Hell...

[bratchaman]

Biblical concept of eternal seperation from God or lake full of fire and torment OR both?

When raised a young Christian in church, I was always taught and believed that Hell was a true lake of fire and torments. Now that I have grown in my faith and become a studious Christian in the path of truth, I began to read other verses that described hell as seperation from God (which is true in either case).

My question as posed above is: Is Hell only an eternal seperation from God? I can see how this could be the case since such seperation would be analogous to burning with torment since the creator is eternally out of view.
Or is Hell spiritually a lake of fire, lava, and the such that will eternally torment the people who rejected Jesus and, thus, God himself?

After posing the question and my thought, I can also view how they can be considered one and the same. My motivation for this post was to get any insight from other Christians with diverse background and world view.
May Christ eternally be with us all and may his name be spread throughtout the nations. Amen.

 

[RVincent]

Here are various words that have been translated or interpreted as "hell". Much of what we hear, or translations that we read today, have been brought about by Greek mythology.

1. sheol: "The first occurrence of this word is in Genesis 37:35, where it is rendered "grave". It occurs sixty-five times in the Hebrew of the Old Testament; and only by studying each passage by itself can the student hope to gather the Biblical usage of the word. All heathen or traditional usages are not only worthless, but mischievous."

"As meaning "THE grave," it is to be distinguished from keber, A grave, or burying-place (from kabar, to bury, first occurrence Genesis 23:4): and bõr, a pit, generally hewn in the rock, hence used of a cistern (Genesis 37:20) or a dugeon, and etc., when dry."

2. gehenna: This was a garbage pit outside Jerusalem, upon which the bodies of dead animals were cast. This is the ultimate in degredation, and is the analogy in Luke 16 with the rich man and Lazarus...a gulf separating those who overcome from those who don't. THE Judgement does not take place till after the millenium (Rev. 20). 2 Ezra 7:79-87 explains why these people are in torment.

3. tataroo: a special holding place for the angels that left their habitation (Jude 1:6), translated "hell" in 2 Pet. 2:4.

4. the lake of fire: Where the second death (Rev. 20:14) takes place. Satan himself is destroyed in this.

(Ezek 28:18-19) Thou hast defiled thy sanctuaries by the multitude of thine iniquities, by the iniquity of thy traffic; therefore will I bring forth a fire from the midst of thee, it shall devour thee, and I will bring thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee. {19} All they that know thee among the people shall be astonished at thee: thou shalt be a terror, and never shalt thou be any more.​

(Rev 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.
​

tormented: from Gr. basanos, a touch-stone, being used to test a person's endurance. We read of how well Satan will endure this...he won't. And when something is consumed with fire from the inside out, and devoured, it remains devoured...for ever and ever.

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

http://www.oca.org/pages/orth_chri/Orthodox-Faith/Spirituality/Heaven-and-Hell.html

 

[James1979]

Unbelievers will be thrown in the lake of fire and will experience torment for an eternity.

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.

Remember that God made man his image, since God is eternal and never cease to exist, our souls are eternal and will never stop to exist.

 

[In Christ Forever]

I have done some studying on the hellfire mentioned both in the Gospels and Revelation. God always mentioned a time of "testing or trial" as if through fire. The Lake of Fire almost appears to resemble a "city burning". This has opened my eyes to a way of looking at the bible that I have never looked at before and why I love studying the Bible.

The parable of Lazarus and the Richman[Luke 16:20] symbolizes the gentiles in the bosom of Abraham [he dies but is not buried but carried by angels], while the Richman appears to be the apostate jewish rulers[he dies and is buried] and is shown in "flames of torment". This appears to symbolize a "testing or trial" also I believe.

John the Baptist and Jesus used these "hellfire" in the gospels, they used language familiar to the Jews whom they taught. The Jews had heard this language no other way than in scenes of national judgment. While it is easy for us to read these passages in the New Testament from the point of view of enduring conscious punishment, we should read them as the Jews who heard them first. They had heard them in no other way than national judgment as used in the Prophets.

