Where is hell? (page 3)

Well, I know that some ancient Jews conceived of Sheol or Gehenna as occupying a specific location. The Book of Watchers in 1 Enoch, for example, gives a very elaborate geography of the physical world, its extremities, heaven, and the chambers of Sheol -- placing the latter in subterranean pits underneath the rocks. The older Canaanite and Babylonian cosmology also placed the underworld below the surface of the earth -- one text I recall depicts the sun goddess Shapsh making her nightly voyage through the underworld between sunset and sunrise. The ancients did not have a heliocentric concept of earth; where else did the sun go at night than through the underworld below our feet so that it would rise the following morning in the east? The same thing can be found in the Epic of Gilgamesh where the hero must travel through the underworld to reach the farthest regions in the east, where the sun makes its appearance in the morning. In Babylonian religion, the sun god was the god of wisdom and knowledge precisely because he can see both what happens on the earth and what happens in the underworld. Later sources seem to have a more metaphysical concept of Gehenna or Sheol than locating it in a specific place, although there is still a general contrast with heaven being up and the underworld being down.

startingover

Thanks Leolaia

Intersting stuff.

Narkissos

It might be worth noting that the Jerusalem topography from which the word "Gehenna" derives (ge' [ben] Hinnom, "valley of the son of Hinnom," name of a ravine South of the city) is still present in some eschatological descriptions, so that it is quite difficult to tell exactly where the literal, local sense ends and where a "purely" metaphorical, non-local sense begins. The key text is Isaiah 66:22ff, where the pilgrims coming over and over again to the Jerusalem temple in the "new world" ("new heavens and new earth") are supposed to see the corpses of the enemies, miraculously maintained as a permanent remembrance: "From new moon to new moon, and from sabbath to sabbath, all flesh shall come to worship before me, says Yhwh. And they shall go out and look at the dead bodies of the people who have rebelled against me; for their worm shall not die, their fire shall not be quenched, and they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." To an extent the same local context is echoed in some eschatological descriptions although it is no longer corpses, but people, that are being burned, e.g. 1 Enoch 90:26f (the "Animal Apocalypse") where the "blind sheep" are hurled into a fiery abyss opened "on the right of the House," i.e. at the South of the Temple. One might possibly assume a similar connection between the "lake of fire" and the "New Jerusalem" in Revelation 21. Of course the multiplicity of descriptions and metaphors for "hell" in Jewish and Christian literature (e.g. "outer darkness" in the Gospels) prevents any consistent localisation, but it still remains that, in many cases, some localisation is implied.

My memories are vague, but I seem to remember an odd Watchtower insistence that "she'ol" was a "place" and not a "condition" (imo an abstract "condition" would have better suited their idea of the dead as non-existent). I doubt they would have said the same thing about Gehenna though.

worldtraveller

Since this planet is doomed someday, I will say welcome to hell. Enjoy it while you can.

jaguarbass

Hell is underneath the ground.

There is a whole 'nother world there....with lots of secret tunnels.

I agree with cameo. It is also under the sea.

The gods are reptile like, They come from Nibiru which comes by our sun once every 3600 years.

They live underground on Nibiru. They also live underground on earth.

There are many tunnels under Washington Dc.

The Gods are reptiles they dont like the sun.

Where is hell?

Sad emo

startingover

Leolaia

startingover

Narkissos

worldtraveller

jaguarbass

JimmyPage

parakeet

parakeet

Share this