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What And Where Was Gehenna?

Otherwise called "the valley of the son of Hinnom," or "the valley of Benhinnom"; a deep and narrow ravine with steep, rocky sides to the S and W of Jerusalem, separating Mt. Zion to the N from the "Hill of Evil Counsel," and the sloping rocky plateau of the "valley of Rephaim" to the South

The earliest mentions of the valley of Hinnom are in Josh 15:8 and 18:16, where the boundary line between the tribes of Judah and Benjamin is described as passing along the bed of the ravine.

On the southern brow, overlooking the valley at its eastern extremity, Solomon erected high places for Molech

Then did Solomon build a high place for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, in the mount that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech the abomination of the children of Ammon. (1 Kings 11:7)

 The later idolatrous kings Ahaz and Manasseh made their children "pass through the fire" in this valley.

But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yea, and made his son to pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the nations, whom Jehovah cast out from before the children of Israel. (2 Kings 16:3)

Moreover he burnt incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and burnt his children in the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom Jehovah cast out before the children of Israel.  (2 Chron 28:3)

He also made his children to pass through the fire in the valley of the son of Hinnom; and he practised augury, and used enchantments, and practised sorcery, and dealt with them that had familiar spirits, and with wizards: he wrought much evil in the sight of Jehovah, to provoke him to anger. (2 Chron  33:6)

The fiendish custom of infant sacrifice to the fire-gods seems to have been kept up in Topheth at its southeast extremity for a considerable period.

And they have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded not, neither came it into my mind. Jeremiah 7:31;

(God's response to Israel doing such a horrible thing to their children was that “which I commanded not, neither came it into my mind” .  How could God say "such a thing never entered His mind" if in fact He is going to do the very same thing to most of His own children?)

To put an end to these abominations the place was polluted by Josiah, who rendered it ceremonially unclean by spreading over it human bones and other corruptions

And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.  (2 Kings 23:10).

And the high places that were before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had builded for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Sidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of Moab, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile. And he brake in pieces the pillars, and cut down the Asherim, and filled their places with the bones of men.  (2 Kings 23: 13-14;)

For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the Asherim, and the graven images, and the molten images. And they brake down the altars of the Baalim in his presence; and the sun-images that were on high above them he hewed down; and the Asherim, and the graven images, and the molten images, he brake in pieces, and made dust of them, and strewed it upon the graves of them that had sacrificed unto them. And he burnt the bones of the priests upon their altars, and purged Judah and Jerusalem. 2 Chron 34:3-5).

The name by which it is now known is Wadi Jehennam, or Wadi er Rubeb   (Information from bible-history.com)

 From that time it appears to have become the common and well-known rubbish dump /cesspool of the city but was never employed in the Old Testament to mean anything else than the place with which every Jew was familiar. Any first-century Jew would have been able to give directions to Gehenna: Convicted criminals were thrown there after they had been executed, instead of receiving a proper burial: It was a place of shame rather than torment - and going there meant you had suffered a dishonourable death and were already dead! Fires were kept burning there not to torment, but to disinfect - to prevent plagues spreading from the rotting rubbish, sewage, and corpses, to the living.

Walter Balfour well says: "What meaning would the Jews who were familiar with this word, and knew it to signify the valley of Hinnom, be likely to attach to it when they heard it used by our Lord? Would they, contrary to all former usage, transfer its meaning from a place with whose locality and history they had been familiar from their infancy, to a place of misery in another world? This conclusion is certainly inadmissible. By what rule of interpretation, then, can we arrive at the conclusion that this word means a place of misery and death?"

(Please Note that Walter Balfour was a Universalist theologian. While we cannot disagree more with Universalism, his statement here made absolute sense)

Gehenna in The New Testament

The Savior and James are the only persons in all the New Testament who use the word (the Savior actually used it only on four or five different occasions, the rest being only repetitions). John Baptist, who preached to the most wicked of men, did not use it once. Paul wrote fourteen epistles, and yet never once mentions it. (The only time Paul even mentioned Hell at all was in any of his epistles, was to declare the triumph of Christ over it in 1 Corinthians 15:55. and even here he used the word Hades). Peter does not name it, nor Jude; and John, who wrote the gospel, three epistles, and the Book of Revelation, never employs it in a single instance. Paul says he "shunned not to declare the whole counsel of God," and yet though he was the great preacher of the Gospel to the Gentiles he never told them that Gehenna is a place of after-death punishment. Would he not have repeatedly warned sinners against it were there such a place?

 The Book of Acts contains the record of the apostolic preaching, and the history of the first planting of the Church among the Jews and Gentiles, and embraces a period of thirty years from the ascension of Christ. In all this history, in all this preaching of the disciples and apostles of Jesus, there is no mention of Gehenna. In thirty years of missionary effort, these men of God, addressing people of all characters and nations, never, under any circumstances, threaten them with the torments of Gehenna, or allude to it in the most distant manner!

If Gehenna or Hell really reveals the terrible fact of endless woe, how can we account for this strange silence? If it had a local application and meaning we can understand this, but if it were the name of the receptacle of damned souls to all eternity, it would be impossible to explain such inconsistency.  How is it possible, if they knew its meaning, and believed it a part of Christ's teaching, that they should not have used it a hundred or a thousand times, instead of never using it at all; especially when we consider the infinite interests involved?

