Open Side Menu Search Icon

    Index Downloading...

    The Watchtower, February 1, 1965

    Download: PDF — The Watchtower, February 1, 1965

    The Watchtower—1965

    The Watchtower — February 1, 1965

    Source: jw.org

    Contents

    Work Is a Blessing

    Why Expect God to Listen to Prayer?

    The Dead Who Are in Line for Resurrection

    Part Two

    A Bible Theme We Must Learn

    Aid Others to Become God’s “Men of Good Will”

    Serving as a Soldier of Christ

    Questions From Readers

    Announcements

    Work Is a Blessing

    Work Is a Blessing

    WORK a blessing? Yes, rightly viewed and unless conditions are too burdensome, work is a blessing. And that is true for more than one reason, even as the Scriptures and the facts show.

    The Bible tells us that God and Jesus Christ are workers and that they are happy. And concerning the blessing of work, a wise king of old, Solomon, once said: “Look! The best thing that I myself have seen, which is pretty, is that one should eat and drink and see good for all his hard work with which he works hard under the sun . . . and to rejoice in his hard work.” “It is the gift of God.”—Eccl. 5:18, 19; 3:13.

    For one thing, work is a blessing because by means of it we can honestly supply our needs. More than that, there is more satisfaction in having earned something than in having received it as a gift. There is no question but what the unemployed man who is sincerely looking for work appreciates that work is a blessing. However, if one has the opportunity to work but does not want to, the Bible rule is “neither let him eat.”—2 Thess. 3:10.

    The blessing of work is not limited to its supplying us with what we need in a material way—food, clothing, shelter, recreation, and so forth. We need work for our own well-being, both of body and mind. The Creator endowed us with the capacity for work, both physical and mental, and for true satisfaction and contentment we must make use of the gifts with which we have been endowed. That is why a man who earns his bread primarily by his thinking ability rather than by the use of his muscles finds that for sound health he needs to have some physical exertion.

    Well has it been observed: “Working is as much a necessity to a man as eating and sleeping.” It is, in fact, the best justification for eating and sleeping. As much as we enjoy a weekend or sabbath of rest or a much-needed vacation, we could not enjoy resting indefinitely. Oh, you might think, If only I did not need to go to work Monday morning! Or, If only I had as many weeks of vacation as I could wish! All well and good for a few days or weeks, but before long you would simply long to do something useful.

    We cannot escape it. We need the joy and satisfaction that come from doing good and useful work. In this we are but imaging our Creator, for his Word tells us that, upon the completion of creation: “God saw everything he had made and, look! it was very good.” True, not everyone can have the work he would most like to do. It may be that such work is not in demand, or does not pay sufficiently; or one may not have the necessary qualifications, such as the second violinist who would like to be conducting the orchestra.—Gen. 1:31.

    But each one can take an interest, and should, in the work he finds it necessary to do to earn a livelihood for himself and those dependent upon him. Most important is that your work be honest and need doing. View it as presenting a challenge to you to keep doing ever better work or to do it ever more efficiently, and that whether you are a professional man or a laborer, an office worker or a housekeeper. Experience the joy and satisfaction that come from doing a good job, be it typing a business letter or repairing a piece of machinery, cooking a meal or cleaning rooms.

    Because so many fail to appreciate the blessing that work can bring when viewed in this manner, today more and more the emphasis is solely on the wages or salary received, the fringe benefits and the limited hours. This does not make for happiness but, rather, is self-defeating. How so? Because the more they get the more they want, as can be seen from the ever higher demands of many unions; and the fewer hours spent the fewer they want to work, as can be seen from the current agitation in the United States Congress for a thirty-two-hour week.

    The truth of the foregoing is borne out by many persons engaged in creative work, such as artists and writers. It is also proved true by many professional persons, such as educators and general practitioners, who could turn to some other activity for more pay but who remain in their profession because of the rewards that cannot be measured in dollars and cents.

    Serving to highlight this principle is the policy of the publishers of one of the leading magazines in the United States. According to a former staff writer, it is against their policy to discharge a writer once they have hired him. Instead, if his work is not good enough, they put him to work on some mammoth project that they never intend to use, and eventually the writer quits out of sheer frustration and feeling of uselessness. Just receiving the pay check was not enough; the writer also needed the inner sense of satisfaction of producing something worth while.

    But nowhere is it more true that work is a blessing than in the work of the man of God, the Christian ministry, for does not the principle also apply here that “there is more happiness in giving than there is in receiving”? Surely! And as Jesus also said: “My food is for me to do the work of him that sent me.” While many observers shrink from the thought of going from house to house or standing on street corners preaching the good news of God’s kingdom, those who wholeheartedly engage in it find a blessing in it that cannot be compared with anything else.—Acts 20:35; John 4:34.

    So, since work needs to be done and you need to work to supply your needs as well as for your own well-being, take an interest in your work, get joy and satisfaction out of doing good work. Then you will agree that work is a blessing, even as the Creator arranged for it to be!

    Why Expect God to Listen to Prayer?

    Why Expect God to Listen to Prayer?

    PRAYER, without doubt, is the most common of all religious practices. The religious man, whether an Australian aborigine or a modern scientist, makes use of prayer. Hindu and African voodoo worshipers, Moslems and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, as well as the Christian witnesses of Jehovah, all pray. Indicative of the interest in the subject is the fact that in the library of a well-known New York City theological seminary there are 1,200 books on the subject.

    Especially in times of emergency do people start to pray. As one Sunday-morning animated religious cartoon character on television put it: “I was so frightened I even started to pray!” Typical was the reaction of the wife of the commander of the United States atom-powered submarine, the Thresher. Upon hearing that the Navy had been out of touch with that submarine for eight hours, she said: “Then we had better start praying.” No wonder General Eisenhower once observed, “There are no atheists in fox holes.”

    Yes, man, especially in his extremity, instinctively turns to some power greater than he is, to God, for help. But when we consider how great the God of the universe is, the Creator of the infinite expanse with its numberless heavenly bodies, we may well wonder why he would be interested in puny man, a tiny speck on a tiny speck. That is, in fact, the attitude of the deist, who, while acknowledging the existence of God as the Creator, denies that God gave man any revelation of himself and that he is at all interested in man’s lot. According to the deist, God is “an absentee-God, who, once and for all having wound up the world-machine, has left it to run its own course and to work out its own self-evolution.”

