Heaven and Hell and The In-Between "Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company."--Mark Twain "Religion is for people who are scared to go to Hell. Spirituality is for people who have already been there.''--Bonnie Raitt "Men long for an afterlife in which there apparently is nothing to do but delight in Heaven''s wonders."--Louis D. Brandeis After death many religious traditions believe the human soul resides in another place for eternity or that it sticks around for a while before hitching a ride in a new body and a new life. Depending on the tradition, Heaven is where people go who are being rewarded for a lifetime of good behavior. Hell is a place opposite of Heaven, where those who break the laws of God or the gods deserve eternal punishment for their sins.
In the triadic worldview of Abrahamic religions, Heaven is located in the sky, and Hell is beneath or below the earth, an "underworld" filled with fire and the agony of tortured souls. Not all traditions view the places our souls might journey to after death the same, just as they don''t always agree on the existence of the soul or afterlife. Though we may wish to end up in the right place, a life review might send us packing for the underworld unless, as some religions insist, we repent and beg for forgiveness. Those who make a lifetime of sin and brutality might not even get the chance to repent and get a one-way ticket to fire and brimstone. What about those who aren''t exactly pure or evil, but somewhere in between? There''s a place for them, too. In between Heaven and Hell is a place called purgatory, a sort of waiting room which some feel is life on Earth itself with all its pain and suffering, or outside a courtroom where you are about to go on trial and God is the judge. It seems almost impossible to imagine ceasing to exist and having no conscious awareness of anything, even eternal blackness, so we humans like to imagine scenarios and places we will inhabit after we leave our bodies. Heaven and Hell also provide us with a moral compass to guide our lives, with Heaven pointing due North and Hell pointing due South, and our path towards one or the other is determined by the good or bad we did on Earth.
There is also a between-state, such as the Catholic concept of purgatory, or the "bardo" of the Tibetan Book of the Dead. More on that in the next chapter. We will start with Heaven and work our way down. Heaven The promise of eternal reward in a paradise-like place is what drives the behavior of many religious people who know that, if they sin too much, they will end up somewhere else, as in Hell, suffering eternal punishment. Heaven has many names, as we shall see, but it is not attainable until we die and go on to meet with God, Jesus, angels, spirit guides, our dead ancestors, and other entities depending on the religious tradition we follow. Heaven can be both a place and a state of mind, as in "Heaven on earth," which describes a beautiful location like Hawaii or a peaceful mountain lake, or the blissful, joyful state of mind a mother might experience while holding her newborn child. Heaven was associated with order and the absence of suffering, pain, ignorance, fear, and death. It was a place and a state of being unrivaled in terms of peace, communion with God, spirits, and angels, joy, and fulfillment of the heart''s desires.
In many cosmogenesis stories of the creation of the world, Heaven was this overarching realm that encompassed the sky and upper atmosphere far beyond the visible sun, moon, and stars. The triadic nature of physical existence found in many of these creation myths usually placed Heaven atop Earth and Earth atop Hell or the underworld, but there were in our ancient past concepts of Heaven as some place far away from Earth, even a place only accessible on a spiritual level. According to ancient Mesopotamian beliefs, the universe or entirety of existence is divided into three levels, with Heaven at the top, accessible only to the purist and most heroic of people. This was the domain of the high gods, who formed a Heavenly council. Earth was created for mortal humans to serve the gods by providing food, tribute, and sacred dwelling places. Minor gods and magical demons were also present on Earth. Humans mostly descended into the underworld after death, with only a few brave souls ascending to Heaven. Ancient Egyptians believed the soul was in the heart and upon death, they would be taken to Duat , which was the realm of the dead, similar to the underworld.
