HELL NOT A PLACE TO CONTINUE ETERNALLY As the word hell, fifty-four times found in our English Bible, is prominently used as either direct or inferential proof of the immortality and endless misery of the wicked, I will endeavor to remove this proof, by devoting a short chapter to the meaning of the word. It will also aid much in removing the proof claimed to be found in other texts. The following remarks on the term hell I published a few months since in a religious paper, and give them here nearly as they appeared then, The brief explanations will be made up in the next chapter. The English word hell, as now generally understood, is a hindrance to those who are examining the doctrine of destruction; but if rightly understood, it would greatly aid in proving the doctrine. It now denotes a place, (no one dares say where), as a prison for the eternal misery of men and devils. I deny this meaning, and say, that none of the four original words translated hell ever have this meaning, as used in the Bible. I will endeavor to prove this assertion, both from the Bible and the confessions of our best critics who hold to endless misery. In the first place, let us hear what Dr. George Campbell, a Presbyterian commentator of Scotland, says on two words translated hell. “In my judgment," he says. "hades ought never, in Scripture, to be rendered hell; at least in the sense wherein that word is now universally understood by Christians. In the 0. T., the corresponding word is sheol, which signifies the state of the dead in general, without regard to the goodness or badness of persons, their happiness or misery. Hades signifies obscure, hidden, invisible.” See Diss., vol. 1, pp. 180, 181. He elsewhere says, “The Saxon word hell originally meant only a pit, or covered place.” SHEOL.—I will next quote from Exegetical Essays, on several words relating to future punishment, by Moses Stuart, Professor in the Theological Seminary at Andover. On page 93 he says, “Sheol is used sixty-three times in the 0. T., and translated hell thirty-one times, grave thirty, and pit three. It is pit in Num. 16:30-33; Job 17:16.” On page 112 he says, “The meaning of sheol which lies upon the face of the sacred record (if I may thus speak,) is indeed that of grave, sepulchre, underground, or state of the dead, as I have given in the recension of the passages.” On pages 116-119, in giving a statement of what the Bible says of sheol, he says, — "1. Sheol is a place from which none ever return, e. g., Job 7:9; 2 Sam. 12:23. 2. It consumes or devours the bodies laid in it. Job 24:19; Ps. 49:14. 3. Sheol is a place of inaction and silence, e. g., Ps. 6:6; 31:17; 1 Sam. 2:9; Isa. 38: 18; Ecc. 9: 10. 4. Sheol extends deep into the recesses of the earth; yea, as deep as the heavens are high above it. Job 1 1:8; Jonah 2:1; Amos 9:2; Deut. 32: 22. 5. Sheol is a place of utter and perpetual darkness and gloom. Job 10:21, 22." 6. [But he adds for comparison:] "Here dwelt the ghosts or manes of deceased men." [This statement he gets from heathenism, as the texts he quotes do not sustain it; and besides he says, on page 121, ‘A deep region beneath, peopled with ghosts, is what we don’t believe in.' His texts are:] Ps.,88:10; Prov.2:18;9;18; Isa. 14:9; 26:14. None prove this view. 7. Sheol is sometimes personified, and represented as an insatiable monster, always devouring without remorse or distinction, o. g., Isa. 5:14 ; Prov. 27:20; 1:12. 8. Sheol, in common and popular language, is the world or region to which both the righteous and the wicked go after death, e. g. Gen. 25:8 ; Num. 20:26; Deut. 32: 50.' On page 122 he says, “Where is the specific difference between the future state of the righteous and wicked, fully set forth in the Hebrew Scriptures? Where are the separate abodes in sheol for each, particularly described? I know not; nor do I believe any one can inform me.” Page 113 he says, “On the whole, it is to be regretted that our English translation has given occasion to the remarks, that those who made it, have intended to impose on their readers, in any case, a sense different from that of the original Hebrew....I am inclined to believe, that in their day, the word hell had not acquired, so exclusively as at present, the meaning of a world of future misery.'' Page 114, he adds, “It is probable that the Hebrews did sometimes so understand sheol; and he quotes five texts to make out this 'probability'—viz., Job 21:13; Ps. 9:17 ; Prov. 9:18; 23:14. I ask the reader to look at these texts, and he will see no proof in them that sheol refers to a 'world of misery.' Ps. 9: 17, likely tells the final doom of the sinner, and if so, it is death; and the dead cannot occupy a world of woe. Ps. 37:10, tells that 'his place shall not be.'” HADES.