Gehenna ( ; ) or Gehinnom ( or ) is a Biblical toponym that has acquired various theological connotations, including as a place of divine punishment, in

Jewish eschatology Jewish eschatology is the area of Jewish philosophy, Jewish theology concerned with events that will happen in the Eschatology, end of days and related concepts. This includes the ingathering of the exiled Jewish diaspora, diaspora, the coming ...

. The place is first mentioned in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' Judah and

Benjamin Benjamin ( ''Bīnyāmīn''; "Son of (the) right") blue letter bible: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/h3225/kjv/wlc/0-1/ H3225 - yāmîn - Strong's Hebrew Lexicon (kjv) was the younger of the two sons of Jacob and Rachel, and Jacob's twe ...

( Joshua 15:8). During the late

First Temple period The history of ancient Israel and Judah spans from the early appearance of the Israelites in Canaan's hill country during the late second millennium BCE, to the establishment and subsequent downfall of the two Israelite kingdoms in the mid- ...

, it was the site of the

Tophet In the Hebrew Bible, Tophet or Topheth (; ; ) is a location in Jerusalem in the Valley of Hinnom (Gehenna), where worshipers engaged in a ritual involving "passing a child through the fire", most likely child sacrifice. Traditionally, the sacrifice ...

, where some of the kings of Judah had sacrificed their children by fire ( Jeremiah 7:31). Thereafter, it was cursed by the biblical prophet

Jeremiah Jeremiah ( – ), also called Jeremias, was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewish tradition, Jeremiah authored the Book of Jeremiah, book that bears his name, the Books of Kings, and the Book of Lamentations, with t ...

( Jeremiah 19:2– 6). In later

rabbinic literature Rabbinic literature, in its broadest sense, is the entire corpus of works authored by rabbis throughout Jewish history. The term typically refers to literature from the Talmudic era (70–640 CE), as opposed to medieval and modern rabbinic ...

, "Gehinnom" became associated with divine punishment as the destination of the wicked for the

atonement Atonement, atoning, or making amends is the concept of a person taking action to correct previous wrongdoing on their part, either through direct action to undo the consequences of that act, equivalent action to do good for others, or some othe ...

of their sins. The term is different from the more neutral term

Sheol Sheol ( ; ''Šəʾōl'', Tiberian: ''Šŏʾōl'') in the Hebrew Bible is the underworld place of stillness and darkness which is death. Within the Hebrew Bible, there are few—often brief and nondescript—mentions of Sheol, seemingly descri ...

, the abode of the dead. The

King James Version The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version (AV), is an Early Modern English Bible translations, Early Modern English translation of the Christianity, Christian Bible for the Church of England, wh ...

of the

Bible The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...

translates both with the

Anglo-Saxon The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...

word ''

hell In religion and folklore, hell is a location or state in the afterlife in which souls are subjected to punishment after death. Religions with a linear divine history sometimes depict hells as eternal destinations, such as Christianity and I ...

''.

Etymology

The

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' or "Valley of Hinnom" (). In

Mishnaic Hebrew Mishnaic Hebrew () is the Hebrew language used in Talmudic texts. Mishnaic Hebrew can be sub-divided into Mishnaic Hebrew proper (c. 1–200 CE, also called Tannaim, Tannaitic Hebrew, Early Rabbinic Hebrew, or Mishnah, Mishnaic Hebrew I), which w ...

and

Judeo-Aramaic languages The Judaeo-Aramaic languages are those varieties of Aramaic and Neo-Aramaic languages used by Jewish communities. Early use Aramaic, like Hebrew, is a Northwest Semitic language, and the two share many features. From the 7th century BCE, Ara ...

, the name was contracted into ''Gēhīnnōm'' () or ''Gēhīnnām'' () meaning "hell". The name "Gehenna" derives from the

Koine Greek Koine Greek (, ), also variously known as Hellenistic Greek, common Attic, the Alexandrian dialect, Biblical Greek, Septuagint Greek or New Testament Greek, was the koiné language, common supra-regional form of Greek language, Greek spoken and ...

transliteration () found in the

New Testament The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus, as well as events relating to Christianity in the 1st century, first-century Christianit ...

