nearly equally by the Teutonic and Latin races, should itself bear a Teutonic name, whose Latinized form bears indisputable witness to the Teutonic conquest of the oldest seat of the Latin race in Italy.Contemporary Review. THE HEBREW HELL. BY JAMES MEW. ISAAC BARROW, in his Sermons on the Creed, speaking of the clause "He descended into hell," asks the following questions: "Is hell a state of being, or a place? if a place, is it that where bodies are reposed, or that to which souls go? if a place of souls, is it the place of good and happy souls, or bad and miserable ones; or indifferently and in common of both these for such a manifold ambiguity these words have, or are made to have; and each of these senses are (is) embraced and contended for. It is proposed in the present paper to attempt a solution of these questions, and others of a similar kind about the condition of hell, its names, its locality, its creation, its final cause, its extent, its rulers, its victims, its tortures, and its duration, from a Rabbinical point of view. The soul of man, when separated from the body, seems to have been to the earliest imaginations a weak and flaccid thing, seeking for itself some place of rest and security, to compensate for that earthly home of which it has been deprived. Its local habitation was probably at first supposed to be the grave, after ward some vast unseen territory, and ultimately, in the case of the bad soul, a place of punishment. These three different senses have all been included under the Hebrew term for hell in the Old Testa ment. It seems probable that the early Hebrews had no idea of hell in our modern sense of a place of punishment. Until the majestic solitude and original simplicity of Hebrew theology was tainted by the adulterations of an alien belief, Sheol, or hell, was for them the one place whither all go, where the dead are which know not anything, where man hath no pre-eminence over a beast, where one lieth down and riseth not again - the silent dark, into which none that go down can praise God. There was the home of that feeble congregation of shadows, the in 66 66 habitants of the land of stillness. There they rested like hybernating buds or beasts, to which no summer may ever come again. There, in fine, was peace. Why," asked the ghost of Samuel of Saul, why hast thou disquieted me to bring me up?" That was its first ques. tion, as if the fittering spirit resented a return to the upper world from that haven of repose where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest. The belief in a place of punishment hereafter seems to have arisen from a reflection in the minds of the crudely philosophical on the prosperity of the wicked. A certain sense of poetic justice and of ultimate compensation introduced probably the doctrine of a penal hell. And much discussion has arisen about the question whether the Jews borrow their hell from the Greeks or from the Persians after the Babylonish captivity. There seems, however, no sufficient reason why they should have been indebted for their ideas on this subject to either. When Job and the authors of some of the Psalms consoled themselves by the reflection that the triumph of the wicked was short, that they would fly away ultimately as a dream and perish forever, that though they spread themselves like green bay trees (trees indigenous to the soil in which they grew), and sprang and flourished like grass, yet it was to this end only, that they should be forever destroyed, they set out on the line which leads to the terminus of an avenging hell. The word hell has been used in the A.V. as a translation of the Hebrew word Sheol. The LXX render the word Hades sixty-one out of sixty-five times in which it occurs. In the A. V. in about half that number of times it is translated hell. This translation is unfortunate, because the common meaning of hell is a place of punishment. The R. V. has, therefore, in many passages left the original Sheol, or substituted another rendering. For 66 66 instance, in 2 Sam. xxii. 6, "cords of Sheol" is substituted for sorrows of hell." Two derivations have been suggested for the word Sheol, from two Hebrew roots, the one signifying to ask," the other" to be hollow." The former is supported by the passage in Proverbs concerning the four things that are never satisfied the grave-the Orcus rapax of Catullus-is continually asking (Prov. xxx. 15); or by the idea that those in Sheol are under the "question," in the sense in