Hell, Sheol, Hades

[Acheron]

What's the difference between the three?

[Diane 1611]

"Footsteps of the Messiah" by Dr. Arnold Fruchtenbaum explains all three of these terms in great detail. Let me see if I can remember it correctly and summarize. Sheol was the place in Old Testament times where souls went after death. There was two compartments in Sheol, one for the good guys & gals (believers) and one for the bad guys & gals (non-believers). Jesus took the good guys & gals up to Heaven after the Resurrection, thereby abolishing Sheol. Hades and Hell are two different words for the same place. It's the New Testament terms. Hell is the Greek term and Hades is the Aramaic term, I think?

[SusieQ]

Here's what I have gathered in my readings/notes

Sheol~Hebrew word in OT =grave. but there is more to it than that since there is consciousness~a fuller definition:spiritual underworld

Hades~Greek word in NT=same as Sheol as far as I can see. When you compare the descriptions of the 2 words from scripture, they seem to be the same.

Sheol/Hades~place where both unrighteous and righteous go upon death in OT (after Christ's death the saved do not descend into Sheol~the righteous side no longer is there~we now ascend into heaven). The unsaved are still descending into the unrighteous side of sheol as far as I can tell by scripture (well, the only side of sheol/hades since the righteous side as been done away with) and will continue to do so until God places death and Hades into the Lake of Fire after the Mill (aka Gehenna)

Sheol/Hades has 2 sides or compartments
righteous side~aka: Abraham's Bosom, paradise
unrighteous side~aka: pit, hell, abaddon

Sheol/Hades location is downward (middle of earth?) Bible always mentions "going down to Sheol", "descend into the pit", "down into the depth of the earth"....

[Hootmon]

'Sheol' and 'Hades' are more or less equivalent terms. The former being Hebrew and the latter being Greek.

'Hell' is a highly generic term that can include both Sheol and Hades, as well as Gehenna (aka Lake of Fire) and other non-synonymous terms.

[Hootmon]

Cool! Just found this diagram from Footsteps.

http://www.yoph.com/files/placeofthedead.pdf

[AnyDayNow]

Cool! Just found this diagram from Footsteps.

http://www.yoph.com/files/placeofthedead.pdf

Frucht-cake :heh

The chart seems pretty inclusive. Only term I saw missing was "outer darkness":

Matthew 8:12 but the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."

I've always thought of it as synonymous with the lake of fire. No one is there as of yet (weeping and gnashing is future) but eventually satan, his followers and all the lost will be. Good find, Hoot. :nod

[SusieQ]

Excellent chart, Hootmon.

[Hootmon]

The chart seems pretty inclusive. Only term I saw missing was "outer darkness":Its probably not included as its part of a parable and therefore not entirely 'literal', if you know what I mean...