To Hell With Hell

Death and Everlasting Punishment

Sleep (asleep) is often used as a metaphor for death (die) in Scripture, and Sheol (to ask; bury; to go down; grave; Hades; house; land; pit; sepulchre; tomb) is the destiny of all.

Hell, the place of everlasting punishment (destroy) in darkness (outer; black) and burning in a lake of unquenchable fire, is the final outcome for all those who forfeit life (perish) by their rejection of God. It is a place of torment (gnash; tooth; worm) and separation (fix; gulf).

The Abyss (bottomless) is the abode of demons.

SOURCE: Vine's Complete Expository Dictionary Topic Finder

What you see above is the result of my typing the word “hell” into the Study Word portion of my Logos Bible Software program. I did this because I have heard it said the Jesus spoke more about hell than he did heaven. I wanted to see what, if anything, I could find that would show such to be a true statement.

According to the Harper's Bible Dictionary, “Hell” is an English word used to translate the Hebrew, Sheol; the Greek, Hades; and the Hebrew. Gehenna. In Christian tradition it is usually associated with the notion of eternal punishment, especially by fire. This idea appears in Isaiah. 66:24, but it is not clearly associated with a place. Jewish writings from the third century B.C. onward, speak of places of punishment by fire for evil spirits and the wicked dead (1 Enoch 18:11-16; 108:3-7, 15; 2 Esdras 7:36-38). The book of Revelation describes a lake that burns with fire and brimstone in which the wicked will be eternally punished (Revelation 19:20; 20:14-15; 21:8). See also Gehenna; Hades; Punishment, Everlasting; Sheol.

Easton’s Bible Dictionary goes a little deeper by explaining that the word “Hell” is derived from the Saxon helan, to cover; hence the covered or the invisible place. In Scripture there are three words so rendered:

(1.) Sheol, occurring in the Old Testament sixty-five times. This word Sheol is derived from a root-word meaning “to ask,” “demand;” hence insatiableness (Proverbs 30:15, 16). It is rendered “grave” thirty-one times (Genesis 37:35; 42:38; 44:29, 31; 1 Samuel 2:6, etc.). The Revisers have retained this rendering in the historical books with the original word in the margin, while in the poetical books they have reversed this rule.

In thirty-one cases in the Authorized Version this word is rendered “hell,” the place of disembodied spirits. The inhabitants of Sheol are “the congregation of the dead” (Proverbs 21:16). It is (a) the abode of the wicked (Numbers 16:33; Job 24:19; Psalms 9:17; 31:17, etc.); (b) of the good (Psalms 16:10; 30:3; 49:15; 86:13, etc.).

Sheol is described as deep (Job 11:8), dark (10:21, 22), with bars (17:16). The dead “go down” to it (Numbers 16:30, 33; Ezekiel 31:15, 16, 17).

(2.) The Greek word Hades of the New Testament has the same scope of signification as Sheol of the Old Testament. It is a prison (1 Peter 3:19), with gates and bars and locks (Matthew 16:18; Rev. 1:18), and it is downward (Matthew 11:23; Luke 10:15).

The righteous and the wicked are separated. The blessed dead are in that part of Hades called paradise (Luke 23:43). They are also said to be in Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16:22).

(3.) Gehenna, in most of its occurrences in the Greek New Testament, designates the place of the lost (Matthew 23:33). The fearful nature of their condition there is described in various figurative expressions (Matthew 8:12; 13:42; 22:13; 25:30; Luke 16:24, etc.). (See HINNOM.)

Nelson's New Illustrated Bible Dictionary also says that “Hell” is the place of eternal punishment for the unrighteous, and that the NKJV and KJV use this word to translate Sheol and Hades, the Old and New Testament words, respectively, for the abode of the dead.

Hell also translates Gehenna, the Greek form of the Hebrew phrase that means “the vale of Hinnom”—a valley west and south of Jerusalem. In this valley the Canaanites worshiped Baal and the god Molech by sacrificing their children in a fire that burned continuously. Even Ahaz and Manasseh, kings of Judah, were guilty of this terrible, idolatrous practice (2 Chronicles 28:3; 33:6).

The prophet Jeremiah predicted that God would visit such destruction upon Jerusalem that this valley would be known as the “Valley of Slaughter” (Jeremiah 7:31–34; 19:2, 6). In his religious reforms, King Josiah put an end to this worship. He defiled the valley in order to make it unfit even for pagan worship (2 Kings 23:10).

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