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Is God n angry judge who tortureshe/pless sinners ages without end? f helldoes exist, where is it and can thosewho are there ever get out? Read hereabout the true biblical hell from one whohas been there

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ot to be sold Published as a free educa-tional service n the public interest.

To Hell and Back reprinted fromThe Plain Truth volume 46 number 101981 Worldwide Church of God;Is There a Hell? reprinted from

The Plain Truth volume 47 number 71982 Worldwide Church of God;Hell Man's Idea vs. the Bible reprinted from

The Plain Truth volume 51 number 1@ 1986 Worldwide Church of God

ll Rights ReservedPrinted n U.S.A.

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Read here about the true biblicalhell from one who has been therey Keith W Stump

N SUNDAY, July 12,went to hell.On th t d ayJerusalem's sun stood

directly overhead as I paused torecheck my map. f my bearingswere correc t hell ' s verythreshold lay before me

I had just left the Old City ofJerusalem through the Dung Gate,one of the eight gates in the oldTurkish wall. I had headed west onthe road paralleling the wall, thenaround the area known today asMount Zion. From there I beganmy descent into the Lower Re-

glOns.The House of HadesThe notion that a mortal mightactually vi sit hell and return hasbeen a source of fascination to peo-ple of almost every age.Since ancient times , the abode ofthe dead has been viewed as lyingdeep underground, with various entrances on the earth 's surface-through caverns, volcanoes, underground rivers and the like. Ancientpeoples Greeks and Romans es-pecially reveled in fanciful accounts of heroes who dared passthrough these fearful portals andinto the Dark Realm.One of the earliest accounts ofsuch a journey is found in Th eOdyssey . It is an ancient epic

poem by the Greek poet Homer(8th century B.C.). Homer writescif the Greek hero Odysseus(Ulysses), the lost king of Ithaca,who wandered the seas in searchof his home for 10 years follow-ing the fall of Troy. In desperation, Ody sseus reputedly foundhis way into the abode of departed spirits to learn from theghost of a famous seer how hemight find his home.

The underworld described byHomer was a shadowy place ofdreary darkness lying beneath thesecret places of the earth. Thougha place of gloom, it was not pic-tured as one of punishment andtorture as is the traditional Christian or Oriental hell.

Homer called the place of thedead the House of Hades." Hades(the Romans called him Pluto) wasthe Greek king of the underworld ,god of de a th. Eventually, Hadesbecame the common name for theunderworld itself.

The ancient classicists believedthat five rivers flowed through theunderworld. The principal one wasthe Styx, across which the agedboatman Charon ferried the soulsof the dead. (The Styx was an ac-tual stream that disappeared underground in Arcadia in Greece.)

In the A eneid an epic by theRoman poet Virgil, the Trojanhero Aeneas, fleeing the burning

ruins of Troy after the Greek vic-tory, successfully besought the fer-ryman Claron for passage into theinfernal region to consult his deadfather. (Virgil preferred the nameTartarus to Hades for the fabledinfernal region.) Aeneas enteredthe underworld through a cavern ata foul-smelling lake near Naples inItaly. Descending on a roadwrapped in shadows, he encountered numerous horrors and frightful terrors.

Tartarus (or Tartaros) was aname used by the later classicalwriters such as Virgil as anothername for Hades. Homer, on theother hand, described Tartarus as adifferent place, lying as far beneathHades as Hades is beneath theearth. I t was in this bottomless pitof Tartarus, according to classicalmythology, that the Greek godZeus confined those who had re-sisted him.

Another hero of ancient Greece,the legendary Hercules, also reputedly traveled to the lower world.One of his famous Twelve Laborswas to fetch up from Hades thetriple-headed, dragon-tailed dogCerberus, the feared guardian ofHades ' gates.

Many other ancients are said tohave made the fearsome journeyinto Hades, including Theseus ofAthens, Orpheus the musician , theprincess Psyche and the twin Pol-lux, in search of his dead brotherCastor.The InfernoPossibly the best-known journey"of all is that of Dante Alighieri(1265-1321) , the medieval Italianpoet. H is tr avels among thedamned are recorded in The In -ferno. It is the first part of histhree-part Divine Comedy an ac-count of his imaginary journeysthrough hell , purgatory a ndheaven.

Dante is conducted through hellby the spirit of the Roman poetVirgil. The trip begins on GoodFriday, A.D. 1300 , in a woodedarea near Jerusalem. Over the gateof hell the two travelers find afearful and now famous inscription ,in today's words: ABANDON EVERYHOPE YOU WHO ENTER HERE.Dante then witnesses in hisimagination the eternal torments of

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the wicked. He describes hell asbeing divided into various levels,descending conically into the earth.Souls suffer punishments appropriate to their sins. Hypocrites, forexample, wear gowns brilliant outwardly, but made of heavy leadinstead of cloth. They must bearthe weight of them forever. Gluttons are doomed to forever lie likepigs in a foul-smelling sty under acold, eternal rain. Dante 's descriptions are vivid and frightening.

