Texts in Conversation
Isaiah 66 shows the aftermath of a battle, where defeated enemies lie unburied as a public warning, their corpses consumed by fire and worms. The Wisdom of Solomon draws on this image and reshapes it into a reflection on the fate of the unrighteous.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Isaiah 66:24
Hebrew Bible
22 “For just as the new heavens and the new earth I am about to make will remain standing before me,” says the Lord, “so your descendants and your name will remain. 23 From one month to the next and from one Sabbath to the next, all people will come to worship me,” says the Lord. 24 “They will go out and observe the corpses of those who rebelled against me, for the maggots that eat them will not die, and the fire that consumes them will not die out. All people will find the sight abhorrent.”
Date: 740–450 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Wisdom of Solomon 4:18
Deuterocanon
16 but a righteous man who is dead will condemn the ungodly who are living, and youth who is quickly perfected will condemn the many years of an unrighteous man’s old age. 17 For the ungodly will see a wise man’s end, and won’t understand what the Lord planned for him, and why he safely kept him. 18 They will see, and they will despise; but the Lord will laugh them to scorn. After this, they will become a dishonored carcass and a reproach among the dead forever; 19 because he will dash them speechless to the ground, and will shake them from the foundations. They will lie utterly waste. They will be in anguish and their memory will perish. 20 They will come with cowardly fear when their sins are counted. Their lawless deeds will convict them to their face.
Date: 50 BCE – 50 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... There is evidence that Isaiah 66:24 played a strong influence on Jewish views of the judgement around the turn of the era. In Judith 16:17 the writer warns that the Lord will take vengeance on the nations that rise up against Israel. He will give 'fire and worms' to their flesh. In contrast to Isaiah 66:24 where the fire and the worms are agents of destruction, here they become agents of torment; the wicked shall 'weep in pain forever' (Judith 16:17). Likewise Sirach 7:17 warns that the punishment of the ungodly will be 'fire and worms'. In contrast to Judith, Sirach does not clarify whether the punishment will result in destruction or prolonged torment. The Isaiah Targum oscillates between the two views. First the translator states that the breath of the wicked "will not die and their fire shall not be quenched" suggesting perhaps ongoing suffering. However, he adds that they will suffer only until the righteous say, 'we have seen enough' (Targum Isaiah 66:24). Summing the above, Mark 9:43-50 shows the influence of two very similar biblical traditions - Jeremiah's Ge-hinnom texts and Isaiah 66:24. From the former Mark retains the name Gehenna, and from the latter some descriptive remarks. Nothing in Mark's sources suggests torment by fire or other means of apostates for shorter or longer periods of time. Both envisage the complete destruction of the wicked ..."
Kim Gary Papaioannou, “Places of Punishment in the Synoptic Gospels” (PhD diss., University of Durham, 2004), 56–57.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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