A Brief History Of Heaven & Hell

A COSMIC PENAL COLONY?

“All the meanness, all the revenge, all the selfishness, all the cruelty, all the hatred, all the infamy of which the heart of man is capable, grew, blossomed, and bore fruit in this one word: Hell.”  —Robert Ingersoll (“The Great Infidels” lecture)

A place of punishment in the afterlife goes back as far as the Egyptian Book of the Dead.  Since time immemorial, those in power have known the utility of having a foreboding cosmic bugbear to keep people in line.  It boils down to control via fear.  The ULTIMATE bugaboo is the hell depicted by John of Patmos; and later by the authors of the Koran.

The notion of a bleak place to which the unrighteous are consigned became known in Abrahamic lore pursuant to the featuring of “Ge-Hinnom” in Abrahamic lore [Valley of Hinnom; rendered “Gehanna” in Syriac].  The moniker referred to a ditch on the outskirts of Jerusalem.  Its etymology indicates that it was correlated with the Valley of the Son of Hinnom (typically rendered “Gei Ben Hinnom”): a dark, dreary place associated with death and decay.  (Note that “Ge-hinnom” is not to be confused with “Sheol”, the Ancient Hebrew term referring to the land of the dead.)  

The threat of hellfire made its first appearance in the New Testament.  The Gospel writers invoked the threat of hell with the repeated used of the phrase “the wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12, 13:41-42/50, 22:14, and 25:30; as well as Luke 13:23-30).  The use of hellfire as a scare-tactic is invoked numerous times (Matthew 7:19, 10:28, 18:8-9, and 25:41; Luke 3:9/17, 10:10-15, and 12:5; as well as John 15:6).  Christians spoke of “Golgot[h]a”–a bleak location on the outskirts of Jerusalem that was associated with death (and was subsequently designated as the place where the Romans performed their crucifixions).  This likely corresponded to the Valley of Hinnom (alt. rendered “Gehenna”), which made its way into Christian lore as a bleak place of punishment for the wicked.  More lurid depictions were provided in the Book of Revelation–replete with hellfire (alternately rendered a bottomless pit and a lake of fire), lots of fire and brimstone, and the gnashing of teeth.

“Ge-Hinnom” was also the basis for the Classical Arabic “Jahannam” used in Islamic theology.  In fact, the only thing that is truly original about the Koranic depiction of hell is the level of absurdity: women carrying firewood for the flames that will burn their husbands, trees bearing poisonous fruit, shackles and chains to prevent inmates from escaping, etc.  In later centuries, Islamic writers even concocted an adjunct to the domain of hellfire: a special section that was FREEZING instead of unbearably hot, dubbed “Zamhareer” (a part that, for some reason, god did not see fit to mention in the Koran).

Descriptions of hell in both Christian and Islamic lore were intended to terrify the audience.  Yet the ploy back-fires when it comes to most modern audiences.  Those of us who have reached a level of maturity beyond that of an adolescent invariably find such cartoonish descriptions silly, not scary.  We are not threatened by such puerile depictions, we are amused by them.

Those who defend all this silliness by insisting that it was meant to be taken figuratively are only deluding themselves.  The treatment of hell and heaven by the authors of the Koran (and Hadith) was clearly NOT intended to be merely symbolic.  It was excruciatingly literal–right down to every gratuitous specification.  Extraneous details like the name of the captain of the guard and precise length of the chains do not facilitate the alleged metaphor; so such information is clearly not intended metaphorically.  (For more on this point, see Appendix 3.)

In any case, distance from divinity needn’t involve burning; nor does it require guards, boiling water, and poisonous fruit.  If conveyed metaphorically, being separated from the divine would not resemble a torture chamber, as it does in the Koran.  Nor would a metaphor for being disconnected from the divine incorporate crude depictions of medieval torture.  The concept of alienation does not involve penal measures.

