(gr., geenna, transcription of the aramaic form of the heb. gebenhinnom, valley of the son of Hinnom). The valley of the son of Hinnom, a valley west and southwest of Jerusalem that formed part of the border between Judah and Benjamin (Jos 15:8; compare Jos 18:16; Neh 11:30-31). It was here that Ahaz (2Ki 16:3; 2Ch 28:3) and Manasseh (2Ki 21:6; 2Ch 33:6) sacrificed their sons to Molech (Jer 32:35; compare Jer 7:31-32; Jer 19: 1-13). It was for this reason that Josiah desecrated the place (2Ki 23:10).
After OT times, Jewish apocalyptic writers began calling the Valley of Hinnom the entrance to hell and then hell itself. The NT makes a clear distinction between Hades, the intermediate disembodied state, and Gehenna, the state of final judgment after the resurrection of the body. Gehenna existed before judgment (Mat 25:41). The word is used 12 times in the NT (11 times by Jesus), translated by hell or the like. The par terms. to Gehenna include furnace of fire (Mat 13:42, Mat 13:50), lake of fire (Rev 19:20; Rev 20:14-15), lake of fire and brimstone (Rev 20:10), everlasting fire ( Jude 1:7) and hell (2Pe 2:4). Jesus’ use of it warns us of the fate that even God’s love does not remove from those who reject his forgiveness.
Source: Hispanic World Bible Dictionary
See ETERNAL PUNISHMENT and SEOL.
Source: New Illustrated Bible Dictionary
Place where sinners are punished, according to the 11 times it appears in the Synoptics (7 in Mt; 5. 22, 29 and 30; 10. 28; 18. 9; 23. 15 and 33; 3 in Mk. 9. 43, 45 and 47, and 1 in Lk 12.5) and the one in Sant. 3. 6. It has a sense of punishment by fire, it causes fear and must be avoided by the practice of good.
It is probably an abbreviated symbolic name (Gehinnon, Hinnon valley) and in Greek “gehenna” and is parallel to the others that allude to the afterlife: abyss or tartar (divers or abysses) that appears 10 times and you do (hades) or hell, which appears another 11 times.
The concept alluded to a valley near Jerusalem, converted into a garbage dump, due to the cult that was given to Molok there (2 Kings 10. 3) and his subsequent extermination (2 Kings 23. 10). But it was popularly identified with the place where the reprobate would go to suffer at the time of death.
In the Jewish tradition it was later considered as a place of punishment, especially since the second century when the theology was formulated after the destruction of Palestine. And from the Jewish spheres it passed to the Christians, who were moving away from the Jewish Gehenna to suspect another place or state of torment for sinners who died without repentance.
Pedro Chico González, Dictionary of Catechesis and Religious Pedagogy, Editorial Bruño, Lima, Peru 2006
Source: Dictionary of Catechesis and Religious Pedagogy
(Gr. form of Heb. Geh Hin·nom, “Valley of Hinnom”).
This name appears twelve times in the Christian Greek Scriptures, and although many translators take the liberty of rendering it “hell,” most modern translations tend to transliterate the Greek term ge en na. (Mt 5:22.)
The narrow and deep valley of Hinnom, later known by this Greek name, is situated to the S. and SW. of Jerusalem, and at the moment receives the name of Wadi er-Rababi (Ge Ben Hinnom). (Jos 15:8; 18:16; Jer 19:2, 6; see HININ, VALLEY OF.) Ahaz and Manasseh, kings of Judah, practiced idolatrous worship there, including offering burnt human sacrifices to Baal. (2Ch 28:1, 3; 33:1, 6; Jer 7:31, 32; 32:35) To prevent these activities from occurring in the future, King Josiah polluted the place of idol worship, especially the section which was called Topheth. (2Ki 23:10.)
