Gehenna and the Lake of Fire in NT

LittleLambofJesus · Mar 21, 2019

This appears to be the only verse in the NT that Jesus condemns a specific group of people, the 1st century Jewish Pharisees and Scribes.

Matthew 23:
1 Then Jesus spake to the multitudes, and to his disciples, 2saying, ‘On the seat of Moses sat down the scribes and the Pharisees;
15 ‘Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!
because ye go round the sea and the dry to make one proselyte,
and whenever it may happen — ye are making him a son of gehenna twofold more than yourselves.
33 "Serpents! produce of vipers!
how ye may be fleeing from the judging<2920> of the geennhV <1067>
==================================================
The phrase "lake of fire" is used in only 5 verses of the entire Bible, and those in 3 chapters of Revelation.

Revelation 19:20
and is arrested<4084> Beast<2342>, and with it the False-Prophet<5578>, the one-doing the signs in view of it, in which he deceives<4105> the ones getting the mark of the beast, and the ones worshiping to the image of it.
Living were cast, the two, into the Lake of the Fire the one burning<2545> in sulfur <2303>

Revelation 20:
10 And the Devil, the one-deceiving<4105> them, was cast into the Lake of the Fire and of sulfur<2303>, the where-are the beast and the false-prophet,
and they shall be being tormented<928> day and night into the ages of the ages.
14 And the Death and the Hades<86> were cast into the Lake of the Fire.
This the Death, the second-one, is being the Lake of the Fire .
15 And if anyone not was found in the Book of the Life having been written
, he was cast into the Lake of the Fire.

Revelation 21:8
To the yet fearful and faithless and ones being abominated and murderers, and paramours<4205>, and enchanters<5333>, and idolaters<1496>, and to-all falsifiers<5571>,
the part of them in the Lake, the one burning<2545> Fire<4442> and sulphur<2306>, which is being the Death, the second-one.

Here is a little info gathered off the net:

Lake of fire - Wikipedia

A lake of fire appears, in both ancient Egyptian and Christian religion, as a place of after-death destruction of the wicked. The phrase is used in four verses of the Book of Revelation. 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 image was also used by the Early Christian Hippolytus of Rome in about the year 200 and has continued to be used by modern Christians. Related is Jewish Gehenna which, among other things, like hell, is a valley near Jerusalem where trash was burned.

The Book of Revelation, written some time in the last half of the first century AD, has five verses that mention a "lake of fire":

Revelation 19:20: "And the beast [6] was taken, and with him the false prophet [7] that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone."
Revelation 20:10 "And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever."
Revelation 20:14-15 "Then Death and Hades[8] were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire." [NKJV]
Revelation 21:8 "But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death."[9]
A commonly accepted and traditional interpretation is that the "lake of fire" and the "second death" are symbolic of eternal pain, pain of loss and perhaps pain of the senses, as punishment for wickedness

Twentieth century
The Catholic Portuguese visionary Lúcia Santos reported that the Virgin Mary (Our Lady of Fatima) had given her a vision of Hell[citation needed] as a sea of fire:

"Our Lady showed us a great sea of fire which seemed to be under the earth. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke, now falling back on every side like sparks in a huge fire, without weight or equilibrium, and amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear."[20]

Universalist eschatology
Early Christian Universalists, most notably Origen of Alexandria (c. 184 – c. 253), and Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335 – c. 395), understood the lake of fire as a symbolic purifying fire used to eliminate the dross from the gold, [21] aka a "refiner's crucible". Origin refers to the "lead of wickedness" that must be refined out of the gold.[22] Origen obtained his Universalist views, known then as apocatastasis,[23] from his mentor Clement of Alexandria (c. 150 – c. 215),[24] who was a student of Pantaenus.

Further evidence that corroborates their understanding that the Lake of fire is a "refiner's crucible" is that the Greek word commonly translated as "lake" also refers to something small, like a pond[28] or a "pool", as translated in the New American Bible (NABRE)[29].

Also, the added detail of "sulfur" in the lake of fire is related to an ancient gold refining technique. Gold refining by sulphurization, also related to Gold parting, is described in detail by ancient writers.[30][31][32][33] When unwanted metals, such as lead and copper, are heated in the presence of sulfur, the chemical reaction reduces the unwanted metals into sulfides, such as Lead(II) sulfide and Copper(I) sulfide. Since sulfur is a much lighter element, atomic number 16 on periodic table, the new sulfide molecules easily float to the top of the crucible as dross. Sulfur is also part of the smelting process related to silver and gold and other metal ores and naturally occurs in these ores.

....................................

SeventhFisherofMen · Mar 21, 2019

Are you a Jehovah’s Witness? Cause no Bible translation I’ve ever read that I have says Gehenna, only the Jehovah’s Witness translation which is a modification and changing of the actual scriptures.

SkyWriting · Mar 22, 2019

SeventhFisherofMen said:
Are you a Jehovah’s Witness? Cause no Bible translation I’ve ever read that I have says Gehenna, only the Jehovah’s Witness translation which is a modification and changing of the actual scriptures.

Géenna is the Hebrew source term, which is changed to "hell" in many translations.

I found these less common translations were it is not changed to "hell":

Berean Literal Bible
Weymouth New Testament
World English Bible
Young's Literal Translation
Aramaic Bible in Plain English

1067 géenna (a transliteration of the Hebrew term, Gêhinnōm, "the valley of Hinnom") – Gehenna, i.e. hell (also referred to as the "lake of fire" in Revelation).

Gehenna ("hell"), the place of post-resurrection torment (judgment), refers strictly to the everlasting abode of the unredeemed where they experience divine judgment in their individual resurrection-bodies. Each of the unredeemed receives one at the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev 20:11-15), i.e. a body that "matches" their capacity for torment relating to their (unique) judgment.

LittleLambofJesus · Mar 22, 2019

SeventhFisherofMen said: ↑
Are you a Jehovah’s Witness? Cause no Bible translation I’ve ever read that I have says Gehenna, only the Jehovah’s Witness translation which is a modification and changing of the actual scriptures.

No I am not JW.

From the NWT Revised 2013 edition.

https://www.jw.org/en/publications/bible/nwt/books/

NWT
Matthew 23: 33 “Serpents, offspring of vipers,+ how will you flee from the judgment of Ge·henʹna?*

SkyWriting said:
Géenna is the Hebrew source term, which is changed to "hell" in many translations.