.Jones, Daniel; Roach, Peter, James Hartman and Jane Setter, eds. ''Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary''. 17th edition. Cambridge UP, 2006.

Geography

The exact location of the Valley of Hinnom is disputed.

George Adam Smith :''Note in particular that this George Smith is to be distinguished from George Smith (Assyriologist) (1840–1876) who researched in some overlapping areas.'' Sir George Adam Smith (19 October 1856 – 3 March 1942) was a Scottish th ...

wrote in 1907 that there are three possible locations considered by historical writers: * East of the Old City (today identified as the

Valley of Josaphat The Valley of Josaphat (; variants: Valley of Jehoshaphat and Valley of Yehoshephat) is a Biblical place mentioned by name in the Book of Joel ( and ): "I will gather together all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Josaphat: "The ...

) * Within the Old City (today identified as the Tyropoeon Valley): Many commentaries give the location as below the southern wall of ancient Jerusalem, stretching from the foot of

Mount Zion Mount Zion (, ''Har Ṣīyyōn''; , ''Jabal Sahyoun'') is a hill in Jerusalem, located just outside the walls of the Old City (Jerusalem), Old City to the south. The term Mount Zion has been used in the Hebrew Bible first for the City of David ( ...

eastward past the Tyropoeon Valley to the

Kidron Valley The Kidron Valley ( classical transliteration, ''Cedron'', from , ''Naḥal Qidron'', literally Qidron River; also Qidron Valley) is a valley originating slightly northeast of the Old City of Jerusalem, which then separates the Temple Mount fro ...

. However, the Tyropoeon Valley is usually no longer associated with the Valley of Hinnom because during the period of

Ahaz Ahaz (; ''Akhaz''; ) an abbreviation of Jehoahaz II (of Judah), "Yahweh has held" (; ''Ya'úḫazi'' 'ia-ú-ḫa-zi'' Hayim Tadmor and Shigeo Yamada, ''The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III (744-727 BC) and Shalmaneser V (726-722 BC), ...

and

Manasseh Manasseh () is both a given name and a surname. Its variants include Manasses and Manasse. Notable people with the name include: Surname * Ezekiel Saleh Manasseh (died 1944), Singaporean rice and opium merchant and hotelier * Jacob Manasseh ( ...

, the Tyropoeon lay within the city walls and child sacrifice would have been practiced outside the walls of the city. * Wadi ar-Rababi: Dalman (1930), Bailey (1986) and Watson (1992) identify the Wadi al-Rababi, which fits the description of Joshua that the Hinnom Valley ran east to west and lay outside the city walls. According to Joshua, the valley began at

Ein Rogel Ein Rogel (Hebrew: ''ʿĒn Rōgēl'') is a spring on the outskirts of Jerusalem, mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. It is most commonly identified as what Arabs refer to as Well of Job ( ''Bir Ayoub'') in Silwan, though some scholars dispute this v ...

. If the modern Bir Ayyub in

Silwan Silwan or Siloam (; ; ) is a predominantly Palestinian district in East Jerusalem, on the southeastern outskirts of the current Old City of Jerusalem.Child sacrifice Child sacrifice is the ritualistic killing of children in order to please or appease a deity, supernatural beings, or sacred social order, tribal, group or national loyalties in order to achieve a desired result. As such, it is a form of human ...

at other Tophets contemporary with the Bible accounts (700–600 BCE) of the reigns of

and

has been established, such as the bones of children sacrificed at the Tophet to the goddess

Tanit Tanit or Tinnit (Punic language, Punic: 𐤕𐤍𐤕 ''Tīnnīt'' (JStor)) was a chief deity of Ancient Carthage; she derives from a local Berber deity and the consort of Baal Hammon. As Ammon is a local Libyan deity, so is Tannit, who represents ...

in Phoenician

Carthage Carthage was an ancient city in Northern Africa, on the eastern side of the Lake of Tunis in what is now Tunisia. Carthage was one of the most important trading hubs of the Ancient Mediterranean and one of the most affluent cities of the classic ...

