Jewish thoughts on heaven/hell

[seeker]

I was wondering if anyone here is Jewish/was Jewish or just knows in general what Jewish people believe about heaven and hell. Are they of the same belief that Christian's are that everyone is going to hell that isn't Jewish? Seems odd to me that God would only speak to a certain group of people and not give a shit about the rest of human race that were alive on different continents at the time.

[Ouroboros]

Good question. I'm not sure exactly what kind of Hell the Jews believed in 2000 years ago, and what they believe today.

 

From what I heard, the pharisees and the saducees had different ideas. One of them believed in a life after death, and the other didn't. And the ones that believe in life after death must have believed in some form of Hell, I guess.

[JeffXL]

I was wondering if anyone here is Jewish/was Jewish or just knows in general what Jewish people believe about heaven and hell. Are they of the same belief that Christian's are that everyone is going to hell that isn't Jewish? Seems odd to me that God would only speak to a certain group of people and not give a shit about the rest of human race that were alive on different continents at the time.

 

The Jews I have known (of all three schools in the US) have very vague ideas about an afterlife. None that I knew believe in an eternal hell, although one orthodox did say the Hitler would be in Gehenna forever (and he never named Hitler directly, he was not comfortable with naming anyone).

 

The O.T.'s first 5 books are devoid of afterlife talk, until Sheol is invented later. Sheol seems to have been borrowed from the Greek Hades, since the 'souls' there were mere shades.

 

This is why Jews don't prosyletize. There's no punishment for not being a Jew.

[dead_hobbit]

I was wondering if anyone here is Jewish/was Jewish or just knows in general what Jewish people believe about heaven and hell.

 

The only concept of a "hell" in Judaism, at the worst, would be that the soul would be in a sort of purgatory for 11 months or less.

 

Are they of the same belief that Christian's are that everyone is going to hell that isn't Jewish?

 

No. In fact, it is required of Rabbis to try to discourage potential converts at least 3 times.

 

Seems odd to me that God would only speak to a certain group of people and not give a shit about the rest of human race that were alive on different continents at the time.

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According to Rabbinic Tradition, God offered the Torah to all the nations of the world, but only the Jewish nation accepted it.

[dead_hobbit]

I'm not sure exactly what kind of Hell the Jews believed in 2000 years ago, and what they believe today.

 

You'd get a wide variety of answers, given that many didn't even believe in an afterlife then. (Such as the Tzadokim - Saducees - who rejected the notions of an afterlife, ressurection, angels, or demons.)

[dead_hobbit]

The Jews I have known (of all three schools in the US) have very vague ideas about an afterlife.

 

When it comes to the afterlife, there's a pretty wide spectrum of beleifs - even amongst the Orthodox.

 

The O.T.'s first 5 books are devoid of afterlife talk, until Sheol is invented later. Sheol seems to have been borrowed from the Greek Hades, since the 'souls' there were mere shades.

 

Not completely. It mentions Sheol, IIRC, but extremely vaguely. The torah refered to people as having "slept with their fathers" when they've died, but that's also pretty vague.

[dead_hobbit]

Some sects of Essene Nazarene Jews (Jesus believing Jews)

 

Uh...

 

1) The Essennes weren't Christians

2) The Essennes were one sect - not a group of sects

3) The Essennes died out 1900 years ago.

4) Not a single Essene writing mentions Jesus

[dead_hobbit]

Hrm... didn't know that. Thanks for the info.

[Gnosis of Disbelief]

The Jews I have known (of all three schools in the US) have very vague ideas about an afterlife. None that I knew believe in an eternal hell, although one orthodox did say the Hitler would be in Gehenna forever (and he never named Hitler directly, he was not comfortable with naming anyone).

 

The O.T.'s first 5 books are devoid of afterlife talk, until Sheol is invented later. Sheol seems to have been borrowed from the Greek Hades, since the 'souls' there were mere shades.

 

This is why Jews don't prosyletize. There's no punishment for not being a Jew.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

I remember that when I was fundified, the fundies would always say that

Sheol meant "the grave." I guess somebody way back when thought the

similarity between Sheol and Hades was too disturbing, so they had to

reinterpret it.

 

They also never explained why the OT talked about Sheol, and the NT

talked about hell, a later introduction that was apparently borrowed from

the Zoroastrians and the Mithraists. Except that the Zoroastrians and

Mithraists restricted hell to people like Hitler, while the xtians expanded

it to include anybody who didn't agree with them.

[MQTA]

  Genesis says that the wages of sin is death. 