—The Greek word hades is translated hell ten times in the N. T., and once grave. It occurs Matt. 11:23; 16:18; Luke 10:15; 16:23; 1 Cor. 15:55; Acts 2:27, 31 ; Rev. 1:18; 6:8; 20:13, 14. Mr. Stuart says: 1."Hades designates the under world, Subterranean regions simply, in opposition to the region above the earth." e. g. Matt. 11:23; Luke 10: 15. "Thou Capernium, which art exalted to heaven, i. e., very highly (alluding probably to its site on a hill) shalt be brought down to the under world, i. e., very low." "This is the natural and primary explanation of the word hades here." 2. "Hades signifies the region of the dead, the domains of death, e. g. Matt 16: 18; Rev. 1 : 18; 6: 8; 20: 13, 14. 3. Hades means grave, sepulchre, depository of the dead, e. g. 1 Cor. 15:55 ; Acts 2:27-31. 4. Hades has the sense of Tartarus in one passage, viz., the region of woe or punishment. Luke 16:23, 'In hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torments.'" [Hades and sheol are used seventy-five times, and all are given up by Stuart and others, as meaning a world of woe, except one, .and that is in an intricate parable. All good critics have admitted, and common sense teaches, that parables can settle no doctrine. This parable has no reference to a literal death or grave, as has often been admitted by critics who hold to endless misery. It is similar to the parable of the prodigal son, with additional circumstances, so I leave it as no proof that hades ever means a place of torment. If it could be shown that this parable proved a place of woe in hades, it would be no proof of a place for endless woe, as Prov. 20:13, 14, tells us hades is to give up the dead, and be destroyed.] TARTARUS.—The Greek word Tartarus, used but once, and translated hell in 2 Pet. 2 : 4, is relied on to prove there is a world of misery. Here we need no authority, for the Bible forbids this idea. "God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to Tartarus and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment." An imprisonment for a limited time is here spoken of, while no place is named, as Tartarus here can only convey the idea of a prison, in the sense of John 3: 36—"He that believeth not the Son, shall not see life ; but the wrath of God abideth on him'; and in v. 18, "He that believeth not is condemned already"; and in 2 Pet. 2:9, "The Lord knoweth how to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished." This sense is seen in the parallel text in Jude 6. If devils are confined to a local place, it is on earth.— See Job 1:7; 1 Pet. v. 8; 2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 2:2— "He goeth to and fro," "is god of this world," "rules in the children of disobedience"; so we are all in the same hell the devil is. Heb. 2:14, tells us he is to be "destroyed," and so his prison will end at the judgment. But further, devils are not punished yet, as they have not been judged, and are as criminals apprehended, and waiting for judgment and punishment. They said to Christ, "Hast thou come to torment us before the time?" and again, "Hast thou come to destroy us?” GEHENNA.—But the Greek word Gehenna, twelve times translated "hell" in the N. T., is the main term used to prove a world of torment, or endless hell in a future state. It occurs in Matt. 5:22, 29, 30; 10:28; 18:9; 23:15, 33; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Luke 12:5; James 3:6. Stuart says, “The word Gehenna, is derived from the words Gi Hinnom, the valley of Hinnom." He adds, "It was a word used by the ancient Hebrews, and they are the only competent witnesses of its meaning." The O. T., then, must be examined for this; for Dr. George Campbell says, "Our Lord, we find from the evangelists, spoke to his countrymen in the dialect of their own Scriptures, and used those names to which the reading of the law and the prophets had familiarized them." Not observing this fact has been the great cause of the woeful mistake about future punishment. I affirm, then, that Hinnom, (Gehenna) is never used in the 0. T. to mean a place of infernal punishment, or world of woe. It is used first, as the name of a literal place; and secondly, as a symbol of destruction, slaughter, death. So the Saviour used it. As this is among the most important points in examining the doctrine of future punishment, it demands full investigation, and I will thereby refer to all the places where Hinnom and Tophet (meaning the same as Gehenna) are used in the Old Testament. See Joshua 15:8; 18:16; 2 Kings 23:10; Neh. 1 1:30; 2 Chron. 