Heaven

Paula Gooder

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9781610977777, 9781498214643
• eBook ISBN: 9781621892953
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Church

"Heaven is one of those great mysteries that somehow symbolize 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 everyday lives and reminds us that beyond the daily grind of our existence there is another, unseen reality. A reality that is as real--if not more so--than our everyday lives. Heaven suggests an answer to the familiar human feeling that there must be more than this, and prompts us to wonder whether there is indeed more in heaven and earth than can be dreamt of in all our philosophies." -Paula Gooder, from the Introduction

1

In the beginning . . . : heaven and earth

May you be blessed by the LORD, who made heaven and earth.

The heavens are the LORD’s heavens, but the earth he has given to human beings.

(Ps. 115.15–16)

Heaven and sky

While, in popular usage, the word heaven is used to refer either to what happens to us when we die or to an emotion that comes close to the bliss we will feel in heaven after death, this is not its only use. Intriguingly we also use the word heaven as an alternative to ‘sky’. It is not unusual to hear someone using the phrase ‘the heavens opened’ to refer to a particularly heavy downpour of rain. When you think about it, it is odd that this expression remains in common usage, since it describes a view of the world that is long gone.

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’.¹ 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 (Ps. 11.4) and of God looking down from heaven to earth (Ps. 14.2).²

Heaven and the heavens

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.

In Hebrew the word for heaven is shamayim Interestingly, this word is plural (the ending ‘-im’ in Hebrew often denotes a plural),³ but it is used in this same plural form whether it refers to the sky or to the place where God dwells. No distinction is made in Hebrew between the two uses. The Hebrew word is always plural no matter what is being referred to. Interestingly Greek does use both singular and plural nouns to refer to heaven, but this usage does not match our English conventions. So for example in the Greek version of Genesis 1.1 (‘In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth’) heaven is translated as singular, but in the Greek of Job 16.19 (‘Even now, in fact, my witness is in heaven’) the word for heaven is plural. My point is that we like to make a clear distinction between heaven as the dwelling place of God and the heavens as the sky but the original languages of the Bible do not. It is simply not possible to distinguish the two as clearly as some people would like to do.

This raises the question of why the Hebrew word for heaven might be plural. One of the intriguing popular phrases about heaven is the expression ‘I’m in the seventh heaven’. It is an expression, akin to ‘heavenly’, used to describe the highest bliss possible. A quick search on the internet reveals companies which sell beds, candelabras and holidays (as well as other less salubrious items and entertainments) under the name Seventh Heaven – there is even an animal rescue centre called Seventh Heaven. This popular usage seems to have its roots in a later Jewish and Christian tradition (from the third century BCE onwards) in which different levels of heaven are identified by varying numbers. Even Paul, writing in the first century, refers to a ‘third heaven’ (in 2 Cor. 12.2). In the Hebrew Bible, however, there is little, if any, evidence that people believed that heaven had more than one level. A belief in heaven as a multi-level realm seems to have developed only later.⁴

The use of the plural in Hebrew seems to be a way of suggesting not variety but vastness. There is no clear reference within the Hebrew Bible to any more than one level of heaven, but there are numerous references to heaven’s immensity. Heaven is regarded both as too large to measure: ‘Thus says the LORD: If the heavens above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth below can be explored, then I will reject all the offspring of Israel’ (Jer. 31.37); and as far, far above the earth: ‘For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him’ (Ps. 103.11). Thus it is most likely that in the period of the Hebrew Bible it is heaven’s size that has given rise to the use of a plural noun in Hebrew rather than the existence of more than one level in heaven. What is likely is that the plural noun provided the space for the later tradition about multiple levels of heaven to develop. (For further discussion of the levels of heaven see Chapter 4.)

Heaven as the dwelling place of God

We are then left with the question of why the same word can be 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. One of the complexities for us in understanding Hebrew attitudes to the world is that we now view the world in an almost entirely different way.

Cosmology in Genesis 1

Genesis 1 gives us a helpful framework for understanding Hebrew cosmology (see Figure 1 overleaf). 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.⁵

Figure 1 Hebrew cosmology

Particularly important here is the description of the separation of the waters above and the waters below. The NRSV 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.⁶. 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.⁷

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. It is not hard to see how the ancient Hebrews came to this understanding of the world. Anyone who has seen a flood will tell you that flood water does feel chaotic, as though the world as we know it is being swept away.

Although modern science has overturned a view of the world in which the blue sky is seen as holding back the waters above, intimations of this view of the world linger on in phrases like ‘the heavens opened’. In Hebrew cosmology, rain was understood as occurring on those occasions when the windows of heaven were opened and the waters which were being held back came through to fall on the earth once more. ⁸

It is worth noting that the way of viewing the world expressed in Genesis 1 – though present in many of the Psalms and in various places in the prophets – is not the only view of the world in the Hebrew Bible. Genesis 2 presents an alternative view in which the earth is nourished, not threatened by water, and is dependent upon water for its well-being. It is watered by it (2.6) and streams flow out of the Garden of Eden to water both the garden itself and the earth beyond (2.10). This view of the world, though less dominant in the tradition, is nevertheless important and can be found alongside the other at various points in the Hebrew Bible.

The words for heaven

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 fact it is most often used in two particular passages: Genesis 1 and Ezekiel 1 and 10. In Genesis 1, it occurs nine times and is used to describe how the world was created, as outlined above. In the book of Ezekiel, it is used five times to describe not the created order but the design of God’s chariot (Ezek. 1.22, 23, 25, 26; 10.1).

This second usage in Ezekiel helps us to understand something important about the raqia‘. Here the raqia‘ was spread over the head of the winged living creatures and provided a platform upon which God’s throne rested. The chariot, then, seems to mimic the design of the world as a whole: just as God’s throne rested on the raqia‘ of the chariot, so too did it rest on the raqia‘ of the created world. It becomes clear then that the raqia‘ serves not just as the barrier for water but as the place upon which God’s throne could rest. This is further illustrated in Exodus 24 when Moses, Aaron, Nadab, Abihu and 70 of the elders of Israel saw God on the top of Mount Sinai and under his feet ‘there was someth...

Table of contents

• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 In the beginning . . . : heaven and earth
• 2 On the wings of the cherubim: God as king
• 3 Chariots of fire: God’s throne-chariot
• 4 In the presence of God: cherubim, seraphim and the heavenly creatures
• 5 From heaven to earth: angelic messengers
• 6 Heaven opened: communication between heaven and earth
• 7 Caught up into heaven: ascending into heaven
• 8 You shall rise: life, death and resurrection
• 9 Between death and resurrection: what happens while we wait for the end?
• Epilogue: . . . so what?
• Notes
• Select bibliography
• Search items of biblical and ancient texts
• Search items of modern authors
• Search items of subjects