Heaven And Hell:

1
Heaven And Hell

• Their Origins and Development in the Hebrew
  World
• Katie McCulloch

2
Ancient Semitic Belief

• Most Semitic peoples were polytheistic, believing
  in more than one god.
• Men lived on earth, while above them reigned the
  sky gods and below them was Sheol, where infernal
  gods dwelled.
• Men could appeal to the sky gods or to their
  ancestors in Sheol, but those in Sheol were cut
  off from the sky gods.

3
Schematic Drawings of Semitic World
4
Sheol for the Hebrews

• The Hebrews were strongly influenced by the
  Semitic ideas.
• Sheol was the resting place where the dead joined
  their ancestors.
• Good and evil alike went to Sheol after dying.
• Sheol was silent and dark, and the shades in
  Sheol were incapable of praising God.

5
Yahwehs Rewards/Punishments

• Most of the early Hebrew belief was based on
  Deuteromic law.
• Yahweh expressed his approval (or lack of) in
  this world.
• Disobedience led to invasions, plagues, and
  ultimately death.
• Faithfulness resulted in being blessed with many
  cattle, children, fields, and respect.

6
Sheol Lessens

• This type of belief minimized the idea of any
  type of life after death.
• When the Hebrews were conquered by the Assyrians,
  they tried to worship only one god.
• With the end of the Judean monarchy by the
  Babylonians in 586 BCE, the dream of a restored
  Israel begins to grow.

7
Dissatisfaction Grows

• Because of equality in death, many Hebrews feel
  that the situation is unfair.
• Those who are good and poor have the same fate as
  the rich and evil.
• This dissatisfaction is expressed in the musings
  of Job, Psalms 47 and 73, and Ecclesiastes.

8
Sheol Evolves

• In the later Old Testament books there is a shift
  to the belief of immortality.
• Sheol becomes divided, so that the good shades
  are kept apart from the bad ones.
• Gehenna is where the Hebrews who broke the
  Covenant burn perpetually. The good souls rest
  in comfort and peace.

9
The Development of Hell

• The regions of hell and descriptions begin with
  Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Jeremiah.
• In Daniel (ca. 165BCE) all the souls are
  resurrected and are separated into groups of
  everlasting life and everlasting contempt.
• The misery of the Syrian and Roman oppressions
  also resulted in apocalyptic literature.

10
Bodily Resurrection?!

• Babylonian captivity gave the Hebrews another
  reason to focus on the next world.
• Ezekiel took the ideas of Zoroaster and suggested
  that when the end comes, the dead would rise to
  join the living in a restored world.
• Once the dead are resurrected, they would have to
  face judgment.

11
The Development of Heaven

• The ideas of Greeks such as Plato, Cicero,
  Plutarch, and Vergil influenced the Hebrews
  ideal Heaven.
• From their ideas, good souls would ascend upward
  and individuals would continue their existence.
• Others thought that Jerusalem restored would
  descend from above and the living and dead would
  exist there together.

12
New Testament Sects

• The Sadducees maintained the belief that Yahwehs
  rewards came in this life and that there was
  nothing to come after death.
• The Pharisees were ritual-oriented, purists, and
  accepted the idea of resurrection.
• The Essenes held an individualistic perspective
  on the afterlife. They saw heaven as eternity in
  a place like the Greeks Isle of the Blest.

13
New Testament Views

• Heaven was the only way that believers of Christ
  could experience the divine fully.
• Hell, according to Thayer, is not a doctrine of
  endless punishment as Christ went there before
  his resurrection.
• Descriptions and explanations are few since most
  Hebrews assumed the end times were at hand.

14
Since New Testament Times...

• Very little was stated explicitly by the Old and
  New Testaments about the characteristics of
  Heaven and Hell.
• Since the end of New Testament times, speculation
  on heaven and hell has been endless.
• In Western literature and art, there have been
  many different interpretations.

15
Bibliography

• Bernstein, Alan E. The Formation of Hell.
  Ithaca Cornell U. Press, 1993.
• McDannell, Colleen and Bernhard Lang. Heaven-A
  History. London Yale U. Press, 1988.
• Miller, Lisa, et al. Why We Need Heaven.
  Newsweek 12 Aug. 2002 44-52.
• Russell, Jeffrey Burton. The Devil Perceptions
  of Evil From Antiquity to Primitive
  Christianity. Ithaca Cornell U. Press, 1977.

16
Bibliography

• ---. A History of Heaven The Singing Silence.
  Princeton Princeton U. Press, 1996.
• Sheler, Jeffery L. Heaven in the Age of
  Reason. U.S. News World Report 31 Mar 97
  65-67.
• Thayer, Thomas. The Biblical Doctrine of Hell.
  The Origin and History of the Doctrine of
  Endless Punishment. 1855. 21 Mar 2003
  http//www.auburn.edu/allenkc/tbell. html.