In Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus, He explained in John 3:13, “And no one has ever ascended into the heaven, except the one who descended out of heaven, the Son of man, the one being in heaven.”  According to Jesus throughout the days of the Old Testament and Jesus’ ministry, no believer had ever ascended into heaven after death. Even David in the OT, after death, did not “ascend in the heaven,” as Peter explained in Acts 2:34-35 with his quote of Psalm 110:1, “For David did not ascended into the heavens, but he himself says, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies a footstool for my feet.”’”  Prior to the ministry of Jesus apparently no believer had ever gone directly to heaven after death.  In fact this may explain the answer of “No one but God” to the rhetorical question in Proverbs 30:4, “Who has ascended into the heavens or descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has bound the waters in a garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name, and what is His Son's name, that you might know?”  This implied answer to each of these rhetorical questions is God in contrast to any man.[1]

In the Hebrew Old Testament, the word for both “hell” and “the grave” is “She’ol” and is much the same idea, as the word, “Hades,” in the Greek New Testament. David explained God’s omnipresence in Ps.139:8 rhetorically, “If I ascend into heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in She’ol, behold you are there.” David was only describing the possibility of both of these things happening in his poetic way, but this would not negate what he wrote in Psalm 16:10, as to his implication of the normal place of a believer after death is in She’ol, “For you will not leave my soul in She’ol, nor will you allow your holy one to see corruption.”  She’ol, as “the grave,” was the abode of all members of the human race, including the Messiah, after death.  Peter reiterated this very thing in Acts 2:27, where he quoted Psalm 16:8-11 using Hades for She’ol, and then interpreted this further by using the past tense in verse 31, “foreseeing [this], he spoke about the resurrection of Christ, that ‘His soul was not left in Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.’”  So the time just prior to the resurrection, Jesus had been in Hades temporarily, which He also called “Paradise” in His conversation with the repentant thief on the cross in Luke 23:43, “and Jesus said to him, ‘Truly I say to you, “Today you shall be with me in Paradise.”’”  An insight into this word can be seen of this by noting that the word, Paradise, comes from a Persian word for garden, a beautiful place to live and relax.  Since Jesus promised this penitent thief that he would be present with Him in Paradise after his death which would be within a few hours after Jesus’ death according to John 19:31-32, Jesus and the thief actually that very afternoon entered into Paradise, as the area of bliss of Hades reserved for believers. 

Prior to Jesus’ being in Hades, He had spoken in Luke 16:19-31 about an actual person[2] named Lazarus who had died (before Jesus’ own death, resurrection, and ascension).  At death he had gone to a “comfortable” area of Hades referred to as “Abraham’s bosom [or breast].”  This area of bliss for the believer within Hades or (She’ol in the Hebrew Old Testament) was on one side of a great “chasm” across from a fiery area referred to as “torments” in which the rich man was existing after death with some kind of bodily suffering.  It is this area of bliss for the believer, “Abraham’s bosom,” that David also calls “the house of the Lord” in Psalm 23:6.  So then prior to the ascension, “Paradise” about which Jesus spoke to the penitent thief on the cross was the same thing as “Abraham’s bosom” in Hades. However, after Jesus’ Ascension in Acts 1:9 Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 12:2-4 of “Paradise” being in “the third heaven.”  So apparently[3] Jesus took Paradise to (the third) heaven at His ascension.  For believers after the Ascension, this Paradise in the Third Heaven is their location after death for “being present with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8). Thus, Hades in the New Testament after Jesus’ Ascension, that is in Acts 1 through Revelation, can be totally identified, as “torments” in translation according to the term in Luke 16:23. Man started in a garden of Eden with God and will eventually be back with God in a garden of Paradise. 

Believers in Jesus Christ understand that eternal life according to Romans 6:23 is a free gift, “the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  After death’s door, this eternal life is heaven.  When Jesus died on the cross, He paid for the sins of the world (1 John 2:2) and purchased a place in heaven for every human being who ever lived or will live. He thus made sins a dead issue, in that anyone who would repent of his or her sins and trust in Jesus Christ, as Savior and Lord, would be saved and go to heaven.  This salvation involves the salvation of the soul and body with a promise of heaven after death.