which it is used by Ayliffe, of rack or torture; or by the fact that the state after death is the subject of universal inquiry -the thing about which all men are inquisitive. The latter derivation, which Gesenius seems to regard with favor, speaking of other etymological conjectures as hardly worth a mention, is supported by one of its admirers as connected with the German holle hohl (hollow), and Höhle a cavity, from which Hölle or hell is, according to this scholar, derived. But hell is perhaps better understood etymologically as a covered place, locus visibus nostris subtractus, as Grotius calls it, the unseen, the Greek Hades. Ihre rejects both these conceptions in his derivation of the old Scandinavian hæl, since he says the notion of death preceded that of hell, and the first of mankind wanted probably a word for death before they wanted a word for the realm of Pluto or the domiciles of the dead. Sheol, as interpreted by biblical science rather than polemical theology, is, we learn from various passages in the Old Testament, correspondent in several respects to the hell of Homer. It is underground, in the land beneath; it is deep, it is dark. Poetry gives it gates and bars, "the gates of the grave" (Is. xxxviii. 10); "the bars of the pit" (Job xvii. 16). Metaphor provides it with valleys. It is cruel as jealousy (Cant. viii. 6). It is insatiable as the barren womb, the earth, and the fire, opening its mouth without measure and swallowing down all the pomp, and pleasure, and bravery, and glory and gallantry of the world. It is the evening land where all things are forgotten; the place of darkness and in activity and sorrow, where there is no work nor device nor knowledge. It is the abode of the Rephaim (curiously translated in Prov. xxi. 16, "the synagogue of giants," by the LXX), of the congregation of the shadows of the dead, of all the trees of Eden, of the choice and best of Lebanon, of Asshur and of Elam, of Tubal and Meshech, of Pharaoh, of the Zidonians, and of Edom (Ezek. xxxii.) ; it is the abode of the good as well as of the wicked; it is the grave in the widest sense of the word, a state of being rather than a place, no receptacle of wood or stone, in earth or sea; it is almost commensurate with death, or rather the permansion in death. Persons cremated or eaten by tigers may be said to be in Sheol. Jacob said, 'I will go down into Shel unto my son mourning, but an evil beast hath devoured him. Sheol is also understood by some philosophical Jews to mean hiyuli harishon, or van, or materia prima, which in the language of the law, says R. Bechai, is called Tohu. A discussion of this signification would lead the reader too far away from the subject of the present paper. It is for this reason that no notice has been taken of the varied esoteric meanings of the strange Rabbinic stories which will be found in the following pages, though they have the liveliest interest for those who care to study them. These inquirers are, however, comparatively few. Maimonides hardly thought of the ordinary public when, in his "Teacher of the Perplexed," he told his disciples to number themselves among "those who are anxious to unriddle the enigmas of prophecy, to awake from oblivion's sleep, to escape from the sea of silliness, and to rise to the realms of supernal truth." But though few have labored to unriddle, many have rejoiced to revile these fanciful allegories of the learned Rabbis, these figurative lessons of Haggadic or homiletic exegesis in their literal sense, and to laugh to scorn the extravagances which are the outcome of their own system of interpretation. They read, for instance, how R. Benjamin, owing to the multiplicity of demons-those millions of errant, unseen, spiritual creatures in whom Milton seems to have believed-advised his pupils to be cautious how they opened their eyes, lest devils might enter between the lids, and then cry aloud with the excellent Wagenseil, "Ŏ was für ein scharffer Rabbinischer Verstand lässet sich hier wieder sehen," and ask, are these of the oracles which Saul of Tarsus allowed to be the pre-eminent privilege and advantage 66 (Rom. iii. 2) of the sons of Israel? They read the well-known Midrash of the precious stone of healing which was transferred from Abraham's neck to the surface of the solar star, and regard it as an actual occurrence rather than a symbolic vision. And they read the fable of the trees trembling at the creation of iron, and of the reply of the iron, "I cannot hurt you, unless yourselves give me a handle," without apprehending or caring to apprehend its moral or secondary meaning, of the danger likely to arise to Israel from internal disintegration. 