    But the Creator did not leave man without a guide. Why should he discriminate against his highest earthly creation? He endowed all the lower animals with infallible instincts to guide them, did he not? Certainly, then, he would also provide an infallible guide for man, and that he did in his Word, the Bible. The very fact that man has the qualities of love, wisdom and justice argues that God would have the same, and, having the same, he would not create man with an inquiring and reasoning mind and then not satisfy that mind with the answers that it needed for its own contentment and happiness. Man does not need to know the length of a light-year to be happy, but he does need to know his purpose of existence, where he came from and what his destiny is. And only a revelation can give him this information, which the Bible does.

    The Bible also gives us a number of reasons why we may expect God to listen to prayer. And let it not be overlooked that prayer not only includes petitions, supplications and requests, but also praise and thanksgiving.

    GOD COMMANDS US TO PRAY

    First of all, we may expect God to listen to prayer because he himself commands that his people pray to him, and his Word gives many examples of faithful servants of God praying; so much so that the Bible may well be said to be The Book of Prayer. Thus the psalmist commands: “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem!” And Jesus told his apostles: “Pray continually, that you may not enter into temptation.” The apostle Paul repeatedly urged those to whom he wrote to pray and to continue in prayer: “Persevere in prayer.” “Pray incessantly.” And the disciple James, a half brother of Jesus, wrote: “Therefore openly confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may get healed. A righteous man’s supplication, when it is at work, has much force.”—Ps. 122:6, RS; Matt. 26:41; Rom. 12:12; 1 Thess. 5:17; Jas. 5:16.

    As for examples of prayer, we find these in the Bible from the first book to the last. Abel’s sacrificial offering might be said to have been a prayer acted out, and it most likely was accompanied by a verbal petition. And the apostle John closes the book of Revelation with two brief prayers. And what a man of prayer David was! Of his more than seventy psalms, nearly all are either prayers or contain prayers in the form of praise directed to God, thanksgiving and/or petition.

    Prayer occupied a prominent place in the life of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Repeatedly we read of his praying, when he was baptized, when he fed the multitudes, just before he chose the twelve apostles, at which time he continued all night in prayer, as well as of his going off by himself time and again to meditate and pray. Especially do we note his praying on the last day that he was on earth as a man: at the institution of the memorial of his death, then afterward the prayer recorded at John 17, three times in the garden of Gethsemane and twice on the torture stake.

    Then there is the example of the apostle Paul. He touches on the subject of prayer some seventy-five times in his letters. How important he considered praying can be seen by his urging Christians to pray right after he had told them to put on the whole armor of God: “With every form of prayer and supplication you carry on prayer on every occasion . . . and with supplication in behalf of all the holy ones, also for me, that ability to speak may be given me with the opening of my mouth, with all freeness of speech to make known the sacred secret of the good news. . . . that I may speak in connection with it with boldness as I ought to speak.” Did King David, Jesus Christ and the apostle Paul expect God to listen to prayer?—Eph. 6:18-20.

    FOR THE SAKE OF HIS NAME

    The fact that God commands us to pray and fills his Word, the Bible, with examples of his servants praying should suffice to show that they can expect God to listen to prayers. But, it may be asked, Why? Why should this great Eternal One, the Most High and Universal Sovereign, listen to the prayers of his servants? One overriding or compelling reason is that the reputation of his name is involved. Thus Moses repeatedly pleaded with God successfully on the basis of God’s name and fame being involved: “Why, O Jehovah, should your anger blaze against your people. . . ? Why should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent he brought them out in order to kill them’?” “Were you to put this people to death as one man, then the nations who have heard of your fame would certainly say this, ‘Because of Jehovah’s not being able to bring this people into the land about which he swore to them he proceeded to slaughter them in the wilderness.”’—Ex. 32:11, 12; Num. 14:15, 16.

    Thus also Jehovah listened to Joshua when, after the defeat at Ai, he prayed: “Excuse me, O Jehovah, but what can I say after Israel has turned his back before his enemies? And the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it, and they will certainly surround us and cut our name off from the earth; and what will you do for your great name?” The same was true of the prayer that Hezekiah, faithful king of the two-tribe kingdom of Judah, offered when confronted with the taunts of the sneering king of Assyria, Sennacherib: “And now, O Jehovah our God, save us, please, out of his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you, O Jehovah, are God alone.”—Josh. 7:8, 9; 2 Ki. 19:19.

    Then again, at Psalm 79:9, we read the prayer: “Help us, O God of our salvation, for the sake of the glory of your name.” And so did Daniel pray, as recorded at Daniel 9:19: “O Jehovah, do hear. . . . Do not delay, for your own sake, O my God, for your own name has been called upon your city and upon your people.” Many more examples could be given, but these should be sufficient to show that Jehovah God can be expected to listen to prayer, particularly when it is related to the vindication of his name.

    BECAUSE OF HAVING KEPT INTEGRITY

    Another reason why God’s servants can expect God to listen to their prayers is his love of righteousness: “Jehovah is righteous; he does love righteous acts.” Because of this we read: “Jehovah is far away from the wicked ones, but the prayer of the righteous ones he hears.” Those who follow an upright course can come to God on the basis of their having kept integrity with God.—Ps. 11:7; Prov. 15:29.

    Thus Job made an eloquent plea to God on the basis of his having followed a righteous course. (Job Chapters 29-31) Likewise King David, in praying for God’s blessing at the time of gathering materials for the building of the temple, said: “I well know, O my God, that you are an examiner of the heart, and that it is in rectitude that you take pleasure. I, for my part, in the uprightness of my heart have voluntarily offered all these things.”—1 Chron. 29:17.

    In the same vein we find Nehemiah praying: “Do remember me, O my God, concerning this, and do not wipe out my acts of loving-kindness that I have performed in connection with the house of my God and the guardianship of it.” The writer of the letter to the Hebrews, doubtless the apostle Paul, likewise shows the connection between purposeful prayer and right conduct: “Carry on prayer for us, for we trust we have an honest conscience, as we wish to conduct ourselves honestly in all things.” In fact, this very same principle is implied in the model prayer Jesus gave his disciples: “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” Yes, because of Jehovah’s love for righteousness all who are lovers of God’s righteousness and seek to practice it can expect God to listen to their prayers.—Neh. 13:14; Heb. 13:18; Matt. 6:12.

    PRAYING ON THE BASIS OF INHERITED SIN

    One of the basic requests imperfect creatures can make in their prayers is that God may forgive them their sins. As the apostle John expresses it: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous so as to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”—1 John 1:9.