I found these less common translations were it is not changed to "hell":
Berean Literal Bible
Weymouth New Testament
World English Bible
Young's Literal Translation
Aramaic Bible in Plain English

1067 géenna (a transliteration of the Hebrew term, Gêhinnōm, "the valley of Hinnom") – Gehenna, i.e. hell (also referred to as the "lake of fire" in Revelation).

Gehenna ("hell"), the place of post-resurrection torment (judgment), refers strictly to the everlasting abode of the unredeemed where they experience divine judgment in their individual resurrection-bodies. Each of the unredeemed receives one at the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev 20:11-15), i.e. a body that "matches" their capacity for torment relating to their (unique) judgment.

Informative post. Thank you for those Bible references.

There is also a Hebrew version of the NT I just recently found.

Matthew 23 Orthodox Jewish Bible

Matthew 23
Orthodox Jewish Bible
33 Snakes, you banim of nachashim,
how can you escape the Yom HaDin of Gehinnom?

Another lesser known version:

The Scriptures (International Standard Version 1998)
33“Serpents, brood of adders! How would you escape the judgment of Gehenna?

Greek New Testament - Parallel Greek New Testament by John Hurt
Matthew 23:
Stephens 1550 Textus Receptus
33 ofeiV gennhmata ecidnwn pwV fughte apo thV krisewV thV geennhV

Greek and Hebrew Reader Online
33 ὄφεις, γεννήματα ἐχιδνῶν, πῶς φύγητε ἀπὸ τῆς κρίσεως τῆς γεέννης

Mathetes66 · Apr 18, 2019

"This appears to be the only verse in the NT that Jesus condemns a specific group of people, the 1st century Jewish Pharisees & scribes."

This is not true BIBLICALLY. You need to look at ALL the references in the Scriptures to get a full harmonization of how that word is used in the NT & the grave warning not to end up being cast in there.

They are not referring to just Jewish religious leaders only but to those whose names are not written in the (Lamb's) book of life, to Jews in general & to Gentiles as well, when the harvest comes at the end of the age & the children of the kingdom of God are separated from the children of the devil, the evil unbelievers.

There are those who choose the narrow path that leads to life vs those who are on the wide & broad way that leads to destruction. In many of them the contrast between the good seed of the Son of Man & the evil seed of the devil is made, those who believe vs those who disbelieve, those who are righteous vs those who are wicked, etc.

In the synoptic Gospels Jesus uses the word Gehenna, eleven times to describe the opposite to life in God's eternal Kingdom (Mark 9:43-48). In certain usage, it is a place where both soul (Greek: ψυχή) AND resurrected, imperishable/incorruptible bodies are cast into (Matt 10:28), in "unquenchable fire" (Mark 9:43). The Apostle James uses it one time in his epistle.

It is literally “the gehenna of fire” (Matt. 5:22; 18:9; Mark 9:47), a place of “unquenchable fire” (Mark 9:43, 45), a 'furnace of fire (Matt 13:42). The wicked are “sons of gehenna ” (Matt. 23:15) who will receive the “condemnation of gehenna”(Matt 23:33). James, in speaking of the danger of the tongue described it as “set on fire by hell (gehenna)” (James 3:6). Jesus describes it also as the place of 'outer darkness' (Mt 25:30).

Another name for it in the OT is Tophet or Topheth ('place of burning & drums or tabrets'), where babies & small children were burned alive to the idol god Molech & they beat drums or tambourines continuously with lyres or harps to keep people from hearing the screams & gnashing of teeth of the children while burning. (2 Kings 23:10; Isaiah 30:33; Jeremiah 7:31,32; 19:6,11,12,13,14)

In Isaiah 30:32,33 God uses the same language for His judgment upon the wicked & describes it similar to how it is described it in the NT.

Isaiah 30:32,33 And with every stroke of the appointed (destined) staff, that YHWH brings down, will be accompanied by music from the tabrets (drums or tamborines struck lightly & frequently) & harps & with battles of swinging (shaking) will He fight with it. For, arranged from former time is Tophet, even it for the king is prepared, He has made it deep, He has made it large, its pile is fire & much wood. The breath of YHWH, LIKE a stream of BRIMSTONE (sulfur), IS BURNING IN IT!

One has to remember that God & His character or attributes, is described in many ways in the Bible. God is love, God is holy, God is just, God is eternal AND God is consuming fire (Ex 24:17; Deut 4:24; 9:3; Ps 18:8; 50:3; 2 Sam 22:9; Isaiah 29:6; Isa 30:27,30; Isa 33:14; Lam 2:3; Joel 2:5; Heb 12:29) This is who God is & His responses to mankind & the spiritual world.

JPS Tanakh 1917 The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling hath seized the ungodly: 'Who among us shall dwell with the devouring (consuming) fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?'

What does it mean that God is a consuming fire?

So the 'lake' OF FIRE is another term to describe the 'gehenna of fire' or the 'furnace of fire' or the 'Tophet of fire & brimstone' or the darkness of the abyss--Gen 1:2 (the final eternal place of punishment for the wicked & the demonic spirits).

This happens after one has physically died & their imperishable, incorruptible bodies are resurrected. Both the resurrected, imperishable/uncorruptible body & the soul of the wicked are cast into it. (I Cor 15:42 "So will it be with the resurrection of the dead: What is sown is perishable; it is raised imperishable")

Matt 7:13,14,21-23 Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate & broad is the way that LEADS TO DESTRUCTION & many enter through it. But small is the gate & narrow the way that LEADS TO LIFE & only a few find it...Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on THAT DAY, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name & in Your name drive out demons & perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, you workers of lawlessness!’

Matt 5:22 But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council & whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell (Gehenna) of fire.

Matt 5:28-31 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out & throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be cast into hell (Gehenna).

Matt 10:28 "Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul & body in hell (Gehenna).

Remember that being cast into Gehenna occurs AFTER THE FIRST DEATH, physical death of the corruptible, perishable body we presently have & AFTER THE RESURRECTION OF OUR BODIES. These new spiritual resurrection bodies are now imperishable & incorrupttible. They CANNOT be annihilated nor can they perish. They remain eternal, just like the soul, which cannot be killed.

