RTE No 20 Interior - Road to Emmaus Journal

Road to Emmaus Vol. VI, No. 1 (#20)The Syriac tradition speaks of Christ taking the Old Testament righteouswith Adam. The tragedy of the Old Testament was that it had lost the ideaof God as a loving father. Even the righteous were subject to this spiritualdeath: they were deprived of the joy of spontaneous communication withGod. Old Adam is the symbol of this old mankind; Christ is the one whobecame “the second Adam,” or according to the expression of St. Ephrem,the firstborn of Sheol 10 , after His descent and resurrection. Now He is theAlpha and Omega, the first and the last man who overcame endless deathand revealed God as a loving father to the whole of humanity. Thus, thedescent into Sheol continues to be perceived as an event which had tremendousmeaning for the whole cosmos and all of creation 11 .For me, this is summed up by lines from the Book of Wisdom 1:12-16:Do not court death by the errors of your ways,Nor invite destruction through the work of your hands.For God did not make Death,He takes no pleasure in destroying the living.To exist – for this He created all things;The creatures of the world have health in them,In them is no fatal poison,And Hades has no power over the world:For uprightness is immortal.The Traditions of Hades,Sheol, Gehenna, and HellRTE: Irina, can you explain to us the difference between Hades, Sheol, and Hell?IRINA: This is a very serious question, and I am afraid my answer will bequite long. First, let us deal with the terms for the underworld and how theydeveloped historically. The Greek name for the underworld, where it wasbelieved that everyone went after death, was Hades. In ancient Greekmythology Hades (or “gloomy Hades,” as they usually called it) was the nameof the underworld ruler who ruled the land of the dead. This land was full of10 See 1 Cor. 15: 20,23, 45, 4711 Alfeyev, Hilarion, Khristos-Pobeditel’ Ada, St.-Petersburg: 2001, p. 30726The souls of the righteous in the hand of God,15th century. Mansija Monastery, Serbia.