66 ders of the tribe of Judah-was, says Rabbi David Kimchi, or Radak, as, he is commonly called, from the first letters of his name, a place in the land lying near Jerusalem, and the place was contemptible, and people cast there their carcases and pollutions, and there was there a fire perpetually to burn their pollutions and their bones (2 Kings xxiii. 10). Therefore, by way of simile, says Radak, the place of judgment of the wicked was called Gehin nom. Elias Levita in his celebrated "Tishbi" says the Rabbis called the place of the punishment of the wicked The names of hell in Hebrew are, ac- after their death Gehinnom, because the cording to a Rabbinic commentator, seven. valley of the son of Hinnom, lying near It is called Abaddon or Destruction, ac- Jerusalem, was a place befouled, where cording to Joshua ben Levi, in the pas- children were burnt in honor of Molech. sageShall thy loving kindness be de- The children, says R. David de Pomis in clared in the grave? or thy faithfulness in his "Tsemach David," were burnt in one destruction?" (Ps. lxxxviii. 11). Tsal- of the chancels called in Jeremiah vii. 31 maveth, or the Shadow of Death, in the "high places" of Topheth. A de"such as sit in darkness and in the shadow scription of the idol and of the process of of death" (Ps. cvii. 10). Sheol in the burning is given in Yalkut, a collection of commencement of the lamentation of the Midrashiin. It is taken from the particuprophet Jonah, when he says, "Out of lar and well-known Midrash of Tanchuma the belly of hell (Sheol) cried I" (Jonah or Yelammedenu. The houses of idols, ii. 2). Shachath or Bir Shachath, cor- says the Rabbinic exegetist, were generruption or the well of corruption, in ally within Jerusalem; that, however, of "neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one Molech was outside of it. This idol had to see corruption" (Ps. xvi. 10). Bor seven chancels. Its face was that of a Shaon, the cistern of sound, that is, the calf. Its hands were stretched out, as sound of the echoes in its hollow vastness, those of a man who stretches out his in "He brought me up also out of an hands to receive somewhat from his comhorrible pit" (Ps. xl. 3). These last two panion. They kindled fire within it, for words, having the marginal annotation it was perforated and hollow, and every Heb. a pit of tumult, are interpreted “a man came in after the value of his offering cistern of sound" by Joshua ben Levi. or Korban. He who came in with a fowl Tit Hayyaven, or mire of clay, as in the entered the first chancel, he who came in continuation of the preceding passage, with a sheep entered the second, with a "out of the miry clay," and Eretz lamb the third, with a calf the fourth, tachtith, the lower land, or the "nether with a heifer the fifth, with an ox the parts of the earth'' (Ezek. xxxi. 18). To sixth, but he who came in with his own these may be added Topheth, Emek hab- begotten child, him they caused to enter bacha, the valley of weeping, or Bacha, or the seventh. He entered, and kissed the balsam, or mulberry, (Ps. lxxxiv. 7), and idol. This serves to explain the passage Alukah, the horse-leech or the vampire in Hosea xiii. 2: "Let the sacrificers of (Prov. xxx. 15). men kiss the calves." Then the child was set before Molech, and the father kindled the fire within the idol till its hands were red like flame, and took the suckling and set it within its hands; what time the priests beat drums and smote them with a mighty sound, so that the voice of the young one might not come forth and his father hear it, and his bowels yearn upon his son. The passage concludes with an etymology. The place All these names seem to indicate hell in its primary sense of Hades-the covered or unseen world-not hell in its popular intendment of a place of torment. The common Hebrew word for hell in this latter signification is Gehinnom. Gehinnom, the valley of Hinnom, or Ge ben-Hinnom, the valley of the son of Hinnom-for it bears both these names in Joshua, who mentions it in his description of the bor 66 was called Ben Hinnom because of the roaring of the child from the force of the fire, or because the bystanders cried out "May it profit thee," that is, "May it be sweet to thee, and season thy food." The Hebrew words for "roaring" and