Psalm 11.6 spoke of fire and brimstone on the wicked, Ezk. 38.22 used this language to speak of national judgment on Gog, a pagan nation opposed to God's people in the restoration after Babylonian captivity. In Rev. 14.9-11, John used fire and brimstone of national judgment on the empire attempting to eradicate the Messiah's people. Scripture uses this language only of national judgment.

Notice that Jesus specifically said what hell is—it's unquenchable fire. John the Baptist said he would baptize with unquenchable fire, not necessarily fire that would burn unendingly, but which would not be quenched. Unquenchable fire is unstoppable! It's fiery destruction brought about by a divine being. In Ezk. 20.47-48, God promised such a national judgment on Judah:

Hear the word of the Lord: Thus says the Lord God, Behold, I am about to kindle a fire in you, and it shall consume every green tree in you, as well as every dry tree; the blazing flame will not be quenched, and the whole surface from south to north will be burned by it. And all flesh will see that I, the Lord, have kindled it; it shall not be quenched.

Although Jesus didn't define hell here either, he taught the same thing John taught in Mt. 3.10-12, that only a divine being has the power to cast someone into unquenchable fire. A human can kill you. A divine being can imminently bring an unstoppable national judgment in which a divinely ordained religion would be brought to an end. Notice also in verse 49 that Jesus said:

I came to cast fire upon the earth; and what do I desire, if it is already kindled?

The fiery judgment of which Jesus spoke was not far off in time and place, but imminent and earthly. In verse 56, Jesus noted that the judgment of which he spoke was imminent, for he said:

Ye hypocrites, ye know how to interpret the face of the earth and the heaven; but how is it that ye know not how to interpret this time?

The word for earth in both these verses is gen, the standard word for land or ground, not necessarily the planet, which we might think. Thayer defined the word as:

1. arable land, 2. the ground, the earth as a standing place, 3. land, as opposed to sea or water, 4. the earth as a whole, the world. (p. 114)

In Mal. 3.1-5, we read a prophecy, quoted in Mt. 11.10 by Jesus, and applied to John the Baptist:

[size=+1]Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts. But who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth?for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness. Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in former years. And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts.[/size]

Isaiah mentions a convenant made with Death and Hades. This is also referring to the jewish rulers in Jerusalem.
Isaiah 28:14 Therefore hear the word of the LORD, you scornful men, Who rule this people who [are] in Jerusalem, 15 Because you have said, "We have made a covenant with Death, And with Hades we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, It will not come to us, For we have made lies our refuge, And under falsehood we have hidden ourselves." 16 Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Behold, I lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, A tried stone, a

Here it shows God is putting it into the minds of the 10 kings to utterly destroy the "Harlot". So it is God bringing the judgement on this "Great City" using an army as he did with the King of Babylon[His servant] in the OT. Pretty fascinating.

revel 17:16 "And the ten horns which you saw on the beast, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh and burn her with fire. 17 "For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled.18 "And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth."

Jeremiah 3:8 "Then I saw that for all the causes for which backsliding Israel [10 northern scattered tribes] had committed adultery, I had put Her away and given Her a certificate of divorce; yet her Treacherous Sister Judah[2 southern tribes] did not fear, but went and played the Harlot also.

 

[In Christ Forever]

Biblical concept of eternal seperation from God or lake full of fire and torment OR both?

When raised a young Christian in church, I was always taught and believed that Hell was a true lake of fire and torments. Now that I have grown in my faith and become a studious Christian in the path of truth, I began to read other verses that described hell as seperation from God (which is true in either case).

My question as posed above is: Is Hell only an eternal seperation from God? I can see how this could be the case since such seperation would be analogous to burning with torment since the creator is eternally out of view.

Paul always said the result of sin was death. He never actually mentioned a hellfire like Jesus did, but then he was writing his epistles to believers and followers, maybe that is the difference.