The Bible has little description of the present heaven for departed believers, that is, the third heaven.  The descriptions of gates of pearl and streets of gold in Revelation 21:21 in its context is about the New Jerusalem and not present heaven.  If this “third heaven” is the eternal throne room of God, “eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1), then the first heaven that you see by day and the second heaven that you see by night would have been the created heavens.  It is interesting that in the Hebrew Old Testament, the word for “heavens” is not in the singular nor in the plural but in the Hebrew “dual,” as is the case for the Hebrew words for eyes, hands, legs, etc.  It would then seem that in Genesis 1:1 the number of the heavens that God literally created was thus two.  In Revelation 21:1 there will come a New Heaven that will replace these three heavens, as the Third Heaven continues eternal. 

The present (“third”) heaven is the throne-room of God at which Jesus Christ is present at His righthand making intercession for us on earth.  When believers pass from this life and are absent from the body, they are immediately, instantaneously present with the Lord at the right hand of God the Father.  It is true that many things of perfection and eternity begin there, which are described later about the New Heaven and New Earth and New Jerusalem, such as perfect environment (Rev. 22:2) and absence of sorrow (Rev. 21:4), BUT THE MOST IMPORTANT DESCRIPTION is being “present with the Lord” Jesus Christ.[4]  This point specifically used in describing the present heaven for believers is explained by Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:8. “We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.” Otherwise, where Paul equated The Third Heaven with Paradise, he latter explained in 2 Corinthians 12:4, “how he was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.” So, the present heaven is beyond description except for this one, most important thing! 

Paul described earlier in 1 Corinthians 13:12, “For we see at present through a mirror puzzled but then we will see face-to-face.  At present I know in part, but then I will fully know, accordingly as I am fully known.” Thus, beyond this life the believer in heaven will know, as he or she is fully known by others.  If this, of course, includes God, then believers will know things, just as they are omnisciently known by God – they too shall know all things in total omniscience and no longer in part.  This is another thing that begins for us in the present heaven. This was what Paul meant about knowledge earlier in verse 8, “Love never comes to an end.  But whether there are prophecies, they will be done away with…whether there is knowledge, it will be done away with.”  In heaven we will have a form of divine omniscience, as perfect, eternal humans with incorruptible minds and bodies.  So, in that sense in heaven we will begin to live in God’s “Eternal Now.”

However, for us in our present life within space and time, we see human believers after death[5] living in what we could term some form of “intermediate bodies” that are called by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:40, “celestial [heavenly] bodies” in contrast to our present earthly bodies called “terrestrial bodies”.  These latter bodies which we have in this life are also called “a natural [or soulish] body” in verse 44.  However, Paul’s reference to a “spiritual body” in the same verse and verse 46 appears to be the resurrection body that believers will receive at their resurrection at the Harpage (or Rapture), a body like unto Jesus’ present resurrection body, according 1 John 3:2 and Philippians 3:21.  According to John 14:3 Jesus is presently preparing a place for His Bride, the Church, from which place He will came back again to earth at the Harpage and take His Church in these resurrection bodies[6] of theirs to this prepared place for the Marriage Supper of the Lamb described in Revelation 19:7-9.  Thus, in our present perspective we need to think in terms of these two stages of future bodies:  our heavenly or intermediate bodies (after death) and then our resurrected or spiritual bodies (after the Hapagmos and in the Millennial Kingdom Age and eternity) – but this distinction may be moot in God’s “Eternal Now” in which the two bodies are one and the same body, as Paul describes all of this in 1 Corinthians 15.

Within the discussion of the Bible’s metaphor of “sleep” about the death of a believer, the concept of “sleep” and “unconsciousness” at times are confused.  Sleep would involve a conscious process of time through the night, for example, after which a person asleep would wake up and note how time had consciously passed with dreams and events through the period of sleep.  Such phenomena, as “rapid eye-movement,” can be studies with recorded EEG patterns correlated.  However, in contrast to this is the state of unconsciousness resulting from say a blow to the head.  During such a deep state a person would probably be in a coma and would not, upon awaking, be aware of any process or passing of time.  Such a person upon awakening or arousing would not have known of the matter of hours or days or weeks during which he was lying unconscious.  Memories of dreams would also be absent. Some people and churches do erroneously think and teach that the next conscious thought of a believer after death is that of the future bodily resurrection and mislabel this “soul-sleeping,” when, as noted above, it should be labeled “soul-unconsciousness.” However, if the biblical metaphor of sleep is allowed all of its significance, then the state of dreaming could be compared to this time between death and the resurrection.  But in a further comparison, or perhaps contrast, an interesting converse can be noted regarding death and sleep.  We have a fuller sense of reality during times, when we are awake, in contrast to times, when we are asleep in a “dream-world.” In the same way that we will have a fuller sense of reality during our time after death in heaven in contrast to the time, when we are presently living on earth in this life.

