Let us consider, to begin with, the very language of heaven and hell, which to us seems so clear, but which is almost impossible to impose consistently or unambiguously upon the Greek of the New Testament. The language of scripture speaks of a restored creation, of a new Age of the world yet to dawn, and of a New Jerusalem established upon the earth; it makes no promises whatsoever about a heaven of redeemed souls. And, as regards the fate of the derelict, what the actual text of the New Testament says could scarcely be more evocatively vague.
