grievous punishments; and wherein Josiah had burned the priests of Moloch upon their own altars, as appeareth at large in the 2nd of Kings 23; the place served afterwards to receive the filth and garbage which was carried thither out of the city; and there used to be fires made from time to time to purify the air, and take away the stench of carrion. From this abominable place, the Jews used ever after to call the place of the damned by the name of Gehenna, or Valley of Hinnon. And this Gehenna is that word which is usually now translated “hell”; and from the fires from time to time there burning, we have the notion of “everlasting” and “unquenchable fire.”
Seeing now there is none that so interprets the Scripture, as that after the day of judgment, the wicked are all eternally to be punished in the Valley of Hinnon; or that they shall so rise again, as to be ever after under ground or under water; or that after the resurrection they shall no more see one another, nor stir from one place to another: it followeth, methinks, very necessarily, that that which is thus said concerning hell fire is spoken metaphorically; and that therefore there is a proper sense to be inquired after (for of all metaphors there is some real ground that may be expressed in proper words), both of the “place of hell,” and the nature of “hellish torments,” and “tormentors.”
And first for the tormentors, we have their nature and properties, exactly and properly delivered by the names of the Enemy, or Satan; the Accuser, or Diabolus; the Destroyer, or Abaddon. Which significant names, Satan, Devil, Abaddon, set not forth to us any individual person, as proper names use to do; but only an office, or quality; and are therefore appellatives; which ought not to have been left untranslated, as they are in the Latin and modern Bibles; because thereby they seem to be proper names of “demons”; and men are the more easily seduced to believe the doctrine of devils; which at that time was the religion of the Gentiles, and contrary to that of Moses and of Christ.