Though Dante's primary purposein writing the poem was to satirizepersons and circumstances of hisday, the theology of his work isbased firmly on the system ofThomas Aquinas (1225-1274),Italian theologian and philosopher.The Divine Comedy is a relativelyaccurate dramatization of medievalChristian theology. Some simpleminded of Dante's day actually believed Dante had really visited hellHis work had a tremendous impression and influence on popularChristian thought.Concentration Camp?Dante ' s medieval picture of hell as

a gigantic concentration camp anightmarish place of eternal torment , horrible beyond imagination,presided over by Satan and hisdemon s largely represents thethinking of significant groups ofprofessing Christians to this day.The concept of a "hell" can befound in one form or anotheramong all the world's princi pal

a. faiths. Multiple billions around the2 world have lived and died over the; millennia believing in and in fear

of a place of eternal torment andpunishment.e Many today continue to wonder,oit "Is there rea lly a hell?" and "Will

. :

end up there?" Many are curiousabout just what hell might be like.It was with questions such asthese in mind that J set out to

investigate the subject and tomake an attempt to actually visithellThree HellsThe starting point for such an in-vestigation can be none other thanthe very book from which Christians profess to derive their doc-trine of hell the Bible By scrutinizing its pages, one can strip awaythe theological trappings of ancientand medieval myth and fabricationand discover the true teaching onthe subject.One 's first surprise is that theBible speaks of not one but of threedifferent "hells" In the widelyused King James Version, three to-tally different Greek words -words with totally different meanings are translated by the oneEnglish word hell. The three wordsare hades tartaros and gehenna.

In biblical usage, the Greek wordhades used only times in theNew Testament is roughly equivalent to the Old Testament Hebrewword sheol, meaning grave or pit(compare Acts 2:27 with Psalm16: I0). Hades may be likened to ahole in the ground. In the Bible it hasnothing to do with fire.

Most modern biblical translatorsadmit that the use of the Englishword hell to translate hades andsheof is an unfortunate and mis-leading practice.Why?

Because in seeing the word hell.many readers impute to it the traditional connotation of an everburning inferno when this wasnever remotely intended in theGreek language or in OldEnglish

In its t rue biblicalusage, hades does indeedrefer to the state or abodeof the dead but not in thesense of spirits walkingaround in some sort of"shadowy realm." Hadesis simply the abode we callthe grave. All the dead goto th is hell.The Second HellThe second hell of the

Bible, tartaros, is mentioned onlyonce in scripture in II Peter 2:4:"For if God spared not the angelsthat sinned, but cast them down tohell [tartaroo ] and delivered theminto chains of darkness to be re-served unto judgment. . . . "

Following their rebellion to unseat God from His throne (Isa.14:12-14; Rev. 12:4), the archangelLucifer (now Satan) and a third ofthe created angels (demons) wereejected from heaven (Luke 10: 18).They were cast down to tartaros aplace or condition of restraint thatGod has imposed on the mutinousangels as they await ultimate judgment (Jude 6; I Cor. 6:3).

Tartaros, then , is a "hell" thatapplies only to evil, rebellious an-gels or demons. I t is interestingthat the ancient Greeks used thisword to describe the place in whichZeus confined the rebellious Titans. Nowhere in the Bible is thereany mention of men being put intothis particular "hell."The Third HellSo far, we have seen that the firsthell of the Bible hades is simply the grave. The second hell-tartaros a place or condition ofrestraint for demons. What, then ,is the third hell of the Bible?Surely, it must be the old fash-ioned Bible "hell" the literalever-burning inferno, the place ofeternal torment of the damned

Or is it?Did you ever notice that theGreek word used by the writers of

the New Testa ment for this thirdhell is gehenna? It comes from theHebrew Gai Hinnom. meaning"valley of Hinnom." Hinnom is adeep, narrow ravine located to the

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south and southwest of. Jerusalem. t is to this hellthat I recently traveled.But what does this valley

have to do with the traditional Christian concept of"hell"? The answer maysurprise youlunch n HellGehenna t he valley ofHinnom is today a relatively pleasan t place. n recent years, g rass and evensome flowers have takenover portions of the valleyfloor, and there are plenty of trees

to provide shade from the scorching sun (see photos on thesepages).

I descended into the valley bymeans of a rocky dirt path. A smalldog no three-headed Cerberus barked briefly, then returned toscavenging in a small cave near thepath. Further on down the valleytwo boys were kicking a soccer ballbetween them.

I sought refuge from the heat ofthe noon sun under a large tree,and took out my lunch. A few birdscame by for a handou t The surroundings were not unlike those ofa typical city park.After enjoying a leisurelylunch, I headed up out of thevalley and proceeded unimpededtoward the Jaffa Gate. My memory of the valley is one of apleasant and relaxing haven in themidst of a hot and t iring walkingtour of Jerusalem.

Gehenna, in short, is a far cryfrom the hell of Dante or fromwhat this valley was like in Jesus'dayThe valley was not always such apleasant place. n the Old Testament it was a place of abominablepagan rites, including infant sacrifice. It was there that the apostatekings Ahaz and Manasseh madetheir children "pass through thefire" to the god Molech. The riteswere specifically celebrated inTophet, the "place of abhorrence,"one of the chief groves in the valley.