Thus, between physical death and the Harpage of the believer, all believers do exist in some form of a physical, though indestructible, body and are conscience of our space-and-time existence here are earth.  The same is true for all unbelievers between physical death and the resurrection of all unbelievers in Rev. 20:5 at the Great White Throne Judgment.  They, too, are conscious of our space-and-time existence here on earth in this life. 

Even though they are existing in God’s Eternal Now, they are still in a temporal process awaiting their respective future resurrections. Jesus’ historical story about Lazarus, Abraham, and the rich man in Luke 16:27-31 describes this very understanding of our immediate state between physical and the resurrection.  As Lazarus apparently listened silently, the conversation between Abraham and the rich man about his five lost brothers still living on earth took place during the lifetime of these brothers, as these two in Hades were conscious about these five men on earth during the course of their conversation.  The rich man in a physical way was very conscious of his ongoing and future torments in Hades, when he requested Abraham to send Lazarus to cool his tongue with a drop of water (Luke 16:24).  In 1 Samuel 28:3 Samuel had died, but later in 1 Samuel 28:15-19 at Endor he was also very conscious about King Saul and his disobedience.  He was conscious about King Saul’s pending death by God’s judgment, and how Saul would be with him in She’ol “tomorrow” (1 Samuel 28:19).

In 1 Corinthians 13:12, Paul explained: “For we see at present through a mirror in an enigma but then we will see face-to-face.  At present I know in part, but then I will fully know, accordingly as I am fully known.”  The expression, “as I am fully known” is something called “the divine passive.”  This is where the subject (here, “I”) receives the action of the verb (here, “known”) with the one doing action of the verb being omitted in the sentence. The one doing the action of the verb, “known,” would need to be omniscient, namely God Himself.  In other words, as Paul is fully known by God, he will know in general in heaven.  So Paul described how in the life to come, that is, in heaven, believers will have the same omniscience that God has of them.  This may explain how Peter in a glimpse of the glory to come would know Elijah and Moses apparently by sight in Matthew 17:4.  One further note about believers in heaven is what Jesus did explain in Matthew 22:30 and Luke 20:35-36. Believers in heaven will be “like the angels” in that there will be no marriage-covenantal relationships after death.  In heaven married couples will be living on a plane of existence and eternality far above anything of earthly marriages.

Although the human soul is everlasting, it is not eternal, in that each soul has a chronological beginning- point of time (with no pre-existence).   The “living soul” is not created out of nothing but is individually manufactured by God's breathing or infusing of a nešāmâ (one word for “soul”) into a providentially formed, DNA-based nepeš (a second word for “soul”) forever at conception.  At death this nepeš-formatted nešāmâ leaves the body for a new “celestial” body, but the nepeš is left with the corpse, as a “dead nepeš” as used in Num. 5:2; 6:6; 9:10.[7]  Thus, without this nešāmâ the nepeš becomes dead.  So, the nepeš is still existing in the physical body, but in the absence of the nešāmâ it exists with (or as) the corpse.  However, every human’s unique nešāmâ, as a human soul at death is joined with a celestial body and at the resurrection will receive a resurrection body.

Thus, OT Hebrew does not have any concept of a Greek “transmigration of the soul” nor of a “disembodied soul” but of a soul connected with a body of some sort. In the New Testament’s progressive revelation, Jesus described the realities beyond death for the believer and unbeliever alike in Luke 16:19-31 regarding Lazarus, Abraham, and the rich man. As to the reality of these three persons historically, none would doubt the reality of Abraham; and Lazarus (’El‘azar) and the unnamed rich man could have been actual people known in Jesus’ omniscience.  But nonetheless, as in all of Jesus stories, the features are real.  So, thus Jesus described both Lazarus and the rich man dying and each being in Hades which can be equated with She’ol; albeit Lazarus was with Abraham, and the rich man was in torments.  Both Lazarus and the rich man are described in terms of corporeal features of “finger,” “tongue,” “water,” “flame,” etc., in contrast to features of “disembodied souls.”[8]