, and also child sacrifice in ancient Syria-Palestine. Scholars such as Mosca (1975) have concluded that the sacrifice recorded in the Hebrew Bible, such as Jeremiah's comment that the worshippers of

Baal Baal (), or Baʻal, was a title and honorific meaning 'owner' or 'lord Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power (social and political), power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The ...

had "filled this place with the blood of innocents", is literal. Yet, the biblical words in the Book of Jeremiah describe events taking place in the seventh century in the place of Ben-Hinnom: "Because they he Israeliteshave forsaken Me and have made this an alien place and have burned sacrifices in it to other gods, that neither they nor their forefathers nor the kings of Judah had ever known, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, a thing which I never commanded or spoke of, nor did it ever enter My mind; therefore, behold, days are coming", declares the Lord, "when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of Ben-Hinnom, but rather the valley of Slaughter". J. Day, Heider, and Mosca believe that the

Moloch Moloch, Molech, or Molek is a word which appears in the Hebrew Bible several times, primarily in the Book of Leviticus. The Greek Septuagint translates many of these instances as "their king", but maintains the word or name ''Moloch'' in others, ...

cult Cults are social groups which have unusual, and often extreme, religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals. Extreme devotion to a particular person, object, or goal is another characteristic often ascribed to cults. The term ...

took place in the valley of Hinnom at the Topheth. No archaeological evidence such as mass children's graves has been found; however, it has been suggested that such a find may be compromised by the heavy population history of the Jerusalem area compared to the Tophet found in Tunisia. The site would also have been disrupted by the actions of Josiah "And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech." (2 Kings 23). A minority of scholars have attempted to argue that the Bible does not portray actual child sacrifice, but only dedication to the god by fire; however, they are judged to have been "convincingly disproved" (Hay, 2011). There is evidence however that the southwest shoulder of this valley (

Ketef Hinnom Ketef Hinnom () is an archaeological site discovered in the 1970s southwest of the Old City of Jerusalem. Archaeological excavations held at the site uncovered a series of Iron Age period Judahite burial chambers, dating to the 7th and 6th cent ...

) was a burial location with numerous burial chambers that were reused by generations of families from as early as the seventh until the fifth century BCE. The use of this area for tombs continued into the first centuries BCE and CE. By 70 CE, the area was not only a burial site but also a place for

cremation Cremation is a method of Disposal of human corpses, final disposition of a corpse through Combustion, burning. Cremation may serve as a funeral or post-funeral rite and as an alternative to burial. In some countries, including India, Nepal, and ...

of the dead with the arrival of the Tenth

Roman Legion The Roman legion (, ) was the largest military List of military legions, unit of the Roman army, composed of Roman citizenship, Roman citizens serving as legionary, legionaries. During the Roman Republic the manipular legion comprised 4,200 i ...

, who were the only group known to practice cremation in this region.

The concept of Gehinnom

Judaism

Hebrew Bible

The oldest historical reference to “the Valley of the Son of Hinnom” is found in the

Book of Joshua The Book of Joshua is the sixth book in the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament, and is the first book of the Deuteronomistic history, the story of Israel from the conquest of Canaan to the Babylonian captivity, Babylonian exile. It tells of the ...

( and ) which describe tribal boundaries. The following reference to the valley is at the time of King

of Judah, who, according to , “burnt incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and burnt his children in the fire”. Later, in , it is said that Ahaz's grandson, king

Manasseh of Judah Manasseh (; Hebrew: ''Mənaššé'', "Forgetter"; ''Menasî'' 'me-na-si-i'' ''Manasses''; ) was the fourteenth king of the Kingdom of Judah. He was the oldest of the sons of Hezekiah and Hephzibah (). He became king at the age of 12 and re ...