YET…virtually every culture in the world has some conception of hell (that is: a place of perdition to which unworthy souls are consigned after worldly death) going all the way back to the Sumerian “Kur-nugia”.  Here are twenty more:

• Akkadians / Assyrians had “Ershetu” / “Irshitu” / “Ershet-la-Tari” (wherein was located Eresh-kigal’s palace: “Ganzer” / “Ganzir”)
• Vedic lore had the Vedic “Narak[a]s” (from the Sanskrit, “Niraya”)
• Jains had the “Nar[a]ka-loka”
• Later Hindus and Chinese Buddhists had “Yama-pur[a]” (the abode of Yama)
• Mahayana Buddhists had “Avici” (the worst of the 16 hells)
• Theravada (esp. Siamese) Buddhists had “Mahanorok”
• Persians (Zoroastrians) had “Grestako” [House of the Lie]
• Turkic peoples had “Tam-ag” / “Tam-uk”
• Mongols had “Kasyrgan”
• Ancient Greeks had “Tartaros” [alt. “Tartarus”; deep place]
• Celts had “Uffern” / “Anaon”
• Ancient Norse had “Hel-heim[r]” / “Nifl-hel” / “Nifl-heim[r]” (simply rendered “Hel”)
• Ancient Slavic peoples had “Peklo”
• Ancient Chinese had the lowest levels of “Di-yu”
• Ancient (Shinto) Japanese had “Yomi”
• Japanese Buddhists posited “Ji-go-ku” (ref. the “Ojo-yoshu”)
• Aztecs had “Mictlan”
• Mayans had “Xibalba”; “Metnal”
• Guanche (Berbers) had “Echeyde”
• Muslims have “Jahannam”

The archetype is roughly the same in every case: A realm of torment for those who have been consigned to perdition.  It has many versions–from the Angolan “Kalunga” to the Nicene Christian lake of fire (famously portrayed by John of Patmos).  Even in Judaic lore, there were vague references to such places as “Topet(h)” [place of fire] and “Neshiyyah” [oblivion].

The lake-of-fire leitmotif actually began in ancient Egyptian mythology about the dire fate of the unworthy in “Duat”–as explicated in the Book of the Dead, the Book of Gates, the Book of Caverns, the Book of Am-Duat, and The Book of the Two Ways [of “Rosetau”] from the Coffin Texts.  Thus the lake of fire described in the “Book of Revelation” was simply an adaptation of an old theme.  It was then adopted by Roman Catholicism in its fire-and-brimstone approach to theology–a theme eventually taken up by Dante in his “Divine Comedy”…and then by the American Puritans.

In most instances, we are treated to premonitions of a luridly macabre punishment for people with a karmic deficit.  In many versions, “inmates” are tortured over and over and over for all eternity–usually by burning in fire or being immersed in cauldrons of boiling fluid.  In Judaic lore, there is the “Duda-El” [cauldron of god].  With the Mongol version of hell “Kasyrgan”, the damned are thrown into a cauldron of boiling tar. {13}  The idea of stewing in a cauldron of boiling fluid was first found in the Mahayana Buddhist version of perdition, “Avici”–a leitmotif duplicated in ancient Mongolian theology.

Judaic lore continued this macabre scheme in the Book of Enoch, which spoke of damned souls being cast into a fiery abyss (but not until the Day of Judgement).  This was a (literal) physical ordeal, as the relevant passages speak of the condemned being BOUND.  In Judaic lore, there was the so-called “Be’er Shachat[h]” [“pit of impurity / impiety”].  The motif of a bottomless pit is echoed in the Koran: “Hawiyah”…which begs the question: Why does Jahannam need gates?

The Christian instantiation of hell was likely derived from the Greek “Tartaros” [deep place].  This is unsurprising, as the New Testament was originally composed in Koine Greek.  We even encounter this Greek lexeme for hell in the Second letter of Peter (2:4).  This was a clerical oversight that reveals the origin of the motif.  (The same passage specified that those consigned to perdition will be put into “chains of darkness”.)  Fire was added to this grim milieu so as to make it all the more terrifying.

