Facts About Hell
February 22nd, 2008 by Sean
by Samuel M. Ohmart
Why Facts about Hell? Because there is much teaching about Hell that is not fact but dishonoring superstition, conceived in ignorance, and taught as truth by men who should know better.
- IT IS A FACT:
- That the popular teaching of an eternal hell has no support in the Scriptures, as we shall show.
- that “the wages of sin is death!”— utter deprivation of being, not eternal torture.
- that fear of an eternal hell has little moral value to restrain men from sin, since millions who believe it go on living in sin.
- that fear of an eternal hell is not a necessary motive in winning men to Christ, since millions of Christians do not believe in such a hell.
- that while wholesome fear of a just penalty is a Scriptural motive to turn to God, the best motive is the appeal to reason, conscience and will — not fear.
- that the doctrine of an eternal hell is the biggest single factor in today’s infidelity.
- IT IS A FACT:
- that hell is an English word chosen by the translators to render four Greek or Hebrew words, three of which mean totally different things, and not one of which means hell in the popular sense, as we shall see.
- that hell in Old English meant a covered place, a pit, or concealed, hidden, like the grave.
- IT IS A FACT:
- that the Hebrew word sheol, translated hell, is also rendered pit three times, and grave thirty-one times.
- that sheol could have been rendered grave, or equivalent terms, every time, had not the translators held the mediaeval theory of eternal torment.
- that in the Revised Version the revisers restored the Hebrew sheol to the text fourteen times untranslated, thus confessing the error of the King James translation and their own ignorance of the true meaning.
- IT IS A FACT:
- that the Greek word hades is rendered hell improperly ten times out of eleven in the New Testament.
- that hades signifies literally the place of the dead, never a place of punishment.
- that from the cross Christ went to hades, the state of the dead, not to a place of punishment.
- that sheol in Hebrew and hades in Greek admit of the same definition — the place of the dead. David prophesied of Christ, “Thou wilt not leave my soul in sheol,” (Psalm 16:10) and Peter quoted it in Greek, “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hades,” i.e., in the place of the dead (Acts 2:27,31).
- IT IS A FACT:
- that while the Greek word gehenna is rendered hell twelve times in the Authorized Version of the New Testament, it should not have been so translated even once.
- that gehenna never means the same as sheol and hades.
- that gehenna is the Greek way of spelling gehinnom or Valley of Hinnom (Jeremiah 7:31, 32).
- that the Valley of Hinnom was the place where by city ordinance the rubbish and refuse of Jerusalem, including the bodies of executed criminals, was consigned to be burned and so destroyed.
- that the Valley of Hinnom was thus not a place of torture but of utter destruction; that it was used by Jesus as a type of the future doom of the lost; and that it has been perverted by theologians to teach a hell of endless suffering.
- that in the Revised Version the revisers restored gehenna to the text untranslated eight times, thereby confessing the error of the King James translators in rendering it hell, as well as their ignorance of the true meaning.
- IT IS A FACT:
- that tartaurus, rendered hell in 2 Peter 2:4, has not the slightest reference to a place of punishment, either present or future, but rather to a place of detention, where evil angels “are reserved unto judgment.”
- that of the four words—sheol, hades, gehenna, tartaurus—rendered hell, not one of them means a place of present suffering or of future eternal suffering.
- that if there is a present hell of punishment, the devil has never been in it.
- that we read of him being cast down from heaven upon the earth (Revelation 12:9).
- that we read of him as “the serpent” in the garden of Eden (Genesis 3:1,5).
- that the Bible speaks of him as “going to and fro in the earth” (Job 1:7) and “walking about as a roaring lion” (1 Peter 5:8).
- that he is called “the prince of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2) and “the prince of this world” (John 12:31;14:30;16:11).
- that we read of him as “the god (or ruler) of this world” (2 Corinthians 4:4).
- but no inspired writer has ever portrayed him in hell, where theologians love to locate him. What would hell be without the devil?
- IT IS A FACT:
- that if there is a present hell, none of the wicked are in it, becaused they are RESERVED unto the DAY OF JUDGMENT to be PUNISHED, and therefore they are not being punished now! (2 Peter 2:9; 2 Timothy 4:1).
- that AFTER the Judgment comes Malachi’s and Peter’s “burning day,” which is also the “lake of fire” (Revelation 20:14; Malachi 4:1; 2 Peter 3:7-12). What would hell be without sinners?
- IS IT NOT A FACT:
- in view of all these facts, that the notion of an everlasting hell of fiery torments is a figment of the theological imagination, and not a Bible doctrine?
The above was sent to me by Dr. John Roller, who is an expert on the subject of conditional immortality–the doctrine that immortality is conditioned on resurrection not the existence of an immortal soul. Email him at johnroller@faithbiblechristian.com if you would be interested in more articles on hell.
Great points! One of my biggest pet peeves is the fact that most translations put “Hell” inplace of Sheol, Gehenna, and Hades. In my research of the word Hell, I found that it has a Viking connection too.
see http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hell
“Word History: Hell comes to us directly from Old English hel. Because the Roman Church prevailed in England from an early date, the Roman—that is, Mediterranean—belief that hell was hot prevailed there too; in Old English hel is a black and fiery place of eternal torment for the damned. But because the Vikings were converted to Christianity centuries after the Anglo-Saxons, the Old Norse hel, from the same source as Old English hel, retained its earlier pagan senses as both a place and a person. As a place, hel is the abode of oathbreakers, other evil persons, and those unlucky enough not to have died in battle. It contrasts sharply with Valhalla, the hall of slain heroes. Unlike the Mediterranean hell, the Old Norse hel is very cold. Hel is also the name of the goddess or giantess who presides in hel, the half blue-black, half white daughter of Loki and the giantess Angrbotha. The Indo-European root behind these Germanic words is *kel-, “to cover, conceal” (so hell is the “concealed place”); it also gives us hall, hole, hollow, and helmet.” Quote from link above.
Thank you for your work. John
If there is no work that man can do to deserve eternal life and joy, what work can man do to deserve eternal torture. If people really thought it through they would realize that the traditional concept of burning forever in hell is a horrible and unjust punishment that no crime is worthy of. The truth of the wage of sin being death (non-exsistance) fits within the scope of the whole Word and is much more motivating, at least to this man.
Right you are, Marc–if God punished a man who died at fifty years old with eternal conscious torment then that would obviously be infinitely unjust. Let’s assume that this fifty year old man did fifty solid years of evil–from cradle to grave he was wicked. If God punished him for fifty years in flaming fire which at once burned his flesh as well as restored it so that it could be burned again, would that not be more than enough? What about a hundred years of such writhing agony? Is paying double for his sins enough? What about a million years of such heinous torture? Has the man still not paid his debt? But, no, the “orthodox” (though it did not develop until Athenagoras and Tertullian, at least a hundred and forty years after the time of Jesus) people want to make us believe that one sin is infinitely offensive to an infinitely holy God and so he must pay for ever. But of course this is just pious fancy talk, completely unbiblical. God will punish sinners but it will be proportional and end in their extinction. This is the doctrine of the Old Testament, the doctrine of the New Testament, and the doctrine of the early church until it was corrupted.