Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount spoke some very inspiring words starting in Matthew 5: 2 – 16. He mentions many blessings to those who would seek to live righteously. However, He then goes on to say things that seem disturbing and uncharacteristic as in the section Matthew 5:20 - 31. Also see Mark 9: 43, 45, 47).

For example, He said this about anger:

Matthew 5:22 (KJV) …. but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire (Gehenna fire – in Greek).

Also:

 Matthew 5:29-30 (KJV) And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell (Gehenna in Greek).…. but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire (Gehenna fire – in Greek).

The Figures of Speech

Christ often used literary devices such as parables and figures of speech in order to create a powerful impact on His audience. A figure of speech is a word or phrase that is used in a non-literal way to create an effect. Such is the case with the two verses from Matthew quoted above and there are many others. The figure of speech He used is a hyperbole. Web sites explaining hyperbole:

https://literarydevices.net/hyperbole/
https://www.gotquestions.org/hyperbole-in-the-Bible.html

Hyperbole is a literary device that creates heightened effect through deliberate exaggeration. Hyperbole is often a boldly overstated or exaggerated claim or statement that adds emphasis without the intention of being literally true. Hyperbole is an extreme exaggeration, usually employed for the sake of emphasis.

As with any figure of speech, hyperbole needs to be recognized for what it is so that we do not take it literally. A useful rhetorical device, hyperbole increases the intensity of the Bible’s warnings, aids our understanding, and adds fascinating complexity to an already rich text.

The Lord is not literally advising anyone to amputate hands or pluck out eyeballs; He is using hyperbole to stress the importance of avoiding sin. Jesus would never ask someone to actually blinded himself or cut off a limb, but the hyperbole makes the point well: we should not tolerate sin in our lives, and take whatever aggressive action we need to in order to stop sinning.

Valley of Hinnom - Gehenna

The frequent references Christ makes to hell (Gehenna in Greek) has nothing to do with the mythical hell fire where evil people spend eternity suffering excruciating pain. His reference is to the Gehenna mentioned in the Old Testament and to the one which will exist in the Millennial Kingdom. Christ was fully aware that the Israelites at that time understood what Gehenna represented. In the Scriptures “Gehenna” does not speak of “the place of the eternal torments of the damned.” Instead, it refers to an actual place on earth, namely, the valley (or “ravine”) of Hinnom (Nehemiah 11:30) in the land of Israel. The ravine of Hinnom is a valley to the southwest of Jerusalem (“the ravine of the son of Hinnom”; Joshua 15:8). The Hebrew phrase gê (“ravine of”) hinnom became geenna in Greek, whence Gehenna in Latin and English.

The reference by Jesus to Gehenna was addressed only to the nation of Israel in His day. When Jesus spoke the words about Gehenna again, in Mark 9: 42 to 48 He also said “Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched” (verses 44 and 48). This is the only place in the New Testament that this phrase is found. This shows that the Gehenna that Christ spoke about was literal. Christ refers to the verse in Isaiah 66 which mentions the worm and fire:

Isa 66:23 (KJV) And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD. 24 And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.

This verse in Isaiah 66 does not specifically mention Gehenna although that is easily inferred. Earlier in this article we saw that Gehenna never meant an ever-burning hell fire. Gehenna, the word, used in the New Testament, is rooted in an Old Testament location. It is generally regarded as derived from a valley nearby Jerusalem that originally belonged to a man named Hinnom. Scholars say the word is a transliteration of the Valley of the Sons of Hinnom, a valley that had a long history in the Old Testament, all of it bad. Into it they cast not only all manner of refuse, but even the dead bodies of animals and of unburied criminals who had been executed. And since fires were always needed to consume these dead bodies, that the air might not become tainted by the putrefaction, it came to pass that the place was called Gehenna. The literal Gehenna has long since vanished. The worms are dead and gone and the fire no longer burns.

So the words of Jesus concerning Gehenna were spiritual and not literal. In the Millennium the Valley of Hinnom will again exist into which criminals and evil doers will be cast into.

Gehenna is not the fabled ever-burning hell. It is not torture in literal fire for evil doers. The word should never have been translated “hell,” for as we saw, the two words have nothing in common. The literal Gehenna (Valley of Hinnom) of the Old Testament has long since disappeared

All the passages spoken by Jesus are clear and comprehensible, when applied solely to Israel in connection with the Millennial kingdom. Promised alone to the nation of Isael, however they raise endless and unsolvable problems as soon as we apply them to all men through the years and to matters outside the sphere of the nation of Israel.

Jesus Himself, was very definite about the fact that He was sent to Israel only:

Matthew 15:24 (KJV) But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

He even forbade His seventy disciples to go to others than their own people. Paul says of Him, that He had been a "servant of the Circumcision." Not before Calvary was this revoked. Only after Israel's rejection were God's plans concerning all mankind made known. See my web site

https://www.gospelfortoday.bibleanalytics.ca

Who would think of forcing Christians today to be circumcised? To introduce the Mosaic sacrifices and rituals into our modern churches? We should recognize what belongs exclusively to the old covenant people. Yet we fail to draw the boundary line at the point when Israel was rejected and Paul commissioned to minister to the nations. We mistakenly appropriate to ourselves what Jesus Himself carefully limited to Israel- alone.

One who has realized that, in interpreting Scripture, it is most important not to apply everything to everybody without distinction, will receive a Bible full of light and consistent teaching instead of untenable notions that condemn themselves.

