Interesting Sheol in the Bible.
Many take it as an old Testament word for the abode of the dead.
The way the Hebrew translates it is a state or abode of the dead.
This aligns with this author's feelings here,
References to parts of hell in the bible
Psalm 86:13
13 For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell.
Psalm 63:9
But those that seek my soul, to destroy it, Shall go into the lower parts of the earth.
Pits of hell referred to in Ezekiel 32:21-24
21The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out of the midst of hell with them that help him: they are gone down, they lie uncircumcised, slain by the sword.
22Asshur is there and all her company: his graves are about him: all of them slain, fallen by the sword:
23Whose graves are set in the sides of the pit, and her company is round about her grave: all of them slain, fallen by the sword, which caused terror in the land of the living.
24There is Elam and all her multitude round about her grave, all of them slain, fallen by the sword, which are gone down uncircumcised into the nether parts of the earth, which caused their terror in the land of the living; yet have they borne their shame with them that go down to the pit.
According to RDRD Bible Study,
The common meaning of Sheol is “underworld,” an intermediate state in which souls are dealt with according to their lives on earth. Some scholars have assigned the meaning as a “place of asking,” as in necromancy, or “hallow place,” as in a venerated place.
The noun Sheol occurs 65 times in the OT. English translations render the word variably as Sheol, grave, hell, or pit. Following is a sampling rendering from popular English translations. Notice that the KJV took a contextual approach in translating the noun as opposed to the exact word used by the RSV and NIV. each translation has its own method.
See more in sources below.
So a pit with graves?
Disembodied spirits perhaps?
Sheol, possibly where the dead were gathered into families and tribes?
Like God said happened to Abraham when he died in Genesis 25:8?
8 Then Abraham gave up the ghost, and died in a good old age, an old man, and full of years; and was gathered to his people.
Said of Ishmael in Genesis 25:17
And these are the years of the life of Ishmael, an hundred and thirty and seven years: and he gave up the ghost and died; and was gathered unto his people.
Said of Jacob in Genesis 49:33
And when Jacob had made an end of commanding his sons, he gathered up his feet into the bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his people.
So is Sheol an intermediate state for one's soul?
Getting in the Metaphysical which was created by God as we are more than just the physical and we serve a supernatural God and most believers believe in supernatural beings like angels and demons?
Interesting in Psalm 88:6
Psalms 88:6
“Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps.”
Psalm 143:3
For the enemy hath persecuted my soul; he hath smitten my life down to the ground; he hath made me to dwell in darkness, as those that have been long dead.
According to Matthew Y. Emerson
Professor, Oklahoma Baptist University
He states in his article titled,
What Is Sheol?
EXPLORING THE AFTERLIFE IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
In the Old Testament, the most common way of describing Sheol is as the house of death. It is the realm of the dead, where all the dead go. This is even personified in Proverbs 1–9, where Lady Folly’s house, and the meal she serves there, is characterized by death. Humanity’s accuser, Satan, is prince over this house of the dead. Death is his hangman and his jailer. The dragon, the great serpent, has been cast down to eat dirt for the rest of his days, and the dirt he eats is that of his realm, the grave (Genesis 3:14). The place of the dead is enemy territory, ruled by the first and greatest enemy of humankind, the accuser.4
Speaking of meals, the Old Testament speaks of Sheol as one who is never satisfied, always attempting to fill its belly but never achieving its goal. Nothing less than all of humanity will satiate it (Proverbs 30:15; Habakkuk 2:5). Its mouth is an open pit, swallowing all eventually. This insatiable gluttony is one of the reasons why it is often characterized as the abode of humanity’s final enemy, death itself, and why death is even called humanity’s shepherd (Psalm 49:14).
Here are those verses mentioned.
Proverbs 15 is mentioned but going back and forward for context,
4 There is a generation, whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw teeth as knives, to devour the poor from off the earth, and the needy from among men.
15 The horseleach hath two daughters, crying, Give, give. There are three things that are never satisfied, yea, four things say not, It is enough:
16 The grave; and the barren womb; the earth that is not filled with water; and the fire that saith not, It is enough.
17 The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it.
Habakkuk 2:5
Yea also, because he transgresseth by wine, he is a proud man, neither keepeth at home, who enlargeth his desire as hell, and is as death, and cannot be satisfied, but gathereth unto him all nations, and heapeth unto him all people:
Psalm 49:14 mentioned, but look what happens in verse 15 suggesting a state that can indeed change!
Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them; and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; and their beauty shall consume in the grave from their dwelling.
15 But God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave: for he shall receive me. Selah.
Sheol is a place from which there is no escape. The gates are locked, the windows are barred, and the prison guard, death, is undefeatable through human effort (Job 10:21; 17:13–16; Isaiah 38:10). The gates of hell are akin to Morannon, the Black Gate of Mordor, unassailably guarding Sauron’s territory in The Lord of the Rings. Human beings on their own cannot escape. Only something unexpected, entering into the realm of the dead and breaking down the gates from the inside, could ever hope to defeat both hell’s gates and their master. Storming the gates, for mere humans, is futile.