King Josiah of ancient Judah fi-

nally put an end to these abominations. He defiled the valley, rendering it ceremonially unclean (IIKings 23: 10). Later the valley became the cesspool and city dump ofJe rusa lem a repos i tory forsewage, refuse and animal carcasses. The bodies of despisedcriminals were also burned therealong with the rubbish. Firesburned continuously, feeding on aconstant supply of garbage and refuse.

Aceldama, the "field of blood",purchased with the money Judasreceived for the betrayal of Christ(Matt. 27:8) was also in part of thevalley of Hinnom.Gehenna and the l keof ireWhat, then, does this valley calledgehenna have to do with hell?

Notice. At the end ofthis age, at the crisis atthe end of this world'scivilization, the prophesied Beast of the book ofRevelation a Satan-inspired political dictatorand a miracle-workingreligious figure, theFalse Prophet, workingwith him will resist there-establishment of thegovernment of God byfighting against JesusChrist at His SecondComing. Their fate is revealed by the apostle John: "Andthe beast was taken, and with himthe false prophet These bothwere cast alive into a lake o fireburning with brimstone" (Rev.19:20).

Where will this temporary lakeof fire this "hell" be?The prophet Isaiah wrote of

this lake of fire prepared for theBeast: "For Tophet [in the valleyof Hinnom] is ordained of old,yea, for the king it is prepared,he hath made it deep and large,the pile thereof is fire and wood,the breath of the Lord, like astream of brimstone, doth kindleit" (Isa. 30:33).

One thousand years later, Satanhimself will be cast into this rekin-

died fiery lake where the Beast andFalse Prophet were cast (See Revelation 20: 10.)

But what of the wicked whohave died over the many millennia?Does the Bible say that they arenow suffering fiery punishment fortheir sins in a lake of fire?

Absolutely notn the sequence of Revelation

20 read it for you rsel f the i ncorrigibly wicked are resurrectedto be thrown into the lake of fireafter Satan s cast there Read it,in Revelation 20:15.

What, then, will become of thesewicked? Will they writhe in flamesfor eternity?No

The wicked will be burned up inthe intense heat of the cominggehenna fire on earth. They will beconsumed, annihilated, destroyed

.This punishment will be everlast-ing permanent and final. TheBible calls it the "second death"(Rev. 20:14; 21:8) from whichthere is no possibility of a furtherresurrection.

The Bible does teach eternalpunishment, but not eternal punish i ng.The prophet Malachi provides agraphic description. "For, behold,the day cometh, that shall burnas an oven, and all the proud,yea, and all that do wickedly,shall be stubble, and the day thatcometh shall burn them up "(4: 1). To the righteous, God saysthat the wicked shall be "ashesunder the soles of your feet "(Mal. 4:3).

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ILL THOSE in hellleave hell at thetime of the res-ur rec t ion orare they confined eternally tohell, so that they shall be UN ABLE to take part in the res-urrection?

What did Jesus mean whenhe said in John 5:28-29:" the hour is coming whenall who are in the tombs willhear his voice and comeforth those who have doneevil, to the RESURRECTION OFJUDGMENT" RSV).

If "those who have done EVIL"the uNsaved shall come forth inthe RESURRECTION OF JUDGMENTwhat is the connection betweenthat resurrection of the uNsaved,and their being in an eternal hellfire?

It 's about time we took thisquestion out of hiding, and took agood look at it What is theTRUTH?Common Idea of HellFirst, what is the generally accepted common belief in our Western world about hell? Here's theterse and brief summation of thispopular belief, which I quote fromthe Encyclopedia Americana:" As generally understood,hell is the abode of evil spirits; theinfernal regions whither lostand condemned souls go afterdeath to suffer indescribable torments and e t e rna l pun i sh -ment. Some have thought of itas the place created by the Deity,where He punishes with inconceivable severity , and through all eternity , the so uls of those whothrough unbelief or through theworship of false gods have angeredHim. It is the place of divine re-venge , untempered, never ending."

Now where, and how, did thispopular belief about hell originate?The Encyclopedia Americanastates further: "The main featuresof hell as conceived by Hindu, Persian, Egyptian, Grecian and Christian theologians are essentially thesame. The Western religiousleaders from Roman times throughthe Middle Ages borrowed thedoctrine of eternal torture from the4

f hell does exist, where is it andcan those who are there ever get out?y Herbert W rmstrong

pagan philosophers. Certain writersof the Middle Ages had suchtremendous influence on the Christian-professing world, that theirwritings and teachings came to begenerally accepted and believed,until it became the doctrine of theChristian-professing world. Amongthese influential writers were Augustine and Dante Alighieri.Some years ago, I ran across abook in a large library, titled Danteand His Influence. It summed upthe history of the Christian-professing doctrine of hell. This factual his-tory is rather amazing Dante livedA.D. 1265 to 1321. Dante, remember, wrote a tremendously popularbook, titled Divine Comedy, in threeparts "Hell ," "Purgatory" and"Paradise."From the Pagans

ow [ quote from the aforementioned book of history: " Of all poetsof modern times, Dante Alighieriwas, perhaps, the greatest educator.He possibly had a greater influenceon the course of civilization than anyother one man si nce h is day[He] wrote, in incomprehensibleverse, an imaginative and lurid ac-count of a dismal journey through alurid hell a long poem containingcertain phrases which have caughtthe attention of the world , such as,

'All hope abandon, Ye who enterhere.' " This had a tremendous impression and influence on the popular Christian thought and teaching.His Inferno was based on Virgiland Plato.