Christ came to the nation of Israel and no one else. It was in the land of Judea where He walked and talked before being sacrificed for all mankind. Can we not see how completely He limited Himself to Israel when on earth from the fact that even His disciples never thought He might also have come for the other masses of mankind? Not even after Jesus had instructed them for forty days concerning the kingdom did Peter know anything about His plans for none Israelites. He had to have the vision of the unclean beasts in the sheet, given by the resurrected Christ from heaven, before he could grasp this further truth.

Some bible scholars deduce the Lord’s sayings as literal not recognizing them as figurative. They connect them with ideas He never had in His mind and which no apostle could have connected with them. Salvation, damnation, heaven and hell, being born again all these have become to many Christians mental conceptions which they believe to be solidly anchored in the Bible, yet which they nevertheless sadly misunderstand, forgetting to whom (only Israel) and in what connection (the coming Kingdom) these things were spoken.

There are people today who, under the weight of evidence, have come to understand that "eternal" in most modern versions of the Bible does not mean endless, but who, in spite of this, insist on the endlessness of suffering in hell, because the Lord said:

"Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." With this quotation they think they can still prove '' eternal fire.'' As this seems to be the only argument left to them, it is worth while to demonstrate how untenable it is.

When our Lord came to this earth, this did not alter anything at first concerning the state of the vast mass of mankind and their standing before God. All were and remained what they had become in Adam, mortals on their way to death. It was just as God had told their first parents. Never did Jesus diverge from that. Never did He make death in Adam to mean life in unending torment. He was the great, glorious expectation of all Hebrew prophecy. And in order to understand His words correctly we must also understand what the prophets of old were inspired to write. What did they set before the longing eyes of the people? Was it bliss in "heaven" after death (NO!), or was it a renewed earth, in which the Anointed One of God would rule in righteousness in His Millennial Kingdom (YES)?

We know that the message of the salvation of the nations was not proclaimed till after Israel was rejected, we know that it could not be proclaimed before the death and resurrection of Christ, we should also know that it will never do to sever vital parts of the kingdom message from where they belong and force them into the message of the cross, with which they can never harmonize organically. See the web site https://www.gospelfortoday.bibleanalytics.ca.

The majority of Jews proved themselves incapable of attaining the righteousness of God, when their Messiah came for the first time. As a result, they were cast off, lost their home and their temple, became a curse among all the nations and will remain under God's judgment until Christ comes for the second time, when all Israel shall be saved (Rom. 11:26).

Many Christian teachers have twisted scripture until it means: "Whosoever is not born again will be lost for all eternity.'' What distortion of the Lord's words! No wonder they create such overwhelming confusion.

And what the Lord will do at the end of this and of the next eon cannot in any way alter His determination to become All in all (salvation of all mankind), when even the rule of the Son comes to an end, because it has accomplished its purpose (1 Cor. 15:25-28). May this passage speak for itself. It does not contradict the worm and the fire, as so many imagine. The worm and the fire will not survive the rule of the Son. The prophets of old emphasized the length, the constancy and the unshakable nature of His Millennial kingdom. Therefore, to most Christians it therefore seems certain that the kingdom will be unending. That is not correct.

And yet Paul tells us that it will have an end. Not one of the Old Testament prophets foresaw this. It was also not part of Christ's commission to disclose this when He was on earth. Because Jesus, as "Servant of the Circumcision" never went beyond the scope of what had already been revealed to His earthly people (Israel), either in plain language or in shadow and symbol, we could never understand Him, if He, as the first one, had stood up with such an awful, revolutionary message, changing the entire outlook, as the doctrine of "eternal hell" does. Fire and worm in the vale of Gehenna were familiar and clear to His hearers.

Today we are to preach the death and resurrection and not the coming Millennial kingdom, neither its blessings nor its judgments. The cross is a stumbling block to the Jew, not the fulfillment of his highest hopes. It does away with all his people's prerogatives. It is the great symbol of his rejection. Therefore, not one of the twelve Apostles was able to preach it. That was entrusted to Paul alone and to those connected with him. Do not confuse the cross with Christ's sacrificial death. His death as the fulfillment of the entire Jewish ritual was also preached by the others. It brought about a shelter from sin, as the blood of the beasts foreshadowed. It protected from divine indignation.

In the kingdom the privileges of the covenant people are still valid. After the Millenium in the new creation these are all abolished, and therefore are today already abolished for all living in spirit in this new order. It is this significance of the cross which the twelve could not grasp. This was entrusted to Paul only.

Those in Israel who rightly understood God and His word, knew that it was His plan to bless all mankind in Messiah's kingdom. But beyond this none could yet see. The idea that blessing for the nations was possible on the ground of Israel's rejection of Messiah and the consequent rejection of the kingdom people (Israel), was one that nobody could have grasped. Paul alone learned it through the exalted Lord. This is the foundation of his message of the cross. And now Paul's view is still further enlarged. He may behold what no one else saw before him. Not only does he see the entire earth blessed and saved, but all reconciled whom God created—even the principalities and powers of the heavens (Col. 1:20). So great is the power of the accomplishment of God through Christ!

Not on earth did Jesus speak the last word concerning hell and heaven. For this, the highest unveiling, Paul was snatched away into paradise. Let us leave to the earth what belongs to it and let us thank God that we may look up to our Lord, exalted over all the universe, to Him who sent us a message out of His glory, concerning the consummation of His ways: God All in all (1 Corinthians 15:28).

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