Journal: Grace Journal
Volume: GJ 11:1 (Winter 1970)
Article: The New Testament Concept Regarding the Regions of Heaven with Emphasis on 2 Corinthians 12:1–4
Author: W. Harold Mare

GJ 11:1 (Wtr 70) p. 3

The New Testament Concept Regarding the Regions of Heaven
with Emphasis on 2 Corinthians 12:1–4

W. Harold Mare

Professor of New Testament Language and Literature
Covenant Theological Seminary

In the varied use of ouranos in the New Testament the concept is implied that there are several regions of heaven, and in one place, 2 Corinthians 12:1–4, it is clearly stated that there is in some sense a third heaven. As a matter of fact, in this passage Paul states that he was snatched up, unto this third heaven, into paradise, and that he did not know whether he was in or out of the body in his experience.

It is the purpose of this study to interpret 2 Corinthians 12:1–4 as to the meaning of the third heaven and to the other regions implied, in the light of the concept of ouranos and related words in classical and Hellenistic Greek, in the Old Testament, in the literature of the Intertestamental period and that of the Dead Sea Scrolls, comparing such usage with the teaching of the New Testament on the subject together with the writings of the Patristic period. The study will be concluded with an examination of the text of 2 Corinthians 12:1–4.

The questions arising in the New Testament and particularly in 2 Corinthians 12 concern how the heaven or heavens mentioned relate to the concept of a plurality of heavenly regions and whether they are to be considered as completely material and spatial, partly so, or not at all, and further, how paradise relates to this concept of heaven. For a more adequate answer to these questions it will be well to observe how writers other than those of the New Testament books used particularly the concept, ouranos.

Ouranos in the Classical and Hellenistic Greek Literature

Ouranos is used from the earliest period of the epic writings of Homer and Hesiod throughout Greek literature, but it never is used in the plural by classical writers.1 The word conveyed the idea of the vault or firmament of heaven which was thought of as being made of bronze (chalkeos, Hom. Il. 17.425; poluchalkos, Il. 5.504) or iron (sidēreos, Hom. Od.

GJ 11:1 (Wtr 70) p. 4

15.329), this vault idea also being conveyed by Empedocles (steremn...