, also “caused his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom”. Debate remains as to whether the phrase "cause his children to pass through the fire" referred to a religious ceremony in which the Moloch priest would walk the child between two lanes of fire, or to literal

child sacrifice Child sacrifice is the ritualistic killing of children in order to please or appease a deity, supernatural beings, or sacred social order, tribal, group or national loyalties in order to achieve a desired result. As such, it is a form of human ...

wherein the child is thrown into the fire. The

Book of Isaiah The Book of Isaiah ( ) is the first of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Major Prophets in the Christian Old Testament. It is identified by a superscription as the words of the 8th-century BC prophet Isaiah ben Amo ...

does not mention Gehenna by name, but the "burning place" () in which the Assyrian army is to be destroyed, may be read in Hebrew as "Topheth". Similarly, describes the bodies of sinners burning near Jerusalem. During the reign of

Josiah Josiah () or Yoshiyahu was the 16th king of Judah (–609 BCE). According to the Hebrew Bible, he instituted major religious reforms by removing official worship of gods other than Yahweh. Until the 1990s, the biblical description of Josiah’s ...

condemned the Topheth worship which was conducted in the Hinnom valley (, ).

destroyed the shrine of

on Topheth to prevent anyone sacrificing children there (). Despite Josiah's ending of the practice, Jeremiah prophesied that Jerusalem itself would be made like Gehenna and Topheth (, ). A purely geographical reference appears in : the exiles returning from Babylon encamped from

Beersheba Beersheba ( / ; ), officially Be'er-Sheva, is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Often referred to as the "Capital of the Negev", it is the centre of the fourth-most populous metropolitan area in Israel, the eighth-most p ...

to Hinnom.

Targums (Aramaic translations)

The

Targum A targum (, ''interpretation'', ''translation'', ''version''; plural: targumim) was an originally spoken translation of the Hebrew Bible (also called the ) that a professional translator ( ''mǝṯurgǝmān'') would give in the common language o ...

s (ancient Jewish paraphrase-translations of the Hebrew Bible) frequently supply the term "Gehinnom" to verses touching upon resurrection, judgment, and the fate of the wicked. For example,

Targum Jonathan The Targum Jonathan () is the Aramaic translation of the Nevi'im section of the Hebrew Bible employed in Lower Mesopotamia ("Babylonia"). It is not to be confused with "Targum Pseudo-Jonathan," an Aramaic translation of the Torah. It is often kn ...

to interprets the Biblical phrase "they the corpses of sinnersshall be an abhorrence to all flesh" as "the evildoers shall be judged in Gehenna until the righteous say of them: We have seen enough".

Rabbinical Judaism

Gehinnom became a figurative name for the place of spiritual purification for the wicked dead in Judaism. According to most Jewish sources, the period of purification or punishment is limited to only 12 months and every

Sabbath In Abrahamic religions, the Sabbath () or Shabbat (from Hebrew ) is a day set aside for rest and worship. According to the Book of Exodus, the Sabbath is a day of rest on the seventh day, Ten Commandments, commanded by God to be kept as a Holid ...

day is excluded from punishment, while the fires of Gehinnom are banked and its tortures are suspended. For the duration of Shabbat, the spirits who are serving time there are released to roam the earth. At

Motza'ei Shabbat The term Motza'ei Shabbat (—literally, the going out of the Sabbath) in Judaism refers to the time in the evening immediately following Shabbat, that is Saturday night. It is a time when, following one's declaration of the intention to end Shabba ...

, the angel Dumah, who has charge over the souls of the wicked, herds them back for another week of torment. After this the soul will move on to Olam Ha-Ba (the world to come), be destroyed, or continue to exist in a state of consciousness of remorse. In classic

rabbinic Rabbinic Judaism (), also called Rabbinism, Rabbinicism, Rabbanite Judaism, or Talmudic Judaism, is rooted in the many forms of Judaism that coexisted and together formed Second Temple Judaism in the land of Israel, giving birth to classical rabb ...

sources, Gehinnom occasionally occurs as a place of punishment or destruction of the wicked. Rabbi

Joshua ben Levi Joshua ben Levi or Yehoshua ben Levi (220 – 250 CE) was an amora—a scholar of Jewish law during the period in which the Gemara was codified—who lived in the Land of Israel in the first half of the third century. He lived and taught in the ...

is said to have wandered through Gehenna, like

Dante Dante Alighieri (; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer, and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called ...