Matt 13:36-42 His disciples came to Him & said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds (tares) in the field.” He replied, “The One who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world & as for the good seed, these are the sons of the kingdom & the weeds (tares) are the sons of the evil one. The enemy who sowed them is the devil & the harvest is the END OF THE AGE & the reapers are angels. "So JUST LIKE the weeds (tares) are gathered up & burned with fire, so shall it be at the end of the age.

42"The Son of Man will send forth His angels & they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks & those who commit lawlessness & will cast them into the FURNACE OF FIRE; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

Daniel 12:1-3 But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life & some to shame & everlasting contempt. 3And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above & those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever & ever.

Matt 13:47-50 "ONCE AGAIN, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was cast into the sea & caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, the men pulled it ashore. Then they sat down & sorted the good fish into containers, but threw the bad away. So it will be at the end of the age; the angels will come forth & take out the wicked from among the righteous & will throw them into the FURNACE OF FIRE; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth.

Matt 23:15 "Woe to you, scribes & Pharisees, HYPOCRITES, because you travel around on sea & land to make ONE PROSELYTE & when he becomes one, you make him TWICE AS MUCH A SON OF HELL (Gehenna) as yourselves."

A proselyte could also have been a Gentile. So even in the verse you quote, it is talking about more than just the Pharisees & scribes!

Matt 23:33 "You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence (judgment) of hell (Gehenna)? Here Jesus literally describes them as serpents, like the devil himself. Remember when John the Baptist warned them when they refused to be baptized & confess their sins? He said, "who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"

Years later, Jesus is now showing they not only did not flee but were actively awaiting the judicial sentence that would cast them into Gehenna. They were leading to the destruction of others & thus they incurred some of the strongest language Jesus had ever used against others. Remember, too, these were the ones that had been continuing to blaspheme the Holy Spirit & would be guilty of an eternal sin, that would not be forgiven.

Matt 25:28-30 'Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to the one who has the ten talents.' "For to everyone who has, more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away. "Throw out the worthless slave into THE OUTER DARKNESS; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth.

Matt 25:41-46 Then He will say to those on His left, ‘DEPART FROM ME, you who are cursed, into THE ETERNAL FIRE PREPARED for the devil & his angels. For I was hungry & you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty & you gave Me nothing to drink, I was a stranger & you did not take Me in, I was naked & you did not clothe Me, I was sick & in prison & you did not visit Me.’

44And they too will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ Then the King will answer, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Mark 9:43-48 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two hands & go INTO hell (Gehenna), INTO the UNQUENCHABLE FIRE,where ‘their worm never dies & the fire is never quenched.’ If your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet & be cast into hell (Gehenna), where ‘their worm never dies & the fire is never quenched.' And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes & be thrown into hell (Gehenna), where ‘THEIR WORM NEVER DIES & THE FIRE IS NEVER QUENCHED.

Luke 12:5 "But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, AFTER He has killed, has AUTHORITY to cast into hell (Gehenna); yes, I tell you, FEAR HIM!

Luke 16:26 'And besides all this, between us & you there is A GREAT CHASM FIXED (established), so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able & that none may cross over from there to us.'

James 3:6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body & sets ON FIRE the course of our life & is set ON FIRE BY HELL (GEHENNA)

James 4:12 There is only one Lawgiver & Judge, the One who is able to SAVE & DESTROY. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

"The phrase "lake of fire" is used in only 5 verses of the entire Bible, and those in 3 chapters of Revelation."

You seem to minimize the horrible nature of this eternal place of banishment from the presence of the Lord for evil doers & the devil & his demons, by saying it is ONLY mentioned 5 times. By reading those verses in context & the full content of what they actually say, there is MUCH there that can be learned & comparing it with what Jesus said about the FIRE of Gehenna, the eternal place of punishment for the wicked & the devil & the demons.

I will cover those verses in another post.

"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."

This is the problem with trying to quote things from Wikipedia. It is not reliable. The biblical idea of Tartarus is nothing like the pagan philosopher Plato's idea of it. Tartarus is mentioned only once in 2 Peter 2:4 & is in the lowest region of hades/sheol/temporary abode of the dead. The only ones mentioned there are the demonic spirits that were sent there at the flood.

2 Pet 2:4-9 For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them deep into hell (Tartarus), placing them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment; if He did not spare the ancient world when He brought the flood on its ungodly people, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, among the eight; if He condemned the cities of Sodom & Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes as an example of what is coming on the ungodly & if He rescued Lot, a righteous man distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw & heard)— if all this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials & to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment.

People are NOT refined in the Lake of Fire. No Bible verse ever describes the lake of fire as a place of refinement but only as a place of eternal punishment away from the Presence of the Lord in His kingdom with His saints forever.

"No I am not JW. From the NWT Revised 2013 edition..."

The reason why another poster asked if you were a JW is because you are quoting from the JW biased & distorted translation of the Scriptures, the New World Translation! Perhaps you did not notice or were aware of this translation being strictly one of JW's.

If you are a spiritually born again Christian, why are you quoting from this aberrent translation, from a cultic source? What is your purpose in doing that?

"Géenna is the Hebrew source term, which is changed to "hell" in many translations."

This also is incorrect. Geenna is the Greek term not the Hebrew term. And it was not CHANGED to hell. No one changed it. This is the equivalent term in the English translation of the Greek manuscript. It is an English translated term that best describes what the original term in the Greek is conveying. Gehenna is a TRANSLITERATION in the English text in some translations.

The Use of "Hell" in the New Testament

The Hinnom Valley and Jesus' Teaching on Final Punishment

What Is Gehenna?

What is Gehenna?

SeventhFisherofMen · Apr 18, 2019

Mathetes66 said:
This is not true BIBLICALLY. You need to look at ALL the references in the Scriptures to get a full harmonization of how that word is used in the NT & the grave warning not to end up being cast in there.

They are not referring to just Jewish religious leaders only but to those whose names are not written in the (Lamb's) book of life, to Jews in general & to Gentiles as well, when the harvest comes at the end of the age & the children of the kingdom of God are separated from the children of the devil, the evil unbelievers.

