Sheol

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For the Naglfar album, see Sheol (album).

She’ol (/ˈʃiːoʊl/ SHEE-ohl, /-əl/; Hebrew ‫ ְׁשאֹול‬Šəʾōl), in the Hebrew Bible, is a place of darkness
to which all the dead go, both the righteous and the unrighteous, regardless of the moral choices
made in life, a place of stillness and darkness cut off from life and separated from God.[1] The
inhabitants of Sheol are the "shades" (rephaim), entities without personality or strength.[2] Under
some circumstances they are thought to be able to be contacted by the living, as the Witch of
Endor contacts the shade of Samuel for Saul, but such practices are forbidden (Book of
Deuteronomy 18:10).[3]

While the Hebrew Bible describes Sheol as the permanent place of the dead, in the Second
Temple period (roughly 500 BC – 70 AD) a more diverse set of ideas developed. Sheol is
considered to be the home of both the dead righteous and wicked, separated into respective
compartments until the Last Judgement (e.g. 1 Enoch 22; Luke 16:19-31). In some texts, it was
considered a place of punishment, meant for the wicked dead alone,[4] and is equated with
Gehenna in the Talmud.[5] When the Hebrew scriptures were translated into Greek in ancient
Alexandria around 200 BC, the word "Hades" (the Greek underworld) was substituted for
Sheol.[6] This is reflected in the New Testament where Hades is both the underworld of the dead
and the personification of it.[4]

Rapid Transit to Sheol – Where We Are All Going According to the Reverend Dr. Morgan Dix,
by Joseph Keppler, 1888.

Contents
 1 Judaism
 2 Personification in the Hebrew Bible
 3 Biblical texts
  4 See also
 5 References
 6 Bibliography
 7 External links

Judaism
According to Herbert C. Brichto, writing in Hebrew Union College Annual,[7] the family tomb is
the central concept in understanding biblical views of the afterlife. Brichto states that it is "not
mere sentimental respect for the physical remains that is...the motivation for the practice, but
rather an assumed connection between proper sepulture and the condition of happiness of the
deceased in the afterlife".[8]

According to Brichto, the early Israelites apparently believed that the graves of family, or tribe,
united into one and that this, unified collectively, is to what the Biblical Hebrew term Sheol
refers: the common grave of humans. Although not well defined in the Tanakh, Sheol in this
view was a subterranean underworld where the souls of the dead went after the body died. The
Babylonians had a similar underworld called Aralu and the Greeks had one known as Hades.
According to Brichto, other biblical names for Sheol were: Abaddon (ruin), found in Psalm
88:11, Job 28:22 and Proverbs 15:11; Bor (the pit), found in Isaiah 14:15, 24:22, Ezekiel 26:20;
and Shakhat (corruption), found in Isaiah 38:17, Ezekiel 28:8.[9]

The Tanakh has few references to existence after death. The notion of resurrection of the dead
appears in two biblical sources, Daniel 12 and Isaiah 25–26.[10]

Personification in the Hebrew Bible

Wojciech Kosior has argued that "Sheol" in the Hebrew Bible refers to an underworld deity.[11]

Some additional support for this hypothesis comes from the ancient Near Eastern literary
materials. For example, the Akkadian plates mention the name shuwalu or suwala in reference to
a deity responsible for ruling the abode of the dead. As such it might have been borrowed by the
Hebrews and incorporated into their early belief system.[12] What is more, some scholars argue
that Sheol understood anthropomorphically fits the semantic complex of the other ancient Near
Eastern death deities such as Nergal, Ereshkigal or Mot.[13] Other scholars have cast doubt on
these readings.[14][15]

Biblical texts
A number of biblical texts reference Sheol.[16] The following is a selection:

Numbers 16:31-34: As soon as he finished saying all this, the ground under them split apart and
the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them and their households, and all those associated
with Korah, together with their possessions. They went down alive into the realm of the dead,
with everything they owned; the earth closed over them, and they perished and were gone from
the community. At their cries, all the Israelites around them fled, shouting, “The earth is going to
swallow us too!”

Job 7:7-10: Remember, O God, that my life is but a breath; my eyes will never see happiness
again. The eye that now sees me will see me no longer; you will look for me, but I will be no
more. As a cloud vanishes and is gone, so one who goes down to the grave does not return. He
will never come to his house again; his place will know him no more.

Psalm 88:2-10: May my prayer come before you; turn your ear to my cry. I am overwhelmed
with troubles and my life draws near to death. I am counted among those who go down to the pit;
I am like one without strength. I am set apart with the dead, like the slain who lie in the grave,
whom you remember no more, who are cut off from your care. You have put me in the lowest
pit, in the darkest depths. Your wrath lies heavily on me; you have overwhelmed me with all
your waves. You have taken from me my closest friends and have made me repulsive to them. I
am confined and cannot escape; my eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, Lord, every day; I
spread out my hands to you. Do you show your wonders to the dead? Do their spirits rise up and
praise you?