profit" bear some resemblance to Hinnom. Rabbi Shelomoh ben Yitschak, the celebrated Rashi, tells us that the idol was made of brass, and that Topheth was so called from Toph, the Hebrew for a drum. The form of the word, however, betrays a foreign origin. It may be Assyrio-Persian, and derived from taftan, to burn. The derivation from the Chaldee obsolete tuph, "to spit," is rendered unlikely by the fact that the place was so called by the devotees of Molech themselves. The Chaldee interpreter of Isaiah xxx. 33 explains Topheth or Tophteh by Gehinnom, and it is certain that it is one of the later names of hell. The Cabalists (or more exactly Kabbalists) conceive that there are two hells, or two kinds of Gehinnom, the upper and the lower, one for the body in this world, another for the soul in the world to come hereafter, wherein it will be entirely purged; and the place comprehending these is called Arka, and therein are seven lodges of agony for the damned, namely, Gehinnom, and the Gates of Death, and the Shadow of Death, and the Pit of Corruption, and the Mire of Clay, and Abaddon, and Sheol. So wrote Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla in his "Garden of the Nut," the chef d'œuvre of Cabalistic theology. The punishments in these lodges are carefully graduated according to the guilt of the sinners. The lodges are set one under the other, and as the lodges differ, so also the fires differ. Ordinary fire is one-sixtieth (in the Muslim hell it is one-seventieth) of the heat of the fire of Gehinnom, which is one-sixtieth of the heat of the fire of the Gates of Death; the fire of the Gates of Death is one-sixtieth of the heat of the fire of the Shadow of Death, and so on till Abaddon, which is one-sixtieth of the heat of the fire of Sheol; and these, says Joseph ben Abraham, are matters which no man can demonstrate to be false. The light sinner will be judged with light fire, and the heavy sinner with heavy fire, and the punishment will be according to the guilt, and of this there is no doubt. For instance, the lodge of Absalom is the second lodge; that of Korah, the third; that of Jeroboam, the fourth; that of Ahab, the fifth; and that of Micah, the sixth. The guilt of him who sows a vineyard with divers seeds, or wears a garment of divers sorts, though a heavy guilt, is not as the guilt of him who slays a man, or profanes the Sabbath with intention, or worships idols. The hell above corresponds in its lodges, and in every other respect, with the hell below, but the soul is afflicted with a more subtle fire. After the separation of the soul from the body, the body eats its corporeal fruits in the corporeal world, the soul eats its intellectual fruits in the intellectual world which is to come. So far the exponent of the Cabala, Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla. The Rabbis add that the upper hell is for the sinners of Israel who have transgressed the commandments of the law, and have not repented. The lower hell is for the uncircumcised, the unbelievers, the Sabbathbreakers. Maimonides, in his Law of Man (folio 97), gives a somewhat different account of these lodges. According to him, there are in every lodge ten peoples of the seventy into which the Gentile world is divided. Absalom is in the first, Doeg in the second, Korah and his company in the third, Jeroboam in the fourth, Ahab in the fifth, Micah in the sixth, and Elisha, son of Abuya, in the seventh. R. Joshua ben Levi says that these are not struck or burnt as the others, because they are of God's dear ones, who said on Sinai, will do and be obedient" (Ex. xxiv. 7) This Rabbi measured the lodges and found them all equal-one hundred miles long and fifty broad, with very many pits and lions of fire therein. Nineteen angels pre "We side, says the Koran, over hell. Here we find that in every lodge is an angel; in that of Absalom is Kushiel; in the others, Lahatiel, Shaftiel, Maccathiel, Chutriel, Pasiel, and Dalkiel in order. These avengers beat the sinners with rods of fire, and then cast them into one of the pits, where the lions devour them, after which they rise again, are again beaten, and cast into another pit. The repetition of punishment is shown in Ps. ix. 18, where the words are not go down" but "shall be turned." This takes place seven times a day and three times in the night, and no one of the sufferers sees his fellow, because of the darkness, for all the darkness which was before the creation of the world is