28:3; 38: 6; Jer. 7:31, 32; 19:2-6, 11-14; 32:35; Isa. 30:33. In these texts we find Gehenna used to symbolize slaughter and death, in Jer. 7: 32; 19: 6-11 ; Isa. 30:33: also, to denote utter destruction, in Jer. 19: 11, 12; Isa. 30 : 33. In Jer. 19:13, it symbolizes a polluted place. Jer. 7:32, reads, "Therefore, behold the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of slaughter; for they shall bury in Tophet till there be no place: " See the same in ch. 19:6. Jer. 19:1 1-12, "I will break this peopie, and this city (Jerusalem,) as one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again, and they shall bury them in Tophet till there be no place else to bury,.... and even make this city as Tophet." Here, as in every place in the 0. T., where it is used figuratively, it symbolizes death and utter destruction. Scott's Commentary says, "It became a place of execution of criminals for theJews.” The fact is plain that "God has surnamed the place, the valley of slaughter, and to affirm that the wicked are to be kept alive there forever, is to charge him with naming it inappropriately.” Bible vs. Tradition, p. 219. Christ evidently used Gehenna figuratively, in ihe same sense the prophets did. There is no proof to contradict this, but much to sustain it. Stuart, Barnes, and others, go to the heathen and to the superstitious Rabbinical writers,and not to the Bible, to prove he meant a world of misery by Gehenna and Hades; and they do the same as to sheol. Out of much and full proof of this, I will quote a little from Stuart's work, named above: Page 146: "That the word Gehenna was common among the Jews, is evident from its frequency in the oldest Rabbinical writings. It was employed by them, as all confess, in order to designate hell, the infernal region, the world of woe.... Indeed, it seems quite probable, as Gesenius suggests, that Gehenna came to be used as a designation of the infernal regions, because the Hebrews supposed that demons dwelt in this valley." He elsewhere shows that the Jews got their ideas from the heathen, and not from their Scriptures. I admit that Christ used Gehenna to symbolize punishment at the judgment; but he used it as the prophets did, with the double meaning of punishment and the kind of punishment, namely, death. When he said to the Jews, “How can ye escape the condemnation (punishment) of Gehenna” [hell]? he meant the same as if he had said, How can ye escape the cross? that is, a disgraceful and miserable death; or the same as if we should say, How can that murderer escape the punishment of the gallows or the stake? Gehenna was a polluted place, as we see by 2 Kings 23:10, and so was the cross; “Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree”; and it is just as absurd to say, Christ meant the sinner would go to a world of woe and live for ever there, by saying he would "be cast into Gehenna," as it would be for us to say, the murderer will live for ever in misery, because he is going to the gallows or the stake. On examining all the texts in the Old and New Testaments, I am compelled to fully believe that Gehenna ought never to be translated, any more than Babylon, Sodom, Egypt and Jerusalem. They are all names of literal places, and used figuratively in both Testaments. No one is misled by these other names not being translated, neither would they be by this being untranslated. The Seventy did not translate it from the Hebrew to the Greek. I cannot think of any other literal place thus translated in the Bible. The precious book is darkened and corrupted by its translation. I am credibly informed that in versions in other languages it is seldom translated. Surely, the word hell is a wrong word to translate it into. Dr. George Campbell says, “At first, hell denoted only what was secret or concealed.’” Parkhurst says, “Our English, or rather Saxon, word hell, in its original signification, exactly answers to the Greek word hades, and denotes a concealed, or unseen, place; and this sense of the word is still retained in the eastern, and especially in the western counties of England: to hele over a thing is to cover it.” Mr. Sabine says, “It appears to me that in the time of this translation, hell, pit. and grave, were synonymous.” Certainly this is not the sense of Gehenna in a single place in the Bible; though it answers to the sense of sheol and hades. The present conventional and perverted meaning of the word hell, is about as far from the sense of Gehenna as was its original meaning. I know it will be said, Gehenna symbolizes a place of punishment, where there will be “weeping and wailing”; yes, and so do the cross and the stake cause weeping. All I have said of Gehenna, is confirmed by the concessions of Rev. A. Barnes, in his notes on Matt. v. 22, where it first occurs as used by Christ—“’Hell fire’ ; the original of this is the ‘Gehenna of fire.’ It was made the place where to throw all the dead carcasses and filth of the city, and was not unfrequently the place of executions. It became, therefore, extremely offensive, and to preserve the pestilential air in any measure pure, it was necessary to keep fires continually burning there. It was the image which our Saviour often employed to denote the future punishment of the wicked.. .. But he who shall load his brother with odious appellations and abusive language, shall incur the severest degree of punishment, represented by being burnt alive in the horrid and awful valley of Hinnom. Among- the Jews there were three degrees of condemnation,— that by the judgment, the council, and the fire of Hinnom.” From this description, Gehenna could symbolize nothing but a miserable and disgraceful loss of life. A Jew could understand Chrst in no other sense, as they knew he understood the prophets, and was constantly calling their attention to them. It is unjustifiable to say Christ used Gehenna in a different sense from what the prophets did, without a good warrant tor doing so. Paul preached thirty years, and wrote fourteen epistles, and is it not passing strange that he never intimated a hell, if he knew there was one? He was explaining what Christ meant by being “cast, into the Gehenna of fire'' in Heb. 10:26, 27. "If we sin willfully.. .there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries."' And Heb. 6:8, (‘”But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing: whose end is to be burned.”) And in Rom. 9:22. where he says the wicked are “vessels of wrath fitted to destruction,”—not to an endless hell, as we now hear in every sermon. If the common theory of a local hell be correct, there must be three distinct hells taught in the Bible; two now in existence, and one to be built in future, (i.) Hades, for souls between death and the judgment. (2.) Tartarus, (the atmosphere) for the present home of devils. And (3.) Gehenna, to be provided somewhere, at the judgment. But we learn from God's word, that hades, the first hell, is to be destroyed. Rev. 20 : 14. The devils hell must be ended when he is destroyed; or rather, when “the new heavens and new earth are made,'' the “air" will be so purified, that he will no longer be "prince of it.” And as to Gehenna, hell, it only symbolizes the punishment to be inflicted at the judgment, which is death; but if we call it a local place, it is to be a slaughter-yard —“the valley of slaughter shall it be called," Jer. 7:32 ; 19:6; and when Christ says, "bring hither mine enemies, and slay them before me"; and “the last enemy is destroyed"; who can divine what will become of this third and last hell ? Or what need there will be of its existence? The common sense answer to such a question, in worldly matters, would be—when there is no more stock to butcher, slaughter-houses will be discontinued. I have quoted but a small part of the authority I have collected, both from the Bible and writers to prove my assertion, No Eternal Hell. This is not saying there will be no future punishment. No,—the sinner will see at the judgment if not before, that to be “burned up with unquenchable fire” in Gehenna—to go to Sheol, the place of the dead' for ever, is a sad punishment, and one that will cause 'weeping and gnashing of teeth,' till the 'blackness of darkness for ever ends his being and his woe. When I had pored over seventy-seven pages of Stuart, in which he labors to make these four terms mean what hell now means and witnessed his reliance on heathen and Rabinic writers,—his probabilities and contradictions, I unavoidably thought of the old proverb, “a mountain travailed and brought forth a mouse.” But be had immortal and polluted souls on hand, and he must find a place for them somewhere. This assumed doctrine of immortality for the wicked, has produced sophistry enough to make any one ashamed of poor erring human nature, and do what it has done—till Christendom with sceptics, and the world with gloom. With hell, and hell-fire, thus wrongfully put in fifty-three texts, no wonder the common people think the Bible is full of endless misery. The whole learned Christian ministry have sinned in permitting and aiding in the change of the English word hell from its original meaning; and they “handle the word of God deceitfully” when they use it in its present perverted sense. Let them not censure me for "rebuking sharply”; for the remembrance that I have been kept in darkness and gloom for forty years; and