Unsurprisingly, much of the Koranic–and the subsequent Islamic–conception of hell was probably cribbed from Zoroastrian theology about “Grestako”, a horrific cave of unending darkness.  Grestako was a venue for the eternal torments inflicted upon the damned, including the eating of putrid stuff like bile and rotten fruit.  And, yes, the Persian hell is GATED and has GUARDS–earthly features repeated in the Koranic depiction of Jahannam. {19}

Tellingly, the notion of nefarious apparitions, djinn, was also appropriated from Persian lore (“jaini”).  The meme was first adapted by the Nabataeans, who posited the Syriac “ginnaye” (as good spirits), from which the Arabic term was derived.  Meanwhile, Canaanites used the Semitic “J-N-N” to indicated something hidden–which explains why “jinn” was the term used for spirits in Aramaic.  Pursuant to the Mohammedan movement, the superstition was incorporated into the revamped Abrahamic theology.  (It is even used as the title for Surah 72.)  The positing of nefarious spirits (demons) is commonplace across cultures–from the Ancient Greek “daimon” to the Vedic “sura”.  In Persian lore, there were the “daeva”.  In Turkic / Mongol lore, there were the “Çor” (generally known as the “Abasi”).  In the Abrahamic tradition, this ideation dates back to the Judaic “shedim” / “se’irim”…later rendered “mazzikim” in Mishnaic lore.

The primary sentiment behind hell is vengeance.  Rather than responding to moral / spiritual delinquency with lamentation, there is only punishment.  This was hardly an idiom for the tragic consequences of impiety.  It was retributive in nature.  In light of this, one might ask oneself: If he existed, would the Creator of the Universe really be in the business of operating torture chambers?

In Nicene Christian and Islamic cosmogony, the Creator of the Universe decided to create a race of beings with the idea that he would torture those who failed to acknowledge his existence and devote their lives to paying him tribute.  What makes this rather deranged is that–according to the Koran–everyone is PRE-SELECTED FROM BIRTH for whether or not they will be damned or saved.  Such pre-destination means that one’s ultimate destination in the hereafter is a foregone conclusion.  (For more on this, see Appendix 1.)

The punitive nature of the Koran’s protagonist infuses the entire book.  The terms for “punish[ment]” (“adhaba[n]” / “adhabu[n]” and “rij’za”) occur roughly four-hundred times throughout the book.  The key, it seems, was not only to condemn a large fraction of mankind, but to make the punitive measures as terrifying as possible.  Throughout the book, there is a creepy preoccupation with forcing boiling water down people’s throats (so that it will burn them from the inside)…even as flames burn off their skin from the outside…over and over and over again…forever (22:19).

Such lurid exposition is an indication that an infinitely beneficent super-being might NOT be the author of the Koran.  The book is unapologetically inconsistent on this fundamental point.  For its protagonist’s peculiar relish of the macabre is at odds with that protagonist’s alleged benevolent nature.  Infinitely merciful?  Brimming with compassion?  Hardly.

Rather than a super-being characterized by beneficence, the Koran’s protagonist is a temperamental, pathologically vindictive despot.  In 6:30 and 6:49, god notifies us that he will torment–TORMENT–us for one reason: for not believing in this particular creed.  In other words: People will be punished not for being iniquitous, but explicitly for the crime of not thinking that the Koran is what it says it is.

As portrayed in the Koran, the Abrahamic deity is not only NOT BOTHERED BY a cosmic torture chamber being populated with billions of sentient beings; he REVELS in it.  Nay: He DEMANDS it.  The Koran’s protagonist is unabashed about the fact that he RELISHES the agony that these unfortunate souls will endure for the crime of displeasing him.

Suffice to say, a benevolent entity would not only be disinclined to sanction this deranged cosmic scheme.  Quite the contrary, such a being would be constitutionally incapable of such malice.  Moral beings tend not to include unrelenting sadism in their repertoire.  (For further discussion of this matter, see Appendix 4.)