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Who's Genesis? Not any Genesis I could find. Doesn't seem to be the wage ONLY and not until Romans 6:23

 

The only mention of wages and sin together is that one verse.

 

Maybe a nifty slogan, but nothing to do with the OT or Genesis

[MQTA]

I was wondering if anyone here is Jewish/was Jewish or just knows in general what Jewish people believe about heaven and hell. Are they of the same belief that Christian's are that everyone is going to hell that isn't Jewish? Seems odd to me that God would only speak to a certain group of people and not give a shit about the rest of human race that were alive on different continents at the time.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

If you want to know how he felt about the other groups, read Judges, for one. All the other groups were to be slaughtered.

[seeker]

If you want to know how he felt about the other groups, read Judges, for one.  All the other groups were to be slaughtered.

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Yea I've heard from a few Jewish people I got in contact with that God came to all people on the earth and asked them to give up their worship of other Gods. And it was the Jews and ONLY the Jews that accepted him. That was the response I got from several different Jews. Sounds to me like they just wanted to feel more importan..

[MQTA]

Yea I've heard from a few Jewish people I got in contact with that God came to all people on the earth and asked them to give up their worship of other Gods. And it was the Jews and ONLY the Jews that accepted him. That was the response I got from several different Jews. Sounds to me like they just wanted to feel more importan..

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OH, so is that what they're saying nowadays? Well, the whole point of believing something is having a nice sweet package. Why not say that.

 

Never heard it before, and probably a year or so ago I'd not have said it, but damn, Judges is damn bloody. So is Joshua, and probably a whole lot of the books I haven't delved into yet.

 

Saw a link here yesterday about the back of the OT books. Hosea.. that's an interesting one. http://www.jaypinkerton.com/backofthebible.html

 

Finding more and more on the web, it's "taking time", but wow, in the last 20 months I covered a whole lot more ground than I had since the all the years befoer it. Got my age old questions from when I was a kid answered, and so much more than I ever bargained for.

 

Before April 2004, I knew very little about the NT. Now I know too much.

[dead_hobbit]

OH, so is that what they're saying nowadays?  Well, the whole point of believing something is having a nice sweet package.  Why not say that.

 

Actually, that person's statement was mostly (but not completely) accurate. But it isn't what is being said "nowadays" - it is what has been taught for the past 2300-2500 years in what is now known as Orthodox Judaism.

 

What is taught is that all the nations of the world were offered the Torah, but only the nation of Israel accepted it. The others allegedly rejected it for various reasons, usually things that were already prohibited under the Noahide Covenant (Idolatry, Adultery, etc.)

 

Some Non-Jews followed the Noahide Covenant, but not many. Today there is a religous movment, mostly promoted by Chabad, that has revived the Noahides.

[chohan]

Yea I've heard from a few Jewish people I got in contact with that God came to all people on the earth and asked them to give up their worship of other Gods. And it was the Jews and ONLY the Jews that accepted him. That was the response I got from several different Jews. Sounds to me like they just wanted to feel more importan..

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Agreed but we all enjoy feeling important and special don't we? It sounds to me like an example of passing the buck. Imho, instead of the blame falling on the Hebrew deity for being 'the chooser', it places it on the other nations and cultures for not being 'choosy enough'.

 

According to Rabbinic Tradition, God offered the Torah to all the nations of the world, but only the Jewish nation accepted it.

 

Right. I can see that from the way the Israelites were busy partying around the golden idol the first time Moshe came down from Mt. Sinai. Can you say pissed?

 

Different slant, same tactic and end result: they accepted, the others rejected. We can't have an in group without the out group, so this is the Jewish version of the sheep/goats mentality.

 

As to the Torah on the 'choosing':

 

"For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God; the Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth. The Lord did not set His love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people.

But because the Lord loved you, and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn unto your fathers ..."

 

"... The Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day."

"For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God, and the Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto Himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth."

 

"But thou, Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend.

"Thou whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, and called thee from the chief men thereof, and said unto thee, Thou art my servant; I have chosen thee, and not cast thee away."

 

"When the LORD your God brings you into the land where you are entering to possess it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and stronger than you, and when the LORD your God delivers them before you and you defeat them, then you shall utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them and show no favor to them. "Furthermore, you shall not intermarry with them; you shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor shall you take their daughters for your sons."

 

"Art not thou our God, who didst drive out the inhabitants of this land before thy people Israel, and gavest it to the seed of Abraham thy friend for ever?"

