Hell and Gehenna

The word Gehenna is used by Jesus twelve times in the four Gospels. God’s first response to the belittlement of his name is this Greek word Gehenna, which we would translate “hell.” The interesting thing about the word Gehenna is that it is a reference to a ravine in the south side of Jerusalem where, about a hundred years before Jesus was born, there were these really odd kind of Blair-Witch–like murders going on. The Jews began to view this area as cursed. It basically became a trash heap or a dumping ground for Jerusalem.

When the pile got too big, they just set the whole thing on fire. Can you picture this? The word Gehenna conjures up a very vivid image: a stinking, smoldering place of destruction and neglect. When Jesus uses the word Gehenna, he’s saying, “It’s like this ravine, the valley of Haman; this is what I’m talking to you about.” The image to hold in our mind is putrid and repulsive; it is dead and deadly; it is smoldering when not blazing. It is utterly desolate, spiritually dark, and endlessly oppressive, and it is the established picture even in these extremes of the slightest falling short of God’s glory.