What is the primary purpose of the Koran, then?  The book announces itself, above all, as a WARNING.  In fact, god instructs his messenger (“Mu-H-M-D”) to announce that he is NOTHING BUT a “warner” (as in 46:9).  A warner of WHAT, exactly?  The horrific punishment in store for anyone who defaults on the enumerated obligations.  The portrayal of said punishment is quite revealing about the psychology of the Koran’s authors.

The Koran actually assigns hell (“Jahannam”) four alternate monikers: Saqar, Sijjeen, Ladha, and Zaqqum.  Make no mistake: The purpose of “Jahannam” is TORTURE. {12}  That is, it exists as a venue to torment those who are on the “bad” list–each of whom is pre-selected (again: see Appendix 1.)  That certain people–including the the author of the present essay–are PRE-ORDAINED for such torment entails that the Creator of the Universe is–quite literally–a psychopath.  Indeed, once we take into account pre-destination, it is almost as if–upon seeing hell being populated–the Koran’s protagonist were GLOATING.

Is Hell, then, just an unfortunate place that non-Muslims wind up…to god’s great disappointment?  No.  On the contrary, he eagerly awaits the punishment of those he condemns.  Passages like 7:179, 11:119, and 38:85 inform us that god actually WANTS to fill hell.  That is, he wants to fill it up as much as possible.  Such an agenda is not exactly indicative of profound mercy.

Is god disappointed at the horrific fate of the condemned…reluctantly letting each of them go?  No.  He CELEBRATES the agony of the damned–eagerly DRIVING them into the blaze (as we’re told in 4:115).  In 2:126, god says that “I will force him to the punishment of the fire.”  In 67:6, god explains that he “PREPARED” hell.  That is: He explicitly designed hell as an “evil destination” for those who have displeased him. {9}

Thus: When it comes to large portions of mankind being damned for all eternity, there is no remorse involved.  There is no reluctance.  There is only vengeance.  This cosmic penal colony is EXPRESSLY DESIGNED to inflict the maximum amount of physical pain in its inmates.  In fact, the Koran’s protagonist is surprisingly open about the fact that he wants to HUMILIATE the condemned.  That he is unapologetically vengeful is revealed by 69:30-32 when he says of the non-Muslim: “Seize him and shackle him, then drive him into Hellfire, then insert him into a chain that is seventy cubits long!”  (Why hell requires long chains is anyone’s guess.)  In 44:47-48, god commands: “Seize him and drag him into the midst of the Hellfire; then pour over his head from the torment of scalding water.” 

On the other hand, 78:24-26 notifies us that the damned will be forced to drink COLD fluid.  Does this mean the swallowing regimen alternates between hot and cold servings?  How does this work?  As if to make things even more confusing, the Hadith posit a counter-point to Jahannam’s hellfire: a horribly frigid pit called “Zamhareer”.

But wait; there’s more.  Those who are sentenced to eternal punishment, we are told, will have “shackles around their necks” and “be dragged into boiling water” and “filled with flames”.  Gadzooks!

As if this weren’t clear enough, the Koran’s protagonist announces that he “will put shackles on the neck of those who disbelieved” (34:33) and “they will be dragged ON THEIR FACES through the fire, and hear [god say], “Taste ye the touch of Hell!” (54:47-48).  All this, of course, occurs while they are forced to “drink boiling water that will sever their intestines” (47:15).

Needless to say, DRAGGING people to hell is hardly a gesture of reluctantly letting them remain separated from you.  But being DRAGGED is–indubitably–what happens to those condemned to perdition. {7}

And, don’t forget: The wife of each man will be forced to carry the firewood to fuel the flames that will burn him…with a rope around her own neck (111:3-5).  On top of all that, he will be forced to choke on food (73:13)…presumably in between the forced guzzling of scalding then freezing liquids. {5}

All this elaborate torture is deliberately conducted by the Abrahamic deity.  CLEARLY, “Jahannam” does not simply mean “separation from the divine”; it explicitly constitutes a venue for inflicting maximal physical pain.  Such lurid descriptions provide us with a comically overwrought picture–a picture of cartoonish morbidity. {12}  It’s enough to make even Edgar Allen Poe wince.