They would be judged, and their hearts weighed against a feather. Those found virtuous and light went on to a place called Aaru , the Egyptian Field of Reeds, their version of Heavenly paradise. The kings of the ancient Greeks would share with the sun god, Re and the sky god, Horus the responsibility of protecting the order of things against chaos. The kings would be given the privilege of renewable life as part of this cosmic cycle and the mortals accepted this. Ancient Egyptians had many visual depictions of this Heavenly concept: the divine crow on whose back the sun god withdrew from the Earthly realm; as the goddess Nut arching her body over the Earth; and as the falcon-headed Horus whose glittery eyes formed the sun and moon. Originally an afterlife here was reserved only for the kings and royalty, but later in the Book of the Dead, an afterlife was accessible for all once they were judged by Osiris, ruler of the Underworld. This tri-level concept of existence of the Heavens above, the underworld below, and Earth in the middle, is mirrored in shamanism, with the lower, middle, and upper worlds a shaman travels through on a spiritual level to attain wisdom or perform a healing. The upper world is not so much a Heavenly place as it is the realm of higher beings and wise, knowing guides.
A similar view is the designation of body, mind, and spirit, with the body representing the "underworld" or lower level of base drives and instincts; the mind as the middle level of intellect and reason; and the spirit as the upper level of oneness and higher consciousness. The ancient Persians coined the term "paradise," which referred to a walled garden or park. In Zoroastrianism, paradise is reached on the fourth day after death by crossing the Chinvat Bridge, also known as the Bridge of the Separator, which widens when approached by the righteous, who were deemed good by Mithra''s scales. When the righteous soul crossed the bridge, they were greeted by a beautiful maiden who embodied the soul''s good works on Earth and led into the House of Song to await the Last Day, when all would rejoice and be purified. There is no mention of who the righteous female souls met, though the beautiful maiden is most likely a construct of male desire and nothing more. Our popular Western concept of Heaven, and how you get there, comes from Christianity, which places it as the realm in the "Heavens" of God and Jesus Christ and the angelic beings. The faithful and those who lived by grace would die and automatically ascend to Heaven until the second coming of Christ and Christians believe this is where Christ went when he rose from the dead, to be at his father, God''s side. This act was considered to have closed the gap between Heaven and Earth so that all who were without sin or purified of their sins could be admitted through the "Pearly Gates.
" This idea of judgment clashes a bit with the teachings of Jesus Christ about not judging others and play into Old Testament beliefs of God as a more punishing Father. The Christian Heaven is also called paradise and a place for great rejoicing. Contained within this Heaven is the city of New Jerusalem, described in detail in the Book of Revelation as a city walled in with 12 gates. On each gate is the name of one of the tribes of Israel along with an angel. The wall, made of precious stones, is 200 feet high and the city is 1400 square miles in size. The river of the water of life flows through from the throne of God and the trees along the riverbanks produce a huge variety of fruit. Judaic texts don''t offer a clear indication of a Heaven or an afterlife. The Pharisees believed in an implied concept of an afterlife, and the Sadducees claimed there was no Biblical evidence to back that up.
Over the course of a thousand years or so, Jews believed God alone could reside in Heaven, as in Psalm 115:16, "The Heavens are the Lord''s Heavens, but the earth he has given to human beings," and that it was separate from Earth, or that some version of Heaven will occur when the Messiah brings the righteous dead back to life. Heaven was described as a vast realm that existed above the Earth and was supported by a hard firmament of dazzling precious stones. This firmament kept the upper waters from mixing with the waters beneath the firmament. In this firmament were the sun, moon, and stars and rain fell when a window was opened, as well as snow, hail and dew. God sat in the highest realm of this Heavenly place and intervened in the affairs of the living through his prophets and providential care. God was surrounded by a host of angelic and astral beings which were similar to gods and goddesses of the Canaanite and Mesopotamian belief system. Later, when the Hebrew scriptures transitioned to monotheism, there was only one God, the Lord, who oversaw all Heavenly and earthly powers. Some Jews believed God ruled from his throne in Heaven and there was also an underworld, with Earth stuck in the middle.
Souls upon death went to the underworld but during the Hellenic period, this belief changed, and humans were able to go to Heaven after death. Muslims believe children automatically go to Heaven, no matter their religious upbringing. Adults must be.