Job 10:21
“Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death;”
Job 17:13-16
13 If I wait, the grave is mine house: I have made my bed in the darkness.
14 I have said to corruption, Thou art my father: to the worm, Thou art my mother, and my sister.
15 And where is now my hope? as for my hope, who shall see it?
16 They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.
Isaiah 38:10
“I said in the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave: I am deprived of the residue of my years.”
Sheol is also symbolically characterized in the Old Testament as the opposite of the Promised Land. To put it geographically, it is the ultimate place of exilic wilderness, a place from which one cannot return to the land flowing with milk and honey. Instead, the only meal one can eat in Sheol is dust and ash. Further, instead of God being praised in the sanctuary — an act which of necessity is bodily — there is no praise of God in Sheol, and the dead do not remember him. Most striking is Psalm 6:5: “In death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who will give you praise?” Likewise, Isaiah 38:18 reads, “Sheol does not thank you; death does not praise you; those who go down to the pit do not hope for your faithfulness.”
What are we to make of these kinds of descriptions? Are the dead, and especially the dead who die with faith in the true God, now experiencing torment, or utterly separated from God? We should begin by noting that these are covenantal and liturgical statements, first and foremost. Psalm 6:5, to state the obvious, is found in the book of Psalms, a book comprised of material originally written for liturgical contexts. The acts of praise, lament, thanksgiving, celebration, and remembrance were, for Israel, primarily acts that took place in the tabernacle and, later, the temple.
Psalms 6:5
“For in death there is no remembrance of thee: in the grave who shall give thee thanks?”
Why is there no remembrance of the grave?
So is it actually in the bottom of the sea?
Are these places or realms just as all is actually energy, vibration and frequency?*
Similar characterizations about Sheol, like the fact that it is a place of darkness and dust, could also be contrasted to statements about the Promised Land and specifically the tabernacle/temple, both of which are characterized by the light of God’s presence to the assembly of Israel and the flowing water of his Spirit, who is especially and particularly present in the Most Holy Place and, by extension, the land.
“In order to be raised from the dead, someone would have to break down the gates of hell.”
Alternatively, rather than dusty graves, sometimes Sheol is equated with the abyss, a place at the bottom of the sea (e.g., Jonah 2:2–9; cf. also Job 26:5). In the Old Testament, the sea is often described as a place of chaos and disorder, a place that stands in opposition to the firm ground of the Promised Land. To go to the sea, and especially into its depths, is to go away from God’s presence as Israel knew it through the tabernacle/temple in the Promised Land.
Jonah 2:2-9
King James Version
2 And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the Lord, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.
3 For thou hadst cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas; and the floods compassed me about: all thy billows and thy waves passed over me.
4 Then I said, I am cast out of thy sight; yet I will look again toward thy holy temple.
5 The waters compassed me about, even to the soul: the depth closed me round about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.
6 I went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars was about me for ever: yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God.
7 When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple.
8 They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.
9 But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving; I will pay that that I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord.
Let's include the prior verse in Job 26 and the remainder of the chapter for context.
Quite Powerful? You decide!
4To whom hast thou uttered words? and whose spirit came from thee?
5Dead things are formed from under the waters, and the inhabitants thereof.
6Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.
7He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing.
8He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them.
9He holdeth back the face of his throne, and spreadeth his cloud upon it.
10He hath compassed the waters with bounds, until the day and night come to an end.
11The pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his reproof.
12He divideth the sea with his power, and by his understanding he smiteth through the proud.
13By his spirit he hath garnished the heavens; his hand hath formed the crooked serpent.
14Lo, these are parts of his ways: but how little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?
Whether Sheol is described as the wilderness where the wild beasts live or the abyss where the chaos monsters swim, Israel conceived of it symbolically as the opposite of Canaan. This is because, for Israel, to live meant to live embodied within the assembly in the presence of God and especially through worshiping him at the tabernacle/temple at liturgical intervals.
These two pictures, of Sheol as the enemy’s bunker and Sheol as the exilic wilderness, are indeed bleak. Death takes everyone, righteous and unrighteous alike, and no one comes back from the realm of the dead. After responding to Bildad’s call to repent, Job expresses this common fate of humanity in his prayer to God:
Why did you bring me out from the womb?
Would that I had died before any eye had seen me
and were as though I had not been,
carried from the womb to the grave.
Are not my days few?