Dante is reported to have beenso fascinated and enraptured by theideas and philosophies of Plato andVirgil, pagan philosophers , that hebelieved they were divinely in-spired. Here is a comment on Vir-gil, from the Americana: "VIRGIL,pagan Roman poet, 70-19 B.C. Be-longed to the national school ofpagan Roman thought, influencedby the Greek writers. Christians ofthe Middle Ages, including Dante,believed he had received somemeasure of divine inspiration. "

Plato was a pagan Greek philoso-pher, born in Athens, 427 B.C. , astudent of Socrates. He wrote thefamous book Phaedo. on the immortality of the soul, and this book is thereal origin of the modern belief inthe immortality of the soul.

There is the general statement ofthe popular belief about hell , andwhere that belief came from ac-tually from the imaginations of pa-gans who knew not GodWhat About the Millions ofHeathen?In spite of missionaries from the

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West, actually more than half ofall the people on this earth havenever so much as HEARD the ONLYname by which men may beSAVED the name of Jesus CHRISTNow is there some other way bywhich men may be saved? TheBible says there is NOT

That means that thousands ofmillions of people on this earthhave lived, and DIED, without everhaving known anything aboutChristian salvation without SAV-ING KNOWLEDGE never havingheard the ONLY name by whichmen may be saved Now thinkwhat that means IF all unsaved goimmediately to hell at death thehell commonly believed in thenmore than HALF of the people whohave lived on this earth have beenconsigned there and they arethere, now, without ever havingbeen given so much as a CHANCE toescape it

Ask yourself candidly, do youbelieve THAT is the plan by whichan all-wise, all-merciful, lovingGOD is working out his purposehere below?Now what is the TRUTH?

We face this alternative: Eitherthe Holy Bible is the inspiredWord of God, BY WHICH THECREATOR reveals the TR UTH onthe subject, or else we must flingup our hands and confess WE JUSTDO 'T K OW we are ignorant onthe question because no one hasever COME BACK from such anever-burning hell to tell us aboutit, and SCIENCE knows nothingabout it. We must believe whatthe BIBLE says, or we can believenothing if we are rational andhonestHell Fire n the ibleJesus said in a passage very oftenquoted: "And if thine eye offendthee , pluck it out: it is better forthee to enter into the kingdom ofGod with one eye, than having twoeyes to be cast into hell fire: wheretheir worm dieth not, and the fireis not quenched. For everyoneshall be salted with fire, and everysacrifice shall be salted with salt"(Mark 9:47-49).

Now exactly what is this hellfire? This word hell is an Englishword. Mark wrote, originally, inthe Greek language. The word

originally inspired, which Mark ac tually wrote, was the Greek wordgehenna which certainly does referto FIRE.

But in most passages in the NewTestament where the English wordhell is found in our English translations, the original Greek wordwas a different word, hades-which does NOT refer to FIRE at all,but has an altogether different

meamng.ncorrectly Translated Hell

Remember we merely read a translation of the Bible from its originallanguages. A leading Bible dictionary, called A Dictionary o theBible edited by James Hastings,says this:"In our Authorized Version theword 'hell' is unfortunately usedas the rendering of three distinctwords with different meanings. Itrepresents, (1) the 'sheol' of theHebrew Old Testament, and the'hades' of the New Testament. . . . It is now an entirelymisleading rendering especiallyin the New Testament passages.The English revisers, therefore,have subst i tuted the originalGreek word 'hades' for 'hell' inthe New Testament. In theAmerican revision the word 'hell'is entirely discarded in this connection The word 'hell ' istranslated (2) as the equivalent ofthe Greek word tartaros (II Peter 2:4; compare with Jude 6),and, (3) as the equivalent of theGreek word 'gehenna.'"Hell is an old English word, and370 years ago, when the Authorized Version was translated, thepeople of England commonlytalked about putting their potatoesin HELL for the winter a goodway of preserving potatoes forthe word then meant merely a holein the ground that was coveredup a dark and silent place aGRAVE.And now the G reek wordgehenna. I quote from Hastings:"Gehenna: the word occurs twelvetimes in the New Testament. Thisterm 'gehenna' represents ' theValley of Hinnom' (Nehemiah11:30, II Kings 23:10, etc.). Theplace was . . . a deep narrow gorgein the vicinity of Jerusalem, understood to be on the south side.

