The following home Bible study notes were distilled from the research underlying the full study “Hell According to Luke,” which is published on this Substack here.
Text Under Discussion Luke 16:19–31 (ESV)
19 “There was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day. 20 And at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, 21 who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man’s table. Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. 22 The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried, 23 and in Hades, being in torment, he lifted up his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. 24 …”
Main Teaching Points
1. Greek hadēs, “unseen place,” “underworld,” or “grave” (used literally & figuratively in the Bible), translates Hebrew “SHEOL.” Originally, the Germanic word hel (eventually our “hell”) was synonymous.
2. In the KJV, hadēs is always translated “hell”; in modern versions, typically “Hades,” wherever it represents the temporary abode of the righteous and unrighteous dead, as they await general judgement of Israel (see “Tartaros” referenced at 2 Pt 2:4). If believed to refer to the final place of the damned, the term “Hell” is still used (once in the ESV, at Mt 16:18).
3. In the pseudepigraphical Book of Enoch (Eth. En. 22), Sheol is divided into four smoothed out hollows: Three darkened hollows containing the myriad spirits of doomed sinners; and a single supernaturally illuminated hollow for the far less numerous spirits of the righteous, commodiously outfitted with a “bright spring of water.”1 This “paradisal” quarter of hades is the self-same destination where Jesus promises to meet the god-fearing criminal in the Lucan account of his Crucifixion (Luke 23:43).2
Conclusion
The motif of the rich man and Lazarus parable is a fictitious framework borrowed from known first century Jewish narratives. Luke’s Jesus is presenting a theological allegory critical of the moral condition of the living in his day, he is not giving a paranormal report on the current state of the dead.3 The language of the parable suggests both characters were in the same underworld; the rich man in the “bad” section reserved for those who lived unrighteously (those who did not fear God); the poor beggar in the section reserved for the righteous (those who feared God). To Jesus’ audience this reversal of fortune was a shocking subversion of the societal presuppositions regarding the degrees of blessedness experienced by both men above ground. Even more shocking was the parable’s ultimate revelation, that there was never any hope of salvation for the rich man, even when he was alive. Being incapable of provided him with genuine saving faith, neither his Jewish heredity, nor his Jewish upbringing, could inculcate in him any sense of covenantal obligation to alleviate the suffering and poverty of his fellow Jew, Lazarus.4 Therefore, constitutionally deaf to the spirit of the Mosaic Law while he lived, the rich man was condemned by the letter of the same Law when he died.
Robert Henry Charles, Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 2:203.
F. C. Fensham, “Paradise,” in New Bible Dictionary, 3rd Edition. (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1996), 870.
See for example Joachim Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus, Rev. ed. (London: SCM, 1963); Richard J. Bauckham, “Eschatology,” in New Bible Dictionary (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1996), 337; Warren Prestidge, Life, Death and Destiny, 2nd revised edition. (Auckland, N.Z: Resurrection Publishing, 2010), 42–43.
“In order to know that the rich should not live in luxury while the poor starve, a revelation from beyond the grave is not necessary because the scriptures are sufficient.” Richard J. Bauckham, “Lazarus,” in New Bible Dictionary (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: IVP, 1996), 679