There are those who choose the narrow path that leads to life vs those who are on the wide & broad way that leads to destruction. In many of them the contrast between the good seed of the Son of Man & the evil seed of the devil is made, those who believe vs those who disbelieve, those who are righteous vs those who are wicked, etc.

In the synoptic Gospels Jesus uses the word Gehenna, eleven times to describe the opposite to life in God's eternal Kingdom (Mark 9:43-48). In certain usage, it is a place where both soul (Greek: ψυχή) AND resurrected, imperishable/incorruptible bodies are cast into (Matt 10:28), in "unquenchable fire" (Mark 9:43). The Apostle James uses it one time in his epistle.

It is literally “the gehenna of fire” (Matt. 5:22; 18:9; Mark 9:47), a place of “unquenchable fire” (Mark 9:43, 45), a 'furnace of fire (Matt 13:42). The wicked are “sons of gehenna ” (Matt. 23:15) who will receive the “condemnation of gehenna”(Matt 23:33). James, in speaking of the danger of the tongue described it as “set on fire by hell (gehenna)” (James 3:6). Jesus describes it also as the place of 'outer darkness' (Mt 25:30).

Another name for it in the OT is Tophet or Topheth ('place of burning & drums or tabrets'), where babies & small children were burned alive to the idol god Molech & they beat drums or tambourines continuously with lyres or harps to keep people from hearing the screams & gnashing of teeth of the children while burning. (2 Kings 23:10; Isaiah 30:33; Jeremiah 7:31,32; 19:6,11,12,13,14)

In Isaiah 30:32,33 God uses the same language for His judgment upon the wicked & describes it similar to how it is described it in the NT.

Isaiah 30:32,33 And with every stroke of the appointed (destined) staff, that YHWH brings down, will be accompanied by music from the tabrets (drums or tamborines struck lightly & frequently) & harps & with battles of swinging (shaking) will He fight with it. For, arranged from former time is Tophet, even it for the king is prepared, He has made it deep, He has made it large, its pile is fire & much wood. The breath of YHWH, LIKE a stream of BRIMSTONE (sulfur), IS BURNING IN IT!

One has to remember that God & His character or attributes, is described in many ways in the Bible. God is love, God is holy, God is just, God is eternal AND God is consuming fire (Ex 24:17; Deut 4:24; 9:3; Ps 18:8; 50:3; 2 Sam 22:9; Isaiah 29:6; Isa 30:27,30; Isa 33:14; Lam 2:3; Joel 2:5; Heb 12:29) This is who God is & His responses to mankind & the spiritual world.

JPS Tanakh 1917 The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling hath seized the ungodly: 'Who among us shall dwell with the devouring (consuming) fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings?'

What does it mean that God is a consuming fire?

So the 'lake' OF FIRE is another term to describe the 'gehenna of fire' or the 'furnace of fire' or the 'Tophet of fire & brimstone' or the darkness of the abyss--Gen 1:2 (the final eternal place of punishment for the wicked & the demonic spirits).

This happens after one has physically died & their imperishable, incorruptible bodies are resurrected. Both the resurrected, imperishable/uncorruptible body & the soul of the wicked are cast into it. (I Cor 15:42 "So will it be with the resurrection of the dead: What is sown is perishable; it is raised imperishable")

Matt 7:13,14,21-23 Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate & broad is the way that LEADS TO DESTRUCTION & many enter through it. But small is the gate & narrow the way that LEADS TO LIFE & only a few find it...Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on THAT DAY, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name & in Your name drive out demons & perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, you workers of lawlessness!’

Matt 5:22 But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council & whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell (Gehenna) of fire.

Matt 5:28-31 But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. "If your right eye makes you stumble, tear it out & throw it from you; for it is better for you to lose one of the parts of your body, than for your whole body to be cast into hell (Gehenna).

Matt 10:28 "Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul & body in hell (Gehenna).

Remember that being cast into Gehenna occurs AFTER THE FIRST DEATH, physical death of the corruptible, perishable body we presently have & AFTER THE RESURRECTION OF OUR BODIES. These new spiritual resurrection bodies are now imperishable & incorrupttible. They CANNOT be annihilated nor can they perish. They remain eternal, just like the soul, which cannot be killed.

Matt 13:36-42 His disciples came to Him & said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds (tares) in the field.” He replied, “The One who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world & as for the good seed, these are the sons of the kingdom & the weeds (tares) are the sons of the evil one. The enemy who sowed them is the devil & the harvest is the END OF THE AGE & the reapers are angels. "So JUST LIKE the weeds (tares) are gathered up & burned with fire, so shall it be at the end of the age.

42"The Son of Man will send forth His angels & they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks & those who commit lawlessness & will cast them into the FURNACE OF FIRE; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

Daniel 12:1-3 But at that time your people shall be delivered, everyone whose name shall be found written in the book. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life & some to shame & everlasting contempt. 3And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above & those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever & ever.

Matt 13:47-50 "ONCE AGAIN, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was cast into the sea & caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, the men pulled it ashore. Then they sat down & sorted the good fish into containers, but threw the bad away. So it will be at the end of the age; the angels will come forth & take out the wicked from among the righteous & will throw them into the FURNACE OF FIRE; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth.

Matt 23:15 "Woe to you, scribes & Pharisees, HYPOCRITES, because you travel around on sea & land to make ONE PROSELYTE & when he becomes one, you make him TWICE AS MUCH A SON OF HELL (Gehenna) as yourselves."

A proselyte could also have been a Gentile. So even in the verse you quote, it is talking about more than just the Pharisees & scribes!

Matt 23:33 "You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence (judgment) of hell (Gehenna)? Here Jesus literally describes them as serpents, like the devil himself. Remember when John the Baptist warned them when they refused to be baptized & confess their sins? He said, "who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?"

Years later, Jesus is now showing they not only did not flee but were actively awaiting the judicial sentence that would cast them into Gehenna. They were leading to the destruction of others & thus they incurred some of the strongest language Jesus had ever used against others. Remember, too, these were the ones that had been continuing to blaspheme the Holy Spirit & would be guilty of an eternal sin, that would not be forgiven.

Matt 25:28-30 'Therefore take away the talent from him, and give it to the one who has the ten talents.' "For to everyone who has, more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but from the one who does not have, even what he does have shall be taken away. "Throw out the worthless slave into THE OUTER DARKNESS; in that place there will be weeping & gnashing of teeth.

