What Is Gehenna?

With Hashem's help

Hello and blessings,

The World to Come is a spiritual place, and there is reward and punishment there for souls according to their good and bad deeds in this world.

Gehenna is a place of punishment, which rectifies the souls for the sins they committed and the damage they caused in them (one may think of it like a garment that became dirty and needs washing).

Just as a good doctor heals the patient through surgery, so Hashem heals the souls through Gehenna, with the goal that they enter Gan Eden whole and perfected. The souls in the World to Come even thank Hashem for Gehenna, just as a patient thanks the doctor who operates on him for his benefit and recovery.

The torments of Gehenna in the World to Come are spiritual torments, and the Sages compared these sufferings to fire, but they are given in the World to Come measure for measure, for whatever the soul sinned in. Every kind of pain it caused, or every transgression in which it was damaged, returns to it like a boomerang. In this way it atones for it.

Anyone who fulfills more mitzvot merits a happier life both in this world and in the World to Come.

And anyone who sins more will be forced to suffer more before entering Gan Eden.

These sufferings can come in this world (through difficulties in livelihood, finding a spouse, health, and the like), or after death in Gehenna.

A person who does teshuvah for his sins can atone for them even in this world.

The World to Come cannot be described and cannot be imagined, for it is a spiritual world unlike this material world. In Gan Eden one merits true happiness, closeness to Hashem; the righteous merit to be in His presence and to enjoy His eternal light and to merit His wisdom, whose enjoyment cannot be imagined. Take the happiest moment of your life and multiply it by a thousand thousand. Hashem is the source of all happiness and pleasures, and closeness to Him gives the highest pleasure there is, the supreme delight.

But trying to understand the World to Come is like trying to understand life outside the water from a fish's perspective. The Sages used various parables to describe Gan Eden and Gehenna in images that we can understand, but of course they are spiritual. One only needs to know that there is reward and punishment for all our actions. And everything that Hashem does to us is ultimately for our eternal good.

We must believe that Hashem, Who is compassionate and gracious, and Who gave us the ability to show mercy, surely knows everything we know and understands everything we understand, and He shows more mercy than we do, for He is the Father of all mercy, and all our mercy comes only from Him. And if He nevertheless acted in His world as He did, we must trust that this was the only possible choice, and never forget for a moment that this world is temporary, and the true destination of the souls is the World to Come.

Many people in this world are like small children who want more and more candies and sweets, and even if they are told that sugar destroys the teeth and harms health, and creates a craving for food and causes obesity, the children will not listen to all these learned explanations, but will continue demanding sweets and crying when they are restricted. We too in this world are like those children who demand material things and do not understand that one day we will look at things differently from the World to Come, as souls, and then we will see the extent of our mistakes. Hashem deals with us in the best way for us, even if at times it seems to us as though He is not taking us into account. He acts as a loving father toward His children, and like every loving father, He does what is best for His children even when they do not understand it.

Regards,

Daniel Bels