Paul explained this very point corporeality beyond death in 2 Cor. 5:3-4, “if indeed having been clothed, we shall not be found naked [as a bodiless soul]…”  Concerning a believer’s death this is the reason of why he wrote of an immediate absence from the body would be an immediate presence with the Lord in 2 Cor. 5:8 and thus a believer would continually be “clothed” with some body, even with a “celestial”[9] body between death and the resurrection according to 1 Cor. 15:40.  (At the resurrection, the believer would then receive a resurrection or “spiritual” body according to 1 Cor. 15:44.)  In other words, it would appear that at death a person’s nešāmâ does depart from the body with a total “mapping” influence from his nepeš and immediately acquires this “celestial” body and eventually a “resurrection” body.  Because this hope of the resurrection, this is the philosophical basis for why Christians bury their dead, when they can, in contrast to cremation of their dead. The Judeo-Christian heritage looks to a time in the future of the bodily resurrection of all believers.  In contrast to this, most all other religions look to the future, when the soul will be released from the body forever, for which idea cremation fits well.  In the context of the early church, when cremation was associated with pagan rituals and unbiblical beliefs, burial seemed to be a more loving and reverent way to bear witness to God’s ultimate victory over death in a future, bodily resurrection for all the believers through the ages.[10]  The example found throughout the Bible is burying the remains of believers but those accursed were “buried” by fire.

For the unbeliever Hades hold more horrors than we could ever know on earth, but Gehenna will hold even greater horrors, “a horrors beyond horrors,” in the future Lake of Fire, than present Hades, in that going from one to the other is called a “second death” in Rev. 20.  Where Hades (Hebrew: Sheol) continue to be within God’s created “Space-Time Continuum” with Lazarus, The Rich Man, Samuel, Moses, Elijah, Gehenna, also called The Lake of Fire, Eternal Fire (Mat. 25:41), is all within God’s Eternal Now, outside of God’s created “Space-Time Continuum” that began in Genesis 1:1.

The Abyss translated by some, as “bottomless pit,” is found in Revelation 20:3, as the place into which God will cast and punish Satan.  It is similar to, but distinct from, Tartarus translated generically, as “hell,” in 2 Peter 2:4 in some translations.

In Revelation 20:11-15 at the Great White Throne Judgment, all unbelievers through the ages have their own version of an intermediate body and will be “resurrected” from the “torments” of Hades.[11]  This will be the final judgment, when Jesus’ gavel will fall in sentencing the unbelievers in all of human history.  They will then be given some new indestructible body, metaphorically alluded to by Jesus in His description of “gehenna [Valley of the Sons of Hinnom]” in Mark 9:44 as “their worm,” regarding their indestructible body and soul, and then they will be judged, or more specifically sentenced.  Normally, worms would be crawling through the refuse of the valley of the sons of Hinnom, a ravine south of Jerusalem, as a part of the decay process.  However, one the one hand, as the fire would sweep through various areas, these worms would naturally be burned up.  On the other hand, Jesus spoke of such “worms” in His metaphor of the realities of Gehenna, as not dying but existing forever, as will unbelievers in their “second-resurrection” bodies in contrast to the “first” resurrection group described in Rev.20:6.  In Mark 9:44 Jesus is quoting from Isaiah 66:24 where the antecedent for “their” would be the unbelievers described in the previous sentence, “And they shall go forth and look upon the [perishing, decaying] corpses of the men who have transgressed against me.  For their worm does not die, and their fire is not quenched.  They shall be a shame to all flesh.”  However, “worm” here is in the singular and refers to their indestructible body and soul in the second resurrection in contrast to the term “worms” in the plural, as small animals, such as in Isa. 14:11. 

Since no humans will ever die again and Hades is emptied after the Great White Throne Judgment, Jesus will cast both of Death and Hades into the lake of fire. Then Jesus will then cast these unbelievers, body-and-soul, into the lake of fire, as a “second death.”  This “second death” would appear to signify another, further, second stage of horror quantitatively equal to the first horror, the “first death” of going from this life into the “torments of Hades” at physical death.  Unbelievers thus have awaiting for them in the future a double horror.  A story has it that some sailors asked their chaplain, if he believed there was a hell.  He answered, “Yes, why?”  They replied, “Well, if there is a hell, we need you, as a chaplain.  If there’s not, we don’t need a chaplain.”  Well, hell is serious, and going to heel is more serious.