Matt 25:41-46 Then He will say to those on His left, ‘DEPART FROM ME, you who are cursed, into THE ETERNAL FIRE PREPARED for the devil & his angels. For I was hungry & you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty & you gave Me nothing to drink, I was a stranger & you did not take Me in, I was naked & you did not clothe Me, I was sick & in prison & you did not visit Me.’

44And they too will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ Then the King will answer, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Mark 9:43-48 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two hands & go INTO hell (Gehenna), INTO the UNQUENCHABLE FIRE,where ‘their worm never dies & the fire is never quenched.’ If your foot causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life lame than to have two feet & be cast into hell (Gehenna), where ‘their worm never dies & the fire is never quenched.' And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes & be thrown into hell (Gehenna), where ‘THEIR WORM NEVER DIES & THE FIRE IS NEVER QUENCHED.

Luke 12:5 "But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, AFTER He has killed, has AUTHORITY to cast into hell (Gehenna); yes, I tell you, FEAR HIM!

Luke 16:26 'And besides all this, between us & you there is A GREAT CHASM FIXED (established), so that those who wish to come over from here to you will not be able & that none may cross over from there to us.'

James 3:6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body & sets ON FIRE the course of our life & is set ON FIRE BY HELL (GEHENNA)

James 4:12 There is only one Lawgiver & Judge, the One who is able to SAVE & DESTROY. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

You seem to minimize the horrible nature of this eternal place of banishment from the presence of the Lord for evil doers & the devil & his demons, by saying it is ONLY mentioned 5 times. By reading those verses in context & the full content of what they actually say, there is MUCH there that can be learned & comparing it with what Jesus said about the FIRE of Gehenna, the eternal place of punishment for the wicked & the devil & the demons.

I will cover those verses in another post.

This is the problem with trying to quote things from Wikipedia. It is not reliable. The biblical idea of Tartarus is nothing like the pagan philosopher Plato's idea of it. Tartarus is mentioned only once in 2 Peter 2:4 & is in the lowest region of hades/sheol/temporary abode of the dead. The only ones mentioned there are the demonic spirits that were sent there at the flood.

2 Pet 2:4-9 For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them deep into hell (Tartarus), placing them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment; if He did not spare the ancient world when He brought the flood on its ungodly people, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, among the eight; if He condemned the cities of Sodom & Gomorrah to destruction, reducing them to ashes as an example of what is coming on the ungodly & if He rescued Lot, a righteous man distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw & heard)— if all this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials & to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment.

People are NOT refined in the Lake of Fire. No Bible verse ever describes the lake of fire as a place of refinement but only as a place of eternal punishment away from the Presence of the Lord in His kingdom with His saints forever.

The reason why another poster asked if you were a JW is because you are quoting from the JW biased & distorted translation of the Scriptures, the New World Translation! Perhaps you did not notice or were aware of this translation being strictly one of JW's.

If you are a spiritually born again Christian, why are you quoting from this aberrent translation, from a cultic source? What is your purpose in doing that?

This also is incorrect. Geenna is the Greek term not the Hebrew term. And it was not CHANGED to hell. No one changed it. This is the equivalent term in the English translation of the Greek manuscript. It is an English translated term that best describes what the original term in the Greek is conveying. Gehenna is a TRANSLITERATION in the English text in some translations.

The Use of "Hell" in the New Testament

The Hinnom Valley and Jesus' Teaching on Final Punishment

What Is Gehenna?

What is Gehenna?

Good stuff, way to put it

it was bothering me this whole Gehenna stuff, as someone who has a good 1/3 of my family as either being JW or once JW as soon as I hear the word I cringe as if I’m about to have to explain basic truths like the fact that Jesus IS God and that Hell exists etc.

LittleLambofJesus · Sep 18, 2019

N T Wright on "Hell"

N.T. Wright on Hell - Glory to God for All Things

The most common New Testament word sometimes translated as hell is Gehenna. Gehenna was a place, not just an idea: it was the rubbish heap outside the south-west corner of the old city of Jerusalem. There is to this day a valley at that point that bears the name of Ge Hinnom. When I was in Jerusalem a few years ago, I was taken to a classy restaurant on the western slope of this famous valley, and we witnessed a spectacular fireworks display, organized no doubt without deliberate irony, on the site to which Jesus was referring to when he spoke about the smoldering fires of Gehenna. But, as with his language about heaven, so with his talk of Gehenna: once Christian readers had been sufficiently distanced from the original meaning of the words, alternative images would come to mind, generated not by Jesus or the New Testament, but by the stock of images, some of theme extremely lurid, supplied by ancient and medieval folklore and imagination.

The point is that when Jesus was warning his hearers about Gehenna he was not, as a general rule, telling them that unless they repented in this life they would burn in the next one. As with God’s kingdom, so with its opposite: it is on earth that things matter, not somewhere else. His message to his contemporaries was stark, and (as we would say today) political. Unless they turned back from their hopeless and rebellious dreams of establishing God’s kingdom in their own terms, not least through armed revolt against Rome, then the Roman juggernaut would do what large, greedy and ruthless empires have always done to smaller countries (not least in the Middle East) whose resources they covet or whose strategic location they are anxious to guard. Rome would turn Jerusalem into a hideous, stinking extension of its own smoldering rubbish heap. When Jesus said “Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish,” that is the primary meaning he had in mind.

It is therefore only by extension, and with difficulty, that we can extrapolate from the many gospel sayings which articulate this urgent, immediate warning to the deeper question of a warning about what may happen after death itself. The two parables which appear to address this question directly are, we should remember, parables, not actual descriptions of the afterlife. They use stock ancient Jewish imagery, such as “Abraham’s bosom,” not to teach about what happens after death but to insist on justice and mercy within the present life. This is not to say that Jesus would have dissented from their implied picture of post-mortem realities. It is, rather, to point out that to take the scene of Abraham, the Rich Man and Lazarus ‘literally’ is about as sensible as trying to find out the name of the Prodigal Son. Jesus simply didn’t say very much about the future life; he was, after all, primarily concerned to announce that God’s kingdom was coming “on earth as in heaven.” He gave (as we have seen) no fresh teaching on the question of the resurrection, apart from dark hints that it was going to happen, and happen soon, to one person ahead of everyone else; for the rest he was content to reinforce the normal Jewish picture. In the same way, he was not concerned to give any fresh instruction on post-mortem judgment, apart from the strange hints that it was going to be dramatically and horribly anticipated in one particular way, in space-time history, within a generation.

