Topic
Gehenna
The word Jesus uses for the place of final destruction. It transliterates the name of the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, a ravine outside Jerusalem with a history of child sacrifice and slaughter.
Also called: gehenna, valley of hinnom, valley of the son of hinnom, topheth, geenna
The valley is named in the Old Testament as the site where children were burned in sacrifice, and Jeremiah announces that it will be renamed the Valley of Slaughter, filled with dead bodies left as food for birds and beasts. That is the background Jesus draws on when he warns about Gehenna.
In the Gospels Gehenna is where body and soul can be destroyed, where it is better to enter life maimed than to be thrown in whole, and where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. That last phrase quotes Isaiah, and in Isaiah the objects of the worm and the fire are corpses.
What Gehenna is not: it is not Hades or Sheol, the realm of the dead before the resurrection; it is not the phrase lake of fire, though both describe the same final outcome; and it is not the English word hell, which does duty for several distinct terms at once.
What this is not
Terms in this dispute are routinely collapsed into one another. These distinctions are what keep the argument honest.
- Gehenna is not Hades. Luke 16 uses Hades of the rich man, and never uses Gehenna.
- The Greek word appears in the Synoptic Gospels and in James, and not in the Old Testament.
- Gehenna is not called the lake of fire, although both name the end of the unrighteous.
- The claim that Gehenna was a burning rubbish dump in the first century lacks primary evidence and is not asserted here.
Principal passages
- Matthew 10:28
- Mark 9:42-48
- Matthew 5:29-30Listed in the Scripture index
- Jeremiah 7:31-33Listed in the Scripture index
- James 3:6Listed in the Scripture index
Where this is argued in the case
- S15 Patterns of Judgment in the Old TestamentThe recurring shape of divine judgment in the Old Testament, and what the Valley of Hinnom contributes to the word Gehenna.
- S10 Can God Destroy Both Body and Soul?Matthew 10:28 in its own terms, the use of the verb elsewhere in the Synoptics, and a technical appendix on two-part and three-part anthropology.
- S01 Mark 9: Undying Worms and Unquenchable FireWhat Isaiah 66:24 contributes to Jesus’ warning, and what "unquenchable" means everywhere else in Scripture.
- S05 The Rich Man and LazarusWhy this passage describes the intermediate state rather than final punishment, and why it therefore supports neither view directly.
Related topics
Sources for this topic
- Joseph Dear. The Bible Teaches Annihilationism. 1st edition, PDF version. 2016. approximately 590 pages View original of The Bible Teaches Annihilationism (opens in a new tab) Details
- Chris Date. Their Worm Does Not Die: Annihilation and Mark 9:48. Rethinking Hell. 2012-07-17 View original of Their Worm Does Not Die: Annihilation and Mark 9:48 (opens in a new tab) Details
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