    When it comes to praying for God’s mercy and forgiveness of sin, God’s servants can use the fact of their inherited sin and imperfection. Thus David pleaded with Jehovah to forgive his sin against Uriah: “Look! With error I was brought forth with birth pains, and in sin my mother conceived me.” King Solomon took note of the same thing in his prayer at the dedication of the temple of Jehovah: “In case they sin against you (for there is no man that does not sin), and you have to be incensed at them and abandon them to the enemy, . . . and they indeed come to their senses . . . and they actually return and make request to you for favor . . . you must forgive your people who had sinned against you.”—Ps. 51:5; 1 Ki. 8:46-50.

    In fact, Jehovah himself tells that he takes man’s inherited imperfection into consideration in dealing with him: “Never again shall I call down evil upon the ground on man’s account, because the inclination of the heart of man is bad from his youth up; and never again shall I deal every living thing a blow just as I have done.” God’s servants, therefore, have ample reason for expecting God to listen to their prayers when they ask for mercy and forgiveness on the basis of inherited weakness, because of the original sin of Adam.—Gen. 8:21; Rom. 5:12.

    JEHOVAH’S LOVING-KINDNESS

    And lastly, God’s servants can always plead their cause with Jehovah, that is, expect him to listen to their prayers, on the basis of his being a God of loving-kindness and mercy. Thus, when Jehovah was ready to wipe out the Israelites because of their having rebelled, Moses pleaded, not only on the basis of Jehovah’s name as being involved, but also on the basis of his being a God of loving-kindness: “And now, please, let your power become great, O Jehovah, just as you have spoken, saying, ‘Jehovah, slow to anger and abundant in loving-kindness, pardoning error and transgression . . . Forgive, please, the error of this people according to the greatness of your loving-kindness.”’ (Num. 14:17-19) Yes, Jehovah had told Moses that He is a God of mercy and loving-kindness, when Moses had asked to see his glory, and so now Moses could properly remind Jehovah of that fact. King David pleaded on this basis (Ps. 51:1) and so did the prophet Daniel on behalf of his people: “Incline your ear, O my God, and hear . . . for not according to our righteous acts are we letting our entreaties fall before you, but according to your many mercies.”—Dan. 9:18.

    No question about it, the Bible does not reveal an absentee-God such as the deist would have us believe that the great Creator is. No, he is interested in his creatures, and that for good reasons. He therefore invites them, yes, commands them to come to him in prayer, in praise, thanksgiving and with supplications. He welcomes their prayers on the basis of his name and because of their having kept integrity. Furthermore, he lets them plead on the basis of their human imperfection and inherited sin and also on the basis of his glorying in showing loving-kindness.

    The Bible speaks of God as the “Hearer of prayer.” But that does not mean he listens and favorably acts on all prayers, for, as is implicit in the foregoing, one must pray to the one true God and in the right manner and about right things to be heard by Him. Those meeting these conditions will find in their own lives that God is indeed the “Hearer of prayer,” that is, hearing in the sense of listening and answering prayer. Happy are those who thus pray!—Ps. 65:2.

    The Dead Who Are in Line for Resurrection

    The Dead Who Are in Line for Resurrection

    “As regards the resurrection of the dead, did you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying ‘I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob’? He is the God, not of the dead, but of the living.”—Matt. 22:31, 32.

    1. In resurrection time, why may many be surprised at being brought forth?

    MANY men and women of ancient history looked forward to a resurrection of the dead. Countless others had no knowledge of such a thing as a resurrection and had no such expectation. Their religions taught them otherwise. Will they be surprised with a resurrection from the dead when Almighty God uses his power during the reign of his kingdom over the earth?

    2, 3. (a) What ancient book has authority to answer that question, and how do its opening and its closing chapters show that? (b) What does its final statement on the resurrection say?

    2 Only one ancient book of religion has the authority to answer that question. It is the only book that teaches such a thing as the resurrection of the dead by means of God’s kingdom, in which kingdom his most beloved Son will rule as king for the blessing of all mankind. This unusual religious book is the Holy Bible, which even today, nineteen hundred years since its completion, ranks first among all the books on the earth, religious or nonreligious. In its opening fifty chapters the Holy Bible points to a resurrection of the human dead. In its last twenty-two chapters it speaks of (1) the resurrection of the faithful Son of God, Jesus Christ, (2) the resurrection of his faithful disciples in what is called “the first resurrection,” and (3) the resurrection of mankind in general. (See Revelation 1:17, 18, 5; 2:10; 20:4-6, 12-14.) In that final statement of the resurrection the writer of that last section of the Bible says:

    3 “And I saw a great white throne and the one seated on it. From before him the earth and the heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and scrolls were opened. But another scroll was opened; it is the scroll of life. And the dead were judged out of those things written in the scrolls according to their deeds. And the sea gave up those dead in it, and death and Haʹdes gave up those dead in them, and they were judged individually according to their deeds. And death and Haʹdes were hurled into the lake of fire. This means the second death, the lake of fire.”—Rev. 20:11-15.

    4. What kind of people did John there see resurrected, and what fact about supremacy will they come to know at least then?

    4 Notice, in Re 20 verse 12 above quoted, that the writer, the Christian apostle John, does not say that those resurrected are either good or bad. He does not say, ‘I saw the dead, the good and the bad,’ but says: “I saw the dead, the great and the small.” In other words, people of all ranks of life. But whether great or small, they all came in for a judgment before the throne of the Judge of all creation, the Most High and Almighty God. At that time, if they have never known it before, they will know what Psalm 83:18 (King James Version) says to this supreme Judge, who is God: “That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most high over all the earth.” Thus the dead cannot escape a judgment by the Most High God named Jehovah.

    5. In writing Revelation 20:11-14, why did not John as a Jew use the word Sheol?

    5 Death is the state of being dead. But from what place will the dead ones about whom Revelation 20:11-14 prophesies come forth? Re 20 Verse 13 says: “And the sea gave up those dead in it, and death and Haʹdes gave up those dead in them.” All of us know what the sea is and know that many have found a watery grave in it. But what is Haʹdes? To most people this has been explained incorrectly, that is, not Biblically. The apostle John, although being a Christian, was a Hebrew or Jew by birth. He wrote Revelation 20:11-14 in the international language of his day, the common Greek, and so he used the Greek word Haʹdes. But if he had written in Hebrew, John would have used the Hebrew word Sheol. In fact, nine modern Hebrew translations of the Revelation to John use the word Sheol; and the Syriac translation, which was read in the Middle East, uses the related word Shiul.

