Question #3589: Hell

[Ask Satya Operator]

Where does the word hell come from? Shouldn't we refer to the "afterlife" in another way? With another word? Sometimes the word hell bothers me because I don't know where it comes from. When I try to debate with Christians and say that we believe in a safe hell, they scoff

Did ancient pagans use this word? Does it have any magical remnants? If not, shouldn't we change it to another name? Hell is a word that carries so much weight

 

[Isisd]

Where does the word hell come from? Shouldn't we refer to the "afterlife" in another way? With another word? Sometimes the word hell bothers me because I don't know where it comes from. When I try to debate with Christians and say that we believe in a safe hell, they scoff

Did ancient pagans use this word? Does it have any magical remnants? If not, shouldn't we change it to another name? Hell is a word that carries so much weight

It's a word derived from the Proto-germanic, old English word "hel", that was a synonym for the other world, or the ethereal world, were the dead would go after the end of their life on this earth. Hellheim in norse mythology was one of the realms of the afterlife. Hel is also a norse goddess, queen of the underwold (I believe the greek Persephone). When christianity came and people were forced to convert, English people began to use the word "hel" as a synonyme of "infernus", that is basically the fictional world of torture and flames created by the Abrahamitic religions. Also the word infernus, before Christianity, represented the otherworld of roman mythology (the greek Hades), were the souls of the dead rested waiting to trasmigrate/reincarnate/live in the grace of the gods (depending on how they spend their life on Earth)