CHAPTER 16
LOCATION: HADES (HELL, TARTARUS, THE ABYSS, & PARADISE)
Another of the primary locations created by God is Hades, which is not a single location but rather has a complex set of four sub-locations or compartments. Let us review the location creations we have noted to this point which are:
1. The original universe without the earth
2. Heaven (simultaneous creation)
3. Earth (original version prepared and created for angels)
4. The Lake of Fire (created after the fall of Satan)
5. The renovated universe and earth (prepared for humans)
And now we come to:
6. Hades (four compartments: two for humans, two for fallen angels)
One of the compartments of Hades is a good place, and the other three are not. Hades is located in middle earth: Isaiah 14: “The realm of the dead below is all astir.” It contains four very different compartments, namely Hell (Torments), Tartarus, the Abyss, and Paradise. Three of the four parts of Hades were created after the renovation of the universe and earth, and one had existed for a long time during the earth's Ice Age. The Old Testament Hebrew calls Hades "Sheol" and they are the same location.
Hades was not created all at the same time. In the order of creations over time, one compartment of Hades actually existed prior to man's occupancy of the earth, and the other three were not originally part of the renovated earth, and were created after man sinned. We will begin with the Tartarus compartment of Hades since it was the first compartment created.
The Tartarus compartment of Hades is for fallen angels and was created by God to house fallen angels who committed crimes while part of the demon armies who battled the elect angels after the fall of Satan. This was while the angelic war was still raging in the universe, when Satan's forces battled the elect angels under the Archangel Michael. Some fallen angels committed violations which required imprisonment, although their actual deeds are not specified. Jude 6 says "And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their proper dwelling—these he has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great Day." Tartarus is located in middle earth under the Euphrates River in Iraq. Revelation 9:14-16 says their numbers are 200 million demons under four demon army commanders. These demons will be released during the Great Tribulation and will kill billions of people on the earth at that time. These are not nice angels.
The other three compartments of Hades were created after the man and woman in the Garden of Eden sinned against God and were evicted to live on the cursed earth, and humans began to multiply. These humans became separated into two categories, namely those who would accept the salvation offer from God, and those who would reject it. Angels have never died physically, so there is no temporary location for dead angels. However, after death humans continue to require a location, since time continues eternally for each soul created. Those humans who rejected the salvation offered during their life required a location apart from God as a place of punishment (Hell), and those human believers who accepted the salvation offer of God required a pleasant place where they could reside temporarily (Paradise). And both of these are temporary locations.
Paradise is the only nice place among the four sections of Hades. Paradise was the temporary abode of those believers who died before the cross and resurrection, since no humans were allowed into heaven before Jesus Christ died for all sins, was resurrected, and ascended to heaven. The first human ever allowed into heaven was therefore Jesus Christ, and all others had to wait. Therefore, until the cross occurred and salvation was a finalized reality no human believer was allowed into heaven, so a temporary location was needed for the believers who died prior to the completion of the salvation plan by the Messiah at the cross. This required a comfortable temporary holding location for those dead believers where they could wait for the Messiah to accomplish His salvation mission. This is why Jesus said to the thief who was crucified next to Him “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:43) Jesus did not tell him he would be with Him in heaven, since Jesus would not ascend to heaven for forty days. Jesus visited the Old Testament believers in Paradise immediately after His death on the cross, and before His resurrection three days later, to tell them the sin issue had been resolved and salvation was now a reality. After Jesus ascended to heaven 40 days after His resurrection, Paradise was emptied and all its residents were finally taken to heaven. Therefore Paradise is currently empty.
But there was at least one visit to Paradise by a human after it was emptied, and possibly two. The Apostle Paul was taken to Paradise after a stoning in the city of Lystra when he temporarily departed his body. This was done so Paul could learn some things which could only be taught to him by angels, so he was taken to Paradise for that purpose since he was going back into his human mortal body soon afterward. Luke recorded the event in Acts 14:19:
“Then some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and won the crowd over. They stoned Paul and dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. 20 But after the disciples had gathered around him, he got up and went back into the city.”
Paul later said in 2 Corinthians 12:4-7
“And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— 4 was caught up to Paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell. 5 I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. 6 Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, 7 or because of these surpassingly great revelations.”
Of course, Paul was talking about himself, and he was referring to the incident when he was stoned in Lystra during his first missionary journey into Asia Minor.
Also, it is possible that the Apostle John was taken to Paradise during the Revelation visions, but that is conjecture without sufficient Biblical validation, so just something to consider as possible. As for John's visions about the Revelation he said “The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John.” [Revelation 1:1] Such angelic revelation to humans during the Church Age have not normally occurred on earth, although they had been done in that way during Old Testament times. But John visiting Paradise for the visions and other extensive information could explain how he received that amount of specific information from angels and also from the Lord Himself in such a visual form. After the Bible was complete, all angelic visitations and direct teaching ceased, since we now have the completed Word of God.
In sharp contrast to the Paradise portion of Hades, another compartment generally called Hell but more precisely called Torments is the temporary abode of all unbelievers until the end of human history when they will all be judged and transferred into the eternal Lake of Fire, which already exists as we have previously discussed. Just as with the Lake of Fire, this is one of the exceptions to God's omnipresence, since He chooses to not be present with those who have rejected Him during their lives, so God rejects these dead unbelievers by excluding His presence.