    6. In the complete Bible, how are Sheol and Haʹdes used, and by finding out who are there, what can we also know?

    6 In other words, in the complete Holy Bible made up of the inspired Hebrew Scriptures and the inspired Greek Scriptures, Haʹdes and Sheol mean the same thing. Haʹdes or Sheol means the common grave of mankind dead in the dust of the ground. In fact, the Authorized or King James Bible Version translates the Hebrew word Sheol thirty-one times as “the grave.” So, now, by finding out from the Holy Bible who it says are in Sheol or Haʹdes, we can know who will be resurrected from there, aside from the sea.

    THOSE WHO ARE IN SHEOL (HAʹDES)

    7, 8. (a) In what connection was the word Sheol reported as being used in the Middle East in the eighteenth century B.C.E.? (b) In what connection was the word Sheol used soon afterward in Egypt?

    7 More than seventeen hundred years before our Common Era people in the Middle East used the word Sheol to mean the common grave of those dying on land, not of those dying at sea. In the year 1750 B.C.E., when Joseph was kidnaped and sold into Egypt, his responsible brothers reported that he had been killed. So his father Jacob (or Israel) refused to take comfort from his other children and said: “I shall go down mourning to my son into Sheol!” (Gen. 37:35) Twenty-two years later nine of Jacob’s older sons wanted to take his youngest son Benjamin down to Egypt to help them to get food from there for the famine. At first Jacob refused and said: “My son will not go down with you men, because his brother is dead and he has been left by himself. If a fatal accident should befall him on the way on which you would go, then you would certainly bring down my gray hairs with grief to Sheol.” (Gen. 42:38) Later, Jacob’s fourth son Judah repeated those very words of his father when Benjamin seemed in danger of being kept as a slave down in Egypt. (Gen. 44:29) Judah also said:

    8 “Then it is certain to occur that as soon as he sees that the boy is not there he will simply die, and your slaves will indeed bring down the gray hairs of your slave our father with grief to Sheol.”—Gen. 44:31. (The Greek LXX translates Sheol as Haʹdes.)

    9. On his deathbed, with whom did Jacob say that he must lie?

    9 At that critical time Jacob’s beloved son Joseph was found to be alive in Egypt as its Food Administrator. So there was a happy reunion there of all the sons of Jacob. The aged man Jacob was sent for and brought down to Egypt to live there the rest of his one hundred and forty-seven years. As his death drew near, Jacob said to his son Joseph, the prime minister of Egypt: “I must lie with my fathers, and you must carry me out of Egypt and bury me in their grave.” (Gen. 47:30) Joseph swore to do this.

    10. (a) To whom did the dying Jacob tell his sons he was being gathered? (b) On dying and being buried, where did Jacob go, and to whom?

    10 On his deathbed Jacob blessed all twelve of his sons and said to them: “I am being gathered to my people. Bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah that is in front of Mamre in the land of Canaan, the field that Abraham purchased from Ephron the Hittite for the possession of a burial place. There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah.” (Gen. 49:29-31, 33) This last request of Jacob was carried out, and thus the earthly remains of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob came to rest together in the same burial place, the cave of Machpelah, in what became the territory of Judah. (Gen. 50:12-14) Thus Jacob finally went down, not to his son Joseph, but to his forefathers, in Sheol.

    11. (a) Where was Abraham in the days of Jesus Christ on earth? (b) From what information do we know that Jesus was speaking a parable in Luke 16:22-26, involving Abraham?

    11 From the Holy Bible it is thus established that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are in Sheol. Many centuries later Abraham was still there when his descendant, Jesus Christ, was on earth and told about a “certain rich man” and a “certain beggar named Lazarus.” Knowing as we do what the Holy Bible teaches about Sheol or Haʹdes, we know that what Jesus said about this “rich man” and this “beggar” must have been a parable or illustration. Thus Jesus talked in picture language, even using Abraham as a picture. To prove this to yourself, note how Jesus worded this story, in Luke 16:22-26, American Standard Version Bible:

    12. How did Jesus involve Abraham and Haʹdes in this parable?

    12 “And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and that he was carried away by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: and the rich man also died, and was buried. And in Haʹdes [Sheol, Hebrew; Shiul, Syriac] he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am in anguish in this flame. But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things: but now here he is comforted, and thou art in anguish. And besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, that they that would pass from hence to you may not be able, and that none may cross over from thence to us.”

    13. In testing out whether Jesus’ words there are to be taken literally, what questions should the reader ask himself?

    13 Now let the reader ask himself, Did Jesus really mean that the angels carried the dead body of Lazarus, full of sores, to the cave of Machpelah in front of the city of Hebron and there laid the dead Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham, crowding out Abraham’s dead wife Sarah? Furthermore, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are all in Haʹdes or Sheol. So did Jesus really mean that there is flaming fire in Haʹdes or Sheol, the place in which, Jesus said, the dead and buried “rich man” found himself? And does that flaming fire torment certain ones in Haʹdes or Sheol and not torment others? Can those in Haʹdes or Sheol see one another and talk back and forth across a “great gulf”? And is there water down in Haʹdes or Sheol into which a person can dip the finger?

    14. (a) Are the “rich man” and “Lazarus” reported today to be buried at the traditional burial place of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? (b) With reference to Jesus’ parable, what does the Bible teach is not so in the literal Haʹdes or Sheol?

    14 Many religious Bible readers say that Jesus was not telling a parable or pictorial illustration but was telling things as they actually are. This makes Jesus ridiculous. It makes him talk contrary to the rest of the Bible as to what it has to say about Haʹdes or Sheol. Go, please, to the Middle East today, to the traditional location of the burial place of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the city of Hebron, under a Mohammedan mosque. Will they tell you that either the beggar Lazarus or the “certain rich man” (the so-called Diʹves) lies buried there? No! Furthermore, the Holy Bible says that Haʹdes or Sheol is not the location of Paradise for some dead ones and of fiery torment for others, but that it is the place of silence and of inactivity in every respect; that the dead ones there do not speak even to laud and praise God, and that there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in Haʹdes or Sheol.—Isa. 38:18; Eccl. 9:5, 10; Ps. 6:5.