t is repeatedly mentioned in theOld Testament (Jeremiah 19:6etc.). t became an object of horror to the Jews, and is said tohave been made the receptacle forbones, the bodies of beasts andcriminals, refuse and all uncleanthings. The terrible associations othe place . . . the fires said to havebeen kept burning in it in orderto consume the foul and corrupobjects that were thrown into itmade it a natural and unmistakable symbol o f di re evi l. . . ABSOLUTE RUIN. S it came todesignate the place of future punishment."Hell a Place of DestructionGehenna was a place of DESTRUCTION and DEATH not a place ofliving torture Jesus was talkingto Jews who understood all abouthis Gehenna or Valley of Hinnom. Utter DESTRUCTION by firewas complete. NOTHING was leftbut ashes

Every text in the Bible translated from th i s Greek wordgehenna means complete destruction not living torture NOT eternal LIFE in torment THE BIBLEsays, in Romans 6:23, "The wagesof sin is DEATH" not ETERNALLIFE in torture. The PU ISHME Trevealed in the BIBLE is DEATH -the cessation of life. Eternal life isthe GIFT OF GOD

Then WHY have we been believing that PUN ISHME T is ETER ALLIFE in fire? And WHY have webeen believing we already .haveetcrnal life and don ' t NEED to cometo God through Christ to receive ias HIS GIFT?

The PUN ISHM ENT is DEATH. It ithe second death , from which thereshall be no resurrection The PUNISHM E T is for ETER ITY DEATHfor eternity ETE RNAL punishment but No where does THEBIBLE say anything about the PAGAN tcaching of eternal punishINGIt's eternal punishMENT, not eternal punishING

When Jesus spoke of being casinto "gehenna FIRE," he was usingthis expression as an illustration othe LAKE OF FIRE, which THE BIBLEreveals is to be THE PLACE of thisfinal punishment this secondDEATH . He referred to Revelation20: 14: "And death and hell were

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cast into the lake of fire. This is thesecond death. "THAT fire will be much hotterthan Dante 's imaginary HELLWhat Happens to Hell ?Do people go at DEATH to the fictitious hell of Dante 's imagination tobe TORTURED by flames of fireforever and then are they to bebrought OUT, to go into a JUDG -MENT, to see if God had made amistake in having punished themso long in this "hell"?

Notice Revelation 20: 13-15:"A nd the sea gave up the deadwhich were in it ; and death andhell delivered up th e dead whichwere in them: and they werejudged every man according totheir works . And death and hellwere cast into the la ke o ire. Thisis the second d ea th. And whosoeverwas not found written in the bookof life was cast into the lake offire." The LAKE OF FIRE which JE-SUS referred to is a place of DEATH,not of etern al life the SECONDDEATH ETERNAL punishmentNotice what Jesu s said inMatthew 10:28: " fear himwhich is able to DESTROY both souland body in [GEHENNA]. " Here inplain language JES US said the SOULcould be destroyed and that itwould be DESTROYED in theGE HENNA that has been falselytranslated by the English wordhell Gehenna is a place of DE-STRUCTION

Again Jesus used this wordge henna as quoted in M a tthew23:33: "Ye serpents," he said tothe Pharisees, " . . . how can yee s c ape the d amn a t i o n o f[G E HENNA]? " t he s econdDEATH eternal PUNISHMENTThe ancient rebellious citiesSodom and Gomorrah suffered, aswe read in Jude 7, the vengeance ofETE RNAL FIRE . But they are notstill burning. They were burned upFOREVER eternal DESTRUCTIONNow what happens in th is" hell" derived from the Greekword gehenna? Let the Holy Wordof GOD answer: "For, behold , theday cometh, that shall burn as anoven; and a ll the proud , yea, and all

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that do wickedly, shall be stubble;and the day that cometh shall burnthem up saith the Lord of hosts,that it shall leave them neither rootnor branch. But unto you that fearmy name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in hiswings; and ye shall go forth , andgrow up as calves of the stall. Andye shall tread down the wicked; forthey shall be ashes under the solesof your feet in the day that I shalldo this , saith the Lord of hosts"(Mal. 4: 1-3).God Is Love and JusticeGod is a God of LOVE orMERCY, as well as a God of ABSO-LUT E JUST ICE If he were the vain,angry, unjust god pictured by thepagans who invented this popularconception of heaven and hell,then , according to the commonbelief of the illu s tr a t ion ofLazarus and the Rich M an, savedmothers up in heaven are hearingthe shrieks, seeing the indescribable AGONY, writhing. of theirown lost children down in hell-actually able to carryon a conversa tion with them yet UNABLE tohelp them.

Would THAT be the heavenlyBUSS it is generally represented?Psalm 37 OUGHT to make plain

to us this matter of heaven andhell. No tice

"For evildoers shall be cut off;but those that wait upon the Lord,they shall inherit the earth. For yeta little while , and the wicked shallnot be; yea, thou shalt diligentlyconsider his place, and it shall notbe. But the meek shall inherit theearth; and shall delight themselvesin the abundance of peace. Thewicked plotteth against the just,and gnasheth upon him with histeeth. But the wicked shall perish,and the enemies of the Lord shallbe as the fat of lambs: they shallconsume; into smoke shall theyconsume away. For such as beblessed of him shall inherit theearth; and they that be cursed ofhim shall be cut off. The righteousshall inherit the land , and dwelltherein for ever" (Ps. 37:9-12, 20,22, 29).

