Death, Sheol, and the Transformation: A Covenant Study on the Afterlife

Charles
Nov 3
16 min read

Death, Sheol, and the Transformation: A Covenant Study on the Afterlife

The question of what happens when we die has troubled humanity since the Garden. Yet Scripture provides not scattered speculation but covenant testimony, witnesses that build upon one another to reveal the architecture of death before the Cross, the conquest accomplished in Messiah's descent, and the transformed reality that now awaits those who die in Him. To understand death rightly, we must read it through the lens of covenant progression, recognizing that what was true before the Blood was shed changed after the victory was won.

The Foundation: Death as Covenant Consequence

When YHWH inscribed the Ten Words with His own Finger at Sinai (Exodus 31:18; Deuteronomy 9:10), He established the eternal vows that govern the relationship between Bridegroom and Bride. These Words are incorruptible, the only Scripture written directly by Elohim's hand, not mediated through human scribes. They reveal both righteousness and consequence: "You shall not murder" (Exodus 20:13) establishes the sanctity of life; the breaking of covenant brings death.

From the beginning, death entered through covenant breach. "You are dust, and to dust you shall return" (Genesis 3:19), this was the sentence pronounced in Eden. Death is not natural but judicial, not the original design but the consequence of broken covenant. Paul confirms this: "The wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23). Death is the enemy (1 Corinthians 15:26), the last enemy to be destroyed, but for millennia it held dominion over all humanity because the price had not yet been paid.

Understanding death requires understanding covenant phases. What was true before Messiah sealed the New Covenant in His Blood differs from what became true after His victory. The geography of death itself transformed when He descended into its depths with keys in hand.

Sheol Before the Cross: The Divided Realm

The Tanakh consistently portrays death as descent into Sheol, a shadowed realm beneath, the gathered place of the dead. Jacob mourned, "I shall go down to Sheol to my son" (Genesis 37:35). The Psalmist cried, "You have delivered my soul from the depths of Sheol" (Psalm 86:13). Job spoke of it as the place where "the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary are at rest" (Job 3:17). This was not poetic metaphor but covenant testimony to an actual realm where the dead awaited resurrection.

But Sheol was not uniform. Yeshua Himself pulled back the veil on its internal geography when He taught about the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31). This account reveals the pre-Cross architecture of death with clarity that cannot be dismissed.

Abraham's Bosom: The Comfort Side

On one side of Sheol dwelt the righteous dead in a place called "Abraham's bosom." The beggar Lazarus "was carried by the angels to Abraham's side" (Luke 16:22). This was not heaven itself, for "no one has ascended into heaven except He who descended from heaven" (John 3:13), but a place of comfort, consolation, and rest among the fathers.

When YHWH promised Abraham, "You shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age" (Genesis 15:15), He was not promising annihilation or unconscious sleep. He was promising rest in the portion of Sheol appointed for the covenant faithful. The righteous who died before the Cross descended to Abraham's bosom to await the Seed who would crush the serpent's head.

They died in faith, "not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar" (Hebrews 11:13). They were consoled but not yet complete. They were captives, not of their own sin (for they had believed YHWH's promises), but of the universal sentence of death that held all humanity until redemption was accomplished.

The Place of Torment: Across the Chasm

But Sheol contained another chamber. The rich man "lifted up his eyes, being in torment" (Luke 16:23). He was conscious, fully aware, capable of speech, possessing memory and recognition. He saw Abraham and Lazarus across a great distance. He felt anguish, thirst, desperation. He begged for relief: "Have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the end of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am in anguish in this flame" (Luke 16:24).

Abraham's response reveals the legal structure of pre-Cross death: "Between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who would pass from here to you may not be able, and none may cross from there to us" (Luke 16:26). Fixed. Permanent under the old order. No passage was possible from torment to comfort or from comfort to torment. The division was absolute within the covenant phase before Messiah's Blood was shed.

This was not yet final judgment, that awaits the Great White Throne (Revelation 20:11-15). But it was a division based on covenant response in life. Those who had received witness of Truth and rejected it descended to torment. Those who had believed YHWH's promises despite not seeing their fulfillment descended to comfort. Both were in Sheol. Both were held captive by death. Both awaited the day when the Conqueror would come.

The Testimony of Samuel: Consciousness Confirmed

We know the nature of this realm not from speculation but from direct witness. When King Saul, desperate and abandoned by YHWH, sought out the witch of Endor to call up the prophet Samuel, something remarkable occurred (1 Samuel 28:3-19). Samuel had died and been buried. But when the witch conducted her séance, she saw "a spirit ascending out of the earth" (1 Samuel 28:13).