    15. How did Jesus use Abraham in the parable, and why appropriately so?

    15 The honest-hearted Bible readers have eyes of understanding to see that in Luke 16:19-31 Jesus Christ was telling a parable or pictorial illustration. Such readers see that Jesus was using Abraham as a picture of the heavenly Father, Jehovah God, who made the promise to his earthly friend Abraham to bless all the families of the earth by means of Abraham’s seed or offspring. Just as Abraham at God’s command presented his son Isaac for human sacrifice, so Jehovah God actually sacrificed his Son Jesus Christ, the real promised Seed of Abraham for the blessing of all the nations of the earth.—Gen. 22:1-18; John 3:16.

    16. Whom do the rich man and Lazarus therefore picture, and on what is this explanation based?

    16 Accordingly, the “certain rich man” and the “certain beggar named Lazarus” were not literal men; they simply pictured two classes of people. The one class died to its favored position with the Greater Abraham, Jehovah God, and thereafter had a tormenting religious experience on earth. The other class died to its unfavorable religious condition and was conducted by angelic power into the favor of the Greater Abraham, Jehovah God, through his sacrificed Son, Jesus Christ. This understanding and explanation of Jesus’ prophetic parable is based upon the actual historical experience of the two general religious classes among the natural descendants of the patriarch Abraham in Jesus’ day.a

    17. What are Abraham, Isaac and Jacob now awaiting, and how did Abraham show his faith in this?

    17 Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in Sheol are awaiting the fulfillment of Revelation 20:12-14 by their resurrection from the dead, when Sheol will give them up. Long ago when Abraham obediently attempted to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac, he displayed his own faith in the resurrection of the dead. Hebrews 11:17-19 tells us so in these words: “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, as good as offered up Isaac, and the man that had gladly received the promises attempted to offer up his only-begotten son, although it had been said to him: ‘What will be called “your seed” will be through Isaac.’ But he reckoned that God was able to raise him up even from the dead; and from there he did receive him also in an illustrative way.”

    18. When Abraham thus received back Isaac, what did this illustrate, in fulfillment of what verse of Psalms?

    18 Thus, when Abraham received his son Isaac back alive from the altar and was provided with a ram to offer as a substitute sacrifice, it illustrated how the Greater Abraham, Jehovah God, would receive his only-begotten Son Jesus Christ from the dead by a resurrection, thereby fulfilling Psalm 16:10: “Thou wilt not leave my soul to Sheol; neither wilt thou suffer thy holy one to see corruption [or, the pit].”—AS, margin.

    19, 20. (a) How is the certainty of the resurrection of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob proved by Jesus’ discussion of resurrection? (b) What purpose of God did Jesus thus show?

    19 The coming resurrection of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is a certainty. The words of Jesus Christ strengthen this certainty. The religious sect of the Sadducees of Jesus’ day did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. To try to prove that the resurrection would be an unreasonable thing, they put a tricky question to Jesus, one having to do with a woman seven times married.

    20 To show that their problem would furnish no difficulty for God in the resurrection, Jesus said to these Sadducees: “You are mistaken, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God; for in the resurrection neither do men marry nor are women given in marriage, but are as angels in heaven. As regards the resurrection of the dead, did you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, ‘I am the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob’? He is the God, not of the dead, but of the living.” (Matt. 22:29-32) In other words, if those three patriarchs were to stay dead forever, God would not have said regarding Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: “I am the God.” He would properly have said, ‘I was the God.’ But, knowing His own purpose to have those three faithful men “living” again by means of the resurrection, Jehovah said: “I am the God” of them.—Mark 12:24-27.

    21. In what sense were the three patriarchs “living” to God?

    21 That Abraham, Isaac and Jacob would live again by a resurrection from the dead was so definitely fixed that God spoke to Moses as if they were already alive, “living.” According to Luke 20:37, 38, Jesus said: “But that the dead are raised up even Moses disclosed, in the account about the thornbush, when he calls Jehovah ‘the God of Abraham and God of Isaac and God of Jacob.’ He is a God, not of the dead, but of the living, for they are all living to him.” At the time that Jehovah God spoke to Moses at the burning thornbush in the wilderness of Arabia, Jehovah did not mean that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were then alive. If they had been then alive in the days of Moses, there would have been no need for resurrecting them from Sheol or Haʹdes and Jehovah’s words would have been no proof that there will be a resurrection of the dead. But only because it was God’s purpose that there be a resurrection, He spoke of the three patriarchs as though they were already living. From the standpoint of the coming resurrection they all are “living” to God.

    WHAT OF THE FOREFATHERS?

    22. (a) What questions come up regarding Abraham’s forefathers, and how are they answered? (b) To whom was Abraham to go at death, and when was this fulfilled?

    22 At this point, however, the question of Abraham’s ancestors or forefathers comes up for attention. These being dead now for thousands of years, where are they? Will they also have a resurrection? How shall we settle these questions? By the written Word of God! According to Genesis 15:15, Jehovah God said to Abraham in the Promised Land: “As for you, you will go to your forefathers in peace; you will be buried at a good old age.” The fulfillment of this came ninety years later, concerning which we read: “Then Abraham expired and died in a good old age, old and satisfied, and was gathered to his people. So Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of Machpelah in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite that is in front of Mamre, the field that Abraham had purchased from the sons of Heth. There Abraham was buried, and also Sarah his wife.”—Gen. 25:8-10.

    23. To what people was Abraham gathered at death, and what, therefore, would thus also be true of those people?

    23 Thus, as God had said, Abraham went to his forefathers in peace; he was gathered to his people. Who were Abraham’s forefathers, and who were his people? Abraham’s immediate father was Terah of the city of Ur of the Chaldeans; and chapter eleven of Genesis lists the forefathers of Abraham all the way back, through nine generations, to Shem, the son of Noah. Noah died two years before Abraham was born, whereas Shem died only twenty-five years before Abraham died. To these men as his people Abraham was gathered, and to these as his forefathers Abraham went in peace at death. What, then, does this mean? This, that, if at death Abraham went to Sheol or Haʹdes, to which place Isaac and Jacob followed him, then Abraham’s people or forefathers back to Noah must also be in Sheol or Haʹdes, and there they too are awaiting the resurrection of the dead under God’s kingdom by his Christ.

    24. To whom was Abraham’s son Ishmael gathered at death, and where?

    24 Isaac’s half-brother Ishmael was the son of Abraham by his Egyptian concubine Hagar. Ishmael lived one hundred and thirty-seven years, and then, as Genesis 25:17 tells us, “he expired and died and was gathered to his people.” His people included his father Abraham, whom both Ishmael and Isaac buried ninety years previously. Ishmael, too, was thus gathered to Sheol or Haʹdes, the common grave of the human dead who lie in earth’s dust.