We cannot therefore look to Jesus’s teaching for any fresh detail on whether there really are some who finally reject God and, as it were, have that rejection ratified. All the signs, of course, are that he went along with the normal first-century Jewish perception: there would indeed be such people, with the only surprise being the surprise experienced, by sheep and goats alike, at their fate and at the evidence on which it was based. And the early Christian writers go along with this. Hell, and final judgment, is not a major topic in the letters (though when it comes it is very important, as for instance in Romans 2:1-16); it is not mentioned at all in Acts; and the vivid pictures toward the end of the book of Revelation, while being extremely important, have always proved among the hardest parts of scripture to interpret with any certainty. All this should warn us against the cheerful double dogmatism that has bedeviled discussion of these topics–the dogmatism, that is, both of the person who knows exactly who is and who isn’t “going to hell” and of the universalist who is absolutely certain that there is no such place or that if there is it will, at the last, be empty.

That latter kind of universalism was the normal working assumption of many theologians and clergy in the liberal heyday of the 1960s and 1970s and has remained a fixed point, almost in some cases the fixed point, for many whose thinking was shaped in that period. I well remember, in one of my first tutorials at Oxford, being told by my tutor that he and many others believed that “though hell may exist, it will at the last be untenanted”–in other words, that hell would turn out to be purgatory after all, an unpleasant preparation for eventual bliss.
The merest mention of final judgment has been squeezed out of Christian consciousness in several denominations, including my own, by the cavalier omission of verses from public biblical reading. Whenever you see, in an official lectionary, the command to omit two or three verses, you can normally be sure that they contain words of judgment. Unless, of course, they are about sex.

SeventhFisherofMen · Sep 18, 2019

LittleLambofJesus said:
N T Wright on "Hell"

N.T. Wright on Hell - Glory to God for All Things

The most common New Testament word sometimes translated as hell is Gehenna. Gehenna was a place, not just an idea: it was the rubbish heap outside the south-west corner of the old city of Jerusalem. There is to this day a valley at that point that bears the name of Ge Hinnom. When I was in Jerusalem a few years ago, I was taken to a classy restaurant on the western slope of this famous valley, and we witnessed a spectacular fireworks display, organized no doubt without deliberate irony, on the site to which Jesus was referring to when he spoke about the smoldering fires of Gehenna. But, as with his language about heaven, so with his talk of Gehenna: once Christian readers had been sufficiently distanced from the original meaning of the words, alternative images would come to mind, generated not by Jesus or the New Testament, but by the stock of images, some of theme extremely lurid, supplied by ancient and medieval folklore and imagination.

The point is that when Jesus was warning his hearers about Gehenna he was not, as a general rule, telling them that unless they repented in this life they would burn in the next one. As with God’s kingdom, so with its opposite: it is on earth that things matter, not somewhere else. His message to his contemporaries was stark, and (as we would say today) political. Unless they turned back from their hopeless and rebellious dreams of establishing God’s kingdom in their own terms, not least through armed revolt against Rome, then the Roman juggernaut would do what large, greedy and ruthless empires have always done to smaller countries (not least in the Middle East) whose resources they covet or whose strategic location they are anxious to guard. Rome would turn Jerusalem into a hideous, stinking extension of its own smoldering rubbish heap. When Jesus said “Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish,” that is the primary meaning he had in mind.

It is therefore only by extension, and with difficulty, that we can extrapolate from the many gospel sayings which articulate this urgent, immediate warning to the deeper question of a warning about what may happen after death itself. The two parables which appear to address this question directly are, we should remember, parables, not actual descriptions of the afterlife. They use stock ancient Jewish imagery, such as “Abraham’s bosom,” not to teach about what happens after death but to insist on justice and mercy within the present life. This is not to say that Jesus would have dissented from their implied picture of post-mortem realities. It is, rather, to point out that to take the scene of Abraham, the Rich Man and Lazarus ‘literally’ is about as sensible as trying to find out the name of the Prodigal Son. Jesus simply didn’t say very much about the future life; he was, after all, primarily concerned to announce that God’s kingdom was coming “on earth as in heaven.” He gave (as we have seen) no fresh teaching on the question of the resurrection, apart from dark hints that it was going to happen, and happen soon, to one person ahead of everyone else; for the rest he was content to reinforce the normal Jewish picture. In the same way, he was not concerned to give any fresh instruction on post-mortem judgment, apart from the strange hints that it was going to be dramatically and horribly anticipated in one particular way, in space-time history, within a generation.

We cannot therefore look to Jesus’s teaching for any fresh detail on whether there really are some who finally reject God and, as it were, have that rejection ratified. All the signs, of course, are that he went along with the normal first-century Jewish perception: there would indeed be such people, with the only surprise being the surprise experienced, by sheep and goats alike, at their fate and at the evidence on which it was based. And the early Christian writers go along with this. Hell, and final judgment, is not a major topic in the letters (though when it comes it is very important, as for instance in Romans 2:1-16); it is not mentioned at all in Acts; and the vivid pictures toward the end of the book of Revelation, while being extremely important, have always proved among the hardest parts of scripture to interpret with any certainty. All this should warn us against the cheerful double dogmatism that has bedeviled discussion of these topics–the dogmatism, that is, both of the person who knows exactly who is and who isn’t “going to hell” and of the universalist who is absolutely certain that there is no such place or that if there is it will, at the last, be empty.

That latter kind of universalism was the normal working assumption of many theologians and clergy in the liberal heyday of the 1960s and 1970s and has remained a fixed point, almost in some cases the fixed point, for many whose thinking was shaped in that period. I well remember, in one of my first tutorials at Oxford, being told by my tutor that he and many others believed that “though hell may exist, it will at the last be untenanted”–in other words, that hell would turn out to be purgatory after all, an unpleasant preparation for eventual bliss.
The merest mention of final judgment has been squeezed out of Christian consciousness in several denominations, including my own, by the cavalier omission of verses from public biblical reading. Whenever you see, in an official lectionary, the command to omit two or three verses, you can normally be sure that they contain words of judgment. Unless, of course, they are about sex.