, under the guidance of the angel Duma. Joshua describes seven chambers of Gehenna, each one presided over by a famous sinner from Jewish history, and populated by deceased sinners suffering brutal punishments. According to another rabbinic story, the ancient Israelite leader

Jair In the Hebrew Bible, Biblical Book of Judges, Jair or Yair ( ''Yā’īr'', "he enlightens") was a man from Gilead. He was of the Tribe of Manasseh and also descended from the Tribe of Judah (Numbers 32:39-41, 1 Chronicles 2:21-23). Jair Hebrew ...

once threatened to burn alive those individuals who refused to worship Baal. In response, God sent the angel Nathaniel, who rescued the individuals and declared to Jair that "you will die, and die by fire, a fire in which you will abide forever." Rabbinic texts contain various answers to the questions of who suffers in Gehenna and for how long. According to the

Tosefta The Tosefta ( "supplement, addition") is a compilation of Jewish Oral Law from the late second century, the period of the Mishnah and the Jewish sages known as the '' Tannaim''. Background Jewish teachings of the Tannaitic period were cha ...

, normal sinners are punished in Gehenna for 12 months, after which their souls leave Gehenna and turn into dust; while heretics, those who abandon the community (''porshim midarkhei tzibur''), and those who cause the masses to sin, suffer in Gehenna eternally. The

Talmud The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of Haskalah#Effects, modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cen ...

states that all who enter Gehenna eventually leave it, except for adulterers, those who humiliate others in public, and those who call others by derogatory names. The traditional explanation that a burning rubbish heap in the Valley of Hinnom south of Jerusalem gave rise to the idea of a fiery Gehenna of judgment is attributed to Rabbi

David Kimhi ''Cervera Bible'', David Kimhi's Grammar Treatise David Kimhi (, also Kimchi or Qimḥi) (1160–1235), also known by the Hebrew acronym as the RaDaK () (Rabbi David Kimhi), was a medieval rabbi, biblical commentator, philosopher, and grammarian ...

(). He maintained that historically, in this valley fires were kept burning perpetually to consume the filth and cadavers thrown into it; therefore, the judgment of the evil after death was metaphorically named after the valley. While this claim is logically plausible, there is no direct archaeological nor literary evidence for it.

Maimonides Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (, ) and also referred to by the Hebrew acronym Rambam (), was a Sephardic rabbi and Jewish philosophy, philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah schola ...

declares, in his 13 principles of faith, that the descriptions of Gehinnom as a place of punishment in rabbinic literature, were pedagogically motivated inventions to encourage respect of the

Torah The Torah ( , "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The Torah is also known as the Pentateuch () ...

commandments by mankind, which had been regarded as immature.Maimonides’ Introduction to Perek Helek, ed. and transl. by

Maimonides Heritage Center The Maimonides Heritage Center (MHC) (Hebrew: מרכז מורשת הרמב"ם) is an educational and cultural non-profit organization in the Israeli city of Tiberias. Established in 2003 by Rabbi Yamin Levy, it works to disseminate the teachings an ...

, p. 3–4. Instead of being sent to Gehenna, the souls of the wicked would actually get annihilated.Maimonides’ Introduction to Perek Helek, ed. and transl. by

, pp. 22–23.

Christianity

Ethiopian Orthodox Old Testament

Frequent references to "Gehenna" are also made in the books of

Meqabyan Meqabyan (, also transliterated as or ), also referred to as Ethiopian Maccabees and Ethiopic Maccabees, are three books found only in the Ethiopian Orthodox Old Testament Biblical canon. The language of composition of these books is Geʽez, als ...

, which are considered

canonical The adjective canonical is applied in many contexts to mean 'according to the canon' the standard, rule or primary source that is accepted as authoritative for the body of knowledge or literature in that context. In mathematics, ''canonical exampl ...

in the

Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church () is the largest of the Oriental Orthodox Churches. One of the few Christian churches in Africa originating before European colonization of the continent, the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church dates bac ...

New Testament

In the King James Version of the Bible, the term appears 13 times in 11 different verses as Valley of Hinnom, Valley of the son of Hinnom or Valley of the children of Hinnom. In the

synoptic Gospels The gospels of Gospel of Matthew, Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Mark, and Gospel of Luke, Luke are referred to as the synoptic Gospels because they include many of the same stories, often in a similar sequence and in similar or sometimes identical ...

the various authors describe

Jesus Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

, who was Jewish, as using the word ''Gehenna'' to describe the opposite to life in the Kingdom (). The term is used 11 times in these writings. In certain usage, the Christian Bible refers to it as a place where both

soul The soul is the purported Mind–body dualism, immaterial aspect or essence of a Outline of life forms, living being. It is typically believed to be Immortality, immortal and to exist apart from the material world. The three main theories that ...