The future “lake of fire” in Rev. 20 can be equated with “gehenna” that Jesus described in Mat. 5:29; 10:28; and Mar. 9:43 and with “the eternal fire” that He described in Mat. 25:41. This “lake of fire” may be the results of the present universe, as “elements being burned will dissolve,” as in 2 Peter 3:10, “But the day of the Lord will come, as a thief in the night, in which day the heavens with a roar will pass away, and the elements being burned will be dissolved, and the earth and the works in it will burned up.”  This eternal lake of fire was originally prepared for the fallen angels described in Revelation 12:4, 9, that fell with Satan in Isa. 14:12-17 and Ezek.28:12-19.  Satan and these fallen angels will one day be cast into gehenna, along with that special group of monstrous fallen angels mentioned in Gen.6:2, as “sons of God,” (according to a common OT expression for angels), who had been consigned to Tartarus. 

Hades is and will be only within God’s Space-Time Continuum, but Gehenna will be or rather is within God’s Eternal Now outside of our Space-Time Continuum, hence irreversible and irrevocable is the Second Death.  Unlike the first death which one may welcome, when one is in the process of excruciatingly dying, the second death is like a process of dying extended for all eternity (God’s Eternal Now) without any translation, as in the first death.

Thus, to sum up, even though Hades and Gehenna are commonly translated “hell,” they do have a sharp contrast.  Hades is temporary and present until the Great White Throne Judgment, where Gehenna is future and eternal, “when time will be no more.”  Hades has the horrors of the First Death, but Gehenna has the greater horrors of the Second Death, a horrors beyond horrors. Hades has opportunity for some to see others even in conversation, where Gehenna is “outer darkness” (Matthew 22:13; 25:30) and being alone.  It would be, as though Hades is comparable to a “cell block” with an awareness, that there are people “on the outside,” where Gehenna is more like “solitary confinement” for all eternity.  At the end of time Hades is the lesser “Swallow-ee,” where Gehenna is the greater “Swallow-er” in Revelation 20:14.  Both are fire with horrors beyond imagination for the unbelieving lost. 

This Great White Throne Judgment and beginning of the lake of fire will in point beyond and outside of time after the passing away of the old heavens and old earth and just before the coming of the New Heavens and New Earth and New Jerusalem with its streets of gold and gates of pearl.  This eternal Lake of Fire is such that no one[12] term can engulf its significance and meaning of its immense horrors beyond horrors. In the New Testament, the reality of this ultimate in divine retribution upon unbelievers through the ages is described, as –

1. Gehenna in Mk. 9:41; Mt. 5:29, as the greatest depth of any existence of life.
2. Eternal Punishment in Mat. 25:46, as unbelievers knowing that Christ had paid for their sins remained unrepentant of them but held on to them, dying in their sins (John 8:24) though not for them.
3. Eternal Fire in Mat. 25:41; Jude 7, as the greatest of sensual pain.
4. Lake of Fire in Rev. 20:10, 14 and Rev. 19:20, as a matter of universal total destruction.
5. Flaming Fire in 2 Thess. 1:8, as the divine vengeance on unbelievers.
6. The Second Death in Rev. 20, as the greater stage of horrors for the lost.
7. Outer Darkness in Mat. 8:12; 22:13; 25:30, as lonely and black – lost, human unbelievers of the ages are totally alone, where nothing is ever seen nor heard by any of them for eternity.

Gehenna will have loneliness, outer darkness, fiery pain, eternity with no end in sight, memories with regret in having a full understanding of its total, absolute and unquestionable justice in which dying in one’s sins is irreversible. Thus, it will be a timeless, eternal, hopeless, excruciating in the solitude of a pit of outer darkness, where the damned will be totally alone with only their own thoughts forever and ever, far from any sense of God’s omnipresence, with a God-given omniscience of understanding of why and with regrets beyond any imagination and all within an indestructible “asbestos” physical body, ultimately all of their own volitional choice.