I’ll be honest and say I didn’t have time to read all of your post in it’s entirety but just out of curiosity you’re not trying to argue that there is no Hell and that Gehenna is just referring to a trash heap and that when we die we turn to nothing because at that point you’re just arguing a Jehovahs Witness belief and at that point it is no longer a Christian argument, you’re not doing that are you?

LittleLambofJesus · Sep 18, 2019

SeventhFisherofMen said:
I’ll be honest and say I didn’t have time to read all of your post in it’s entirety but just out of curiosity you’re not trying to argue that there is no Hell and that Gehenna is just referring to a trash heap and that when we die we turn to nothing because at that point you’re just arguing a Jehovahs Witness belief and at that point it is no longer a Christian argument, you’re not doing that are you?

Nope.................nothing to do with JWs or any other Christian sect/denomination.............
So what is your view of the topic of this thread...........

FWIW, there is also a similar thread on this topic on another board [and thus I will no longer respond on this thread]..........

GEHENNA/HELL "Lake of Fire" "Valley of Hinnon/Slaughter" 1st century Judea/Jerusalem

LittleLambofJesus said:
Our Lord mentions the phrase "gehenna" in Matt 23 and one that I had never really looked closely at until just recently, which is referenced in the Hebrew OT.
[The Jerusalem/Temple Olivet Discourse immediately follows after this chapter.]
Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke's Temple/Jerusalem Discourses harmonized- Poll Thread

G1067 (YLT)
G1067 γέεννα (geenna), occurs 12 times in 12 verses

Matthew 23:
15 'Woe to ye Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!
That ye are going about the sea and the dry to make one proselyte, and whenever he may be becoming,ye are making him a son of gehenna twofold more of yourselves.
33 "Serpents! brood of vipers!
how? ye may be fleeing from the judging<2920> of the Gehenna/
===============================
Below I put up some links as well as a few maps concerning Gehenna/Valley of Hinnon

Hinnom, Valley Of Definition and Meaning - Bible Dictionary

The meaning of "Hinnom" is unknown; the expressions ben Hinnom and bene Hinnom would suggest that it is a proper name; in Jeremiah 7:32; 19:6 it is altered by the prophet to "valley of slaughter," and therefore some have thought the original name must have had a pleasing meaning.

The Valley of Hinnom has been located by different writers in each of the three great valleys of Jerusalem. In favor of the eastern or Kidron valley we have the facts that Eusebius and Jerome (Onom) place "Gehennom" under the eastern wall of Jerusalem and the Moslem geographical writers, Muqaddasi and Nasir-i-khusran, call the Kidron valley Wady Jahamum. The Jewish writer Kimchi also identifies the Valley of Jehoshaphat (i.e. the Kidron) with Hinnom. These ideas are probably due to the identification of the eastern valley, on account of its propinquity to the Temple, as the scene of the last judgment--the "Valley of Jehoshaphat" of Joel 3:2--and the consequent transference there of the scene of the punishment of the wicked, Gehenna, after the ancient geographical position of the Valley of Hinnom, had long been lost. In selecting sacred sites, from the 4th Christian century onward, no critical topographical acumen has been displayed until quite modern times. There are three amply sufficient arguments against this view:

(1) the Kidron valley is always called a nachal and not a gay' (see KIDRON); (2) the "Gate of the Gai" clearly did not lie to the East of the city; (3) En-rogel, which lay at the beginning of the Valley of Hinnom and to its East (Joshua 15:8; 18:16) cannot be the "Virgin's fount," the ancient Gihon (2 Samuel 17:17).

Encyclopedias - International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Hinnom, Valley Of
HINNOM, VALLEY OF

hin'-om (ge hinnom, Joshua 15:8; 18:16; "valley of the son of Hinnom" (ge bhen hinnom), Joshua 15:8; 18:16; 2 Chronicles 28:3; 33:6; Jeremiah 7:31; 19:2,6; 32:35; "valley of the children (sons) of Hinnom" (ge bhene hinnom), 2 Kings 23:10; or simply "the valley," literally, the "hollow" or "ravine" (ha-gay'), 2 Chronicles 26:9; Nehemiah 2:13,15; 3:13; Jeremiah 31:40 and, perhaps also, Jeremiah 2:23 (the above references are in the Hebrew text; there are some variations in the Septuagint)):

The meaning of "Hinnom" is unknown; the expressions ben Hinnom and bene Hinnom would suggest that it is a proper name; in Jeremiah 7:32; 19:6 it is altered by the prophet to "valley of slaughter," and therefore some have thought the original name must have had a pleasing meaning.

The exact location of the Valley of Hinnom is disputed. Older commentaries give the location as below the southern wall of ancient Jerusalem, stretching from the foot of Mount Zion eastward past the Tyropoeon to the Kidron Valley. However the Tyropoeon Valley is usually no longer associated with the Valley of Hinnom because during the period of Ahaz and Manasseh, the Tyropoeon lay within the city walls and child sacrifice would have been practiced outside the walls of the city. Smith (1907),[7] Dalman (1930),[8] Bailey (1986)[9] and Watson (1992)[10] identify the Wadi ar-Rababi, which fits the description of Joshua that Hinnom valley ran east to west and lay outside the city walls. According to Joshua, the valley began at En-rogel. If the modern Bir Ayyub is En-rogel, then Wadi ar-Rababi, which begins there, is Hinnom.[11]
=====================
Jerusalem's Hinnom Valley

Jerusalem's Hinnom Valley marked the western and southern edges of Jerusalem, beginning along the Western Hill and ending where the Tyropean and Kidron Valleys meet. In the Old Testament, it was often the site where people of Judah sacrificed their children to Baal (2 Kings 23:20; 2 Chron. 28:3,4; Jer. 7:31; 19:5, 6; 32:35).

By Jesus' time, the Greek translation of Hinnom Valley, gehenna, became a synonym for hell. Thus the English versions of the Bible translate "Valley of Hinnom" in the New Testament as "hell." With its pagan history and its burning sewer stench, Jerusalem's Hinnom Valley serves as a vivid metaphor for both the Christian and Jewish concept of hell

King Manasseh of Judah added to the negative reputation of the Hinnom Valley by sacrificing some of his own sons in Baal worship there (2 Chron. 33:6). He also practiced sorcery and witchcraft in defiance of God's law. King Josiah, Manasseh's grandson, later destroyed many of these pagan structures and practices. But by that time, Israel was so involved in paganism that God's judgment soon fell upon the people.

