Did Christ Descend Into Hell? Sheol, Paradise and the Bosom of Abraham

Among the divides as to beliefs about what happened to Christ during his three day burial, one of the proclamations is that Christ did not actually descend into hell. It is often argued that there is no clear representation of this in scripture. But there are actually very clear indications of this.

Firstly let us look at a prophecy of Christ rising:

thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption (Psalm 16:10)

This is widely agreed upon to signify the prefiguring of the three day ressurection, for after 3 days, a body will typically start to decay or "corrupt." Corruption as understood here as well as in the time of Christ does not only mean evil but it means damage or decay or destruction.

Secondly hell, which is also called Hades (Greek) in the Septuagint and Sheol (Hebrew) in the Mesoratic literally means underworld or unseen realm. It was both common knowledge to Jews and Greeks that this was where the dead descended to, and for the Jews it was where they were as they awaited the Messiah. It was thought of as a holding place for the dead. 

This is why when the poor man Lazarus, in the story Christ tells, dies, he does not go to paradise but the Bosom of Abraham, a place of comfort that exists in Sheol in Jewish teaching. More so, the fact that Christ it tells it means that this was actually a real place.

Christ does not proclaim paradise as a viability until the day of His crucifixion which is why He says that the thief will join him in paradise because at his death Sheol will no long exist (Luke 23:43). This is what he means when he says that the gates of hell (Sheol, Hades) will not stand against the church(Matthew 16:18). He was prophesying the ministry of His death. And this is the precise reason we proclaim His death (1 Corinthians 11:23-26).

This is why the Apostle Peter has said:

in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, 20 because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. (1 Peter 3:19-20)

The word prison here comes from the Greek word "phulassó" which means watching or guarding, this meaning it to be a place of holding. Peter as a Galilean Jew would have grown up hearing this tradition of Sheol and the Bosom of Abraham (which is why Christ does not explain what it to his disciples). This is why in another translation, it says "who disobeyed long ago" and formerly did not obey (of course another thing we shall also get to is how Christ proclaims himself in those in the underworld who were disobedient).

Because Sheol was no more, we see that many of the saints had come back from the dead because the were finally freed by Christ (Matthew 27:52-53).

Now we must also see that this is, of course, a dramatically different understanding of hell than what is commonly taught in the West. But this is how we have reached this conclusion in the Orthodox faith. We believe that it is by prayer and careful study of the scripture that we are able to proclaim that Christ did indeed descend into hell to "proclaim freedom for the prisoners. (Luke 4:18)"

Your dead will live; their bodies will rise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in the dust! For your dew is like the dew of the morning, and the earth will bring forth her dead. (Isaiah 26:19)

The LORD kills and gives life, he brings people down to where the dead are and he raises them up. (1 Samuel 2:6)