Paul greatest concern of all of this was the urgency of evangelism, as to what awaits the lost beyond this life.  He wrote in 2 Thessalonians 1:8 of judgment upon unbelievers regarding Hades and eventuating Gehenna: “in flaming fire giving an exacting of justice to those not knowing God and to those not obeying the gospel of our Lord Jesus.”  Unbelievers who have no relationship with God will rightfully and justly suffer in Hades and eventually in Gehenna, as the Lake of Fire, the appropriate penalty of their defiance of the Lord Jesus’ plan for eternal salvation.  Thus, sadly, future, eternal Gehenna will be the ultimate reality of the sovereign necessity of God to give the unrepentant, lost sinners what could be biblically called, “Holy Hell” – total separation from-God, instead of to-God.  However, as to present-day Hades, The Church Triumphant is alive and well, as the Church Triumphant overpowers Hell, in that repentant lost sinners learn of repentance and faith through The Church.

Therefore, in light of the reality of all of these horrors Paul wrote of our motivation for evangelizing the lost in 2 Corinthians 5:11, “knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men.”   People so often use “hell” in a flippant way, not realizing all this gravity. Biblically, there could be no such thing, as a “hell on earth.”   Heaven is far too wonderful to miss, and Hades with its later Gehenna is far too terrifying to even think of, but both heaven and hell are real.

The Lower Region of Hell called Tartarus:

During the three days between Jesus’ death and resurrection, he descended into another area of hell and visited some “spirits” who were in what he called a “prison” in 1 Peter 3:19, which Peter further explained in 2 Peter 2:4, as Tartarus. Before the Mabbul[13] of Noah, commonly called The Flood, there had been some monstrous angels among the fallen “sons of God” who had committed fornication[14] with human women[15] according to Gen. 6:1-4, “1And it was that man began to multiply upon the face of the ground, and daughters were born to them. 2And the sons of God saw the daughters of man, that they were good-looking, and they took for themselves women from all whom they selected. 3And Yahweh said, ‘My Spirit will not put up with man forever in that he also is flesh, and his days will be a hundred-and-twenty-year.’  4Mighty, fallen ones were on the earth in those days, and came about thus: the sons of God came into the daughters of man, and they bore children to them; those were the valiant heroes who from the ages were men making a name for themselves.”  This phrase, “sons of God,” is used to refer to angels (both fallen and elect) in the Old Testament, as in Job 1:6; 2:1; 38:7; Ps. 29:1; 82:6; 89:7; 139:6, (although in Hosea 1:10 the unique expression, “sons of the living God[16]” is used for the believing remnant of Israel, God’s people).  These fallen angels are the same ones, as referred to in Jude 6-7:  God “has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness the angels, not keeping their own domain but forsaking their own habitation, for judgment of a great day, as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, in the manner similar to these fornicating and going after other flesh, are laid forth, as an example to undergo justice of an eternal fire.”  They were similarly being judged for grotesque fornication, as He had the sodomy of Sodom and Gomorrah.

It was not until John 1:12 that the expression, “sons of God,” was used for human believers.  In the OT, human believers were called “servants of God” as in Joshua 1:2 and 1 Kings 8:66.  Jesus’ point in Luke 24:39 that “a spirit does not have flesh and bone” shows that, though Satan and his demonic servants may appear as “an angel of light” or “servants of righteous” (2 Cor. 11:14-15), fallen angels were to never take on any such sensual, physical bodies.  If these “sons of God” in Genesis 6:2 had been human beings, they would have been ungodly unbelievers.  Such humans would not be considered any sons of God, even if there were just sons of Seth. 

This “supernatural” interpretation[17] of Genesis 6:2, where these are described as fallen angels is found in 2 Peter 2:4 and Jude 6.  The “non-supernatural” interpretation where the Sethites (the sons of Seth) have been identified as “the sons of God” is not found in any early Christian or Jewish writings, prior to the third century AD.  It was taught only from the third century on by Julius Africanus, especially in the Syriac Church, and by Luther and Calvin. However, if the “daughters of men” in verses 2 and 4 are identical to the “daughters…born to them” in verse 1, where the antecedent of “them” is the word, “men,” earlier in verse 1, “men” in verse 2 could not be referring to the unbelievers from the ungodly line of Cain, since this would be in sharp contrast contextually to this same word, adam, used earlier in verse 1 and later in verse 3 for mankind in general!  In other words, this term “men” refers to all men godly and ungodly, descendents of Seth and Cain, not just Cain.  These “sons of God” and “daughters of men” who cohabited with them were all evil. Also, further verse 4 describes extraordinary beings and not ordinary human beings, as though they were from only human parents.  Thus these demonic, evil angels ended up in Tartarus, and the evil women and their demonic progeny would have ended up in She’ol or Hades.

