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Luke 16 depicts the rich man in Hades experiencing torment, while 4 Ezra describes Gehenna as a place of judgment. Both draw on unique cosmology that developed in early Jewish tradition that described places in Hades or Gehenna with distinct purposes.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
4 Ezra 7:36
2 Esdras
Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
34 Only judgment will remain. Truth will stand. Faith will grow strong. 35 Recompense will follow. The reward will be shown. Good deeds will awake, and wicked deeds won’t sleep. 36 The pit of torment will appear, and near it will be the place of rest. The furnace of hell will be shown, and near it the paradise of delight. 37 Then the Most High will say to the nations that are raised from the dead, ‘Look and understand whom you have denied, whom you haven’t served, whose commandments you have despised. 38 Look on this side and on that. Here is delight and rest, and there fire and torments.’ Thus he will speak to them in the day of judgment.
Date: 70–132 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
Luke 16:23
New Testament
21 who longed to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. In addition, the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 “Now the poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 And in Hades, as he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far off with Lazarus at his side. 24 So he called out, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue because I am in anguish in this fire.’ 25 But Abraham said, ‘Child, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things and Lazarus likewise bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in anguish.
Date: 75–85 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Defining the infernal realm or hell within the Second Temple period and Late Antiquity is not a facile project as this era is marked by incredible diversity of thought concerning the nature of the afterlife. Sites traditionally associated with the infernal world - the realm of the dead (Sheol, for example, Isaiah 38:10, 18; Psalm 88:4; Job 7:9; Qoheleth 9:10 or Hades [for example, Iliad 9.158-59; Odyssey 11.487; Josephus, Antiquitates Judaicae 18:14; Matthew 11:23; Luke 16:23; Acts 2:27; Revelation 1:18; 20:13-14]), Gehenna, a fiery place of punishment or for judgment of the wicked (Matthew 5:22; 29-30; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Sibylline Oracles 1.103; 2.292; 4 Ezra 7:36; Ascension of Isaiah 4:14; m. Qidd. 4.14; t. Berakhot 6.15; t. Sanhedrin 13.3; b. Berakhot 28b; Midrash Tehillim 31.3) and Tartarus, traditionally a subterranean prison or abyss where the titans or other sorts of celestial beings were punished (Ilias 8.13-16; Theogonia 713-35; LXX Proverbs 30:16; Job 40:20; 41:24; 1 Enoch 20:2; 2 Peter 2:4; Sibylline Oracles 1.101) - are distinctive in origin and purpose; further, because of the variety of views held on the afterlife, each of these terms could be employed differently by ancient authors, not always in uniform manner ..."
Kelley Coblentz Bautch, "Heavenly Beings Brought Low: A Study of Angels and the Netherworld" in in Reiterer, Friedrich Vinzenz, et al. (eds.) Angels: The Concept of Celestial Beings Origins, Development and Reception (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2007), 459–475.
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