And notice Psalm 104:35: "Letthe sinners be consumed out of theearth, and let the wicked be nomore."And now, Isaiah 66:24: "Andthey shall go forth , and look uponthe carcases of the men that havetransgressed against me: for theirworm shall not die , neither shalltheir fire be quenched; and theyshall be an abhorring unto allflesh. "ever to Be Quenched?Nei ther shall their fire be

QUENCHED." Does that meanburning forever and never burningup ? Try th is test: Put a piece ofpaper in a pan. Light it with amatch. Now, don' t QUENCH thatfire Don ' t put it out for that'swhat "quench" means. Very soonth e paper will burn up Then putit down on th e fl oo r and step onit Now it 's merely ashes underthe sole of your fee t precise ly asTHE BIBLE pl a inly says the wickedsha ll be In Jeremiah 17:27 , Godwarned the Jews that Jerusalemwould be burned. and th e firewould not be quenched unlessthey repented. In Jeremiah 52: 13 ,you read the account of the burning of Jeru sa lem. That fire wasNOT QUENCHED It is NO T stillburning

Do you know that THE BIBLEte ac hes the resurrec tion of allwho die? The apostle Paul saidhi s HOPE was the hope of theRESU RR ECTIO N As the resurrection is true doctrine , then thepagan myth of an eternal TOR-TURE, beginning at death , is asdeceptive as Satan hi mse lf f alluNsaved even all who neverh ea rd the ONLY name JesusChrist are roasting , screaming,in such a hell , and can never getout, HOW can there be a RESU R-RE CTION?Thank GOD there is to be aresurrection to JUDGMENT, as wellas a resurrection to eternal life ofthe dead IN C hrist Ye s , thankGOD, he so LOVED the world weNEED not perish, but throughChrist we m ay have EVE RLASTI NGLIFE 0

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U HAVE probablynever heard whereyour ideas abouthell came from.So open your mind to some

startling truth you may not haveunderstood before

You probably have heard of theidea of a horrifying, nightmarishplace of never-ending torture forlost sinners. Atheists say religiouspeople use this concept of hell asa means of playing upon the emotions of people who are sincerelytrying to find God's will.But where did they and wheredid you learn these ideas?

God's PurposeThe primary reason so many menand organizations of men have afalse conception of hell is that theyview it just as an isolated doctrine.God created man in his own image and likeness (Gen. 1 26). Inthe garden of Eden, he told manthe way that would lead to eternallife. Then he told man that goingthe wrong way the way of selfishness and greed would lead toDEATH (Gen. 2:17).But Satan, the father of lies(John 8:44), told the woman , Yeshall not surely die (Gen. 3:4).You have an immortal soul.

Man has been believing that lieabout the immortal soul ever sinceGod's purpose is to develop holy,righteous character in man. Godgave ancient Israel his Ten Commandments, that it might be wellwith them, and with their childrenfor ever (Deut. 5:29).God's decrees are always forman 's good. They are not designedas arbitrary decrees that God usesas an excuse for plunging men intoflames of fire Notice that God offered Adam and Eve life on the onehand, and death on the other.Adam and Eve would not havebeen offered LIFE if they alreadywere immortal souls. Man was created mortal and in need of eternallife from God through his Spirit.

f man rebelled against God andmade himself miserable throughsin, then the kindest thing thatGod could do would be to let mandie. Then, stubborn, sinning manwould be unable to bring any further misery on himself or others by

Is God an angry Judge" whotortures helpless sinners ages without end?y Roderick C Meredith

his wrong ways. He would justcease to exist, and would thus notinterfere with the happiness of others who sought eternal life. That iswhy we read that the SOUL thatsins shall die (Ezek. 18:4).

But men have disagreed withGod and his Word, and have cometo believe in an entirely differentreward for the wicked. So, wheredo men get their ideas of hell ?hat s Hell ?

You will be surprised to learn thatJesus Christ himself went to hellwhen he died In Peter 's inspiredsermon on the day of Pentecost, hesaid, He [David] seeing this before spake of the resurrection ofChrist, that his soul was not left inhell, neither his flesh did see corruption (Acts 2:31).

So according to your Bible Jesus went to hellThe hell where Jesus was forthree days and three nights (Matt.12:40) after his crucifixion is translated from the Greek word hades.Hades simply means pit orgrave. When the AuthorizedVersion of the Bible was made,Englishmen commonly understoodthat hell could mean a grave, pitor hole in the ground. They oftenspoke of burying their potatoes inhell for the winter.The hell where Jesus wentwas simply the grave the rockhewn sepulcher where he was

buried. Unless you live until Christcomes and are changed from mortal to immortal (I Cor. 15:53), youwill go to this same hell.

The second Greek word translated hell is tartaros. t s usedonly once in the Bible (II Pet. 2:4)and refers to the condition of restraint of the fallen angels. It neverrefers to men.

Gehenna is the third Greek wordtranslated hell." Gehenna or theValley of Hinnom, was located outside of Jerusalem. It was a placewhere trash , filth and the deadbodies of animals and despisedcriminals were thrown. It was likesome of our city dumps today. Or dinarily, everything thrown in thisvalley was destroyed by fire completely burned up.