This was not a demon impersonating Samuel, his first words confirm his identity: "Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up?" (1 Samuel 28:15). Disturbed. Not awakened from unconscious oblivion, but interrupted from a state of rest. Samuel was aware in Sheol. He possessed continuity of memory, knowledge of earthly events during his time there, and retained his prophetic insight. When the witch described him, she said, "An old man is coming up, and he is covered with a mantle" (1 Samuel 28:14), the prophetic garment that had marked his office in life still clothed him in death.

Samuel's testimony destroys any notion that the dead are unconscious or annihilated. He knew what had happened to Saul, that YHWH had departed from him, that David had been chosen. And he prophesied with authority: "Tomorrow you and your sons will be with me" (1 Samuel 28:19). Saul would die and descend to the same realm where Samuel dwelt, the gathered place of the dead, where spirits existed in conscious form, awaiting the Day of YHWH.

The Doctrine of Purgatory: A Covenant Assessment

Given this biblical witness, how should we assess the doctrine of purgatory as developed in later church tradition? The claim is that there exists an intermediate state of purification where souls are cleansed from remaining sin through temporal punishment before entering heaven. This doctrine requires careful examination against the covenant testimony of Scripture.

The Blood Sufficiency Problem

The doctrine of purgatory fundamentally undermines the sufficiency of Messiah's Blood. When Yeshua declared from the Cross, "It is finished" (John 19:30), He announced the completion of redemptive work. The writer to the Hebrews makes this explicit: "He has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself" (Hebrews 9:26). Once for all. Complete. Sufficient.

If Messiah's Blood fully atones for sin, if His sacrifice is complete and sufficient, then what remains to be purged? "The blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin" (1 John 1:7). All sin. Not most sin, requiring additional purification later. All sin, cleansed by His Blood.

The Ten Words, written by the Finger of Elohim, establish righteousness and reveal that covenant breach brings death. But under the Royal Covenant, the New Covenant sealed in Messiah's Blood, those vows are inscribed on hearts by the Ruach HaKodosh (Jeremiah 31:33; Hebrews 10:16). The transformation is complete: "Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more" (Hebrews 10:17). What YHWH does not remember, purgatory presumes to cleanse.

The Absence of Scriptural Witness

The doctrine of purgatory cannot be established by two or three witnesses from Scripture, the standard that governs all covenant teaching (Deuteronomy 19:15; 2 Corinthians 13:1). The primary text cited in its defense is from the Apocrypha: "It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins" (2 Maccabees 12:46). But this book is not part of the inspired canon received by the covenant community. It is historical testimony, not covenant witness.

No teaching in the Apostolic Writings supports purgatory. Paul declares, "We would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8). Not "away from the body and into purification." Home with the Lord. Immediately. Consciously. Completely.

Yeshua told the thief on the cross, "Truly, I say to you today, you will be with Me in Paradise" (Luke 23:43). The thief had no time for purification, no opportunity for cleansing beyond what the Blood accomplished. His confession secured his place: faith was credited to him as righteousness, just as it was to Abraham (Romans 4:3).

The Geographic Confusion

Purgatory doctrine confuses the pre-Cross geography of Sheol with post-Cross reality. Before Messiah's descent, even the righteous descended to Abraham's bosom, a place of comfort but not yet the fullness of Presence. This was not purification but waiting. They were not being cleansed of remaining sin but resting in faith while the price was being paid.

After the Cross, after Messiah's descent and proclamation and victory, the architecture changed. Abraham's bosom was transformed into Paradise (Luke 23:43). The righteous dead no longer wait in Sheol but dwell in the Presence of the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8; Philippians 1:23). To insert purgatory between death and heaven is to misunderstand what Messiah accomplished in His descent and to reintroduce a division He conquered.

The Pastoral Danger

The doctrine of purgatory creates pastoral cruelty. It teaches the bereaved that their loved ones who died in faith are suffering, not in judgment but in purification. It suggests that prayers, masses, and indulgences can shorten this suffering, placing a burden on the living and creating a marketplace for spiritual manipulation. History testifies to the abuses this doctrine enabled.

But the covenant comfort is this: those who die in Messiah are "at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8). Not suffering. Not being purged. Resting in His Presence while awaiting the resurrection that will reunite spirit with glorified flesh. "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on" (Revelation 14:13). Blessed. Not purged.

The Descent: Messiah's Conquest of Death

What changed between the old Sheol and the new Paradise? What transformed death from captivity to doorway? The answer is found in Messiah's descent between His death and resurrection.

