The Vision of the Underworld
It's interesting the viewpoints of the afterlife in modern day. The church's standpoint is that hell is the eternal damnation for sinners and at the heart, there stands Lucifer. Where does it come from though? I believe that mythology around the world holds the key for our views of heaven/hell in their myths; especially Egyptian/Norse/Greek. I'll use Greek as the main example because the others may be confusing. In Greek; Hades stood at the center and watched over all the dead (shades) in the underworld. Regardless of whether you were a saint or a sinner; it's where you ended up. Elysian Fields also existed in Greek Mythology as a type of heaven for those deserving. There was a perfect outline for the underworld with rivers and places of importance Tartarus. It brings up the relevance of The Inferno by Dante Alighieri where the same ploy is used. The deepest parts of hell had the worst criminals. It was Cassius and Brutus in The Inferno according to Dante, but it was Cronus and other Titans in Tartarus according to classical mythology. Some others were punished for their crimes including Ixion, Sisyphus, and Tantalus; however the underworld in ancient mythology was tepid compared to the blazing hell from the Inferno that became the Christian church's traditional views of hell. It's interesting to see this transition from then to now, don't you think?
It's interesting the viewpoints of the afterlife in modern day. The church's standpoint is that hell is the eternal damnation for sinners and at the heart, there stands Lucifer. Where does it come from though? I believe that mythology around the world holds the key for our views of heaven/hell in their myths; especially Egyptian/Norse/Greek. I'll use Greek as the main example because the others may be confusing. In Greek; Hades stood at the center and watched over all the dead (shades) in the underworld. Regardless of whether you were a saint or a sinner; it's where you ended up. Elysian Fields also existed in Greek Mythology as a type of heaven for those deserving. There was a perfect outline for the underworld with rivers and places of importance Tartarus. It brings up the relevance of The Inferno by Dante Alighieri where the same ploy is used. The deepest parts of hell had the worst criminals. It was Cassius and Brutus in The Inferno according to Dante, but it was Cronus and other Titans in Tartarus according to classical mythology. Some others were punished for their crimes including Ixion, Sisyphus, and Tantalus; however the underworld in ancient mythology was tepid compared to the blazing hell from the Inferno that became the Christian church's traditional views of hell. It's interesting to see this transition from then to now, don't you think?