Where on Earth is Heaven?

A Little Book Of Guidance

Paula Gooder

• Publisher: SPCK Publishing
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN: 9780281073245
• eBook ISBN: 9780281073252
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

'Heaven is one of those great mysteries that somehow symbolizes what we don't know about ourselves and the world around us. At the same time it lifts our vision from the mundane realities of our lives and reminds us that beyond the daily grind of our existence there is another, unseen reality.'
Paula Gooder explores the Bible's teaching on heaven and explains how it is nearer to earth than you might think. A book for all who are curious about the dwelling place of God and the angels.
Intended for people looking for answers to life's biggest questions, this little book of guidance will appeal to anyone, whether believer or non-believer, looking for a quick and easy way into the topic.

1

What and where is ‘heaven’?

There is one other popular use of the word heaven. Intriguingly, we also use it as an alternative to ‘sky’. It is not unusual to hear someone saying ‘the heavens opened’ to refer to a particularly heavy downpour of rain. This usage can be traced back to biblical tradition, where we find a parallel with our own modern usage. So, in Genesis 8.2, when it stopped raining we are told that the ‘the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained’, or in Psalm 147.8 that God ‘covers the heavens with clouds’. Elsewhere the word is used in a different way to describe not so much the sky as the place where God dwells. So, in other places in the Bible, descriptions are given of God’s throne being in heaven (e.g. Ps. 11.4) and of God looking down from heaven to earth (e.g. Ps. 14.2).

In English, the only slight difference in the way we use the word heaven in these two contexts is that when referring to the sky the word is more often in the plural (‘the heavens’); when it refers to God’s dwelling place it is in the singular (‘heaven’). English translations of the Bible use this as a way of indicating when the word means sky and when it means God’s dwelling place. On one level this is helpful, because it has helped to focus the question of what the word means each time it is used; on another it has been distinctly unhelpful, because it implies that ‘heavens’ and ‘heaven’ reflect a different Hebrew word or usage. The problem is that this is purely a convention in English and is not reflected in the use of the Hebrew word.

Heaven as the dwelling place of God

So why in the bible is the same word used both for the sky and for God’s dwelling place? Surely that only leads to confusion? The answer is relatively straightforward and can be found in the Hebrew understanding of the world (or ‘cosmology’).

In the first chapter of the Bible, Genesis 1, we find a helpful framework for understanding Hebrew cosmology. In Genesis 1, we are told that God created the heavens and the earth. This was done by the act of three separations: light from darkness (1.4); the waters above from the waters below (1.7); and the dry land from the waters on the face of the earth (1.9). These three separations were followed by three main actions that filled the space made: the sun, moon and stars were hung in the sky (1.14); fish were created for the sea and birds for the air (1.20–21); and finally animals and humanity were brought into being to fill the dry land (1.24–26). Each filling matched each separation.

Particularly important here is the description of the separation of the waters above and the waters below. One modern English version translates the means of separation here as a ‘dome in the midst of the waters’ (1.6). The Hebrew word for this is raqia‘, which literally means an ‘extended surface’, or an expanse as if beaten out. It is almost impossible to translate it into an English word that makes sense to the modern reader. The word was translated into Latin as firmamentum and from there was put into the English form ‘firmament’ in around the thirteenth century. This word was then used by the translators of the King James Bible and was widely used in all English translations until well into the twentieth century. The problem is that it doesn’t mean very much to the modern reader as it is simply an Anglicized version of a Latin word. It may therefore be preferable to stick to using the original Hebrew word raqia‘; the more usually used ‘expanse’ or ‘dome’ do not quite communicate everything about the raqia‘ that is inherent in the original word, which has the resonance of something that has been beaten out and is, as a result, thin.

The raqia‘ is integral to the ancient Hebrew vision of the world, as it protects the world from the waters of chaos that flow over it. The New Jewish Encyclopedia describes rather poetically and helpfully this view of the way in which the world is made:

The Hebrews regarded the earth as a plain or a hill figured like a hemisphere, swimming on water. Over this is arched the solid vault of heaven. To this vault are fastened the lights, the stars. So slight is this elevation that birds may rise to it and fly along its expanse.¹

Thus the raqia‘ acted as a waterproof layer holding back the waters of chaos above the earth from flooding the earth.

As a result the significance of the flood in Genesis 6—9 was more than simply the destruction of evil humanity: it was an act of de-creation. It was as if God wanted to go back to the start of creation and begin again. At the flood, God’s separation of the waters above and the waters below was undone and the waters of chaos flooded back in to fill the space.

We are left, then, with the question of how the raqia‘ relates to heaven (the Hebrew word shamayim). The word raqia‘ is used much less often in the Hebrew Bible than its counterpart shamayim, and, by and large, is used to describe simply the dome above the earth. In Job 22.14 God is depicted as walking on the dome or vault of heaven, which would seem to indicate that what is to us apparently the roof of the earth is to God the floor of heaven. This also answers the question about why the same word, shamayim, can be used both for sky and for the place in which God dwells. The same word can be used because they are, effectively, the same place. We simply see it from below and God from above. Heaven lies directly above earth, with the floor of heaven functioning as the roof of the earth. As a result the word ‘heaven’ can accurately and easily describe both what we can see (the sky) and the entire place where God dwells (i.e. heaven itself), which lies above the sky.

Going up and coming down

This brings us to one of the questions about heaven that we in the twenty-first century find most challenging. The biblical understanding of heaven (both in the Hebrew Bible and in the New Testament) functions with a Hebrew cosmology. As a result, descriptions of divine or angelic beings coming to earth or of human beings going to heaven are all given a direction. Heavenly beings come ‘down’ to earth and human beings go ‘up’ to heaven. This directional view of heaven forms the bedrock of a lot of biblical description. The story of Jacob’s ladder in Genesis 28.12, ‘And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it’, and the narrative of Christ’s Ascension in Luke 24.51 and Acts 1.9, are both based on a cosmological, directional view of heaven as located above the earth. Indeed so vital is this view to the biblical mindset that it is woven through almost every book of the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation.

Despite a modern cosmology which entirely overturns this ancient, biblical view, the same directional language lingers on. When people talk of heaven they point upwards and when they talk of hell they point downwards.

We are faced then with something of a dilemma. Much of the language and art of our heritage presupposes something for which our view of the world no longer has room. Indeed one of the challenges for us today is what to do with the co...

Table of contents

• Cover page
• About the author
• Series title
• Title page
• Imprint
• Table of contents
• Introduction
• 1. What and where is ‘heaven’?
• 2. Who are the angels?
• 3. What is the meaning of ‘resurrection’?
• 4. What happens between death and resurrection?
• 5. What does this mean for me now?
• Notes
• Further reading