Palestrina’s Credo if you wish to listen whilst reading
An Opinion On “HELL”
A commentary on The Credo – Apostle’s Creed
the first part of this rant was created
before referring to the Catechism.
My BOLD, Coloured, Underlined notations
are at my hand. To make a point. Hank
Latest St Paul’s Daily & Weekday Missals *
Also, The Anglican Common Prayer Book
* Published 2012, states:
Direct importance to the Credo or The Apostle’s Creed
“Suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried,
he descended into HELL”
Really, is that the HELL we were taught about as children, that place
of eternal punishment ???
See Luke’s Gospel Chapter 16 Verses 19:31 (King James Version) [Protestant Bible]
This is the story of Lazarus and the rich man.
Verse 26 (KJV) says:
And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed:
so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot:
neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence.
Verse 26 (New Jerusalem Bible) [Catholic Edition]
But that is not all: between us and you a great gulf has been fixed,
To prevent those who want to cross from our side to yours or from
your side to ours.
Or did he descend to “Sheol” [Hebrew, resting place of the dead]
Question:
Where did these good people go after death ?,
Saints Joseph, Ann & Joachim, John The Baptist, Moses, Elijah,
Simeon, Noah, the list is endless, so etc etc etc.
HELL does not make any sense at all, to me at least.
Purgatory, a place of temporal punishment.
See Old Testament 2 Maccabees 12:43 around 124BC
[not found in Protestant Bibles]
Limbo/Sheol, makes a whole bunch of sense to me, why ?
These wonderful and God Loving & Serving people ‘did not deserve Punishment, awaiting the opening of the gates of Heaven after Our Lords’ Great Sacrifice. Would you not agree ?.
I leave it up to you to decide.
Did Jesus descend into HELL ?
Did Jesus descend to the DEAD (who were awaiting freedom)
Descend to the DEAD was said by Catholics for decades of the 20th Century at least. Only with the new Missals was it changed (2012)
Just remember Scripture as noted above especially Verse 26.
Message to Church officialdom:
Stop confusing the simple (childlike) faithful with the term HELL.
My Grandsons & my 40 year old son, have asked,
Why did Jesus descend into HELL ??? Why Indeed
Further Research material:
Taken from:- CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
St Pauls Publications 1994. Pages 164 & 165
Article 5: He descended into HELL, on the third day he rose again
631 :
Jesus “descended into the lower parts of the earth. He who descended is he who also ascended far above all the heavens. The Apostles’ Creed confesses in the same article Christ’s descent into hell and his Resurrection from the dead on the third day, because in his Passover it was precisely out of the depths of death that he made life spring forth: Christ, that Morning Star, who came back from the dead, and shed his peaceful light on all mankind, your Son who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Amen.
Paragraph 1. Christ Descended into Hell
632:
The frequent New Testament affirmations that Jesus was “raised from the dead” presuppose that the crucified one sojourned in the realm of the dead prior to his resurrection. This was the first meaning given in the apostolic preaching to Christ’s descent into hell: that Jesus, like all men, experienced death and in his soul joined the others in the realm of the dead. But he descended there as Savior, proclaiming the Good News to the spirits imprisoned there.
633:
Scripture calls the abode of the dead, to which the dead Christ went down, “hell” -Sheol in Hebrew or Hades in Greek because those who are there are deprived of the vision of God. Such is the case for all the dead, whether evil or righteous, while they await the redeemer: which does not mean that their lot is identical, as Jesus shows through the parable of the poor man Lazarus who was received into “Abraham’s bosom”: “It is precisely these holy souls, who awaited their Savior in Abraham’s bosom, whom Christ the Lord delivered when he descended into hell. Jesus did not descend into hell to deliver the damned, nor to destroy the hell of damnation, but to free the just who had gone before him.
634:
“The gospel was preached even to the DEAD.” The descent into hell brings the Gospel message of salvation to complete fulfillment. This is the last phase of Jesus’ messianic mission, a phase which is condensed in time but vast in its real significance: the spread of Christ’s redemptive work to all men of all times and all places, for all who are saved have been made sharers in the redemption.
635:
Christ went down into the depths of death so that “the DEAD will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.” Jesus, “the Author of life,” by dying destroyed “him who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and [delivered] all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong bondage.” Henceforth the risen Christ holds “the keys of Death and Hades,” so that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.”
Today a great silence reigns on earth, a great silence and a great stillness. A great silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began…. He has gone to search for Adam, our first father, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow Adam in his bonds and Eve, captive with him – He who is both their God and the son of Eve …. “I am your God, who for your sake have become your son…. I order you, 0 sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead.”
IN BRIEF:
636:
By the expression “He descended into hell,” the Apostles’ Creed confesses that Jesus did really die and through his death for us conquered death and the devil “who has the power of death” (Heb 2:14).
637:
In his human soul united to his divine person, the dead Christ went down to the realm of the dead. He opened heaven’s gates for the just who had gone before him.The more you investigate this matter as a mere member of the Laity the more confused you may become. The Church needs to be more simple in her explanations, HELL, DEAD, SHEOL, HADES
The “door knockers” are only TOO happy to show you things in our BIBLES that will confuse the living daylights out of you. A simple example of this is “that Jesus had Brothers & Sisters”
[for another time] dear friends in Jesus & Mary, Hank