    25. To whom was Moses’ brother Aaron gathered at death, and at what time?

    25 God’s written Word mentions the gathering of others to their forefathers at death. Just a hundred and fifteen years after the patriarch Jacob died down in Egypt, his great-great-grandson Aaron was born and three years later Aaron’s brother, who became the prophet Moses. When Aaron was a hundred and twenty-three years old God said: “Aaron will be gathered to his people, for he will not enter into the land that I shall certainly give to the sons of Israel.” So God’s high priest Aaron died on Mount Hor east of the Promised Land. (Num. 20:23-29) Later that same year Jehovah said to the prophet Moses: “You must be gathered to your people, yes, you, just as Aaron your brother was gathered.”—Num. 27:13.

    26. Where was Moses gathered to his people, and where is he now?

    26 Before this occurred, Jehovah had Moses execute vengeance upon the enemy Midianites. (Num. 31:1, 2) On the day of Moses’ death in 1473 B.C.E., Jehovah told him to climb Mount Nebo and view the Promised Land from there and then be gathered to his people. (Deut. 32:48-52) Moses obeyed this command; and the postmortem report about him says: “After that Moses the servant of Jehovah died there in the land of Moab at the order of Jehovah. And he proceeded to bury him in the valley in the land of Moab in front of Beth-peor, and nobody has come to know his grave down to this day.” (Deut. 34:5, 6) But wherever Moses’ grave was, he went to Sheol or Haʹdes. From there God can deliver him and also Aaron through a resurrection by means of Jesus Christ the King.

    27. To whom were Joshua and his contemporary Israelites gathered at death, and to what did they then descend?

    27 Who succeeded Moses as the visible judge of God’s chosen nation? It was Joshua the son of Nun. He led the chosen people across the Jordan River into the Promised Land. He was faithful to God until he died. Concerning Joshua and others of his day Judges 2:8-10 tells us: “Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of Jehovah, died at the age of a hundred and ten years. So they buried him in the territory of his inheritance in Timnath-heres in the mountainous region of Ephraim, on the north of Mount Gaash. And all that generation too were gathered to their fathers, and another generation began to rise after them.” The gathering of all these to their fathers signifies that they all descended to Sheol, Haʹdes.

    28. (a) With whom did King David lie down at his death? (b) Where did the apostle Peter report David to be on Pentecost of 33 C.E.?

    28 Centuries later David of Bethlehem became king of all twelve tribes of Israel. He was the first Jewish king to rule at Jerusalem. In a number of the psalms that David wrote he speaks about deliverance from Sheol or Haʹdes. (Pss. 16:10; 18:5; 30:3; 86:13) He lived to see his wise son Solomon installed as his successor on the throne of Jerusalem. “Then David lay down with his forefathers and was buried in the city of David.” (1 Ki. 2:10; Acts 13:36) He joined his forefathers in Sheol or Haʹdes. Long afterward, on the festival day of Shabuoth (Pentecost) of 33 C.E., David was reported to be still in Sheol or Haʹdes. On that day the Christian apostle Peter reported that Psalm Sixteen Ps 16 (composed by David) had then been fulfilled in David’s promised descendant, Jesus Christ. As Peter said concerning David: “He saw beforehand and spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that neither was he forsaken in Haʹdes nor did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus God resurrected, of which fact we are all witnesses. . . . Actually David did not ascend to the heavens.” (Acts 2:1-34) According to Peter’s words David’s resurrection is yet future.

    29, 30. (a) To whom did the prophetess Huldah say that King Josiah would be gathered, and how was this fulfilled? (b) Were all the kings prior to Josiah buried In the same place?

    29 One of David’s faithful successors to the throne of Jerusalem was Josiah of the seventh century before our Common Era. By turning back his people to the law of Jehovah God, Josiah tried to do what he could to prevent national calamity from coming upon them. When he inquired through the prophetess Huldah what the future held for his nation, Josiah was given this promise from God: “Here I am gathering you to your forefathers, and you will certainly be gathered to your own graveyard in peace, and your eyes will not look upon all the calamity that I am bringing upon this place.”—2 Ki. 22:20.

    30 Josiah died from a wound received in battle at Megiddo. So it was not during the terrible calamity that was to come upon Jerusalem. After Josiah was fatally wounded, “his servants took him down from the chariot and had him ride in the second war chariot that was his and brought him to Jerusalem. Thus he died and was buried in the graveyard of his forefathers; and all Judah and Jerusalem were mourning over Josiah.” (2 Chron. 35:22-24) Not all the kings of Jerusalem who preceded Josiah were buried in the same place at Jerusalem, in the “burial places of the kings of Israel.”—2 Chron. 28:27; 21:20; 24:25; 32:33; 16:14.

    31, 32. (a) For such ancient personages to be gathered to their people, what about their individual graves? (b) From where will they all come forth in common, and how?

    31 For all these kings and patriarchs to be gathered to their people or to go to their forefathers and to lie with their forefathers, it did not mean that they all had to be buried in the same grave or tomb. Certainly when the patriarch Abraham died and was “gathered to his people,” he was not buried in the same grave with his father Terah, who died up north in Haran in the Mesopotamian valley, nor in the same graveyard or cemetery with Noah and Shem.

    32 Certainly when high priest Aaron died at Mount Hor and his brother Moses died at Mount Nebo and they were gathered to their people, they were not buried with their forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the cave at Machpelah near Hebron in the Promised Land. Yet they were all gathered to Sheol or Haʹdes. They all lie dead in the one Sheol or Haʹdes; and from there, Revelation 20:13 tells us, the dead will come forth in a resurrection.

    [Footnotes]

    In the book What Has Religion Done for Mankind? see Chapter 19 entitled “The Poor Transferred to Abraham’s Bosom,” pages 246-256, and page 307, paragraph 11.

    Part Two

    Part Two

    1. (a) Who did Paul say to Governor Felix would come forth in a resurrection? (b) How can we make sure whether such kinds of persons are in line for resurrection?

    ONCE the Christian apostle Paul spoke in court before the Roman Governor Felix, who did not believe in the Bible and its teaching of a resurrection. Paul said: “I am rendering sacred service to the God of my forefathers, as I believe all the things set forth in the Law and written in the Prophets; and I have hope toward God, which hope these men themselves also entertain, that there is going to be a resurrection of both the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Acts 24:14, 15) Well, then, does the Bible teach that there are unrighteous persons in Sheol or Haʹdes, which place will be emptied of all its dead by God’s kingdom? We can make sure of the answer to this question. How? By learning who else are in Sheol (Haʹdes) and what the Bible has to say about their morality and their position during their past earthly life.

