the
realm of death, serving in common parlance as a figure of the greatest conceivable strength,
because they never allow to escape what has once entered through them.
The above survey of the passages tends to show that Hades, where it is locally conceived, is not a
provisional receptacle for all the dead, but plainly associated with the punishment of the wicked.
Where it comes under consideration for the righteous there is nothing to indicate a local sense.
8. Not a Final State
The element of truth in the theory of the provisional character of Hades lies in this, that the New
Testament never employs it in connection with the final state of punishment, as subsequent to the
last judgment. This is also shown in 1 Peter 3:19 and 1 Peter 4:6 when Jesus "preached to the
spirits in prison". For the final place of punishment after the last judgment GEHENNA (see below)
and other terms are used. The rich man is represented as being in Hades immediately after his
death while his brethren are still in this present life. Whether the implied differentiation between
stages of punishment, depending obviously on the difference between the disembodied and
reëmbodied state of the lost, also carries with itself a distinction between two places of punishment,
in other words whether Hades and Gehenna are locally distinct, the evidence is scarcely sufficient
to determine. The New Testament places the emphasis on the eschatological developments at the
end, and leaves many things connected with the intermediate state in darkness.
Gehenna

gē̇ - hen´a ( γεέννα, geénna (see Grimm-Thayer, under the word)): Gehenna is a transliteration
from the Aramaic form of the Hebrew gē -hinnōm, "valley of Hinnom." This latter form, however, is
rare in the Old Testament, the prevailing name being "the valley of the son of Hinnom." Septuagint
usually translates; where it transliterates the form is different from Gehenna and varies. In the New
Testament, the correct form is Geénna with the accent on the penult, not Géenna'. There is no
reason to assume that Hinnom is other than a plain patronymic, although it has been proposed to
find in it the corruption of the name of an idol (EB, II, 2071). In the New Testament (King James
Version margin) Gehenna occurs in Matthew 5:22, Matthew 5:29, Matthew 5:30; Matthew
10:28; Matthew 18:9; Matthew 23:15; Matthew 23:33; Mark 9:43; Mark 9:15; Mark 9:47; Luke
12:5; James 3:6. In all of these it designates the place of eternal punishment of the wicked,
generally in connection with the final judgment. It is associated with fire as the source of torment.
Both body and soul are cast into it. This is not to be explained on the principle that the New
Testament speaks metaphorically of the state after death in terms of the body; it presupposes the
resurrection. In the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and
American), Gehenna is rendered by "hell". That "the valley of Hinnom" became the technical
designation for the place of final punishment was due to two causes. In the first place, the valley
had been the seat of the idolatrous worship of Molech, to whom children were sacrificed by fire (2
Chronicles 28:3; 2 Chronicles 33:6 ). Secondly, on account of these practices the place was defiled
by King Josiah (2 Kings 23:10 ), and became in consequence associated in prophecy with the
judgment to be visited upon the people (Jeremiah 7:32). The fact, also, that the city's offal was
collected there may have helped to render the name synonymous with extreme defilement.
Topographically the identification of the valley of Hinnom is still uncertain. It has been in turn
identified with the depression on the western and southern side of Jerusalem, with the middle
valley, and with the valley to the east.

Reading: Kingdom of God (ISBE Article)

The "kingdom of God" is one of the most remarkable ideas and phrases of all time, having begun to
be used very near the beginnings of history and continuing in force down to the present day.
I. Meaning and Origin of the Term
1. Place in the Gospels:
Its use by Jesus is by far its most interesting aspect; for, in the Synoptists, at least, it is His
watchword or a comprehensive term for the whole of His teaching. Of this, the ordinary reader of
Scripture may hardly be aware, but it becomes evident and significant to the student. Thus,
in Matthew 4:23, the commencement of the ministry is described in these words, "And Jesus went
about in all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and
healing all manner of disease and all manner of sickness among the people." And, somewhat later,
in Luke 8:1, the expansion of His activity is described in the following terms, "And it came to pass
soon afterwards, that he went about through cities and villages, preaching and bringing the good
tidings of the kingdom of God, and with him the twelve." When the Twelve are sent forth by
themselves, the purpose of their mission is, in Luke 9:2, given in these words, "And he sent them
forth to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick." In Matthew 13:11, the parables, which
formed so large and prominent a portion of His teaching, are denominated collectively "the
mysteries of the kingdom of heaven". And we must remember how many of these commence with
the phrase, "The kingdom of heaven is like."