Jerusalem's Hinnom Valley also became the perpetual burning-garbage dump and city sewer. Residents sometimes called it the "valley of the sewer" or "the valley of the pagans."
============================
View attachment 260794

View attachment 260790

SeventhFisherofMen · Sep 18, 2019

LittleLambofJesus said:
Nope.................nothing to do with JWs or any other Christian sect/denomination.............
So what is your view of the topic of this thread...........

FWIW, there is also a similar thread on this topic on another board [and thus I will no longer respond on this thread]..........

GEHENNA/HELL "Lake of Fire" "Valley of Hinnon/Slaughter" 1st century Judea/Jerusalem

I’ve never read Gehenna in any Bible translation so I never gave it much thought. As to if I think Gehenna and the Lake of Fire are the same thing no I don’t. I think Hell and The Lake of Fire are different. I do believe however that The Lake of Fire is currently located in Hell and can be seen there but that The Lake of Fire is not yet occupied. It is called the second death in Revelation and is mentioned as where people go after their judgement if they came from Hell (which I think is similar to death as in Death and Hades) they then go to The Lake of Fire which is the second death.

mkgal1 · Sep 18, 2019

LittleLambofJesus said:
As with God’s kingdom, so with its opposite: it is on earth that things matter, not somewhere else. His message to his contemporaries was stark, and (as we would say today) political. Unless they turned back from their hopeless and rebellious dreams of establishing God’s kingdom in their own terms, not least through armed revolt against Rome, then the Roman juggernaut would do what large, greedy and ruthless empires have always done to smaller countries (not least in the Middle East) whose resources they covet or whose strategic location they are anxious to guard. Rome would turn Jerusalem into a hideous, stinking extension of its own smoldering rubbish heap. When Jesus said “Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish,” that is the primary meaning he had in mind.

Thank you for sharing this article by N.T. Wright, LLoJ. I've not read that before (from him).

I just discovered this article the other day that coincides with all this:

Quoting from linked article:
WHAT IS THE SYMBOL OF THE LAKE OF FIRE?
What event in their past does it point to, that the generation that John lived in was in danger of experiencing? Every Israelite, every Jew in that day knew the history from their scriptures. When someone spoke of the greatest fire and brimstone story related to the judgment of a city, it was the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. And do you know where that is? It is the cities around the dead sea… which is a large lake, historically a lake of fire.

Imagine John speaking of the lake of fire to his contemporaries. He would be warning them that just as Sodom and Gomorrah fell, through fiery destruction, they were in danger as a Jewish legalistic system of ending in the same manner. He was pointing to the past, in order to warn them that just as what happened in the past… A SIGN POINTING.

Jude verse 7, uses the illustration of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, to warn the apostate Jews in his day.

Did you know that in the NT era, there were still active fires and smoke around the dead sea according to Strabo, the first century geographer, who called it “a land of fires” (XVI, 764).

A hundred years before Strabo, there is the record of a Jewish author who described the Dead Sea area. “Wisdom saved a man [Lot] from a destruction of the godless, and he escaped the fire that came on the Five Cities, cities whose wickedness, is still attested by a smoking waste” (Wisdom of Solomon 10:7, italics mine).

Diodorus Siculus, who also lived in the 1st century BC said: “The fire which burns beneath the ground and the stench render the inhabitants of the neighboring country sickly and very short lived” (Book II, 48).

A few years later, in the time of Christ’s childhood, the Jewish writer Philo gave witness to the burnings and smoke that was still ascending. “The fire is most difficult to extinguish, and creeps on pervading everything and smoldering. And a most evident proof of this is to be found in what is seen to this day: for the smoke which is still emitted, and the brimstone that men dig up there” (On Abraham XXVII). [References from Associates of Scriptural Knowledge]

BUT… in the Bible IS Jerusalem associated with Sodom? YES!

In Deuteronomy 29:22-24, the book of the Law, was a prophecy that one day they would be overthrown like the burning and brimstone of Sodom and Gomorrah. The prophets multiple times say one day Jerusalem would be overthrown like Sodom and Gomorrah.

Jesus said in Matthew 11:24, "Nevertheless I say to you that it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for you.”

But does Revelation teach that Jerusalem is Sodom? Yes… Revelation 11:8, “And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified.”

So everyone knew that the lake of fire was a symbol of the dead sea lake region of Sodom, and Jude and John pointed back to it saying that was going to happen to Jerusalem.

Did that happen? Yes… in AD 70 fires ravaged the city killing hundreds of thousands.

Among the tragic events that at this time occurred, the following is more particularly deserving of notice: A false prophet, pretending to be a divine commission, said that if the people would flee to the Temple, they should behold signs of their speedy deliverance. Accordingly, about six thousand people, chiefly women and children, assembled in a gallery that was yet standing, on the outside of the building. While they waited in anxious expectation of the promised miracle, the Romans, with the most wanton barbarity, set fire to the gallery. Multitudes, rendered frantic by their horrible situation, threw themselves from the gallery onto the ruins below and were killed by the fall. Meanwhile, awful to relate, the rest, without a single exception, perished in the flames. (Welton, Jonathan (2013-11-01). Raptureless: An Optimistic Guide to the End of the World - Revised Edition Including The Art of Revelation (Kindle Locations 1380-1385). BookBaby. Kindle Edition.)

~ Spiritual Myth-Busters: The Lake of Fire — A New Day Dawning

Gehenna and the Lake of Fire in NT

Is gehenna and lake of fire the same thing?

Yes

No

They appear to be

I don't know

Other

Hebrews 2:14.... Pesky Devil, git!

You cannot fool Jesus

The Librarian

Hebrews 2:14.... Pesky Devil, git!

Well-Known Member

You cannot fool Jesus

Hebrews 2:14.... Pesky Devil, git!

You cannot fool Jesus

Hebrews 2:14.... Pesky Devil, git!

You cannot fool Jesus

His perfect way sets me free. 2 Samuel 22:33

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