The Bible provides glimpses of what Hell is like, and by extension what the Lake of Fire will be like. The Lake of Fire is contrasted with the current Hell, which is not as bad as the Lake of Fire. The Bible discusses a request from a man in Hell to Abraham who was still in Paradise at that point (later transferred to heaven) to allow a drop of water to be placed on his tongue. We have a description of Hell (Torments) in Luke 16:19-31:
“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. 20 At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores 21 and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 “The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23 In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24 So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’ 25 “But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’ 27 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, 28 for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ 29 “Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’ 30 “ ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ 31 “He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’ ”
Most of the information people think they know about Hell comes from the writer Dante and his poem “Divine Comedy”. Just to be clear, Divine Comedy is not a book in the Bible. Dante describes 9 levels of Hell based on the degree of sins as defined by the writer. This is fiction in every respect. Neither the current temporary Hell nor the permanent Lake of Fire have levels of punishment. All residents are equally punished for one single reason alone, which is rejection of salvation through faith in Christ for humans, and rejection of God by Satan and fallen angels. The degree of sins is not the issue. Jesus Christ paid for all sins, at least the human ones, so the sin issue has been resolved. They cannot be judged again for sins, even during eternity. It is the rejection of God and His Messiah which is punished.
The current Hell is bad, but the eternal Lake of Fire will be worse. The Beast-Antichrist and False Prophet will be the only residents of the Lake of Fire for the first 1000 years until all unbelievers are judged at the Great White Throne judgment and moved there. And it is interesting to note that these two will be “thrown alive” into the Lake of Fire, which is apparently more torturous.
Caricatures of Satan ruling Hell are also fiction. Satan has never been there, and he does not want to be there or in the Lake of Fire. When he is finally put into his eternal punishment, it will be the Lake of Fire, not Hell, so he will never see the current Hell which is part of Hades. And he will have no special status in the Lake of Fire, let alone be a ruler there. He will be just one more tortured soul in an eternal lowly body since his old one will be taken away. Because angels have the same exact soul as humans, all fallen angels and unsaved humans during the eternal state will be put into the same lowly body, called the body of the “second death,” a body maximized for suffering. They will all suffer equally and without distinction.
The fourth compartment of Hades is another demon prison called the Abyss which is used to imprison fallen angels who have violated the rules of the appeal trial of Satan in egregious ways after the fall of man. It is not the same as Tartarus, which is used as a prison for those fallen angels who committed violations prior to the start of the appeal trial, when the angels battled in the universe. God has rules for Satan's appeal trial, otherwise Satan would simply kill all human believers if he were not restricted. But Satan must operate under strict rules from God, and violations are punished by imprisonment. Currently there are millions of fallen angels in the Abyss which is in middle earth under the ocean.
The Abyss is described in several verses:
2 Peter 2:4: "For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment."
Revelation 9:1 "The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. 2 When he opened the Abyss, smoke rose from it like the smoke from a gigantic furnace. The sun and sky were darkened by the smoke from the Abyss. 3 And out of the smoke locusts [demons] came down on the earth and were given power like that of scorpions of the earth."
These demon prisons provide another glimpse into what Hell might be like. The “fallen star” is Satan (Isaiah 14:12; Ezekiel 28:16) who will be banished to earth during the last part of the Tribulation. First he is thrown down to earth during the Great Tribulation, and he releases the fallen angels from the Abyss where they have been imprisoned for thousands of years. They will create havoc on the earth for over three years, then after the Tribulation ends Satan and all demons will be put into jail in the Abyss for 1000 years during the Millennium. Therefore the Abyss will once again be used as a prison for all fallen angels during the Millennium. Michael the Archangel will put Satan into the Abyss, along with all other fallen angels because of their egregious violations of the rules of the Angelic Conflict which they will commit during the Tribulation. Satan and the fallen angels will not be put into the Lake of Fire yet, but will be removed from the remainder of human history except for one final revolt against God. After the 1000 year Millennium Satan will be released from the Abyss to commit his last act of revolt just before he and all fallen angels are finally put into the Lake of Fire which was prepared for them before man was created (Matthew 25:41).
To summarize Hades, we see that three of the compartments of Hades were created after the fall of man, and one (Tartarus) was created long before, just after Satan's fallen angel armies lost their war with the elect angels, a long time before man ever existed. The other three compartments of Hades (Hell, Paradise, and the Abyss) were created after the fall of man, so they were not part of the renovated universe and earth. Hades was not needed in the universe until there was revolt against God, first by angels, and then by man. Hades has a Paradise section which is now empty, and a Hell section which will continue to remain as the location of human unbelievers until their judgment day, after which they will all be put into the Lake of Fire. Hell and Paradise are only for humans, while Tartarus and the Abyss are for fallen angels. This is also an exception to God's omnipresence, since He chooses to not be present in the Abyss or Tartarus along with the fallen angels who are imprisoned there since they have rejected God during their lives, so God rejects them.
Therefore Hades is the sixth location created by God. As a preview, there are two more locations which will be created in the future, namely:
7. The future eternal universe, including the new earth
8. The future eternal heaven inside the New Jerusalem
Now let’s take a look at the timeline after the fall of man, and how human history has played out in Ages since the time when man was forced out of the Garden of Eden, which was only 6000 years ago. This next chapter will expand on how we know this timeline is accurate, and show that this rather short period of 6000 years since the fall of man is entirely consistent with the rest of the Bible.