Then cease, and leave me alone, that I may find a little cheer
before I go — and I shall not return —
to the land of darkness and deep shadow,
the land of gloom like thick darkness,
like deep shadow without any order,
where light is as thick darkness. (Job 10:18–22)
Job 10:18-22
King James Version
18 Wherefore then hast thou brought me forth out of the womb? Oh that I had given up the ghost, and no eye had seen me!
19 I should have been as though I had not been; I should have been carried from the womb to the grave.
20 Are not my days few? cease then, and let me alone, that I may take comfort a little,
21 Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death;
22 A land of darkness, as darkness itself; and of the shadow of death, without any order, and where the light is as darkness.
Does the enemy, therefore, always win, even if during this life God may give Israelites victory over their human enemies? Does Death always have an incurable sting and thus always gain the final victory? The short answer is no. Because the Lord is King over all things.
Sheol Is Under the King’s Authority
In the Old Testament, God has no rival. There is no place in heaven, on earth, or under the earth over which the Lord Almighty does not reign. Of course, his chosen people, Israel, dwell in a specific place, the place that he prepared and won for them, the Promised Land. But God’s rule does not stop at Israel’s borders and is not limited to his throne room in heaven. It extends even over the territory of Israel’s enemies on earth and to the depths of Sheol in the underworld.
This means that, despite Sheol’s gluttony, despite its characterization as the enemy’s bunker and all of humanity’s exilic wilderness, God still has authority in this darkest of places, this unnatural habitat for those who have received sin’s wages (Isaiah 25:8). As Richard Bauckham puts it,
Ancient Israel shared the conviction of the Mesopotamian peoples that “he who goes down to Sheol [the underworld] does not come up” (Job 7:9; cf. 10:21; 16:22; 2 Sam 12:23). No exceptions were known; there is no Old Testament instance of a true descent to and return from the underworld by a living human being, though there is one case of the calling up of a shade from Sheol by necromancy (1 Sam 28:3–25) and other references to this practice, which was rejected by the law and the prophets (Lev 19:31; Deut 18:10–12; Isa 8:19; 65:2–4).
Isaiah 25:8 kjv
8 He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for the Lord hath spoken it.
Some feel there is a Sheol of the damned.
Tartarus, could this be where fallen angels are bound?
In Greek mythology, Tartarus is the deep abyss that is used as a dungeon of torment and suffering for the wicked and as the prison for the Titans.
According to Don Stewart,
One of the Greek words translated "hell" in the English versions is "tartarus." Peter uses the word in referring to the place of judgment for evil angels.
Jude
Jude also speaks about this place for sinning angels. He calls it a place of everlasting chains.
See more here,
https://www.blueletterbible.org/faq/don_stewart/don_stewart_167.cfm
Abrahams Bossom, no longer there as it was carried up into the presence of the Lord when Jesus died and rose from the dead.
Does this demonstrate different realms, even simulations which could be holographic as all is energy, vibration and frequency?
Some feel there are expansive spaces in multiple locations within the earth where disembodied souls go.
So not just chained fallen angels inside of the earth, but also reprobate souls that are damned awaiting final judgement? You decide.
Some think the souls of the saints were living in the earth and bound to the earth very much like a place of paradise or Abraham's Bossom.
Check out I Samuel 28 starting in verse 7 where Saul disguises himself and goes to see the Witch of Endor,
7 Then said Saul unto his servants, Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her, and enquire of her. And his servants said to him, Behold, there is a woman that hath a familiar spirit at Endor.
8 And Saul disguised himself, and put on other raiment, and he went, and two men with him, and they came to the woman by night: and he said, I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit, and bring me him up, whom I shall name unto thee.
9 And the woman said unto him, Behold, thou knowest what Saul hath done, how he hath cut off those that have familiar spirits, and the wizards, out of the land: wherefore then layest thou a snare for my life, to cause me to die?
10 And Saul sware to her by the Lord, saying, As the Lord liveth, there shall no punishment happen to thee for this thing.
11 Then said the woman, Whom shall I bring up unto thee? And he said, Bring me up Samuel.
So why did Samuel come UP and not down?
When I was little and attended many private schools, we were taught that it was because Hades was the holding place for souls until Jesus died on the cross.
They used to explain that a portion of hell was partitioned off for the saints or those who were God's true sons and daughters.
Something to consider, according to Blue Letter Bible,
Tartarus is the place where certain sinful angels are presently kept bound. This specific Greek word is only used once in the New Testament. It has no reference to the final destination of the wicked, or hell. Tartarus is not even the final destination of angels. It is, therefore, unfortunate that some English versions translate the term as "hell" because it confuses this place with the place of final judgment of the wicked.
https://www.blueletterbible.org/faq/don_stewart/don_stewart_167.cfm
Interesting podcasts,
Antarctica and Imprisoned Fallen Angels from the Book of Enoch
Thank you Great Warrior Connie Grabowski for this interesting link below,
The Watchers, The Nephilim, & Creatures Living Deep Inside The Earth | with Ben Garrett
Found inside of comments here on my FB,
#Sheol, #Tartarus, #Hades, #FallenAngels, #Nephilim, #Watchers, #Dimensions, #Enoch, #BookOfEnoch
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