The point that Jesus making in Mat. 22:30, “For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels,” was that believers in heaven would be far beyond and above any earthly marriage covenant relationship, even as angels presently are and were supposed to always be. (However, Jesus did not say that fornication between fallen angels and humans were not possible.) Thus any such cohabiting would be outside of any marriage and would fit the fornication-context of Jude 6-7 and 2 Peter 2:4-10.  Note the tiers of God-angels-humans:  God can do anything that angels and humans can do and then some, and angels can do anything that humans can do and then some. Humans are more limited than angels, and angels are more limited than God.

In God’s judgment of them, the monstrous, fallen angels were sentenced to Tartarus according to 2 Peter 2:4[18], in what Jude called “eternal chains under darkness” in Jude 6.  There in Tartarus they received an announcement by Jesus of his completed, prophesied Messianic mission in 1 Pet.3:18-20, “Because Christ also suffered on account of sins, once for all, the righteous on behalf of the unrighteous, that He might bring us to God; having been put to death, to be sure, in flesh but having been made alive in spirit; in which [spirit] He also went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison who formerly were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, while the Ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is eight, souls were brought safely through water.” These “spirits” are the disobedient, fallen angels referred to in Genesis 6:2, who were imprisoned in Tartarus. This Tartarus is somewhere located in some deeper regions of Hades. Tartarus refers to a prison in the lowest depths of Hades in a total incommunicato with any and all others until the lake of fire.  In Greek mythology, Tartarus had been thought of by the Greeks as a dark place, as far below Hades, where a falling bronze anvil would take 9 days to reach it.[19]  It also was supposed to have a river of fire called Phlegethon encircling it.  Homer described it in his Iliad (8,7 & 8,13, 481), as an underground prison, as far below Hades, as earth is below heaven, in which the Titans who rebelled against the will of Zeus were confined.[20]  Tartartus is also found in Israelite apocalyptic literature, as well, such as in Enoch, Philo, Josephus, and The Sibylline Oracle.  In 1 Enoch 20:2 and The Vision of Esdras Tartarus is specifically described, as a place of punishment for these particular fallen angels.

Thus, in an effort to fit a theological understanding all this into the Bible and not the other way around, one can see that there are presently three heavens and the earth and Hades with its Tartarus.  But after the Great White Throne Judgment in Revelation 20:11-15 there will be only the future New Heaven and New Earth and New Jerusalem and Gehenna, also called the Lake of Fire (in which will be Hades along with Tartarus and its “eternal chains under gloomy darkness.”)

Hades (Hebrew: Sheol) continue to be within God’s created “Space-Time Continuum” with Lazarus, The Rich Man, Samuel, Moses, Elijah. But Gehenna, also called The Lake of Fire, Eternal Fire (Mat. 25:41), is all within God’s Eternal Now, outside of God’s created “Space-Time Continuum” that began in Genesis 1:1.

The Big Picture

In reading through the Bible there was an abode of God from eternity past called now, “The Third Heaven” where in Genesis 1:1 “The Second Heaven” of the Universe was created and “The First Heaven” was created with the earth.  Thus, as these three heavens are enumerated, as first and second and third, this would be the order from our perspective and reverse order chronologically.  In a balance to these there are three hells noted in the Bible: present Hades with the Abyss and Tartarus.  Gehenna will begin during the Millennial Kingdom on earth and continue for all eternity, as The Lake of Fire, and The New Heaven and The New Earth and The New Jerusalem will begin after the Great White Throne Judgment for all eternity.

Our existence beyond this world and beyond this life will be either far grander OR far more horrible than most people will ever realize.  A faulty view of heaven leads to a wasted life lacking preparation for enjoying the beyond.  A faulty view of hell also leads to a wasted life lacking preparation for avoiding the beyond.

Each of us are among those in their rejection of Jesus Christ bound for Hades and Gehenna OR among those in their acceptance of Jesus Christ bound for an eternal security of our eternal life that begin in this life.  For the latter this is the best it will ever be.  For the former the best is yet to come!

[1] Concerning Elijah in 2 Kings 2:11, he would have been taken up to the Hebrew heavens of the first and second heaven on his way to She’ol.