It is not a symbol of eternal torment. Jesus Christ related fire to the word Gehenna (Mt 5:22; 18:9; Mr 9:47, 48), as did the disciple James, the only biblical writer, apart from Matthew, Mark and Luke, who used this finished. (Jas 3:6) Some commentators attempt to connect the idea of a fiery Gehenna with the human burnt offerings offered before Josiah’s reign, thus arguing that Jesus used Gehenna as a symbol of eternal torment. However, Jehovah manifested his repugnance for such a practice saying that it was a † ˜thing that He had not commanded and that it had not come up into his heart † ™. (Jer 7:31; 32:35) Thus, it is highly unlikely that when the son of God spoke of divine judgment, he made an idolatrous practice the basis of the symbolic meaning of Gehenna. It should be noted that God prophetically decreed that the Valley of Hinnom would serve to dispose of large numbers of dead bodies, and not to torment living victims. (Jer 7:32, 33; 19:2, 6, 7, 10, 11) Thus, it is generally accepted that the reference in Jeremiah 31:40 to the “lower plain of dead bodies and of greasy ashes” designates the Valley of Hinnom, and towards the eastern end of this valley, at its intersection with the Kidron Gorge, would be the gate known as the “Gate of the Ash Heaps”. (Ne 3:13, 14) It seems obvious that such “carcasses” and “greasy ashes” have nothing to do with the human sacrifices performed in that valley under Ahaz and Manasseh, since the idolaters would have considered the bodies “sacred.” thus offered and would not have allowed them to lie in the valley.
Therefore, the biblical testimony concerning Gehenna coincides with the traditional view presented by both rabbinic and other secular sources. This view is that the Valley of Hinnom was used to dump the waste of the city of Jerusalem (of the twelve times ge en na appears in the scriptures, it is translated “burning place” eleven times in CR and five times in NBE ). When the Jewish commentator David Kimhi (1160-1235) explains Psalm 27:13, he gives the following historical information about the † œGehinnom †: † œIt is a place situated on the outskirts of Jerusalem, a disgusting place where corpses and filth are thrown . There was a fire that did not go out and that burned the filth and the bones of the corpses. Hence the judgment of the wicked is called, in parabolic language, Gehinnom†.
Complete destruction symbol. It is obvious that Jesus used Gehenna as a picture of complete destruction, destruction that would be the result of God’s adverse judgment, and from which there would be no possibility of resurrecting to life as a soul. (Mt 10:28; Lu 12:4, 5) The wicked class of the scribes and Pharisees were denounced as †˜deserving of Gehenna†™. (Mt 23:13-15, 33) So the followers of Jesus had to get rid of anything that could cause spiritual stumbling, in order to avoid such destruction. The †˜cutting off a hand or a foot†™ and the †˜gouging out an eye†™ figuratively represented the deadening of these members with reference to sin. (Mt 18:9; Mr 9:43-47; Col 3:5; compare Mt 5:27-30.)
It seems that Jesus also alluded to Isaiah 66:24 when he said that in Gehenna the “maggot does not die and the fire is not quenched.” (Mr 9:47, 48) It is evident that this is not a symbolic picture of torment, but rather of complete destruction, since the text of Isaiah is not speaking of living persons, but of the “carcasses of the dead”. men who were transgressing† against God. If the Valley of Hinnom was a place where garbage and corpses were dumped, as the available documentation indicates, the only appropriate means of disposing of such waste would be fire, perhaps fueled by the addition of sulfur. (Compare Isa 30:33.) Where the fire did not reach, maggots or maggots would breed, consuming whatever the fire had not destroyed. On this basis, Jesus’ words implied that the destructive effect of God’s adverse judgment would not cease until complete destruction was achieved.
figurative use. The disciple Santiago uses the word “Gehenna” to show that an uncontrolled tongue constitutes in itself a world of injustice, and that words, which are like fire, can affect the wheel of natural life and stain the body. of which he speaks This tongue “full of deadly poison” is evidence of a bad heart condition and can cause God to condemn the person who has it to symbolic Gehenna. (Jas 3:6, 8; compare Mt 12:37; Ps 5:9; 140:3; Ro 3:13.)
The symbolic use given in the Bible to the term Gehenna corresponds to that of the “lake of fire” of the book of Revelation. (Re 20:14, 15; see LAKE OF FIRE.)
Source: Dictionary of the Bible