Hell, No! An Alternative View of Hell

By Jack Marshall

Hell is, perhaps, the most common and misunderstood subject that one could consider in the Bible. For centuries, we have been plagued by the interpretation that it is a horrific place of torment that all "sinners" will go to after they die. But is this really the case? Is there really a place called hell that only Christians will avoid? Is this really what the Bible teaches, or is there something we are missing due to the fact that tradition has blinded us for so long? This study uses a scripture-based approach to present an alternative view of hell that may surprise you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jack Marshall
• Release date: Jun 7, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310986963

Jack Marshall

I was born in California in 1957, but raised in Oklahoma, where my experience with Christianity began at the age of 19. After several years of attending various denominational and non-denominational churches, my love for the Bible and desire to understand the scriptures became a vital part of my life. Through in-depth study for the past 45 years, I have discovered that the message of scripture is truly one of hope, love, and encouragement for the entire world.

Book preview

HELL, NO!

An Alternative View of Hell

Revised and Expanded

Jack Marshall

Hell, No!

An Alternative View of Hell

Revised and Expanded

Jack Marshall

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2016 Grain of Wheat Publishing

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This free eBook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it

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Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter One: Definitions

Chapter Two: Hades

Chapter Three: Gehenna

Chapter Four: Fire

Chapter Five: The Hell of Fire

Chapter Six: The Rich Man and Lazarus

Chapter Seven: Falling Away

Chapter Eight: More on the Rich Man and Lazarus

Chapter Nine: The Parable of the Rich Fool

Chapter Ten: The Left Hand of God

Bibliography

Introduction

I believe in heaven and hell, but not in the traditional sense.

Jesus said, "You have made the commandment of God of no effect by your tradition (Matt. 15:6; KJV). The strength of tradition often stands on the fact that none of us are willing to question what we have heard or dig deeper into spiritual matters. So if errors exist in what we think, they remain because of our lack of due diligence. But Paul wrote, Test all things; hold fast what is good" (1 Thess. 5:21; NKJV).

I believe that the longstanding idea of hell as being a place of eternal torment has caused many to reject the message of hope that is found in scripture. After all, how can anyone equate the ultimate sacrifice of Christ with the idea of eternal torment and separation from our heavenly Father? If God is truly our Father, and we are all His children, how could He allow even one of us to burn or suffer for an eternity? Would you wish that for your children?

It is my hope in this study to present you with an alternative view of the concept of hell. Does it exist? Yes, but it is not what we have been led to believe.

There are mistakes in this presentation, not by intention, but out of ignorance. I am still and always will be learning. It has been difficult to put aside what I have inherited in order to see from a fresh perspective.

In His Grace,

Jack Marshall

Please note: All Hebrew and Greek definitions are taken from the Strong’s Greek and Hebrew Dictionary unless otherwise noted. All scripture notations are taken from the New King James Version unless otherwise noted.

Revelation 6:8 (KJV)

And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

Chapter One

DEFINITIONS

Who hasn’t heard about hell?

What is hell? Where is hell? Is it really a place of eternal damnation and torment, of untold misery and suffering that lasts forever? If so, who goes there and why? Will Christians avoid hell and everyone else be cast into it because they have not received Jesus Christ as their personal savior? Is that all it really takes to avoid hell? Who is deserving of hell? Who isn’t? How do we really know?

Hell is, perhaps, the most misunderstood subject that one could consider in the Bible. So here is the first problem. Though I will be the first to admit that I love the scripture, God is not restricted by or limited to, our interpretations of what we believe to be right. My faith, your faith, anyone’s faith, is null and void when it is based on something that is simply a product of long-standing tradition established in error. And let’s be honest. Despite our ignorance of this and many other teachings, how many of us have ever taken the time to delve into the matter at hand? How many of us have ever stopped to question why we believe something so contrary to the very essence of Christianity as pictured in the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ?

Revelation 1:18 (KJV)

¹⁸ I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

Let’s consider the Strong’s Definition of the Greek word used for hell in this passage. It is the Greek word Hadēs and reads, "From G1 (a) (as a negative particle) and G1492 (eido); properly unseen, i.e. "Hades or the place (state) of departed souls. Notice how this definition reads. First, we are told it is the product of two other words, G1 and G1492. The word from G1 is a or alpha and simply refers to the first letter of the Greek alphabet. The second word is eidō which means, "Properly to see (literal or figurative). When the second word is used in conjunction with the first as a negative particle, it changes to see to unseen. And from there, can we leave out the i.e." that follows? We should, for it is just an opinion, not a fact, inserted into the concordance by the author, James Strong. So to put it plainly, this word hell or Hades in Revelation 1:18 means "unseen," nothing else.

Matthew 5:29 (NKJV)

²⁹ If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.

Our next definition comes from the first mention of the word hell in the King James New Testament. The Strong’s Concordance reads, "Of Hebrew origin [H1516 (gay') and H2011 (Hinnom)]; valley of (the son of) Hinnom; gehenna (or Ge-Hinnom), a valley of Jerusalem, used (figurative) as a name for the place (or state) of everlasting punishment. So this definition means the valley of Hinnom or the son of Hinnom. Again we must put aside Strong’s opinion of a name for the place (or state) of everlasting punishment."