2. "Kingdom of Heaven" and "Kingdom of God":
In these quotations, it will be observed that the phrases "the kingdom," "the kingdom of God," and
"the kingdom of heaven" are used interchangeably. The last of the three, "the kingdom of heaven,"
is confined to the First Gospel, which does not, however, always make use of it. It is not certain
what may have been the reason for the substitution. The simplest explanation would be that
Heaven is a name for God, as, in the parable of the Prodigal Son. In that parable, the penitent says,
"I have sinned against heaven," and we might say, "Heaven forbid!" It is not, however, improbable
that we learn the true meaning from two petitions of the Lord's Prayer, the one of which is
explanatory of the other, "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." Here
the disciples are instructed to pray that the kingdom of God may come, but this is equivalent to the
petition that the will of God be done on earth. Jesus is, however, aware of a region in the universe
where the will of God is at present being perfectly and universally done, and He elevates thither the
minds and hearts of those who pray. The kingdom of heaven would thus be so entitled because it is
already realized there and is, through prayer and effort, to be transferred to this earth.
3. Relation to the Old Testament (Daniel, Etc.):
Although, however, the phrase held this master position in the teaching of Jesus, it was not of His
invention. John the Baptist used the phrase before Jesus. We read, in Matthew 3:1-2, "In those
days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, 'Repent, for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand.'" Indeed, the phrase is far older.
On glancing toward the Old Testament, we come at once, to Daniel 2:44. A passage where the
young prophet explains to the monarch the image of gold, silver, iron and clay. In the king's
dream, he had seen the image shattered by "a stone cut out without hands". Daniel interprets it
as a succession of world kingdoms, destined to be destroyed by "a kingdom of God," which
shall last forever. Then in his famous vision of the "son of man" in Daniel 7:14, it is said, "There
was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and
languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass
away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed."
These passages in Daniel form the proximate source of the phrase, yet the idea that it represents
reaches far higher. From the first, the Jewish state was governed by laws believed to be derived
directly from heaven. Then the people demanded a king that they might be like other nations; they
were reproached for desiring any king but God Himself. With this sublime conception, the actual
monarchy was only a compromise, the reigning monarch passing for Yahweh's representative on
earth. In David, the man after God's own heart, the compromise was not unsatisfactory. In
Solomon, it was still tolerable, but in the majority of the kings of both Judah and Israel it was a
dismal and disastrous failure. The pious sighed and prayed that Yahweh might take to Himself His
great power and reign. The prophets predicted the coming of a ruler who would be far nearer to
God than the actual kings and of whose reign there would be no end. Even when the political
kingdom perished and the people were carried away into Babylon, the intelligent and truly religious
among them did not cease to cherish the old hope. The very aspect of the world powers then and
subsequently menacing them only widened their conceptions of what that kingdom must be which
could overcome them all. The return from Babylon seemed a miraculous confirmation of their faith,
and it looked as if the day long prayed for was about to dawn. Alas, it proved a day of small things.
The era of the Maccabees was only a transitory gleam; in the person of Herod the Great a usurper
occupied the throne, and the Romans were hovering on the horizon. Still Messianic hopes
flourished, and Messianic language filled the mouths of the people.
II. Use by Jesus - Contrast with Jewish Conceptions.
1. Current Jewish Opinions:
Schurer, in his History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ (II, 11,126 ff), has drawn up
a kind of Messianic creed, in no fewer than eleven articles, which he believes was extensively
diffused at this period. The Sadducees, indeed, had no participation in these dreams, as they would
have called them, being absorbed in money-making and courtiers. But the Pharisees cherished
them, and the Zealots received their name from the ardor with which they embraced them. The true
custodians, however, of these conceptions were the Prosdechomenoi, as they have been called.
From what is said of them in the New Testament, they "waited for the kingdom of God." To this
class belonged such men as Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea (Luke 23:51). It is at the
beginning of the Gospel of Luke that we are introduced to its most numerous representatives, in the
groups surrounding the infant John the Baptist and the infant Saviour (Luke 2:25, Luke 2:38). The
expression of their sentiments must be sought in the inspired hymns which rose from them on this
occasion. The center of their aspirations, as there depicted, is a kingdom of God - not, however, of
worldly splendor and force, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit; beginning in
humility, and passing to exaltation only through the dark valley of contrition.
