Hi all,
First, I ask that you receive what I have to say with grace and mercy because I know I am not a perfect person and I am in no way trying to tell others what and what not to believe... this is simply something I am struggling with at the present time.
I am becoming sceptical of English Bible translations. I believe firmly that God's Word is infallible, however, I don't believe translations are infallible. I've never studied the Bible in its original language and now I'm starting to wonder if translations could be leading us away from the original intended meaning of scripture.
I came across a book written by someone who, after studying parts of the Bible in Hebrew, came to the belief that hell will not be eternal. He brought up a lot of points on this, and one was the idea that some Hebrew words have been wrongly translated in English (he reckoned that in some places where the English word "eternal" has been used, the original Hebrew word actually meant a measurable amount of time).
Now I haven't decided whether I believe this or not, but I have come to a place where I am questioning what is right. I believe in God and Jesus and I love Him very much, but I am worried that I am being mislead by "mainstream" Christianity. The early churches did not preach the idea of an eternal hell - and my pastor at church even confirmed this when I asked him about it.
Has anyone else struggled with this kind of thing before? Do you think it's worth buying a Hebrew concordance?
Again I wish to stress that I'm not trying to blaspheme or anything, I am just searching to find what is right and good in a world that is just so confusing with all its different ideas and interpretations of things..
To be able to understand the Bible, a person needs a Bible that is accurately translated. An inaccurate Bible (in this case in English) is like having a map that is distorted, street names that are not correct and as result, when used in traveling a person finds themselves in a wrong location. Or it is like having an inaccurate measuring tape, so that when building a home, nothing is square and doors will not shut properly.
For example, the
King James Bible, though authorized by King James I of England in 1604 C.E., has many inaccuracies and inconsistencies. Even though there are now available over 13,000 papyrus and vellum manuscripts for comparative study, dating from the 2nd to the 16th century, containing the whole or a part of the Christian Greek Scriptures (commonly called the "New Testament"), little has changed with regard to the inaccuracy and inconsistencies of the
King James Bible.
With regard to the Hebrew word
sheol, the
King James Bible has rendered it as “hell” 31 times, as “grave” 31 times and as “pit” 3 times. Due to the way people have understood the word “hell”, as a place of fiery torment,
Collier’s Encyclopedia (1986, Vol. 12, p. 28) said concerning “Hell”: “First it stands for the Hebrew Sheol of the Old Testament and the Greek Hades of the Septuagint and New Testament. Since Sheol in Old Testament times referred simply to the
abode of the dead and suggested no moral distinctions, the word ‘hell,’ as understood today, is
not a happy translation.”
The Greek equivalent of the Hebrew
sheol is
hades.(Ps 16:10, Acts 2:31) And the
King James Bible has rendered hades as “hell” 10 times. In fact, it has used the English word “hell” when even the Greek word
Gehenna was spoken by Jesus as at Matthew 10:28 and Luke 12:5.(
New World Translation) Two different Greek words does not mean the same thing, such as blue does not mean green, and especially when given a wrong connotation as the English word “hell” has become in the minds of so many. Few, including religious leaders and Bible translators, have done their “homework” in analyzing the real meanings of various Hebrew and Greek words, and as a result, dispenses that which, in many cases, is not true.
For instance, the Greek word
Raca, at Matthew 5:22. It is left untranslated by many Bibles because of not knowing it’s meaning, though now it is understood, as “an unspeakable word of contempt.”(
New World Translation) Within this scripture, the
King James Bible also renders the Greek word
Gehenna as “hellfire”, again fomenting the false religious doctrine that there is a “hellfire” or “hell”. This leaves the reader to erroneously conclude that there is an everlasting fiery place of torment. Rather than "putting their ducks in a row" and digging for the real meaning of
sheol or
hades as mankind's common grave, with all there being resurrected from the dead (Rev 20:13) and
Gehenna, the "second death"(Rev 20:14), and where no one ever receives a resurrection, many have continued to believe the false doctrine of eternal torment.
At Ecclesiastes 9:5, Solomon wrote that "the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are
conscious of nothing at all, neither do they anymore have wages, because the remembrance of them has been forgotten." Those who who are alive are well aware that they will die, but the dead "are conscious of nothing at all", not able to be tormented. Furthermore, at Psalms 115:17 says that "the dead themselves do not praise Jah, nor any going down into silence." Hence, the dead are ' silent,' unable to be tormented.