The Koran devotes such a substantial portion of its text to graphic descriptions of this penal colony, it is obviously trying to convey something by “Jahannam” that is vastly different from, say, Taoism’s notion of straying from the Way (i.e. being out of sync with divinity”) or “distance from god” (i.e. being disconnected from the divine; or some other spiritual isolation).  Rather, PHYSICAL anguish is the theme; to be inflicted in the manner of a medieval torture chamber.  Its primary feature: hellfire (variously dubbed “Nar”, “Jaheem”, “Ladthaa”, “Sa’eer”).

As we have seen, the Koran’s protagonist is a king that is hell-bent on being incessantly glorified…and unquestioningly obeyed (with dire penalties in store for subversives).  The key to salvation, then, is to stick to the so-called “straight path” designated by Koranic dictates.

And so it goes: The Koran’s hell is a cosmic penal colony–overseen by “Shaytan” (Satan)–in Islamic theology: “Iblis”, the disobedient angel, fallen from grace.  “Shaytan”, it should be noted, cannot do anything without a go-ahead from the Abrahamic deity (58:10).

In 50:30, god even checks to see if the cosmic penal colony is full yet.  (It’s not?  Well, then keep dragging them down!)  67:8-11 even tells us that the attendants have conversations with the inmates. {10} 

Hell even as a WARDEN.  He is referred to as “Maalik” (presumably, a variation on the Semitic tri-root, “M-L-K”), and oversees the punishment of the inmates.  He reports to either “Iblis” (i.e. “Shaytan” himself) or to the Abrahamic deity (i.e. “Allah”), depending on one’s theological interpretation of the (cosmic) delegation of powers.  Evidently, even hell requires administration.  (The notion of a magistrate in the underworld has a long history.  In Sumerian theology, Eresh-kigal’s attendant is “Namtar”.  In Egyptian theology, the warden is “Anubis”.)

Note: The Old Semitic name for this warden was “Douma” (Aramaic), which was later rendered “Dumah” (Hebraic).  In Judaic lore, the warden of hell is referred to as “Abaddon” (rendered “Apollyon” in Greek).

17:8 describes hell as a dungeon. (A dungeon for whom?  For non-Muslims, of course.)  In 8:50, we are notified that the damned are reprimanded by henchmen (“malaikah”, a variant of the moniker used for the warden; alt. “zabaniyah”)…who hit people in the face and on the back during their conveyance to Jahannam (per 47:27).  Yes, that’s right: In the event that you are condemned to hell, en route, you will be taunted, slapped, and spanked by a posse of angelic goons.  That a bevy of angels is commissioned to mock the damned for being damned is rather callow.  How many are charged with this task?  Nineteen (as specified in 74:26-30).  (Only NINETEEN?  Each must have a tremendously heavy workload!)  The Koran explains that these henchmen take their instructions from god (ref. 40:49, 66:6, and 74:31).

We read about the convicted being shackled and chained, then dragged into the hellfire.   Then we read about how the henchmen tending to hell will yell at the inmates: “Taste the punishment of the burning!” (8:50 and 22:19-22) and “Taste the touch of hellfire!” (54:48).  (Really?  THAT’S what they’ll say?)  And when the inmates plead for reprieve, they will be told, “No!  The hellfire will melt off your skin!” (70:15-16). {10}

This particular collection of passages can be described as either jaw-droppingly sadistic or laughably absurd.  In either case, it is bizarrely sophomoric.  And the cloying dialogue encountered in the Koran is something we might expect in an amateurish script for some tacky, made-for-TV movie.  Many of us have witnessed this kind of bad writing when we watch shoddy sci-fi flicks or bad porn.  In spite of their laughably poor quality, we often enjoy such low-caliber fare.  Yet we are never inclined to actually take such juvenile spectacle seriously.  Alas.