2. Relation of Jesus to Same:
Such was the circle in which both John the Baptist and Jesus were reared. It has frequently been
said that, in making use of this term, Jesus accommodated Himself to the opinions and language of
His fellow-countrymen. There is truth in this, because, in order to secure a footing on the solid earth
of history, He had to connect His own activity with the world in which He found Himself. Yet the idea
was native to His home and His people, and therefore to Himself; and it is not improbable that He
may at first have been unaware of the wide difference between His own thoughts on the subject and
those of His contemporaries.
3. Growing Divergence and Contrast:
When, however, He began, in the course of His ministry, to speak of the kingdom of God, it soon
became clear that by Him and by His contemporaries it was used in different senses. This contrast
went on increasing until there was a great gulf fixed between Him and them. The difference cannot
better be expressed than by saying that He and they laid the accent on different halves of the
phrase. They emphasized "the kingdom" and He emphasized "of God." They were thinking of the
expulsion of the Romans, of a Jewish king and his court, and of a world-wide dominion going forth
from Mt. Zion. He was thinking of righteousness, holiness, and peace, of the doing of the will of God
on earth as it is done in heaven. So earthly and fantastic were the expectations of the Jewish
multitude that He had to escape from their hands when they tried to take Him by force and make
Him a king. The authorities never acknowledged the pretensions of One who seemed to them a
religious dreamer, and, as they clung to their own conceptions, they grew more and more bitter
against One who was turning the most cherished hopes of a nation into ridicule, besides threatening
to bring down on them the heavy hand of the Romans. And at last they settled the controversy
between Him and them by nailing Him to a tree.
4. Prophetic Character of the "Temptation":
At one time Jesus had felt the glamor of the popular Messianic ideas, and at all times He must have
been under temptation to accommodate His own ideas to the prejudices of those on whose favor
His success seemed to be dependent. The struggle of His mind and will with such solicitations is
embodied in what is called the Temptation in the Wilderness (Matthew 4:1-11). There He was
tempted to accept the dominion of the world at the price of compromise with evil; to be a bread-king,
giving panem et circenes; and to curry favor with the multitude by some display, like springing from
the pinnacle of the temple. The incidents of this scene look like representative samples of a long
experience; but they are placed before the commencement of His public activity in order to show
that He had already overcome them; and throughout His ministry He may be said to have been
continually declaring, as He did in so many words at its close, that His kingdom was not of this
world.
5. Positive Conceptions of Jesus:
In the nature of the case, the kingdom grew from stage to stage during His earthly ministry. He
Himself was there, embodying the kingdom in His person. The circle gathered around Him partook
of the blessings of the kingdom. This circle might have grown large enough to be coextensive with
the country; and, therefore, Jesus retained the consciousness of being the Messiah and offered
Himself in this character to His fellow-countrymen by the triumphal entry into Jerusalem. But the
citizens of the kingdom had to enter it one by one, not in a body, as the Jews were expecting. Strait
was the gate; it was the narrow gate of repentance. Jesus began by repeating the initial word of the
teaching of His forerunner; and He had too much reason to continue repeating it, as the hypocrisy
and worldliness of Pharisees and Sadducees called for denunciation from His lips. To the frailties of
the publicans and sinners, on the contrary, He showed a strange mildness, but this was because
He knew the way of bringing such sinners to His feet to confess their sins themselves. To the
penitent, He granted His pardon, claiming that the Son of Man had power on earth to forgive sins.
Then followed the exposition of righteousness, of which the Sermon on the Mount is a perfect
specimen. Yet it commences with another watchword - that of blessedness, the ingredients of which
are set forth in all their comprehensiveness. In the same way, in other passages, He promises
"rest", "peace" and the like; and again and again, where He might be expected to employ the term
"kingdom of God," He substitutes "life" or "eternal life." Such were the blessings He had come into
the world to bestow, and the most comprehensive designation for them all was "the kingdom of
God."
Steadily, from the commencement of the last stage of His career, He began to speak of His own
dying and rising again. To those nearest Him, such language was at the time a total mystery; but
the day came when His apostles were able to speak of His death and ascension as the crown and
glory of His whole career. When His life seemed to be plunging over the precipice, its course was
so diverted by the providence of God that, by dying, He became the Redeemer of mankind and, by
missing the throne of the Jews, attained to that of the universe, becoming King of kings and Lord of
lords.
