Hell is a Mistranslation - Part I

Disclaimer: 

I’m neither a theologian nor a scholar. In this this series I am merely sharing how, I, as a regular person, came to the understanding of what I am about to share. These posts are not exhaustive essays, but nutshells. 

It is not written from a haughty and insecure "I'm right - you're wrong" position, something that is so prevalent in the fundamentalist religious circles. My hope is that, this will encourage someone to look beyond the obvious, to dig in, instead of blindly agreeing with the unquestioned answers. 

This series is not about me pushing my thoughts down your throat; again, something that fundamentalism is infamous for. Truths are discovered by the seeker; not swallowed. 

You may not agree with this series right now (which is absolutely fine), but know that, just because we have heard something for so long, does not necessarily make it the ultimate truth. There was a time when we scripturally believed that the sun rotated around the flat earth. We now look back and laugh at our idiocy of having believed that ignorance, and yet, sometimes we assume that we now know it all. But, do we?

Based on the scriptures we know, it may be tempting to discard anything that we haven't heard before, while reading this series. I used to be a pro at that. I had all the scriptural points to prove why I was “right” regarding a particular belief. Little did I know then, that I was merely echoing one of the many interpretations out there, and that, the picture is much bigger than what I initially thought it was.

On to the topic at hand.

::

I no longer believe in ‘Hell’, because, for starters, the word is a mistranslation.

The books of the Bible were not originally written in English or any of our mother tongues. It was written in Hebrew (Old Testament) Greek (New Testament) and few texts in Aramaic. Fortunately, thanks to the Internet, we do not have to be a Greek/Hebrew scholar to study the actual words. There are several online tools available. 

The popular idea we have of Hell, is that it is an eternal inferno where bad people (and/or those who haven't received Christ Jesus) will spend their eternity in. But when we look up the root words, we find that it has nothing to do with what we have been led to believe.

 

The Hebrew word from which the word Hell is translated in the English Bibles is 'Sheol'. Sheol simply means grave or a place of dead or unseen. The translators deliberately mistranslated the words in the Old Testament (OT). When the word came up concerning "good" people, they used the word 'grave'. But for bad people, it was 'hell'. (For some examples, see Ps 9:17; Ps 55:15; Ps 89:48; Job 14:13)

 

An orange is an orange. It does not change to an apple, depending on who is eating that fruit. 

The Greek words used for 'hell' are - Hades, Tartaroo and Gehenna.

Hades is the New Testament (NT) equivalent of the Hebrew word Sheol, which means grave or place of dead or unseen.

 

Tartaroo is only mentioned once (in 2 Peter 2:4) and it appears to be a temporary confinement for some demons until judgment. The word is actually a verb, meaning "to cast down", instead of a noun, Hell.

 

Gehenna is an actual place near Jerusalem - Gehinnom Valley. In the OT Hebrew, it was called the valley of Ben-Hinnom or Topheth. During the time of OT, this place was notorious for paganism, idolatry and child sacrifice. By the time of NT, this valley had turned into a garbage dump outside the city gates of Jerusalem, where fires were always burning to consume trash and dead bodies, where worms and maggots thrived (a reason why it is said that hell has worms). Lepers and criminals were sent to live there in shame, away from the rest of the society.

None of these words refers to a fiery oven, where people would be deep-fried, forever and ever. 

In the next post, I will write about the phrase 'lake of fire' and words like 'eternal', ‘everlasting’ and 'forever and ever'.

::
Read Part I, Part II, Part III and Part IV of this series.