(Greek: ψυχή, psyche) and body could be destroyed () in "unquenchable fire" (). Christian usage of Gehenna often serves to admonish adherents of the religion to live righteous lives. Examples of Gehenna in the Christian New Testament include: * Matthew 5:22: "....whoever shall say, 'You fool', shall be guilty enough to go into Gehenna." * Matthew 5:29: "....it is better for you that one of the parts of your body perish, than for your whole body to be thrown into Gehenna." * Matthew 5:30: "....better for you that one of the parts of your body perish, than for your whole body to go into Gehenna." *

Matthew 10 Matthew 10 is the tenth chapter in the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament section of the Christian Bible. This chapter opens with Jesus calling some of his Disciple (Christianity), disciples and sending them out to preach and heal. This chapte ...

:28: "....rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul reek: ψυχήand body in Gehenna." * Matthew 18:9: "It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than with two eyes to be thrown into the Gehenna...." *

Matthew 23 Matthew 23 is the twenty-third chapter in the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament section of the Christian Bible, and consists almost entirely of the accusations of Jesus against the Pharisees. The chapter is also known as the Woes of the Phar ...

:15: "Woe to you, scribes and

Pharisees The Pharisees (; ) were a Jews, Jewish social movement and school of thought in the Levant during the time of Second Temple Judaism. Following the Siege of Jerusalem (AD 70), destruction of the Second Temple in 70 AD, Pharisaic beliefs became ...

, hypocrites, because you... make one

proselyte The biblical term "proselyte" is an anglicization of , as used in the Septuagint for "stranger", i.e. a "newcomer to Israel"; a "sojourner in the land", and in the Novum Testamentum Graece for a first-century convert to Judaism. It is a transla ...

...twice as much a child of Gehenna as yourselves." * Matthew 23:33, to the Pharisees: "You serpents, you brood of vipers, how shall you escape the sentence of Gehenna?" * Mark 9:43: "It is better for you to enter life crippled, than having your two hands, to go into Gehenna into the unquenchable fire." * Mark 9:45: "It is better for you to enter life lame, than having your two feet, to be cast into Gehenna." * Mark 9:47: "It is better for you to enter the Kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes, to be cast into Gehenna." *

Luke 12 Luke 12 is the 12th Chapters and verses of the Bible, chapter of the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament of the Christianity, Christian Bible. It records a number of teachings and Parables of Jesus, parables told by Jesus Christ when "an innumerab ...

:5: "....fear the One who, after He has killed has authority to cast into Gehenna; yes, I tell you, fear Him." Another book to use the word ''Gehenna'' in the New Testament is James: * James 3:6: "And the tongue is a fire,...and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by Gehenna."

New Testament translations

The New Testament also refers to

Hades Hades (; , , later ), in the ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, is the god of the dead and the king of the Greek underworld, underworld, with which his name became synonymous. Hades was the eldest son of Cronus and Rhea ...

as a place distinct from Gehenna. Unlike Gehenna, Hades typically conveys neither fire nor punishment but forgetfulness. The

Book of Revelation The Book of Revelation, also known as the Book of the Apocalypse or the Apocalypse of John, is the final book of the New Testament, and therefore the final book of the Bible#Christian Bible, Christian Bible. Written in Greek language, Greek, ...

describes Hades being cast into the

lake of fire The lake of fire is a concept that appears in both the ancient Egyptian religion, ancient Egyptian and Christianity, Christian religions. In ancient Egypt, it appears as an obstacle on the journey through the underworld which can destroy or refres ...

(). The King James Version is the only English translation in modern use to translate Sheol, Hades,

Tartarus In Greek mythology, Tartarus (; ) is the deep abyss that is used as a dungeon of torment and suffering for the wicked and as the prison for the Titans. Tartarus is the place where, according to Plato's '' Gorgias'' (), souls are judged after ...