In Jewish thought, this burning,smoking Valley of Hinnom was associated with the future punishment ofthe wicked. So it was natural forJesus and the apostles to use theword gehenna derived from theValley of Hinnom when referringto the lake of fire, which will be thefate of the wicked. This lake of fireis described in Revelation 20: 14-15.

These, then, are the three Greekwords that are translated into theword hell in our Bibles. In theHebrew there is only one word thatis translated hell. That word issheol. t corresponds to the Greekword hades meaning the grave, orpit.

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Worms n HellA familiar passage is found inMark 9:43-48. Jesus was showingthat it was better to rid ourselvesof anything even a job, an association or a habit that we loved asmuch as our right arm than tolet it cause us to disobey God andthus be cast into hell (gehenna),"into the fire that never shallbe quenched: where their wormdieth not, and the fire is notquenched."The "hell" to which Jesus referred was gehenna deriving itsname from the Valley of Hinnom.There were ledges along the edgeof this valley.Smith's Bible Dictionary gives adescription of this valley. If anything, especially a dead body,landed on a ledge above the fires, itwould be devoured by many wormsor maggots that were kept alive bythe animal and vegetable substances deposited there.

t was to these worms thatChrist was referring when he said,"Their worm dieth not." ButChrist didn't mean that each individual worm continued to liveforever He wasn't teaching the immortality of worms

Actually, these worms, or maggots, are the larvae that developfrom eggs deposited by flies. Theycontinue for only a few days in thislarva form, then pupate and finallyemerge as flies, later dying.The Greek word that was inspired and translated into the English word "worm" in this passagesimply means a grub or ' maggot. Itis a collective expression for all theworms that devour dead matter.These worms do not die, but pupate and become flies. Later, theseflies like all other animals will return to the dust from which theycome. "All are of the dust, and allturn to dust again" (Eccl. 3:20).

The "fire that never shall bequenched" is a description showingthat God will permit nothing to putout or quench this fire. It will simply burn up the bodies of thewicked.Naturally, those who preach"hell fire" use this passage tofrighten unthinking people into believing that sinners will suffer eternal torment in hell fire evidently8

with worms chewing on them atthe same timeWhom Do You FearInstead of fearing what some misguided preacher may tell us abouthell, let us see what Jesus said tofear. "And fear not them which killthe body, but are not able to killthe soul: but rather fear him [God]which is able to destroy both souland body in hell [gehenna](Matt. 10:28). Here we find theclear statement that God can destroy both our body and soul inGehenna, or the lake of fire. Thereis no mention made of burningforever and ever, and yet neverquite burning up. But it does speakof destruction.Recall that God told Adam andEve that if they disobeyed him,they would surely DIE. Their liveswould be cut off destroyed. Jesustold his disciples: " wide is thegate, and broad is the way, thatleadeth to destruction [not eternallife in "hell fire"], and many therebe which go in thereat" (Matt.: 13). Then he said, "Every tree

that bringeth not forth good fruit ishewn down, and cast into the fire"(verse 19). What happens to a treewhen it is cast into the fire? Why,it is burned up-destroyed.Speaking of the harvest of therighteous and wicked, Jesus said hewould tell the reapers, "Gather yetogether first the tares, and bindthem in bundles to burn them: butgather the wheat into my barn"(Matt. 13:30). The tares, of course,refer to the wicked, and the wheatto the righteous. When literal taresare burned, they are BURNED UP.What about these types of sinnersthat are burned up? Was Jesus using wrong examples, or , did hemean what he said?The obvious answer is Jesusmeant exactly what he said. Thefate of the wicked will be Gehenna,or the lake of fire that the Biblementions. But this fire is a lot hotter than most people thinkThe wicked are human, mortalbeings. Flesh and blood is subjectto burning up. When the wickedare cast into the lake of fire, theywill be burned up-destroyed

From Genesis to Revelation, lifeand death are set as the two opposites the fate of the righteous and

the wicked respectively. God toldAdam, " dust thou art, and untodust shalt thou return" (Gen.3: 19). No mention here of beingplunged immediately into "hellfire." The reward for disobediencewas death.Later, David wrote of thewicked, " into smoke shall theyconsume away" (Ps. 37:20).Still later, Malachi speaks of thefire that will burn the wicked: "For,behold, the day cometh, that shallburn as an oven; and all the proud,yea, and all that do wickedly, shall bestubble: and the day that comethshall BURN THEM UP, saith the Lordof hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch And yeshall tread down the wicked; forthey shall be ashes under the solesof your feet in the day that I shalldo this " (Mal. 4:1, 3).

Can anything be plainer thanthat the wicked are to be burnedup-----completely destroyed? That iswhy Jesus said, " fear himwhich is able to DESTROY both souland body in hell" (Matt. 10:28).Wages of SinThe apostle Paul summed up thewhole matter of man's reward forsin when he wrote, "For the wagesof sin is DEATH; but the gift of Godis eternal life through Jesus Christour Lord" (Rom. 6:23). f you believe this scripture means what itsays, then you know the truth. But,unfortunately, theologians oftenfail to understand what Paul said.