[2] Whether this is considered a parable or not is immaterial.  Jesus gave an actual name and was not accommodating to the Jewish mythology of the day but was actually describing a spiritual and physical reality about Lazarus and the Rich Man after death in Hades.  (Even tradition has given this rich man the name of Dives, however the Greek New Testament Papyrus 75 has him by the name of Nevēs.)  Tertullian in his “A Treatise on the Soul,” ch. 7 asked, “Do you suppose that this end of the blessed poor man and the miserable rich man is only imaginary?  Then why the name of Lazarus in this narrative, if the circumstance is not in (the category of) a real occurrence?  But even if it is to be regarded as imaginary, it will still be a testimony to truth and reality.”

[3] That is, this interpretation of Jesus’ ascension with deceased believers translated to the Third Heaven is apparent, although the Bible never explicitly describes this in these terms.  This fits well into the overall plan of God, that is described throughout the Bible. 

[4] With this Paul also added in Philippians 3:20 a point about our present heavenly citizenship, “For our citizenship is in heaven from which also we anticipate a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.”

[5] However, the heresy developed, as early as in the second century, that dead believers were identified, as being angels, in The Maryrdom of Polycarp, 2.3:  “…it was shown by the Lord, to them who were no longer men, but they were already angels.” 

[6] The difference between present heaven with a celestial body and the resurrection at the Rapture is paralleled to a betrothed couple getting together with their family, etc., chaperoned, of course, and seeing each other and fellowshipping with each other in contrast to that point of time that he goes to receive his bride to himself to begin the marriage feast.

[7] Also, note Lev. 5:2; 19:28; 21:1, 11; 22:4; Num. 18:11, 13; Hag. 2:13.

[8] This has a rather interesting parallel of the soul in contrast to the body in comparing them to software in contrast to hardware in computers.  Software is a highly complicated arrangement of minute things in the hardware of a hard disc drive or memory chips and could not exist outside of such physical hardware. The human soul is directly a part of the body and also could not exist apart from some kind of body, be it, a celestial body or resurrection body.

[9] Or an “intermediate” body between death and the future resurrection.

[10] Minucius Felix, a second century Christian writer, in his Octavius wrote, “Nor, as you believe, do we fear any loss from sepulture, but we adopt the ancient and better custom of burying in the earth. See, therefore, how for our consolation all nature suggests a future resurrection.”

[11] This could be illustrated by having an indicted criminal in the County Jail being convicted and then sent to the State penitentiary, as a convicted criminal.

[12] Unlike Hades which has this one principal term.

[13] This cataclysmic event in Noah’s day was far more catastrophic than the words, “flood” or “deluge,” would connote.  It was a singularly unique event in all of history.  The special name given to it in the Hebrew Old Testament is Mabbul.

[14] This “unnatural” fornication is put in the context of the homosexual fornication of Sodom and Gomorrah in both 2 Peter 2:4-8 and Jude 6-7.

[15] In Matthew 22:30 and Luke 20:35-36 Jesus was not teaching that angels could not fornicate, but simply that they were never involved in any kind of marriage covenant, in that they “neither married not were given in marriage,” and this was to be the situation for believers after death.

[16] Here Hosea uses El, as the Hebrew word for God, instead of Elohim (as the first verse of chapter two).

[17] This interpretation is also found outside the canonical scriptures in 1 Enoch 6:1-2; 10:11-12; [6-16]; 69:86-88; 2 Enoch 18:7 (rec. a) Jubilees 4:15; 5:6; Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs – Reuben 5:5-7; Naphtali 3:3-5; Qumran:  1QapGen 2:1 & Damascus Document [CD] 2:16-19; Philo, On the Giants 6-7; Josephus, Antiq. 1.73; Targum Pseudo-Jonathan 6:1-2, 4; Justin, Apology 2.5; Clement, Miscellanies 5.1.10.

[18] “For if God spared not the sinning angels, but in casting them into Tartarus in chains of gloom he delivered these being kept into judgment.”

[19] Hesiod, Theogony 720-725, who so describes Tartarus below the earth, as is the earth below heaven.

[20] Hesiodus (Epicus.) is the primary early Greek authority on the emergence and interrelationships of figures in the Olympian pantheon; however, he never used the verb tartaroō.   He did relate how Zeus cast individual Titans and all the gods who rebelled against his regime into Tartaros or Tartarus, so that such consignment became a “canonical” image of divine management of rebel subordinates.