there. The seven palaces or lodges of hell correspond with the seven appellations of the Yetser Hara, which is called by God, Gen. viii. 21, the evil imagination; by Moses, Deut., x. 6, the uncircumcised; by David, Ps. li. 10, the unclean; by Solomon, Prov. xxv. 21, the enemy; by Isaiah, lvii. 14, the stumbling-block; by Ezekiel, xi. 19, the stone and by Joel, i. 20, the northern or midnight wind. We learn from other authorities that every lodge is a journey of 300 years in depth, and that all the seven angels are under the control of Duma, of whom it is said that he was formerly of the gods of Egypt, but afterward became the angel of silence or of death, and the supreme prince of hell. Every angel has thousands and tens of thousands of assistants; and two scribes are continually busied in allotting to every one of the damned his proper position. None of the damned shall know his own name, but there will be more praise of God in hell than in heaven, because every one who is in a lodge above his fellow will praise God for his preferment. We are also toid that in every one of the lodges are 7,000 holes, in every hole 7,000 fissures, in every fissure 7,000 scorpions, in every scorpion seven articula. tions, and in every articulation 1,000 casks of gall. Besides this there are in every lodge seven floods of deadly poison, the which, if a man do but touch it, he shall burst atwain. Sinners are punished immediately after their death. The mode of punishment is chiefly by intense heat and intense cold. The cold is derived from a paraphrase of Jonathan ben Aziel in Job xxviii. 5, which he explains, "under it is Gehinnom, which for the cold of its snow is converted into fire." Some say, in every lodge of hell there are seven floods of fire and seven of hail. This may serve to throw a light on the gnashing of teeth in the outer darkness of the Evangelist, which seems less appropriately considered the result of heat than of cold. The wicked spring from the hail into the fire, and from the fire into the hail, and Duma drives them as a shepherd drives his sheep, from mountain to hill, and from hill to mountain. So Ps. xlix. 14, "like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed (on) them." Another account says that the wicked remain for half the year in fire, and then for half the year in hail and snow; and the cold, it is added, is a greater torture than the heat. The alternation of heat and cold, of fire and ice, is familiar to the student of Milton and of Shakespeare. It is Claudio, who fears for his delighted spirit in Measure for Measure" To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice. With regard to the fire, not the place, of hell, opinions differ as to the time of its creation. Some say it was formed on the eve of the Sabbath, others on the second day, as Maimonides in his Law of Man (folio 97), "on the second day God created the firmament and the angels, and the fire of flesh and blood, and the fire of hell," for which reason it is not said of the work of that day, as of the work of the remaining days, that God saw that it was good. Others again hold it to have been prepared as a warning, before sin existed, with the creation of the world. Ordinary fire was created by the Deity on the going out of the Sabbath. R. Josi says two things occurred to God to be created on the coming in of the Sabbath, but they were not created till its going out. Knowledge was created for Adam, like that above, and God took two stones and struck them one on the other, and produced fire. It was on this night, they add, that Adam was dismissed from Paradise. The elemental fire differs from the fire of hell. As the Sabbath is but a sixtieth part of heaven, so our fire is but a sixtieth of the fire of hell. It is dark. No light, but rather darkness visible, says Milton, borrowing his idea perhaps from the Talmudists. A land "where the light is as darkness," says Job, x. 22, referring probably to the grave, but according to some Hebrew commentators, to hell. The children of the kingdom, says Matthew (viii. 12), shall be cast out into outer darkness-perhaps contrasting the infernal gloom with the inner darkness of the mind. And the three days' darkness of the Egyptians is explained in Wisdom xvii. 14, as an intolerable night which came upon them out of the bottoms of inevitable hell. The fire of hell, moreover, is extremely fine, not properly corporeal, receiving increment from things and devouring them. The force of this fire was |