(Greek ταρταρώσας; lemma: ταρταρόω ''tartaroō''), and Gehenna as Hell. In the New Testament, the

New International Version The New International Version (NIV) is a translation of the Bible into contemporary English. Published by Biblica, the complete NIV was released on October 27, 1978, with a minor revision in 1984 and a major revision in 2011. The NIV relies ...

, New Living Translation, New American Standard Bible (among others) all reserve the term "hell" for the translation of Gehenna or Tartarus (see above), transliterating Hades as a term directly from the equivalent Greek term. Treatment of Gehenna in Christianity is significantly affected by whether the distinction in Hebrew and Greek between Gehenna and Hades was maintained: Translations with a distinction: * The fourth century

Gothic Bible The Gothic Bible or Wulfila Bible is the Christian Bible in the Gothic language, which was spoken by the Eastern Germanic (Goths, Gothic) tribes in the Early Middle Ages. The translation was allegedly made by the Arianism, Arian bishop and m ...

was the first bible translation to use the Germanic root Halja, and maintains a distinction between Hades and Gehenna. However, unlike later translations, Halja
Matt 11:23
is reserved for Hades,Murdoch & Read (2004) '' Early Germanic Literature and Culture'', p. 160

/ref> and Gehenna is transliterated to Gaiainnan
Matt 5:30
, which ironically is the opposite to modern translations that translate Gehenna into Hell and leave Hades untranslated (see below). * The late fourth century Latin

Vulgate The Vulgate () is a late-4th-century Bible translations into Latin, Latin translation of the Bible. It is largely the work of Saint Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels used by the Diocese of ...

transliterates the Greek Γέεννα "gehenna" with "gehenna" (e.g. Matt 5:22) while using "infernus" ("coming from below, of the underworld") to translate ᾅδης (Hades]). * The 19th century

Young's Literal Translation Young's Literal Translation (YLT) is a translation of the Bible into English, published in 1862. The translation was made by Robert Young, compiler of '' Young's Analytical Concordance to the Bible'' and ''Concise Critical Comments on the New Te ...

tries to be as literal a translation as possible and does not use the word Hell at all, keeping the words Hades and Gehenna untranslated. * The 19th century Arabic

Van Dyck Sir Anthony van Dyck (; ; 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England after success in the Spanish Netherlands and Italy. The seventh child of Frans van Dyck, a wealt ...

distinguishes Gehenna from Sheol. * The 20th century New International Version,

New Living Translation The New Living Translation (NLT) is a translation of the Bible in contemporary English. Published in 1996 by Tyndale House, Tyndale House Foundation, the NLT was created "by 90 leading Bible scholars." The NLT relies on recently published Text ...

and New American Standard Bible reserve the term "Hell" only for when Gehenna or Tartarus is used. All translate Sheol and Hades in a different fashion. For a time the exception to this was the 1984 edition of the New International Version's translation in Luke 16:23, which was its singular rendering of Hades as Hell. The 2011 edition renders it as Hades. * In texts in Greek, and consistently in the

Eastern Orthodox Church The Eastern Orthodox Church, officially the Orthodox Catholic Church, and also called the Greek Orthodox Church or simply the Orthodox Church, is List of Christian denominations by number of members, one of the three major doctrinal and ...

, the distinctions present in the originals were often maintained. The Russian Synodal Bible (and one translation by the

Old Church Slavonic Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic ( ) is the first Slavic languages, Slavic literary language and the oldest extant written Slavonic language attested in literary sources. It belongs to the South Slavic languages, South Slavic subgroup of the ...

) also maintain the distinction. In modern Russian, the concept of Hell (Ад) is directly derived from Hades (Аид), separate and independent of Gehenna. Fire imagery is attributed primarily to Gehenna, which is most commonly mentioned as Gehenna the Fiery (Геенна огненная), and appears to be synonymous to the lake of fire. * The New World Translation, used by

Jehovah's Witnesses Jehovah's Witnesses is a Christian denomination that is an outgrowth of the Bible Student movement founded by Charles Taze Russell in the nineteenth century. The denomination is nontrinitarian, millenarian, and restorationist. Russell co-fou ...