In assaying the litany of disturbingly lurid passages about hell in the Koran, it becomes plain to see that there is a method to the madness.  Such verses are clearly designed to instill fear (nay, terror) in the obsequious (and credulous) reader.  It soon becomes apparent that the Koran’s protagonist has some inexplicable predilection to RETALIATE against a large portion of mankind–as if damnation was his mode of retribution for having been slighted by creatures that himself made.  This is a strange relationship for the Creator of the Universe to have with primates who dwell on the third planet from Sol on the outer reaches of the Milky Way galaxy–a species HE brought into existence.  Would a super-being really be non-plussed by the non-cooperation of his own creation?  This self-inflicted vexation would seem to be a daffy game to play with himself.  One wonders if he was listless…or just lonely.

So the story goes: Homo sapiens are rewarded and punished for being precisely the way god made them.  The justification for this charade employs circular reasoning with a radius of zero.  But no matter: We humans are suckers for lofty notions of a longed-for destiny.  That our fate is written in the stars holds myopic appeal to those who don’t want to bother with the burdens of autonomy.  After all, going to the trouble of thinking for oneself requires cognitive exertion…which often seems more of a hassle than it’s worth.  Mental discipline is not fun.  It’s easier to simply follow orders (or, as the case may be, an instruction manual), and get a prize in the end.

Divine command theory is appealing because it’s straight-forward.  Yet, in the final analysis, piety is no proxy for probity.  And morality in “dunya” does not require us to posit a “akhira”.  Good will needn’t be a means to an end.  Placating an overlord is not an admirable motive; it’s just a RATIONAL motive for those who are convinced there is an overlord in need of placating.

In obeying a master, we are given specious reasons to do “good” when there are universal moral principles available to us.  Resorting to supplication enables us to abide hubris with the pretense of humility; obeisance with the pretense of valiance.  Servility is thereby misconstrued as integrity.

Getting into heaven (and avoiding hell) is ultimately about asking: “What’s in it for ME?”  By adopting this modus operandi, self-interest can masquerade as service.  And–depending on the sacred doctrine being honored–turpitude can operate under the auspices of rectitude.  We can be craven while fashioning ourselves as courageous.

The prospect of gaining admission to a celestial luxury resort (vs. being condemned to a preternatural dungeon) can be riveting.  This false choice reminds us that every human can’t help but operate within some sort of incentive structure.

Therefore, the power to tweak the incentive structure within which people operate translates to a profound ability to control people.  Such machinations are largely a matter of manipulating the interests / perceptions of one’s audience.  Persuade enough people that there is a glorious master to obey, throw in some eye-catching carrots and sticks, and PRESTO: One has a totalitarian regime in the making.

When it comes to our proclivity to invent fantastical after-death destinations, our imaginations often run amok.  For it is a way for us to make sense of THIS world–a consolation for the injustices with which we often contend.  The notion that everyone will get what’s coming to them, that there will be a “settling of accounts”, is tremendously gratifying.  The problem is we often get carried away with these flights of fancy.  (Ernst Becker addressed our penchant for immortality in his classic, “The Denial Of Death”.)  For every case, though, we find that it takes a great deal of mental discipline to disabuse ourselves of the captivating illusions on which we’ve come to depend.

In the end, we might ask: What would a sophisticated conception of hell actually look like?  Sartre had it backwards.  Hell is NO other people.  It is isolation, not camaraderie, that makes life hellish.  Indeed, the worst possible condition for any human-being is complete disconnection from fellow human-beings.

Meanwhile, “heaven” is not a place; it’s something one has with another person.  It is something that one has in THIS–the only–life.  That requires not faith in a deity, but faith in humanity.

One might even say that heaven is the epitome of human connection.  No golden bracelets required.