The Keys Claimed

When the risen Yeshua appeared to John, He declared, "I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades" (Revelation 1:18). Two keys. Death is the state, the condition of being dead, the separation of spirit from body. Hades (Sheol) is the place, the realm that holds the dead in its chambers. To possess both keys is to exercise complete authority over death in all its manifestations.

These keys were not possessed before the Cross. They were wrested from the adversary through the victory accomplished in Messiah's Blood and confirmed in His descent. He entered Sheol not as victim but as Conqueror, not to suffer its power but to break it.

The Proclamation to All Captives

Peter provides crucial testimony about what occurred in those depths: "He went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared" (1 Peter 3:19-20). Later Peter adds, "For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does" (1 Peter 4:6).

The spirits in prison. Those who did not obey. The generation of Noah, drowned in judgment, held in Sheol for over two millennia. No prophet had visited them. No covenant promises had been clearly revealed to them in life. Yet Messiah went to them and proclaimed.

The text does not say He proclaimed condemnation. It says He proclaimed—He heralded, He announced. And the content is given: the gospel was preached to the dead "that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does" (1 Peter 4:6). This is declaration of accomplished reality, announcement of what His Blood achieved.

But He also proclaimed to those in Abraham's bosom. The righteous who had waited in faith heard the Voice they had died hoping to hear. "When He ascended on high He led a host of captives" (Ephesians 4:8). Not some captives. Captivity itself. He conquered the very principle of captivity, the power that had held the dead imprisoned.

The Firstfruits Presented

Matthew records an astonishing detail: "The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many" (Matthew 27:52-53). The dead rose. Not all the dead, but many of the saints, the holy ones who had waited in Abraham's bosom.

These were the firstfruits of resurrection, presented to the Father as the guarantee of the full harvest to come. This is why, when Mary encountered the risen Yeshua in the garden, He told her, "Do not cling to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father" (John 20:17). He was not speaking of the forty-day ascension recorded in Acts 1:9, but of the immediate ascension necessary to present the firstfruits, those who had been raised with Him, before the Father as the initial wave offering of resurrection.

The pattern comes from the appointed feasts: the firstfruits must be brought before YHWH, waved as an offering (Leviticus 23:10). Only after this presentation was complete could Thomas touch Him (John 20:27), could He eat with the disciples (Luke 24:42-43), could He walk with them for forty days teaching about the Kingdom (Acts 1:3).

Paradise Opened: The Post-Cross Reality

After Messiah's descent, proclamation, victory, and presentation of firstfruits, death's geography transformed. The divided Sheol of the old covenant gave way to Paradise opened.

Immediate Presence

The thief on the cross provides crucial testimony to this transformation. When he confessed faith, "Jesus, remember me when You come into Your kingdom" (Luke 23:42), Yeshua responded with a declaration: "Truly, I say to you today, you will be with Me in Paradise" (Luke 23:43). The emphasis falls on "today", this day of covenant sealing, this hour when Blood is poured out. The declaration made that day would be fulfilled through what Messiah accomplished in the depths.

Because of his confession, the thief was received into Abraham's bosom when he died. There he rested with the righteous who had died in faith. And there he heard the proclamation when Messiah descended and announced captivity's end. What had been Abraham's bosom, a place of comfort-in-waiting, became Paradise through the victory accomplished.

Paul later describes being "caught up to the third heaven...into Paradise" where he "heard things that cannot be told" (2 Corinthians 12:2-4). This is not the old Sheol where Samuel rested and could be disturbed by the witch of Endor. This is Paradise, the dwelling place of the righteous dead transformed by Messiah's conquest, where spirits rest in His Presence while awaiting the resurrection that will reunite them with glorified flesh.

For those who die in Messiah after the Cross, Paul's declaration stands without qualification: "We would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8). No descent to divided Sheol. No waiting in Abraham's bosom as the patriarchs did. No purification in purgatory. Immediate Presence. Conscious rest. Complete acceptance based on His Blood, not our purging.

The Intermediate State Clarified

Yet even Paradise is not the final state. The dead in Messiah rest in His Presence, but they await the resurrection morning when spirit will be reunited with glorified flesh. Paul makes this clear: "We await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body" (Philippians 3:20-21).

This is not purgatory, there is no suffering, no purification, no cleansing of remaining sin. It is Paradise, conscious rest in the Presence of the Lord. But it is still intermediate because the fullness has not yet come. "The dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

The covenant arc moves from Oath to Blood to Table to Presence. Those who die in Messiah have experienced Oath (promises made), Blood (redemption accomplished), and Table (covenant meal through faith). They rest in anticipatory Presence, with the Lord, yet awaiting the fullness of resurrection when "this mortal body must put on immortality" (1 Corinthians 15:53).