the sad fact that millions of God's dear people, whom I love and wish to comfort, are still kept in the same darkness and gloom, by their covering up the truth in this matter, arouses the deep emotions of my soul, and I cannot believe I sin, by giving them vent. And besides, the time has come for the fifty or more ministers, in the United States, who have been hurled from the churches, and branded with heresy, for preaching the Bible instead of the creeds to speak out with boldness, and carry back the ponderous load of heresy to the doors where it belong. War has been declared against us, and I am not content with defensive warfare, but judge it best to drive the battle into the enemies' camp, knowing they cannot defend it, as they have not “the sword of the spirit,’” which is the word of God,—that mighty weapon is in our camp, and we should use it and let our deceived foes feel its power, to "pull down strong holds, and cast down imaginations." 2 Cor. 10:4. I wish to act in the same spirit of love and boldness that Paul did, when he “withstood Peter to his face, and said he was to be blamed for dissembling.” Gal. 2:11-13. True, I have sinned myself: for the English student of the Bible, by a long research can find it teaches no endless hell, but simply a second death for the poor sinner. Thanks be to God that thousands are thus learning at the present time. But the joy of this fact, is chilled by hearing from the learned ministry the cry, —“pernicious doctrine,” —infidelity,— illiterate souls,—'cast them out of the Synagogue'!! Surely, mountain piles of; “hay, wood, stubble,” will have to be “burned up” at the judgment, or many, whom we hope will have “eternal life,” will be cast into Gehenna. The Lord in mercy save the church from a far worse than Papal purgatorv delusion. Buffalo, X. F.. Nov. 9, 1852.
THE CATHOLICS MORE HONEST IN THEIR TRANSLATION THAN THE PROTESTANTS.
I here throw in an interesting tact from the Catholic Bible, in relation to the word hell, which I have just discovered. As far as I have examined, they translate sheol and hades honestly, in giving to the English word hell its original and proper meaning, viz , secret, covered, etc, or, the state of the dead, without making any distinction between the saint and sinner. Their notes of course are useless, and I only add them as a curiosity. [OMITTED]
ERRORS IN TRANSLATION.
Here we have full proof that the Saxon word hell has been changed from its original meaning; and my charge of corruption in changing it, and that the learned sin in using it in its present perverted sense,” is justifiable. I defy them to evade the proof and argument, or to justify their practice.
Thus, as I have said, the unlearned in Greek and Hebrew may, by research, learn that the Bible teaches no local eternal hell.
I will add here, that the Bible is perverted by the learned in applying the term " bottomless pit" to a place of woe. They know -'the Greek word abussus, translated "bottomless pit," is only used metaphorically in Revelation, and only means immense, profound, a wilderness, etc. It is used Rom. 10:7, "Who shall descend into the deep, abussus? (that is to bring up Christ again from the dead.”) Here it evidently means the grave; for who believes Christ was in a place of woe?" See "Bible vs. Tradition” Rev. 9:1-5, shows its meaning; as all agree the Mahomadan delusion is meant.
[9:1 When the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the bottomless pit. 2 And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit. 3 Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. 4 They were commanded not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green thing, or any tree, but only those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. 5 And [b]they were not given authority to kill them, but to torment them for five months. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man.]
I have just further discovered that the Dauay Bible is honest and exposes the corruption of our translation in the term "give up the ghost." It is thus—Gen. 25 : 8, "And decaying he died"; 49: 3, "and died." Job 10:18, "And that I had been consumed." "Giving up the ghost" in the sense now attached to it, is very different from "decaying, and being consumed, and dying" ; and yet the learned know that the latter is the sense of the Hebrew and Greek as used in the Bible ; and to get the former sense they go to the heathen and ignorant Jewish writers, who even held to the pre-existence and transmigration of souls.
"The word ghost is a Saxon word, derived from gust of wind, and originally meant merely giving up the wind, or "breath of lives.”,—Bible vs. Tradition.