Could anything be more clearthan this scripture? The wages, orreward, of sin is shown to be death,and eternal life is stated to be a giftfrom God not something we already have.Death means just that the cessation of life and consciousnesstotal oblivion In spite of the vainattempt of many preachers to makedeath mean separation from God,you cannot reconcile this withScripture. Neither does deathmean eternal life in nightmarishtorments of an imagined "hell."

This "hell-fire" doctrine that isused to frighten so many ignoranthuman beings is a LIE. Its author isthe father of lies Satan the devilf you are one who has gulliblyswallowed that doctrine and suf

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of a man-made hell-fire, Godhelp you to study all the scriptureson this subject and find his truth.

But remember that the penaltyof death will be caused by fire.Paul warns in Hebrews 10:26-27:For if we sin wilfully after that wehave received the knowledge of thetruth, there remaineth no moresacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for judgment and fieryindignation, which shall DEVOURthe adversaries.This is a FEARFUL WARNING tothose who know God's truth andstill refuse to obey it This is not anunreasoned fear of a harsh, sternGod who delights in punishing sinners. Rather, it is the sober realization that unless we surrender toGod's will and his way of love, andrefuse to let anything turn us aside,God will take away the life he has

given us.Yet this same passage showsGod's infinite LOVE. He will nottake away people's lives because ofignorance or weakness, but becausethey willfully and knowingly refuseto obey their Creator. This rebellious attitude in itself would bringthem, and those about them, nothing but eternal trouble and miseryif they were allowed to live forever.So God in his mercy and supremewisdom has decreed the penalty ofDEATH for such people.The Lake of ireWhen the Bible says, The wagesof sin is death, it is not referringto the death we see around us everyday. This death is referred to in ICorinthians 15:22, which says, InAdam all die, and in Hebrews9:27, which says, And as it isappointed unto men once to die,but after this the judgment. Thesepassages describe the first dea th-a death caused by a person wearingout physically and from which hecan be resurrected.Revelation 20 shows the time oflater resurrections, and when thewicked are cast into the lake offire. Study it carefully. The firstthree verses describe Satan beingbound for a thousand years, andthe resurrected saints, who are in

o according to yourBible J went tohell where Jesus wentw s y the gravethe rock h wn sepulcher

where h was buried.the first resurrection, ruling theworld under Christ.

The first part of verse 5 is aninserted thought that tells us, Butthe rest of the dead lived not againuntil the thousand years were finished. So the heathen, the atheistsand all who were not called to a fullknowledge of God's truth, are notresurrected until after the thousand-year reign of Christ. This isthe second resurrection. For themthe book of life is opened for thefirst time (Rev. 20:11-12).

But just before then, at the endof the thousand years of peace inthe world tomorrow, the devil willgo forth to deceive the nations whowere not imbued with God's HolySpirit. He will be overcome andcast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the falseprophet are, and shall be tormentedday and night for ever and ever(verse 10). Notice that the wordare is in italics in the AuthorizedVersion. t is an inserted word tocomplete the meaning, and shouldbe rendered were cast becausethe beast and the false prophet arehuman beings who will be burnedup when they are cast into the lakeof fire just before the thousandyears begin (Rev. 19:20).At this point, you may be thinking about the parable of Lazarusand the rich man and wonderingif the rich man wasn't pictured asbeing forever in eternal torment.He definitely was not But he wasin mental torment as the fire ofGehenna was about to end his life.For the full and interesting proofof this, write immediately for ourfree booklet titled Lazarus and theRich Man

Now continuing in Revelation20, notice in verse 3 that the remaining dead are raised in a thirdresurrection and are judged according to their works. These arethe wicked who were called in thislife and who rebelled. Verse 14continues, And death and hell[hades the grave] were cast intothe lake of fire. This is the seconddeath. Here is a plain statementrevealing that Gehenna, or the lakeof fire, IS the SECOND DEATH .Truth Makes reeThe Bible reveals a very differentGod from the one so oftenpreached today.

t seems that men either try todo away with God's power altogether by preaching as though Godhad gone way off' and left man towork things out according to human reason, or they go to the opposite extreme and look upon God asan angry Judge who is just waiting for an opportunity to punishhelpless sinners thoughout all eternity.

The Creator of heaven and earthis now permitting man to sin andsuffer in order to learn certain lessons. f man will accept God'struth as it is revealed, learn theselessons God intended, he will begiven eternal life in God's kingdom. But if he stubbornly persistsin going the way that leads towretchedness and misery for himself and others, God in his mercywill cut off his life by casting himinto the lake of fire which is thesecond death.

Untold suffering and mental anguish have been caused by the falsedoctrine of an angry God plungingeveryone who did not follow certain denominational teachings intoa terrifying hell fire of everlasting torments.

Most people have been bound bydenominational teachings, and toofew have been willing to study all thescriptures on the subject to see whatthe Bible really says. But Jesus saidof those who were willing to continue in his word, And ye shallknow the truth, and the truth shallmake you free (John 8:32). 0

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