Others passages mentioning Sheol include 1 Samuel 2:6; 2 Samuel 22:5-19; Job 10:18-22; Psalm
30:3; 94:17; 143:3; 115:17; Jonah 2:3-8, and others, including passages in the New Testament
describing Hades (such as the story of the rich man and Lazarus; Luke 16:19-31).

See also
 Barzakh
 Biblical cosmology
 Christian views on Hades
 Eirene (goddess)
 Hel (being)
 Hellenistic Judaism
 Limbo of the Patriarchs
 Shalim
 Spirit world (Latter Day Saints)
 Tartarus
 Xibalba

References
1.

 Rainwater 1990, p. 819

Sheol ... is the OT word for the underworld or unseen world of the dead where departed spirits
go ... It was a place of stillness, darkness...
  Longenecker 2003, p. 188
  Knobel 2011, pp. 205–06
  Longenecker 2003, p. 189
  Eruvin 19a:16
  Patte, Daniel (ed). The Cambridge Dictionary of Christianity. Cambridge University Press,
2010, 490.
  The Hebrew Union College Annual is an annual peer-reviewed academic journal in the field
of Jewish and historical studies. It was established in 1924 and is published by the Hebrew
Union College.
  Brichto 1973, pp. 1-54.
  Brichto 1973, p. 8.
  Life After Death – My Jewish Learning. Retrieved 10 July 2014.
  Kosior, Wojciech (2014). "The Underworld or its Ruler? Some Remarks on the Concept of
Sheol in the Hebrew Bible". Polish Journal of Biblical Research. 13 (1–2 (25–26)): 35–36.
Retrieved 16 June 2014.
  P.S. Johnston, Shades of Sheol. Death and Afterlife in the Old Testament, Illinois 2002, p.
78. See also: L.B. Paton, The Hebrew Idea of the Future Life. III. Babylonian Influence in the
Doctrine of Sheol, “The Biblical World”, Vol. 35, No. 3, Chicago 1910, p. 160.
  H. M. Barstad, Sheol, in: K. van der Toom, B. Becking, P.W. van der Horst (eds.),
Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 2nd ed., Leiden, Boston, Köln, 1999, pp. 768–70.
  Levenson, Jon Douglas. Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel: the Ultimate Victory of
the God of Life. Yale University Press, 2006, 41.
  Johnston, Philip. Shades of Sheol: death and afterlife in the Old Testament. InterVarsity
Press, 2002, 102.

16.  Levenson, Jon Douglas. Resurrection and the Restoration of Israel: the Ultimate
Victory of the God of Life. Yale University Press, 2006, 35-43.

Bibliography
 Aune, David E. (2003). "Cosmology". Westminster Dictionary of the New Testament and
Early Christian Literature. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 9780664219178.
 Bernstein, Alan E. (1996). The Formation of Hell: Death and Retribution in the Ancient
and Early Christian Worlds. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0801481314.
 Brichto, Herbert Chanan (1973). "Kin, Cult, Land and Afterlife – A Biblical Complex".
Hebrew Union College Annual. 44. JSTOR 23506813.
 Hess, Richard S. (2007). Israelite Religions: An Archeological and Biblical Survey.
Baker Academic Press. ISBN 9781441201126.
 Kelly, Henry A. (2010). "Hell with Purgatory and two Limbos". In Moreira, Isabel;
Toscano, Margaret (eds.). Hell and Its Afterlife: Historical and Contemporary
Perspectives. Ashgate Publishing. ISBN 9780754667292.
 Knobel, Peter (2011). "Death". In Berlin, Adele; Grossman, Maxine (eds.). The Oxford
Dictionary of the Jewish Religion. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199730049.
  Longenecker, Richard N. (2003). "Cosmology". In Gowan, Donald E. (ed.). The
Westminster Theological Wordbook of the Bible. Westminster John Knox Press.
ISBN 9780664223946.
 Mabie, F.J (2008). "Chaos and Death". In Longman, Tremper; Enns, Peter (eds.).
Dictionary of the Old Testament. InterVarsity Press. ISBN 9780830817832.
 O'Dowd, R. (2008). "Creation imagery". In Longman, Tremper; Enns, Peter (eds.).
Dictionary of the Old Testament. InterVarsity Press. ISBN 9780830817832.
 Rainwater, Robert (1990). "Sheol". In Watson E. Mills (General Editor) (ed.). Mercer
Dictionary of the Bible. Mercer University Press. ISBN 9780865543737.
 Reike, Bo (2001). "Hell". In Metzger, Bruce Manning; Coogan, Michael David (eds.).
The Oxford Guide to Ideas & Issues of the Bible. Oxford University Press.
ISBN 9780195149173.

External links