So we see our teachers have changed the meaning of this word, just as they have of hell. Will the laity patiently continue to be thus deceived, or awake and demand of instructors the whole truth? They must do so, or "follow the multitude to do evil" ; for as I have said, learned ministers seem bent on having me reform, or on not giving any new light to the people on this great subject. They seem to think that an eternal hell and endless torment must be preached, or religion will go to wreck. Preach the truth, and Christ will take care of his own cause.
When I say the translators designedly covered up the truth, I do not mean that they did so in relation to all doctrines and duties, but only where they wished to sustain a favorite doctrine, and a faithful and uniform translation of the original would seem to destroy it. They had retained the pagan and papal doctrines of immortality—that the dead are alive, and that there is a hell, or local place of torment; and on these points it can be demonstrated that they used equivocation, and the learned now refuse to expose it.
See a proof. Hades occurs eleven times in the N. T., and they render it hell ten times, but when they come to 1 Cor. 15:55, lest their idea of hell should appear false, they translate it grave. "0 grave, where is thy victory?" They evidently start back!— “If we are uniform, and translate this hell, the unlearned will see that our place for torment is to have ‘no victory' —no inhabitants or deathless spirits after the judgment!—so we must put it grave here!”
Acts 2; 27, “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell,” [hades), if rendered grave, the people would see his soul did not go off to paradise with the thief, and so their doctrine of going to heaven when we die, would be disturbed —hence they put it hell, concluding the people (as proves to be the fact,) would wonder and wonder over it, as a mystery and leave it there!
Rev. 20 : 13, "Death and hell {hades) delivered up the dead which were in them." Here a good purpose could be answered by putting it hell instead of grave, as the people would think (as is the fact) that the wicked came from a world of torment to be judged.
Look at the thirty-one texts where sheol is translated hell and it is plain they rendered it hell wherever the sense did not compel them to put it grave or pit.
We hear much about the sainted king James who ordered our translation; but do divines tell that his reign was a corrupt one—that he restrained the translators as to certain words, etc., and that he died a Catholic? Yet history tells these startling facts.
We should be traitors to the cause of religion if we did not condemn what is wrong in our translation, and seek to have it corrected ; and the outcry that we are destroying confidence in the Bible, is fallacious. The course the mass of ministers are now taking in opposing a new translation, is a direct way to do it.
The ostrich, when pursued, hides its head in the sand or a bush, to avoid being discovered. Opposers to a correction of king James' translation exhibit a similar folly.— Learned Unitarians, Universalists, and Deists, are exposing these errors, and by proving that the orthodox use evasion, much injury is done. The learned ministry are now, in a special manner, practicing evasion to oppose those who teach the destruction of the wicked.
“Give us the mind of the Spirit, if it tears into atoms every human creed in Christendom,” should be our motto.
PRES. EDWARDS ON HELL AND HEAVEN.
In vol. 4. p. 287 and on, he says, "The woes of sinners in hell will not be a cause of grief to saints in heaven, but of rejoicing. This rejoicing will be the fruit of an amiable disposition, and a perfect holiness and conformity to Christ. At the judgment you may be ready to fly to some godly friend, but you will see them unconcerned for you, with joy ascending to meet their Lord, and not the less joyful for the horror in which they see you. When they hear you groan and gnash your teeth, these things will not move them at all to pity you. After your godly parents shall have seen you lie in hell millions of ages, in torment day and night,
they will not begin to pity you then; they will praise God that his justice appears in the eternity of your misery. The torments in hell will be immensely greater than being in a glowing oven, a brick-kiln, or a fiery furnace."
This is a specimen of five sermons on this subject; and, with such teaching, no wonder Universalism has spread in the Eastern States. Prof. Finny slanders God far worse, by saying, that "the torment will eternally increase." Verily, God is "forbearing and forgiving," or he would (not eternally torture, but) annihilate, for such blasphemy. Where is the Bible for such stuff?
Compare such statements with Bible language— “Our God is full of compassion—of pity—will not hold his anger forever—his mercy endureth forever," etc. All texts, as we shall prove, which tell of “vengeance, and woe," show them to be momentary—so, “our God will not hold his anger forever." Amen.
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