Matt. 10:28 - The destruction of body and soul in gehenna

Andrew, some of those very same thoughts have prompted me to seriously consider annihilationism as a solution to the apparent dilemma.

Understanding the proper use of “Gehenna” and the context in which it was used in the first century is crucial to the conversation in my opinion. In his book “The Fire That Consumes: A Biblical and Historical Study of the Doctrine of Final Punishment,” Edward Fudge wrote:

The valley bore this name at least as early as the writing of Joshua (Josh. 15:8; 18:16), though nothing is known of its origin. It was the site of child-sacrifices to Moloch in the days of Ahaz and Manasseh (apparently in 2 Kings 16:3; 21:6). This earned it the name “Topheth,” a place to be spit on or abhorred. This “Topheth” may have become a gigantic pyre for burning corpses in the days of Hezekiah after God slew 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in a night and saved Jerusalem (Isa. 30:31-33; 37:26). Jeremiah predicted that it would be filled to overflowing with Israelite corpses when God judged them for their sins (Jer. 7:31-33; 19:2-13). Josephus indicates that the same valley was heaped with dead bodies of the Jews following the Roman siege of Jerusalem about A.D. 69-70...Josiah desecrated the repugnant valley as part of his godly reform (2 Kings 23:10). Long before the time of Jesus, the Valley of Hinnom had become crusted over with connotations of whatever is “condemned, useless, corrupt, and forever discarded.” (Edward William Fudge, The Fire That Consumes [Houston: Providential Press, 1982], p. 160.)

” … as all Israel should fear at this time of eschatological crisis - the God who will utterly destroy rebellious Israel”

There is no mention of rebellious Israel in Matthew 10:28; but there is reference to ‘body and soul’ - ‘fear him who can destroy body and soul in hell’. This is a warning to the disciples, not Israel, against apostacy - that they should not turn away from loyalty to the one who had sent them, even to death. The warning includes the reference to hell (gehenna), which leads to the next point:

“The image of gehenna is drawn from Jeremiah’s vivid account of the horrors of the Babylonian invasion - Jeremiah 7:30-33; 19:6-8 - - -“

Jeremiah’s prophecy referred to the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon in 587 B.C. Was Jesus intending his warnings about gehenna to be a literal recapitulation of this event? Yes and no. The echoes of Jeremiah in Jesus’s own words are certainly notable - even down to the carcases being exposed to the ‘birds of the air’/’vultures/eagles’ - Jeremiah 7:33, 19:7/Matthew 24:28.

No-one is denying that Jesus warned about the disaster of AD 70 in the synoptic apocalypses. It would be natural for Jesus or any NT author to draw on the history and imagery of their people in describing prophetic events. AD 70 bore a resemblance to the earlier destruction of Jerusalem. Daniel is invoked to create the idea of a recapitulation of the desecration of the temple.

It is also the case that Jesus warned about the AD 70 disaster in language that invoked his own unique status and role - not merely a prophet who gave warning about disloyalty ro YHWH, but a messiah who came to do battle on Israel’s behalf against her enemies, and one who in his own person, and in the way he was invoked following his death/resurrection, placed him, as NT Wright puts it, on ‘the divine side of the equation’.

In other words, this is not mere recapitulation of Israel’s previous history, but the conclusion towards which her history was tending. Time is up. God has himself come in person to visit Israel - conclusively. The issues for Israel are now not simply of temporal but eternal significance - where eternal means the everlasting fulfilment of God’s purposes for his creation.

In the same way, it is impossible to view references to Hinnom in gehenna in quite the same way as at previous stages of Israel’s history. The burial ground is now not simply a place where bodies are buried; it is also a place signifying the ultimate destiny of those buried there, and by metonymy, all who die and are buried at all times. All the imagery associated with Hinnom now comes into play - not just the references in Jeremiah, but the contemporary visual aid which the valley presented - a place of garbage disposal, the place where Judas hanged himself, a place where in former times, Israel had practised the condemnable abominations of child sacrifice, and a place representing her own condemnation. Associated with gehenna are further references Jesus makes to the ultimate destiny of rebellious Israel, the place of outer darkness where those who opposed him would be cast - Matthew 8:12, 13:42, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30; Luke 13:28 etc. It seems clear that Jesus is taking the imagery of Hinnom contained in gehenna, along with other imagery of final judgement, much further than was suggested by Jeremiah.

The finality of this judgement beyond death is suggested in Matthew 10:28, which is reinforced by Matthew 10:33. Gehenna here is very much more than a geographical and historical place of slaughter.

It seems odd that Andrew should seek to locate the ‘surprising dualism of body and soul’ of Matthew 10:28 in a ‘hellenised martyr theology’, quoting from 2 & 4 Maccabees to reinforce the case. But the very last thing the Maccabeean martyrs wanted was anything to do with Greece and Greek thinking. The NT is quite at ease in speaking of soma and psuche, without suggesting any particular division of the human person by doing so (eg bipartate or tripartate models beloved of contemporary theorists). The emphasis is on the totality of destruction, in contrast with those who can only destroy the body, but not that part of the person preserved by God after death for resurrection (the so-called intermediate state, when dead people are alive, conscious, but not yet complete in the sense of not having been given a resurrection body). The point being made is that God has the power to utterly destroy not simply his obvious opponents, but those who turn away from him through disloyalty. This was a warning to the disciples, not Israel in general.

The main principle of interpretation is one which occurs time and again in NT interpretation: that the NT introduces a new phase in Israel’s history, new events and concepts which had not appeared previously. It is therefore possible to use the vocabulary and imagery of Israel’s previous history to describe what is happening now, but it is not possible to confine their meaning exclusively to that of a previous phase in her history. Jesus himself bore no exact parallel with anyone who had gone before; what he did was not an exact repetition of anything that had preceded him. In many respects, it is accurate to say that he is unique. But not all the imagery or vocabulary which is used to describe him is unique; much of Israel’s history is consummated in him; the language of Israel’s history is deployed to describe him, but the content of the language and imagery is filled out with fresh meaning.

In the same way, the language which Jesus uses is not simply a recapitulation of the way in which language was being used in the past. The associations are there, but the content is filled out in fresh ways. This is precisely how we need to approach concepts like gehenna. It has all the richness of the imagery associated with the word, but the new context gives enhanced meaning to the word. It is not difficult to deduce his from the context of the gospels. If we were in any doubt, there is plenty of supporting evidence to reinforce the new meaning in the new context.