 The first Jewish writer who ever names it as a place of future punishment is Jonathan Ben Uzziel who wrote, according to various authorities, from the second to the eighth century, A. D.

The first Christian writer who calls Hell Gehenna is Justin Martyr who wrote about A. D. 150. (In his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, Martyr states that the soul is mortal, that the souls of the unrighteous will suffer only as long as God wills, and that finally their souls will pass out of existence).

In the face of such a fact as this, can any man believe that Gehenna signifies endless punishment, and that this is a part of divine revelation, a part of the Gospel message to the world?

Uses of The Word Gehenna

“The first great cluster of references to Gehenna, are found in the Sermon on the Mount (Mat 5:22, 29, 30), Jesus' great sermon to His disciples in which He warned that one was in danger of Gehenna for the likes of calling someone a fool. If Hell is real, why were most of the warnings pertaining to punishment/Gehenna directed to Israel, particularly the Lord’s own disciples as well as the Pharisees?” (The Case Against Hell By Mercy Aiken )

Matthew. 5:22.  "But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of Hell-fire."

(Raca is a Syriac word, expressive of great contempt. It comes from a verb signifying to be empty, vain; and hence, as a word of contempt, denotes senseless, stupid, shallow-brains. )

"In this verse it denotes a degree of suffering higher than the punishment inflicted by the court of seventy, the Sanhedrim. And the whole verse may therefore mean… He that hates his brother without a cause, is guilty of a violation of the sixth commandment, and shall be punished with a severity similar to that inflicted by the court of judgment.

He that shall suffer his passions to transport him to still greater extravagances, and shall make him an object of derision and contempt, shall be exposed to still severer punishment, corresponding to that which the Sanhedrim, or council, inflicts.

But he who shall load his brother with hateful names and abusive language, shall incur the severest degree of punishment, represented by being burnt alive in the horrid and awful valley of Hinnom."

But there is another consideration deserving notice. The difference between the sinfulness of saying Raca and Fool, is hardly great enough to warrant such a difference in punishment as is involved in the supposition. There seems no proportion between the slight difference in guilt and the tremendous, infinite difference in punishment. But if the comparison is between penalties symbolized by stoning to death, inflicted by the Sanhedrim council, and burning alive in Gehenna, then there is proportion, because the difference between death by stoning and death by burning is not certainly very great; but the difference between death by stoning and endless torment is infinite.

Whether or not Jesus means the literal Gehenna, or makes these three degrees of punishment emblems of the severe spiritual penalties inflicted by Christianity, there is no reference to the future world in the language.
 

Mark 9:43, 49. "And if your right eye offends you, pluck it out, and cast it from you; for it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish, and not that your whole body should be cast into Hell. And if thy right hand offend you, cut it off, and cast it from you; for it is profitable for you that one of your members should perish, and not that your whole body should be cast into Hell. Matt. 5:28, 29. "And if your eye offend you, pluck it out, and cast it from you: it is better for you to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into Hell-fire. Matthew 18:9, "And if your hand offend you, cut it off: it is better for you to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into Hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched. And if your foot offend you, cut it off; it is better for you to enter lame into life, than having two feet to be cast into Hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched. And if your eye offend you, pluck it out: it is better for you to enter into the Kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into Hell-fire."

A simple reading of this passage tells us in very strong terms that it would be very unwise for any worldly (and temporary) benefit to stand in the way of our very salvation. That nothing on this earth is worth the forgoing of so great a reward.  That it is better to enter the Christian life destitute of some great worldly advantage, comparable to a right hand, than to live in sin, with all worldly privileges.

Regardless,  there is no reference to an after-death suffering, in any proper use of the terms. The true idea of the language is this: Embrace holiness without (which no one will see God), whatever sacrifice it calls for.
 

Mark 9:45-49 "If your foot should cause you to offend, cut it off: it would be better for you to enter into Life crippled, than remain in possession of both your feet and be thrown into Gehenna where their worm does not die and the fire does not go out. Or if your eye should cause you to offend, tear it out. It would be better for you to enter into the Kingdom of God half-blind than remain in possession of two eyes and be thrown into Gehenna, where their worm does not die and the fire does not go out. Every one, however, will be seasoned with fire." (Emphasis Added)

This is a direct quotation from Isaiah 66:23-24: "all flesh shall come to worship before me, says YHWH. And they shall go out and see the dead bodies of the men who have transgressed against me; for their worm shall not die, nor shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an object of disgust to all flesh."  
 

This verse speaks plainly of the dead corpses of men upon the physical earth in the valley of Hinnom or Gehenna and that this is not happening in any afterlife to conscious souls but on the earth to people who have already died. This is a fate of shame, not of torment.
 

Matt. 10: 28. "And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in Hell. Luke 12: 5.  "But I will forewarn you whom you shall fear: Fear him which, after he hath killed, hath power to cast into Hell: yea, I say unto you, fear him."

All this verse says is the most that men can do is to destroy the body, but God is able, ("hath power") to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna. It proves no more than God's ability to annihilate,  not his purpose to torment..
 

James 3: 6 "And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity; so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of Hell."

There is no reference whatsoever to any place of after-death place of torment but solely to a locality well-known to all Jews, as a place of corruption which was figuratively applied to a vile tongue.

This brief look at the uses of the word Gehenna in the New Testament tells us no more than the fact that Gehenna was a vile physical location, with a horrendous history, outside the city walls. There is little or no hint that that it denotes a place of punishment after death.