Our third and final definition of hell is found in 2 Peter 2:4.

2 Peter 2:4 (KJV)

⁴ For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment…

The definition given in the following passage is actually the phrase, cast down to hell, the word them inserted by the translators. The Greek word for this phrase is tartaroō and reads, "From Tartaros (the deepest abyss of Hades); to incarcerate in eternal torment." Consider this treatment from Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament.

Cast them down to hell (ταρταρώσας)

Only here in New Testament. From Τάρταρος, Tartarus. It is strange to find Peter using this Pagan term, which represents the Greek hell, though treated here not as equivalent to Gehenna, but as the place of detention until the judgment.

This word deserves a little more attention. Consider the following from The Complete Biblical Library Greek-English Dictionary.

Classical Greek

Tartaroō is a word of Christian origin based on the term Tartarus (Turner, Christian Words, p. 210). In Greek mythology Tartarus was the place of punishment for the wicked. Homer described it as a black hole, a bottomless pit with iron gates and bronze walls; it was as far below Hades as heaven was above the earth (Iliad 8:13). Thus, Greeks believed Tartarus lay under the earth.

According to mythology, Tartarus was the place in which the Titans, the children of the gods Ouranos and Gaia (Sky and Earth), were confined after they rebelled against the Olympian gods (Zeus, Poseidon, etc.) (Hesiod Theogony 715-722). There they supposedly are kept, bound with chains and hidden in misty gloom. Tartarus was also the place in which the wicked dead were confined and was the opposite of the Elysian Fields. In earlier mythology those in Tartarus were punished solely for having offended the gods, not necessarily for ethical, moral reasons (Rose, Handbook of Greek Mythology, p. 80). Later, however, people were cast into Tartarus for moral misdeeds—treason, abuse of power, offenses against close blood relations, as well as offenses against the gods (ibid., p. 90). Plato described Tartarus as a place under the earth, which was both the origin and goal of all subterranean rivers (Phaed. 112a). Here all sinners were kept, those who committed moral or ethical crimes (Gorgias 523b).

Septuagint Usage

The verb tartaroō does not appear in the Septuagint. The noun tartaros appears a few times. In Job 40:15 (LXX) and 41:23 it is not a deep place under the earth, but the deep, i.e., the sea. In Job 41:23 it is synonymous with abussos (12), the deep. In some manuscripts tartaros appears in Proverbs 24:51 (LXX 30:16). In this passage, it is synonymous with hadēs (85), hell.

The concept of Tartarus as a place of imprisonment appears in noncanonical Jewish literature. Pseudo-philo 60:3 refers to Tartarus as the place where evil spirits walk. The book of First Enoch (Greek text) states that Tartarus is ruled by the archangel Uriel (20:2).

New Testament Usage

This verb is used only in 2 Peter 2:4 in the New Testament. Peter wrote: "God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell (tartarōsas), and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment." This passage was written to Jews of the Diaspora who would have been very familiar with the term Tartarus. They would have understood Peter to say that these fallen angels received the gravest punishment imaginable. This is not to say that the New Testament teaches the existence of the literal Tartarus described in Greek mythology. Rather, the writer used a concept that was meaningful to those who received his epistle.

Adam Clarke states that God cast the apostate angels out of His presence into that zophos tou skotous, blackness of darkness (2 Peter 2:17; Jude 13) where they will be forever banished from the light of His countenance (Clarke’s Commentaries, 6:885).

As we see, there is a lot of speculation here about the meaning of this word. For this reason, I don’t believe we need to consider it. There is a lot of imagination wrapped around this word, but be sure to note the following:

The verb tartaroō does not appear in the Septuagint. The noun tartaros appears a few times. In Job 40:15 (LXX) and 41:23 it is not a deep place under the earth, but the deep, i.e., the sea. In Job 41:23 it is synonymous with abussos (12), the deep. In some manuscripts tartaros appears in Proverbs 24:51 (LXX 30:16). In this passage, it is synonymous with hadēs (85), hell.

I think it would be safe to say that our two main areas of concern are the first two definitions, since with our one exception, they were used by Christ and the apostles in various passages.

In the New Testament, our word hell is used 22 times, 12 referring to the valley of the son of Hinnom (Gehenna) and 10 to unseen (Hades). Once, Hades is translated as the word grave in the King James (1 Cor. 15:55), but removed from other versions.

In the Old Testament, the word hell is used 65 times, and comes from the same Hebrew word every time (Sheol). This definition reads, "She'ol, sheh-ole'; from H7592 (sha'al); hades or the world of the dead (as if a subterranean retreat), including its accessories and inmates. Note that this definition is derived from H7592 which reads, Sha'el, shaw-ale'; a primitive root; to inquire; by implication to request; by extension to demand." The word She'ol is translated