    UNRIGHTEOUS PERSONS ALSO IN SHEOL (HAʹDES)

    2. How, in the book of Numbers, does Moses use the word Sheol in calling down judgment upon three rebels and their households?

    2 The Hebrew word Sheol (Greek LXX, Haʹdes) occurs four times in the first book of the Bible, called Genesis and written by the prophet Moses. The next occurrences of Sheol are in the fourth book of the Bible, called Numbers, also written by Moses. Twice the word is there used, in connection with the households of the Israelites Korah, Dathan and Abiram. Those three men became rebellious against Jehovah, and so he used his prophet Moses to call down his judgment upon them. First the other Israelites were told to get away from the tabernacles of those three rebels and their households. Then Moses showed that the judgment would be from God by saying: “If it is something created that Jehovah will create, and the ground has to open its mouth and swallow up them and everything that belongs to them and they have to go down alive into Sheol [Haʹdes], you will then know for certain that these men have treated Jehovah disrespectfully.”—Num. 16:20-30.

    3. So what punishment did Moses ask to come upon those condemned ones, and where did they go at their execution?

    3 Notice that the prophet Moses did not pray or ask for those three family groups to go down into everlasting destruction. He did not call for the worst punishment possible to be executed upon them. He asked for the ground beneath them to open up and swallow them down alive and bury them out of sight, that in this way they might go down “into Sheol.” Did they go to Sheol (Haʹdes), or to a worse place? The very next verses (Num. 16:31-33) tell us, saying: “And it came about that as soon as he had finished speaking all these words, the ground that was under them began to be split apart. And the earth proceeded to open its mouth and to swallow up them and their households and all humankind that belonged to Korah and all the goods. So down they went, and all who belonged to them, alive into Sheol [Haʹdes, LXX], and the earth went covering them over, so that they perished from the midst of the congregation.”

    4, 5. (a) How was Korah himself executed at that time? (b) Who of those households were spared, and why?

    4 Apparently the leading man Korah was not with those who went down alive in this manner into Sheol. He was a Levite and evidently was in the courtyard of the tabernacle of worship among the two hundred and fifty Levites who sided with Korah against Moses and Aaron. “And a fire came out from Jehovah and proceeded to consume the two hundred and fifty men offering the incense.”—Num. 16:35.

    5 Thus by the miraculous splitting of the ground and by miraculous fire those three rebels and their households were cleared out from the congregation of Israel at about the same time. Sheol or Haʹdes holds them. The sons of Korah did not side in with their father and hence were not burned up. As Numbers 26:9-11 tells us: “However, the sons of Korah did not die.” In support of this, see also the superscriptions of Psalms 42-49, 84, 85, 87, 88.

    6. According to Deuteronomy 32:22, how far-reaching is the expression of God’s anger, and how does Amos 9:2 agree with this?

    6 In the Bible’s fifth book, called Deuteronomy, Moses used the word Sheol. In his farewell song to the congregation of Israel, Moses warned them about how thoroughly God would express his fiery anger against those who incite him to jealousy by their false worship. In giving this warning Jehovah God says through Moses: “A fire has been ignited in my anger and it will burn down to Sheol, the lowest place, and it will consume the earth and its produce and will set ablaze the foundations of mountains.” (Deut. 32:22) In pictorial language this warns us that Jehovah’s fiery anger goes down to the very roots of things. It is so thorough in its execution that if people try to dig as far down into the earth as Sheol in an attempt to escape, they will be overtaken by Jehovah’s searching anger. The reach of his ability to execute destructive judgment goes as far as earthly man can go. (Amos 9:2) Jerusalem was a city built upon a mountaintop, but God’s expression of anger reached her and caused her destruction.

    7. Against whom were Korah, Dathan and Abiram directly speaking, and so why would it have otherwise gone far worse for their rebellion?

    7 In the above-mentioned cases of the Israelites Korah, Dathan and Abiram, we must remember that they were rebelling and speaking against typical or prophetic figures. Both Moses as prophet and his brother Aaron as high priest were types of Jesus Christ in similar offices. (Deut. 18:15-19; Acts 3:20-23; Heb. 3:1, 2; 5:4-6; 9:23-26) When Jesus was on earth and was being spoken against he said: “Whoever speaks a word against the Son of man, it will be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the holy spirit, it will not be forgiven him, no, not in the present system of things nor in that to come.” (Matt. 12:32) Korah, Dathan and Abiram were speaking against the two men, Moses and Aaron, who were types or prophetic figures of the Son of man, Jesus Christ. Had that not been so, it might have gone far worse with them than merely to descend with their households into Sheol or Haʹdes.

    8. How did King David use language like that of Moses when speaking to Solomon concerning the Benjaminite Shimei?

    8 Another man who used language like that of the prophet Moses was David, the first Jewish king of Jerusalem. He also was a type or prophetic figure of Jesus Christ, who was born into David’s own royal family. When David gave final instructions to his son Solomon to whom he had abdicated the throne of Jerusalem, David said: “Here there is with you Shimei the son of Gera the Benjaminite from Bahurim, and he it was that called down evil upon me with a painful malediction on the day that I was going to Mahanaim; and he it was that came down to meet me at the Jordan, so that I swore to him by Jehovah, saying, ‘I shall not put you to death by the sword.’ And now do not leave him unpunished, for you are a wise man and you well know what you ought to do to him, and you must bring his gray hairs down to Sheol with blood.” In due time Solomon carried out his father’s orders.—1 Ki 2:8, 9, 42-46.

    9. How was this true also with regard to David’s former army general Joab?

    9 Concerning his former army general named Joab, the aged David said to Solomon as his successor: “You yourself also well know what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me in what he did to two chiefs of the armies of Israel, to Abner the son of Ner and Amasa the son of Jether, when he killed them and placed the blood of war in peacetime and put the blood of war on his belt that was about his hips and in his sandals that were on his feet. And you must act according to your wisdom, and not let his gray hairs go down in peace to Sheol.” In due time, in the interest of the peace and unity of the kingdom, Solomon found it necessary to send his army officer Benaiah to execute Joab, who tried to take sanctuary at Jehovah’s altar. “Then Benaiah the son of Jehoiada went on up and fell upon him and put him to death; and he got to be buried at his own house in the wilderness.” (1 Ki. 2:5, 6, 28-34) Thus Joab’s gray hair did not go down in peace to Sheol.—Contrast Genesis 42:38.

