Among them are "
hell," "
hades," "
tartarus," "
sheol," and "
gehenna." The word "
hel" is not a Jewish term. It's not "Christian," either. The same goes for "
hades" and "
tartarus." The terms "
sheol" and "
gehenna" are Jewish terms, but I'll address them separately. The first three terms are pagan terms, terms used in reference to pagan mythologies, not Judaic theology. We read them in our Greek manuscripts of the New Testament but it's doubtful Jesus used these terms, or that if he did use the terms he did so simply to address the pagan mythologies existing in his time relevant to the true truth he taught about what happens on the other side of the grave. Remember, it's likely Jesus taught in Aramaic, not Greek. Jesus may have used terms like "
kukku," "
kur,"
dagon," or names common to the surrounding cultures in the middle east. "
Hades" is a Greek term. It comes from Greek mythology. So is "
tartarus."
Hel is Norse. Jesus may have used the Greek term, but it's not likely he used a Norse term. Possible, not likely. These terms are translations of translations, or more generally recognizable translations of locally familiar terms Jesus used when speaking about the grave, the "underworld," or the places people believed the deceased went when they died.
Sheol and gehenna are different. Sheol is a Jewish term and because of that it is quite likely Jesus used that term and used it most often, simply because it was a Jewish term firmly rooted in the Jewish scriptures, and the one with which his Jewish audience would have been most familiar. However, there are specific connotations relevant to that term that aren't applicable to all the others. I'll cover that after this: "gehenna" was a reference to the trash pit outside of Jerusalem. The valley of Hinnom surrounded a portion of Jerusalem and it was a place where people discarded their refuse. Anyone who has ever visited an old municipal landfill knows the debris there often catches fire. Landfills where the trash is buried have methane vents due to the gases given off through decomposition, and sometimes fire can be seen coming from those vents. The trash burns endlessly, or seemingly so.
Sheol is entirely different. Mostly. In traditional Judaism "the dead know nothing." The ancient Jewish theology held this life was all there is an after that there was nothing. It was during the intertestamental period that the belief in an afterlife or a resurrection became substantive in Jewish theology, but even then it was not the norm. This belief in life after death was one of the matters that separated the Pharisees from the Sadducees. The Pharisees were a minority. The prevailing Jewish point of view was death was final.
The scriptures that allude to a life aside from the grave are part of the veiled soteriological and eschatological texts later revealed more substantively in the New Testament, the newer revelation. The gospel was preached to Abraham. David understood a resurrection would come and he understood God would be present in the depths; there was no place God would not be for His own. But this was not orthodox Jewish theology.
So in the pagan views, the pagan religions, the pagan mythologies, there was a life after death, but it was a miserable existence living in the underworld ruled by a lesser god. The only exception was the possibility of being elevated in status to live among the gods in places like the Elysian Fields or Valhalla. That was for a privileged few. And then there was the nihilistic nothing of sheol.
Jesus spoke to all these conditions, likely using very diverse terms familiar to his first century audience, but he also taught something MUCH different than all of them.
I'll cover that in my next post but this one is lengthy and the misses is summoning me
.
