<p>9:46<em> Where their worm does not die and the fire is not put out- </em>The Jews believed that &lsquo;hell&rsquo; had three sections: Gehenna, a place of eternal fire and worms for those Jews who broke the covenant and blasphemed God; &lsquo;the shades&rsquo;, an intermediate place similar to the Catholic idea of purgatory; and a place of rest where the faithful Jew awaited the resurrection at the last day). This distinction has no basis in the Bible. However, it&rsquo;s significant that the Lord Jesus uses &lsquo;Gehenna&rsquo; and the figure of eternal fire to describe the punishment of people for what the Jews of His day would&rsquo;ve considered incidental sins, matters which were far from blasphemy and breaking the covenant &ndash; glancing at a woman with a lustful eye (Mk. 9:47), hypocrisy (Lk. 12:1,5; Mt. 23:27&ndash;33), not giving a cup of water to a &ldquo;little one&rdquo;, forbidding a disciple of John the Baptist to follow Jesus (Mk. 9:39&ndash;43); not preaching the Gospel fearlessly and boldly (Mt. 10:25&ndash;28). These matters were and are shrugged off as of no eternal consequence. But just like the prophets of Israel did, the Lord Jesus seizes upon such issues and purposefully associates them with the most dire possible punishment which His Jewish hearers could conceive &ndash; Gehenna. Time and again, the Bible alludes to incorrect ideas and reasons with people from the temporary assumption those ideas might be true. The language of demons, as we will show later, is a classic example. And it&rsquo;s quite possible the Lord is doing the same here with the concept of Gehenna &ndash; the punishment for the Jew who breaks the covenant and blasphemes. The Lord was primarily teaching about behaviour, not giving a lecture about the state of the dead. And so He takes the maximum category of eternal punishment known to His audience, and says that this awaits those who sin in matters which on His agenda are so major, even if in the eyes of the Jewish world and humanity generally they were insignificant.</p>