The “Apostle’s Creed” [which is attributed to the apostles, but certainly was not written by them] begins, “I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; he descended into hell …” As a recent article in the Anniston Star notes, a “rich mythology” developed as a result of this misunderstanding (“Jesus in the realm of the dead,” April 15, 2006, page 3D).

Even from Apostolic times, there has been confusion about the state of the dead. The Hebrew word for the realm of the dead is Sheol, which is equivalent to the Greek word Hades. These refer to the realm of the dead before the Day of Judgment. Another Greek word, Gehenna, is the word properly translated hell. One problem that we have always faced in understanding “the other side,” is that we cannot know anything about this other than what has been revealed in the Bible.

Confusion over the place of the dead was compounded when the King James translators used the word hell to translate both Hades and Gehenna, since at that time hell was thought to refer to both the realm of the dead, as well as the final place of punishment for the wicked. Acts 2:31 in the KJV reads, “He seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption.” In this case, the word translated hell is Hades, not Gehenna.

Hades, the realm of the dead, has one portion for the righteous, called paradise (Luke 23:43) and Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16). The wicked, such as the rich man (Luke 16), are also in torment in another portion of Hades. Did Jesus go to hell (Gehenna)? Hell is a place of outer darkness, and everlasting punishment, away from the presence of God. It is the same kind of pain Jesus experienced in His separation from His Heavenly Father on the cross (Matthew 27:46). It is a place of no hope!