79 lines
6.0 KiB
Plaintext
79 lines
6.0 KiB
Plaintext
WHERE DOES THE WORD HELL COME FROM?
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Webster's Third New International Dictionary, unabridged, under "Hell"
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says: "from 'helan' to conceal." The word "hell" thus originally conveyed
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no thought of heat or torment but simply of a 'covered over or concealed
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place.' In the old English dialect the expression "helling potatoes" meant,
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not to roast them, but simply to place the potatoes in the ground or in a
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cellar.
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Collier's Encyclopedia (1986, Vol 12, p.28) says concerning "Hell":
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First it stands for the Hebrew Sheol of the Old Testament and the Greek
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Hades of the Septuagint and New Testament. Since Sheol in the Old Testament
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times refered simply to the abode of the dead and suggested no moral
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distinctions, the word 'hell,' as understood today, is not a happy
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translation."
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The meaning given today to the word "hell" is that portrayed in Dante's
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Divine Comedy and Milton's Paradise Lost, which meaning is completely
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foreign to the original definition of the word. The idea of a "hell" of firey
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torment, dates back long before Dante or Milton. The Grollier Universal
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Encyclopedia (1971, Vol. 9,p.205) under "Hell" says: "Hindus and Buddhists
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regard hell as a place of spiritual cleansing and final restoration.
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Islamic tradition considers it as a place of eternal punishment." The idea
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of suffering after death is found among the pagan religious teachings of
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ancient peoples in Babylon and Egypt. Babylonian and Assyrian beliefs
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depicted the "nether world . . . as a place full of horrors, . . . presided
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over by gods and demons of great strength and fierceness." Although ancient
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Egyptian religious texts do not teach that the burning of any individual
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victim would go on forever, they do portray the "other world" as featuring
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"pits of fire" for "the damned."--The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, by
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Morris Jastrow, Jr. 1898, p. 581; The Book of the Dead, 1960, pp. 135-200.
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"Hellfire" has been a basic teaching in Christendom for many centuries,
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it is understandable why The Encyclopedia Americana (1956, Vol XIV,p.81)
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said:"Much confusion and misunderstanding has been caused by the early
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translators of the Bible persistently rendering the Hebrew Sheol and the
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Greek Hades and Gehenna by the word hell. The simple transliteration of
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these words by the translators of the revised editions of the Bible has not
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sufficed to appreciably clear up this confusion and misconception."
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Nevertheless, such transliteration and consistent rendering does enable the
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Bible student to make an accurate comparison of the texts in which these
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original words appear and, with open mind, thereby to arrive at an
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understanding of their true significance.
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So, what is the 'Lake of Fire" of Revelation chapter 20? First let's
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look at verse 15, it says: "Whosoever was not found written in the book of
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life was cast into the lake of fire." But verse 14 says:"And death and hell
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were cast into the lake of fire." Is hell itself to be tormented? And how
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can death ,a condition, be thrown into a literal fire? The rest of verse 14
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reads: This [the lake of fire] is the second death." Rev. 21:8 repeats this
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point. What is this "second death"? The Catholic Jerusalem Bible adds this
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footnote concerning "the second death": "Eternal death. The fire ... is
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symbolic." Very true, for it signifies complete destruction, or
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annihilation.
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How interresting! "Hell" is to be destroyed! Note, however, that the
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Greek word used here is Hades, which, according to Strong's Exhaustive
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Concordance of the Bible, means "grave." Are the dead conscious or
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suffering in hell, or Hades? The Bible replies:"The dead know nothing...for
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neither work, nor reason, nor wisdom,nor knowledge shall be in hell, whither
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thou art hastening."--Ecclesiastes 9:5,10, Catholic Douay Version.
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However you may ask "Why does Rev.20:10, say that the Devil will be
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'tormented' in the lake of fire?" If, as we have seen, the lake is
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symbolic, then, logically the torment is also.
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In the Bible times, jailers often cruelly tortured their prisoners,
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hence they were called "tormentors." In one of his illustrations, Jesus
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spoke of a cruel slave as being 'delivered to jailers' (Greek, basanistes',
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which actually means "tormentors" and is so rendered by the KJV at Matt.
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18:34). So when Revelation speaks of the Devil and others as being
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"tormented...forever" in the lake of fire, it means that they will be
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"jailed" to all eternity in the second death of complete destruction. The
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Devil, the death inherited from Adam, and the unrepentant wicked all are
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spoken of as being destroyed eternally--"jailed" in the lake of
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fire.--Compare Heb.2:14; 1 Corinthians 15:26; Psalm 37:38.
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The Dogma of eternal torment is based on the immortal-soul theory.
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However, the Bible clearly states: "The soul that is sinning--it shall
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die."(Ezekial 18:4,20; see also Acts 3:23.) Proclaimers of hellfire have
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made the true God, Jehovah, appear to be a fiend--a cruel monster--instead
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of what he is: a God of love, "merciful and gracious . . . and abundant in
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loving kindness."--Exodus 34:6.
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Lovingly God has made provision to save men, not from torment, but from
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being destroyed. Said Jesus: "God loved the world so much that he gave his
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only-begotten Son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him not be
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DESTROYED but have everlasting life.--John 3:16.
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