    10. Did David understand his use of terms in the case of Sheol, and to what, therefore, did he ask Solomon to bring Joab and Shimei down?

    10 When giving such instructions to his son Solomon concerning Joab and Shimei, King David knew what he was talking about. He understood the meaning of the language that he was using. He knew what Sheol meant. In eleven of his psalms David, under inspiration, used the word Sheol and used it in a correct way.a He foretold, in Psalm 16:10, the resurrection of Jesus Christ from Sheol. This resurrection of Jesus laid the basis for all others in Sheol to be resurrected during the rule of God’s kingdom by his Messiah Jesus the descendant of David. So, in ordering Solomon to bring down Joab and Shimei violently to Sheol, David knew that he was not asking Solomon to bring down these disobedient men to everlasting destruction without hope of any future existence.

    11. In Psalm 31:17, 18 David asked for the wicked to be silenced where, and why was that the correct location?

    11 David’s psalms and those of other Israelites are in harmony with David’s orders to Solomon as to the place to which to bring down men like Shimei and Joab. In Psalm 31:17, 18 David appeals to God and says: “O Jehovah, may I not be ashamed, for I have called on you. May the wicked ones be ashamed; may they [the wicked] keep silent [where?] in Sheol. May false lips become speechless, that are speaking against the righteous one, unrestrainedly in haughtiness and contempt.” In reading the prayer of David let us remember that it was written under inspiration by God’s spirit and that the right terms and locations are used.

    12. In Psalm 9:17-20, what appeal to God does David make against nations leaving Him out of account?

    12 In Psalm 9:17-20 the inspired David makes this appeal to God against the nations that leave God out of account and that therefore march to the attack upon David and his people: “Wicked people will turn back to Sheol, even all the nations forgetting God. For not always will the poor one be forgotten, nor will the hope of the meek ones ever perish. Do arise, O Jehovah! Let not mortal man prove superior in strength. Let the nations be judged before your face. Do put fear into them, O Jehovah, that the nations may know that they are but mortal men.”

    13. In Job 21:7-14, who did Job say descended down to Sheol?

    13 It was not the delirious raving of a deathly sick man when Job said concerning the location of wicked people after death: “Why is it that the wicked themselves keep living, have grown old, also have become superior in wealth? . . . They spend their days in good times, and in a moment down to Sheol they descend. And they say to the true God, ‘Turn away from us! And in the knowledge of your ways we have found no delight.”’—Job 21:7-14.

    14. What did Job 24:19, 20 say snatches away sinners?

    14 To those words Job added these about sinners: “The drought, also the heat, snatch away the snow waters; so does Sheol those who have sinned! The womb will forget him, the maggot will sweetly suck him, he will be remembered no more. And unrighteousness will be broken just like a tree.”—Job 24:19, 20.

    15, 16. (a) Do the lower animals go to Sheol or Haʹdes at death? (b) How is it that stupid men, though in honor, have been appointed to Sheol like sheep, but how is it different with the upright ones?

    15 Do the lower animals, such as sheep, go to Sheol or Haʹdes? No; even though their carcasses may have been buried along with human corpses or though images of animals may have been put in the sepulchers of believers in the immortality of animal souls as well as of human souls. However, just as helpless sheep are slaughtered in great numbers, so persons of all stations, high and low, rich and poor, have been slaughtered or killed in great numbers and thus been brought down to the common grave of humans who are dead in the dust of the ground. (Ps. 44:22; Rom. 8:36) The Levite sons of Korah sang of this fact, in Psalm 49:12-15:

    16 “And yet earthling man, though in honor, cannot keep lodging; he is indeed comparable with the beasts that have been destroyed. This is the way of those who have stupidity, and of those coming after them who take pleasure in their very mouthings. Like sheep they have been appointed to Sheol itself; death itself will shepherd them [as if they were slaughtered sheep, the flock of Death]; and the upright ones will have them in subjection in the morning [of the day of deliverance of the upright ones], and their forms are due to wear away; Sheol rather than a lofty abode is for each one. However, God himself will redeem my soul from the hand of Sheol, for he will receive me.”

    17. How was the counsel of Ahithophel esteemed, but against whom did he turn traitor?

    17 There was a man who was high in honor in the court of King David. That man was Ahithophel, the intimate adviser of David. “The counsel of Ahithophel, with which he counseled in those days, was just as when a man would inquire of the word of the true God. That was the way all the counsel of Ahithophel was both to David and to Absalom.” (2 Sam. 16:23) However, Ahithophel turned traitor to King David and joined in the revolt of his son Absalom.

    18. (a) How did Ahithophel die, and with whom was he buried? (b) In Psalm 55:13-16, what punishment did David pray to befall the treacherous one?

    18 In Absalom’s chamber of counselors God caused the wily counsel of Ahithophel to be frustrated. Hence, Ahithophel went off and committed suicide, hanging himself. “So he was buried in the burial place of his forefathers.” (2 Sam. 17:23) The treacherous person referred to by King David in Psalm Fifty-five is understood to be Ahithophel. Concerning the treacherous friend, David says under inspiration: “But it was you, a mortal man who was as my equal, one familiar to me and my acquaintance, because we used to enjoy sweet intimacy together; into the house of God we use to walk with the throng. Desolations be upon them! Let them go down into Sheol alive; for during their alien residence bad things have been within them. As for me, to God I shall call out; and Jehovah himself will save me.”—Ps. 55:13-16.

    19. (a) In this connection, of whom was David a type? (b) Of whom was Ahithophel a prototype, and why is this latter one barred from a resurrection?

    19 King David was a type or prophetic figure of his most eminent descendant, Jesus Christ, the Permanent Heir of the kingdom. So Ahithophel was a traitor, not to the Messiah or Christ himself, but to one who was merely a type of the Messiah. In harmony with this fact David’s prayer was that those like Ahithophel committing treachery against him should go down alive into Sheol, just as the household of Korah, Dathan and Abiram had done in Moses’ day. However, Ahithophel was a prototype of Judas Iscariot, who betrayed the real Christ to his enemies for thirty silver pieces of money. Hence, the crime of Judas Iscariot was far more serious than that of Ahithophel, and Jesus called Judas, not the son of Sheol, but “the son of destruction.”b Jesus also called him a “slanderer” or a “devil.” (John 17:12; 6:70, 71) The destruction of Judas bars any resurrection for him.

    …