(Deuteronomy 7:6, 10:15, 14:2, Isaiah 41:8, 2 Chronicles 20:7)

 

Chosen due to the Hebrew deity's love for his friend Abraham and all that. Pretty obvious who chose who. All this choosiness is making me dizzy.

 

Some Non-Jews followed the Noahide Covenant, but not many. Today there is a religous movment, mostly promoted by Chabad, that has revived the Noahides.

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Non-Jews... yes, just the other day I met a non-Goy, or was it a non-Muslim, non-Arab or perhaps just a non-black? It all grows too bizarre for me. A revived Noahide you say? I wonder how long the waiting list is for that one. Interesting.

 

So what exactly is a non-Jew? A Gentile? Non-goyim simply need a category to separate themselves from the rest of humanity. No different than Muslims and their infidels.

 

It mentions Sheol, IIRC, but extremely vaguely. The torah refered to people as having "slept with their fathers" when they've died, but that's also pretty vague.

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I agree the torah is vague in this regard. The Israelites weren't exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer when it came to knowledge of the non-physical.

 

cheers,

cho

[diggin]

I was wondering if anyone here is Jewish/was Jewish or just knows in general what Jewish people believe about heaven and hell. Are they of the same belief that Christian's are that everyone is going to hell that isn't Jewish? Seems odd to me that God would only speak to a certain group of people and not give a shit about the rest of human race that were alive on different continents at the time.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I'm not Jewish but have good relationships Jewish friends and do a lot of reading on the subject. Most Jews today trace their spiritual roots to the Pharisees of the NT, and as recorded in the Gospels, the Pharisees believed in a resurrection on earth.

The Pharisees seem to have picked up some elements of Greek thought as well, where the idea of eternal torment originated. http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.4.iii.html

 

The OT Bible, in my opinion, did not ever teach a burning hell (Nor, I believe did the NT -- but gehenna was indeed referred to as a picture of annihilation. Jesus defined it as "destruction of body and soul" Matthew 10:28 http://bible.cc/matthew/10-28.htm

 

Hades in the NT equals Sheol in the OT, and both refer to the exact same thing -- the grave, the state of death, oblivion. Here's an example: Jesus' soul went to hades, that is, died. Acts 2:27, quoting Psalm 16:10

 

Most OT verses speak of sheol as a place of silence, death, unconsciousness, and the same for good and bad people. 1 verse in the OT associates the concept of conscious suffering with sheol -- Deuteronomy 32:22, where context indicates the nation of Israel is referred to. Obviously, a nation can go into oblivion as a state or polity while its people are alive and experiencing pain.

 

1 verse in the NT associates conscious suffering with hades - Luke 16:23. Here again, I think it is clear from context that this is a parable about the Jewish nation going into oblivion, and its people experiencing torment during that time. (Rich man = Jews, Lazarus = Gentiles) In my opinion, the parable was given to warn the Pharisees that the Jews would exchange positions of favor as respects the Abrahamic covenant with the Gentiles -- and experience a long period of torment during that time. This does not mean God prefers Christians, or that Jews go to hell. Not at all. Lots and lots of Bible verses speak of regathering, restoration, resurrection of the Jews both as a nation and as individuals. And Christians are condemned for persecuting the Jews. (Isaiah 47:5-14. Obviously, I equate Babylon of prophecy with mainstream Christianity)

 

As to the idea of Sheol being a later development -- I think the Greek spin on it was, but the word itself occurs several times in Genesis and has no connotation of suffering or special punishment. Jacob expected to go there -- to die.

 

I think that Tartarus was used in the NT (2 Peter 2:4, same idea as Jude 1:6) to refer to the earth's atmosphere, where disobedient angels were forced to reside since the flood under certain limitations (chains of darkness). Prior to the flood, angels were able to materialize and engage in sexual activity, and this was no longer permitted after the flood).

 

Here's a convenient list of all the places where all the verses are that use sheol, hades, gehenna, and tartarus. (I'm not associated with the website that hosts this list)

http://what-the-hell-is-hell.com/HellStudy/HellCharts.htm

 

Overall answer to your question is that God does care about the Jews, and the Gentiles, and has provided for the learning and restoration of all in "due time". In the end, hades will be cast into the lake of fire, which means all who died will come back to life.

[SkepticOfBible]

No. In fact, it is required of Rabbis to try to discourage potential converts at least 3 times.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Why do they do that?

[MQTA]

Why do they do that?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Everything is THREEs, or 40s, in the book. They had a fixation for that number