, maintains a distinction between Gehenna and Hades by transliterating Gehenna, and by rendering "Hades" (or "Sheol") as "the Grave". Earlier editions left all three names untranslated. * The word "hell" is not used in the

New American Bible The New American Bible (NAB) is an Bible translations into English, English translation of the Bible first published in 1970. The 1986 Revised NAB is the basis of the revised Lectionary. In the Catholic Church it is the only translation approved ...

, except in a footnote in the book of Job translating an alternative passage from the

, in which the word corresponds to

Jerome Jerome (; ; ; – 30 September 420), also known as Jerome of Stridon, was an early Christian presbyter, priest, Confessor of the Faith, confessor, theologian, translator, and historian; he is commonly known as Saint Jerome. He is best known ...

's " inferos," itself a translation of "sheol." "Gehenna" is untranslated, "Hades" either untranslated or rendered " netherworld," and "sheol" rendered "nether world." Translations without a distinction: * The late tenth century ''Wessex Gospels'' and the 14th century

Wycliffe Bible Wycliffe's Bible (also known as the Middle English Bible ''MEB Wycliffite Bibles, or Wycliffian Bibles) is a sequence of orthodox Middle English Bible translations from the Latin Vulgate which appeared over a period from approximately 1382 to ...

render both the Latin ''inferno'' and ''gehenna'' as Hell. * The 16th century

Tyndale William Tyndale (; sometimes spelled ''Tynsdale'', ''Tindall'', ''Tindill'', ''Tyndall''; – October 1536) was an English Biblical scholar and linguist who became a leading figure in the Protestant Reformation in the years leading up to ...

and later translators had access to the Greek, but

translated both Gehenna and Hades as same English word, Hell. * The 17th century King James Version of the Bible is the only English translation in modern use to translate Sheol, Hades, and Gehenna by calling them all "Hell." Some Christians consider Gehenna to be a place of eternal conscious punishment.Metzger & Coogan (1993) ''Oxford Companion to the Bible'', p. 243. Some other Christians, however, imagine Gehenna to be a place where sinners are tormented for a limited amount of time until they are eventually destroyed, soul and body. Some other Christians believe that Gehenna is a metaphor for complete destruction of soul and body, and that those who are "cast" into it will not experience any torment; they will just cease to exist. Some Christian scholars, however, have suggested that Gehenna may be a different type of metaphor, a

prophetic In religion, mythology, and fiction, a prophecy is a message that has been communicated to a person (typically called a ''prophet'') by a supernatural entity. Prophecies are a feature of many cultures and belief systems and usually contain divin ...

one for the horrible fate that awaited the many civilians killed in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE.

Islam

The name given to Hell in Islam, ''

Jahannam In Islam, Jahannam () is the place of punishment for Islamic views on sin, evildoers in the afterlife, or hell. This notion is an integral part of Islamic theology,#ETISN2009, Thomassen, "Islamic Hell", ''Numen'', 56, 2009: p.401 and has occupied ...

'', directly derives from Gehenna.Richard P. Taylor (2000). ''Death and the Afterlife: A Cultural Encyclopedia.'' "JAHANNAM From the Hebrew ge-hinnom, which refers to a valley outside Jerusalem, Jahannam is the Islamic word for hell." The

Quran The Quran, also Romanization, romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a Waḥy, revelation directly from God in Islam, God (''Allah, Allāh''). It is organized in 114 chapters (, ) which ...

contains 77 references to the Islamic interpretation of Gehenna (جهنم), but does not mention

/ Hades as the "abode of the dead", and instead uses the word "Qabr" (قبر, meaning grave).

References

Citations

Sources

External links

Short guide to today's Valley of Hinnom, with biblical story

Columbia Encyclopedia on the Valley of Hinnom

Gehenna
from the 1901–1906 Jewish Encyclopedia
The Jewish view of Hell
on chabad.org

Judaism 101

Ariela Pelaia, About religion, about.com

Ariela Pelaia, About religion, about.com

from Tentmaker.org
A Christian Conditionalist perspective on Gehenna
from Afterlife.co.nz {{Authority control