why is heaven up and hell down?

Answer 1

Because when people die they are buried in the earth. If we think of heaven in the atmosphere, it's a symbolic way of avoiding death.
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Answer 2

It's in Genesis. The second of the two creation stories (yup there's TWO and they contradict each other) is the one most widley known. God creates the world in six days blah blah blah.

Well in that it describes Heaven as being above the dome that contains the water (cause you know people didn't have any idea about condesation back then so they figured rain was held in a giant bubble above trapdoor's that opened up from time to time...) So there's one reason why people think Heaven is up.

It also might have something to do with how beautiful the stars are, how peacefull they can make us feel...As for Hell being below, well take a look around you. The stars make us feel inspired, or like there is a greater purpose to life...Do you get that same feeling when you watch the news, or walk down the poverty stricken areas in your town (assuming you have them.)

In the end...I believe Heaven and Hell are both here on earth, you just have to look to find them.

Answer 3

. The roots of this can be traced from Greek to Egyptian, and later Judaism. Remember that Christianity contains very little that does not have roots in earlier belief systems adaptation and absorption is the norm. The Greeks had an `underworld`, and the Egyptians considered the stars above to be the resting place of their deity. Of course all Gods come DOWN from above, live on mountains, (sermon on the mount), live in the sky, or have wings (Angels). The darkness below ground is where death lies, it is a bad place without LIGHT,with demons, countless mythical beings. Heaven/Hell / Light / Darkness are themes traceable throughout the Bible. Nothing original there!

Answer 4

The topology of spirit-space is a little underdeveloped, but generally it's because Hell as an actual location (rather than state of mind) was originally a burning valley a few miles south of Jerusalem, while Heaven accommodates winged angels and the spirit-Jesus "ascending" or "descending" and thus needs to in some sense be above the Earth.

Answer 5

When Lucifer rebelled against the authority of God, he was condemned to Hell along with all his followers.

This place was set apart from heaven, a place of 'descent' with the Archangel Michael standing guard at its gates to prevent further rebellion.

Its gates were closed for 1,000 years before Satan (Lucifer) and his followers were let loose.

It is the free will of mankind to choose either Heaven or Hell by the example of their lives.

Answer 6

The original idea for hell was a dump where it was burning all the time. You went down into it.

Obviously, up is heaven (as many felt the Gods lived in mountain) and you go up into the mountains

Answer 7

At the time people believed that the earth was flat. They believed that going up into the beautiful sky would take them to heaven; and going down into the hot earth would eventually lead to hell.

Thanks to SCIENCE we know now that the earth isn't flat and the stories in the bible are just morality folk tales.

Answer 8

Heaven is up because it is suppose to be good. We look up to good things and look down on bad things. We can see the sky and how things fly towards it-we can imagine our spirit/soul escaping towards it. Hell is down because it is at the pit of earth-which is hot as hell. Also because the Bible tell us, "and he/they looked looked up to heaven".

Answer 9

Seemed the most obvious way to describe things for the early fiction writers who were attempting to explain things no one understood.

Of course all these religious fables were blown to bits when man discovered the world was a sphere and not flat!

Answer 10

I believe in the other side, the place we came from and have a choice to come back to earth if we choose. I believe we are all here to learn what we haven't learned from our past lives. I don't believe in a hell.