III. The Idea in History.
1. Apostolic and Post-Apostolic Age:
After the death of Jesus, there soon followed the destruction of the Jewish state. Christianity went
forth among the nations, where to have spoken of it as a kingdom of God would have unnecessarily
provoked hostility and called forth the accusation of treason against the powers that be. Hence, it
made use of other names and let "the kingdom of God" drop. This had commenced even in Holy
Scripture, where, in the later books, there is a growing infrequency in the use of the term. This may
be alleged as proof that Jesus was being forgotten; but it may only prove that Christianity was then
too much alive to be trammeled with words and phrases, even those of the Master, being able at
every stage to find new language to express its new experience.
2. Early Christian Centuries:
In the early Christian centuries, "the kingdom of God" was used to designate heaven itself. In which,
from the first, the development of the kingdom was to issue. This, in fact, was not infrequently the
meaning of the phrase even in the mouth of Jesus. The Alexandrian thinkers brought back the
phrase to designate the rule of God in the conscience of men. Augustine's great work bears a
title, De Civitate Dei, which is a translation of our phrase; and to him the kingdom of God was the
church, while the world outside of the church was the kingdom of Satan. From the time of
Charlemagne there were in the world, side by side, two powers, that of the emperor and that of the
pope; and the history of the Middle Ages is the account of the conflict of these two for
predominance, each pretending to struggle in the name of God. The approaching termination of this
conflict may be seen in Wycliffe's great work De Dominio Divino, this title also being a translation of
our phrase.
3. Reformation Period:
During the struggles of the Reformation the battles of the faith were fought out under other
watchwords; and it was rather among such sectaries as the Baptists, that names like Fifth
Monarchy and Rule of the Saints betrayed recollection of the evangelic phraseology. How near,
then and subsequently, the expression of men's thoughts about authority in church and state came
to the language of the Gospels could easily be demonstrated, for example, from the Confessions
and Books of Discipline of the Scottish church.
4. Later Ideas:
The very phrase, "the kingdom of God," reappeared at the close of the Reformation period among
the Pietists of Germany. Their multiplying benevolent and missionary activities overflowed the
narrow boundaries of the church, as it was then understood. They spoke of themselves as working
for the kingdom of God, and found this more to their taste than working for the church. The vague
and humanitarian aspirations of Rationalism sometimes assumed to themselves the same title, but
it was by Ritschl and his followers that the phrase was brought back into the very heart of theology.
In the system of Ritschl, there are two poles - the love of God and the kingdom of God. The love of
God enfolds within itself God's purpose for the world, to be realized in time, and this progressive
realization is the kingdom of God. It fulfills itself especially in the faithful discharge of the duties of
everyone's daily vocation and in the recognition that in the course of Providence all things are
working together for good to them that love God.
IV. Place in Theology.
1. Elements of Living Power in Idea:
In the phrase "the kingdom of God" there are elements of living power which can never pass away.
(1) It expresses the Power inside of Christianity. A kingdom implies multitude and variety, and,
though religion begins with the individual, it must aim at brotherhood, organization and expansion.
(2) It expresses loyalty. The strength to conquer and to endure will always have to be derived from
contact with personalities. God is the king of the kingdom of God, and without the love of God the
Father, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit no progress can be
made with the Christianization of the world. (3) It keeps alive the truth, suggested by Jesus in the
Lord's Prayer, that the doing of the will of God on earth is the one thing needful. This is the true end
of all authority in both church and state, and behind all efforts thus directed there is at work the
potency of heaven. (4) It reminds all generations of men that their true home and destiny is heaven.
In not a few of our Lord's own sayings, as has been remarked, our phrase is obviously only a name
for heaven; and, while His aim was that the kingdom should be established on earth, He always
promised to those aiding in its establishment in this world that their efforts would be rewarded in the
world to come. The constant recognition of a spiritual and eternal world is one of the unfailing marks
of genuine Christianity.
Literature.
See the works on New Testament Theology by Weiss, Beyschlag, Holtzmann, Feine, Schlatter,
Weinel, Stevens, Sheldon; and on the Teaching of Jesus by Wendt, Dalman, Bruce; Candlish, The
Kingdom of God ; Robertson, Regnum Dei ; Stalker, The Ethic of Jesus .