Jeremiah 19: Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of slaughter; for they shall burn in Tophet, till there be no peace.

Notice the mention of Topheth, "the place of burning" again. Isaiah also spoke of Topheth this way in Isa. 30.33, when he warned the pro-Egypt party among the Jews (i.e., those trusting in Egypt for their salvation from Babylon rather than God) of a fiery judgment coming on them. In Jer. 19.11-14, Jeremiah gave this pronouncement of judgment by Babylon on Jerusalem at the valley of Hinnom:

And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink offerings unto other gods.
From these passages we can see that, to the Jews, the valley of Hinnom, or Topheth, from which the New Testament concept of gehenna arose, came to mean a place of burning, a valley of slaughter, and a place of calamitous fiery judgment. Thus, Thayer in his Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, said, concerning gehenna:

Gehenna, the name of a valley on the S. and E. of Jerusalem . . . which was so called from the cries of the little children who were thrown into the fiery arms of Moloch, i.e., of an idol having the form of a bull. The Jews so abhorred the place after these horrible sacrifices had been abolished by king Josiah (2 Kings xxiii.10), that they cast into it not only all manner of refuse, but even the dead bodies of animals and of unburied criminals who had been executed. And since fires were always needed to consume the dead bodies, that the air might not become tainted by the putrefaction, it came to pass that the place was called gehenna.

One interesting parallel I found concerning the devil, is what Jesus referred to the jewish religious rulers[not the regular jewish people or "lost sheep"]. This is the only time a reference of the devil was to a particular group or person. Just quoting from the bible. Any views?

44 "You are of [your] father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and [does not] stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own [resources,] for he is a liar and the father of it.

reve 20:10 The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet [are.] And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

Malachi 2:1 "And now, O priests, this commandment is for you. 2 If you will not hear, And if you will not take [it] to heart, To give glory to My name," Says the LORD of hosts, "I will send a curse upon you, And I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have cursed them already, Because you do not take [it] to heart. 3

 

[In Christ Forever]

[size=+1]Hades Used of National Judgment[/size]

Like its companion word in the Old Testament, hades was also plainly used of national judgments in the New Testament. In Mt. 11.23 and Lk. 10.15, Jesus said Capernaum would go down into hades, i.e., it was going to vanish. In Mt. 12.41 and Lk. 11.29-32, Jesus said his generation of Jews was going to fall.

About hades in Greek mythology, Edward Fudge said:

In Greek mythology Hades was the god of the underworld, then the name of the nether world itself. Charon ferried the souls of the dead across the rivers Styx or Acheron into this abode, where the watchdog Cerberus guarded the gate so none might escape.

The pagan myth contained all the elements for medieval eschatology: there was the pleasant Elyusium, the gloomy and miserable Tartarus, and even the Plains of Asphodel, where ghosts could wander who were suited for neither of the above . . . The word hades came into biblical usage when the Septuagint translators chose it to represent the Hebrew sheol, an Old Testament concept vastly different from the pagan Greek notions just outlined. Sheol, too, received all the dead . . . but the Old Testament has no specific division there involving either punishment or reward. (Edward William Fudge, The Fire That Consumes [Houston: Providential Press, 1982], p. 205.)

We need to make sure that our ideas concerning hades come from the Bible and not Greek mythology. We have no problem using sheol the way the Old Testament used it, or hades, as the New Testament used it. Both refer to the dead who are unseen, and to national judgments.

Isaiah 28:14 Therefore hear the word of the LORD, you scornful men, Who rule this people who [are] in Jerusalem, 15 Because you have said, "We have made a covenant with Death, And with Hades we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, It will not come to us, For we have made lies our refuge, And under falsehood we have hidden ourselves." 16 Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Behold, I lay in Zion a stone for a foundation, A tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation; Whoever believes will not act hastily. 17 Also I will make justice the measuring line, And righteousness the plummet; The hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, And the waters will overflow the hiding place.

Revel 20:14 Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.