(1) Amos 9:2. — “Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them.” [A figurative  expression;  but  certainly  pits  of  the   earth   are   the   only   hells men dig into.]

(2) Psalms 16:10. — “Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell; neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.” [This refers to our Lord’s three days in the tomb. — Acts 2:31; Acts 3:15.]

(3, 4) Psalms 18:5 and 2 Samuel 22:6 margin. — “The cords of hell compassed me about.” [A figure in which trouble is represented as hastening one to the tomb.]

(5) Psalms 55:15. — “Let them go down quick into hell” —margin, “the grave.”

(6) Psalms 9:17. — “The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.” This text will be treated later, under a separate heading.

(7) Psalms 86:13. — “Thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell” — margin, “the grave.”

(8) Psalms  116:3. —  “The  sorrows  of  death  compassed  me,  and  the  pains  of hell gat hold upon me.” [Sickness and trouble are the figurative hands of the grave to grasp us.]

(9) Psalms 139:8. — “If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.” [God’s power is unlimited; even over those in the tomb. He can and will exert it and bring forth all that are in the graves. — John 5:28]

(10) Deuteronomy 32:22. — “For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell.” [A figurative representation of the destruction, the utter ruin of Israel as a nation — “wrath . . . to the uttermost,” as the apostle called it, God’s anger burning that nation to the “lowest deep,”  as  Leeser  here  translates  the word sheol. — 1 Thes. 2:16]

(11) Job 11:8. — “It [God’s wisdom] is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell [than any pit]; what canst thou know?”

(12) Job 26:6. — “Hell [the tomb] is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering.”

(13) Proverbs 5:5. — “Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell [i.e., lead to the grave].”

(14) Proverbs 7:27. — “Her house is the way to hell [the grave], going down to the chambers of death.”

(15) Proverbs 9:18. — “He knoweth not that the dead are there; and that her guests are in the depths of hell.” [Here the harlot’s guests are represented as dead, diseased, or dying, and many of the victims of sensuality in premature graves from diseases which also hurry off their posterity to the tomb.]

(16) Proverbs 15:11. — “Hell and  destruction  are  before  the  LORD.”  [Here  the grave is associated with destruction and not with a life of torment.]

(17) Proverbs 15:24. — “The way of life is above to the wise, that he may depart from hell beneath.” [This illustrates the hope of resurrection from the tomb.]

(18) Proverbs 23:14. — “Thou shalt beat him with the rod, and shall deliver his soul from hell” [i.e., wise correction will save a child from vicious ways which lead to premature death, and may also possibly prepare him to escape the “Second death“].

(19) Proverbs 27:20. — “Hell [the grave] and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.”

(20) Isaiah 5:14. — “Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure.” [Here the grave is a symbol of destruction.]

(21, 22) Isaiah 14:9,15. — “Hell [margin, grave] from beneath is moved for thee to meet thee at thy coming.” “Thou shalt be brought down to hell” [the grave — so rendered in verse 11].

(23) Isaiah 57:9. — “And didst debase thyself even unto hell.” [Here figurative of deep degradation.]

(24, 25) Ezekiel 31:15-17. — “In the day when he went down to the grave I made the  nations  to  shake  at  the  sound  of  his  fall,  when  I  cast  him  down  to hell with them that descend into the pit. . . . They also went down into hell with him unto them that be slain with the sword.” [Figurative and prophetic description of the fall of Babylon into destruction, silence, the grave.]

(26) Ezekiel 32:21. — “The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out of the midst  of  hell  with  them  that  help  him.”  [A  continuation  of  the  same  figure  r e p r e s e n t i n g  E g y p t ‘ s  o v e r t h r o w  a s   a   n a t i o n   t o   j o i n   B a b y l o n in destruction — buried.]

(27) Ezekiel 32:27. — “And they shall not lie with the mighty that are fallen of the uncircumcised, which are gone down to hell with their weapons of war: and they have laid their swords under their heads, but their iniquities shall be upon their bones, though they were the terror of the mighty in the land of the living.” [The grave is the only “hell” where fallen ones are buried and lie with their weapons of war under their heads.]

(28) Habakkuk 2:5. — “Who enlargeth his desire as hell [the grave], and as death, and cannot be satisfied.”

(29) Jonah 2:1,2. — “Then Jonah prayed unto the LORD his God out of the fish’s belly, And said, I cried by reason of mine affliction unto the LORD, and he heard me; out of the belly of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice.” [The belly of the fish was for a time his grave — see margin.]

(30, 31) Isaiah 28:15,18. — “Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell [the grave] are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves: Therefore, thus saith the Lord, Your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell [the grave] shall not stand.” [God thus declares that the present prevalent idea, by which death and the grave are represented as friends, rather than enemies, shall cease; and men shall learn that death is the wages of sin, and that it is in Satan’s power (Rom. 6:23; Heb. 2:14) and not an angel sent by God.]