Heaven and Hell

Heaven and Hell

Author: Bart D. Ehrman

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2021-03-23

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 1501136747

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Over half of Americans believe in a literal heaven, in a literal hell. Most people who hold these beliefs are Christian and assume they are the age-old teachings of the Bible. Ehrman shows that eternal rewards and punishments are found nowhere in the Old Testament, and are not what Jesus or his disciples taught. He recounts the long history of the afterlife, ranging from The Epic of Gilgamesh up to the writings of Augustine, focusing especially on the teachings of Jesus and his early followers. Ehrman shows that competing views were intimately connected with the social, cultural, and historical worlds out of which they emerged. -- adapted from jacket


Journeys to Heaven and Hell

Journeys to Heaven and Hell

Author: Bart D. Ehrman

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2022-04-05

Total Pages: 343

ISBN-13: 0300265166

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

A New York Times best-selling scholar's illuminating exploration of the earliest Christian narrated journeys to heaven and hell “[An] illuminating deep dive . . . An edifying origin story for contemporary Christian conceptions of the afterlife.”—Publishers Weekly From classics such as the Odyssey and the Aeneid to fifth-century Christian apocrypha, narratives that described guided tours of the afterlife played a major role in shaping ancient notions of morality and ethics. In this new account, acclaimed author Bart Ehrman contextualizes early Christian narratives of heaven and hell within the broader intellectual and cultural worlds from which they emerged. He examines how fundamental social experiences of the early Christian communities molded the conceptions of the afterlife that eventuated into the accepted doctrines of heaven, hell, and purgatory. Drawing on Greek and Roman epic poetry, early Jewish writings such as the Book of Watchers, and apocryphal Christian stories including the Acts of Thomas, the Gospel of Nicodemus, and the Apocalypse of Peter, Ehrman demonstrates that ancient tours of the afterlife promoted reflection on matters of ethics, faith, ambition, and life’s meaning, the fruit of which has been codified into Christian belief today.


The Penguin Book of Hell

The Penguin Book of Hell

Author: Scott G. Bruce

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2018-09-04

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 0143131621

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

"From the Bible through Dante and up to Treblinka and Guantánamo Bay, here is a rich source for nightmares." --The New York Times Book Review Three thousand years of visions of Hell, from the ancient Near East to modern America A Penguin Classic From the Hebrew Bible's shadowy realm of Sheol to twenty-first-century visions of Hell on earth, The Penguin Book of Hell takes us through three thousand years of eternal damnation. Along the way, you'll take a ferry ride with Aeneas to Hades, across the river Acheron; meet the Devil as imagined by a twelfth-century Irish monk--a monster with a thousand giant hands; wander the nine circles of Hell in Dante's Inferno, in which gluttons, liars, heretics, murderers, and hypocrites are made to endure crime-appropriate torture; and witness the debates that raged in Victorian England when new scientific advances cast doubt on the idea of an eternal hereafter. Drawing upon religious poetry, epics, theological treatises, stories of miracles, and accounts of saints' lives, this fascinating volume of hellscapes illuminates how Hell has long haunted us, in both life and death. For more than seventy-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 2,000 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.


Visions of Heaven & Hell Before Dante

Visions of Heaven & Hell Before Dante

Author: Venerable Bede

Publisher: Medieval & Renaissance Texts

Published: 2009-03-22

Total Pages: 318

ISBN-13: 9781599102320

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This essential and widely used collection of visions of heaven and hell, the first in English, presents new translations of two visions and newly edited versions of previously translated ones. Describes the place of these works in medieval literature and provides a helpful resource for studying elements of medieval religion. Includes: St. Peter's Apocalypse, St. Paul's Apocalypse, St. Brendan's Voyage, St. Patrick's Purgatory, and the Visions of Furseus, Drythelm, Wetti, Charles the Fat, Tundale, the Monk of Evesham, and Thurkill. Bibliography, index, glossary, notes, illustrated.


Rescue for the Dead

Rescue for the Dead

Author: Jeffrey A. Trumbower

Publisher:

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 223

ISBN-13: 0195140990

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Christianity is a religion of salvation in which believers have always anticipated some type of post-mortem bliss. This belief in salvation for the faithful has usually meant non-salvation for others. This text examines the establishment of this view.


Unquenchable Fire

Unquenchable Fire

Author: Lawrence R. Farley

Publisher:

Published: 2017

Total Pages: 239

ISBN-13: 9781944967185

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The doctrine of hell as a place of eternal punishment has never been easy for Christians to accept. The temptation to retreat from and reject the Church's traditional teaching about hell is particularly strong in our current culture, which has demonstrably lost its sense of sin. Fr. Lawrence Farley examines the Orthodox Church's teaching on this difficult subject through the lens of Scripture and patristic writings, making the case that the existence of hell does not negate that of a loving and forgiving God.


Encyclopedia of Imaginary and Mythical Places

Encyclopedia of Imaginary and Mythical Places

Author: Theresa Bane

Publisher: McFarland

Published: 2014-03-04

Total Pages: 203

ISBN-13: 0786478489

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The heavens and hells of the world's religions and the "far, far away" legends cannot be seen or visited, but they remain an integral part of culture and history. This encyclopedia catalogs more than 800 imaginary and mythological lands from all over the world, including fairy realms, settings from Arthurian lore, and kingdoms found in fairy tales and political and philosophical works, including Sir Thomas More's Utopia and Plato's Atlantis. From al A'raf, the limbo of Islam, to Zulal, one of the many streams that run through Paradise, entries give the literary origin of each site, explain its cultural context, and describe its topical features, listing variations on names when applicable. Cross-referenced for ease of use, this compendium will prove useful to scholars, researchers or anyone wishing to tour the unseen landscapes of myth and legend.