The Sleep Metaphor

Throughout Scripture, death for believers is called sleep. When Lazarus died, Yeshua said, "Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him" (John 11:11). Paul writes of "those who have fallen asleep in Christ" (1 Corinthians 15:18). Daniel prophesies, "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake" (Daniel 12:2).

This is not soul sleep, the false doctrine that the dead are unconscious. Samuel was fully conscious in Sheol, capable of prophecy and complaint. The rich man in torment was aware and suffering. The martyrs beneath the altar in Revelation cry out, "How long?" (Revelation 6:10), they are conscious, they remember, they speak.

Sleep captures something else: the temporary nature of death, the certainty of awakening, the rest from which one rises. Job grasped this: "Man lies down and rises not again; till the heavens are no more he will not awake or be roused out of his sleep" (Job 14:12). Death is sleep from which resurrection awakens us. David declared, "As for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with Your likeness" (Psalm 17:15).

For believers after the Cross, death is sleep in Paradise, conscious rest in His Presence, awaiting the morning when the trumpet sounds and the Voice that called Lazarus forth calls all the faithful dead to rise in glorified flesh.

The Threshold: Between Life and Death

Many who attend the dying have witnessed something remarkable: the dying who speak to people not present, who see things invisible to others, who seem to move between awareness of this world and awareness of another. They are not yet dead, the silver cord has not yet snapped (Ecclesiastes 12:6-7), yet they appear to wander between realities.

What is happening in these sacred moments?

Stephen, being stoned to death, saw "the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God" (Acts 7:56). This was before his death, while stones still fell. His vision bridged two realities, he stood in Jerusalem being murdered, yet simultaneously beheld the throne room of heaven. The veil between worlds had thinned for him in his final moments.

If the dying process involves a gradual loosening of the silver cord before it finally snaps, then consciousness may drift, sometimes anchored in the physical world, sometimes slipping toward the realm beyond. The dying person stands between two worlds, perceiving both dimly, the physical world growing distant and dreamlike, Paradise drawing nearer and becoming more vivid.

This is not delirium. Not neurological misfiring. But genuine glimpses across the threshold, the spirit beginning to perceive the realm it is approaching while still connected to the flesh. For believers in Messiah, this threshold is not to be feared. On the other side of that loosening cord lies Paradise, immediate Presence with the Lord.

Those who attend the dying serve a sacred purpose. Touch, voice, prayer, Scripture read aloud, these anchor the dying to the world they are leaving while blessing them toward the world they are entering. The Ruach HaKodosh ministers in both realms simultaneously, comforting in the borderlands they are beginning to perceive while sustaining through the presence of those still fully in the flesh.

The Resurrection Hope

Death for the believer, whether before or after the Cross, is never the final state. The covenant promise culminates not in disembodied existence, not in purgatorial purification, but in resurrection life."The Lord Himself will descend from he

aven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first" (1 Thessalonians 4:16).

This is the completion of redemption: not escape from physicality but its glorification. Spirit reunited with glorified flesh. Humanity restored to fullness. The covenant pattern consummated in eternal Presence.

"Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God" (Revelation 21:3). This is the fullness toward which those in Paradise await. This is the completion of what began when Messiah descended with keys in hand and conquered death in its own domain.

The dead in Messiah do not suffer in purgatory. They do not sleep in unconscious annihilation. They rest in Paradise, conscious, in His Presence, awaiting the trumpet call that will reunite spirit with glorified flesh and usher them into the fullness of eternal dwelling with YHWH.

Conclusion: The Covenant Comfort

Death is real. Death is the enemy. But death is defeated. For those who die in Messiah, whether the thief confessing in his final breath or the saint walking in covenant faithfulness for years, the promise is certain: "Absent from the body, at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8).

The doctrine of purgatory cannot stand against the sufficiency of Messiah's Blood, the testimony of Scripture, or the covenant transformation accomplished in His descent. His Blood cleanses from all sin (1 John 1:7). His sacrifice was offered once for all (Hebrews 9:26). When He cried "It is finished" (John 19:30), He meant it.

Those who die in Him enter Paradise immediately, not purgatory gradually. They rest in His Presence consciously, not in soul sleep unconsciously. They await resurrection gloriously, not annihilation fearfully. And when the trumpet sounds and the Voice calls, they will rise, spirit reunited with glorified flesh, to inherit the Kingdom prepared from the foundation of the world.

This is the covenant hope. This is the testimony of Scripture. This is the comfort for those who mourn: "We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep" (1 Thessalonians 4:13-14).

Death is but threshold. Paradise is rest. Resurrection is promise. And Presence, full, complete, eternal Presence, is the joy that awaits: "So we will always be with the Lord" (1 Thessalonians 4:17).