Abyss

Biblical Texts

In the New Korean Revised Version, the term mujeogaeng ("abyss") appears only in the New Testament.

• Luke 8:31: In the account of the healing of the Gerasene demoniac, the demons possessing the man beseech Jesus "that he would not command them to go out into the deep." The parallel account in Mark 5:10 reads instead "that he would not send them away out of the country."
• Romans 10:7: Paul asks, "Who shall descend into the deep?" and explains this as an attempt "to bring up Christ again from the dead." The surrounding context draws on Deuteronomy 30:11–14.
• Revelation: At the sounding of the fifth trumpet, a star fallen from heaven receives the key of the bottomless pit and opens it, and smoke and locusts come forth from it (9:1–3). Their king is "the angel of the bottomless pit," whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon and in Greek Apollyon (9:11). The beast that kills the two witnesses (11:7) and the beast that carries the harlot (17:8) also ascend out of the bottomless pit. In chapter 20 an angel seizes the dragon, that is, Satan, casts him into the bottomless pit for a thousand years, shuts him up, and sets a seal upon him (Revelation 20:1–3).

Terminology and Background

The Greek word abyssos means "bottomless" or "immeasurably deep." The Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, used this word to render the Hebrew tehom, which refers to the deep waters beneath the earth or of the sea, as in "the deep" of Genesis 1:2. The Sino-Korean term mujeogaeng (無底坑) is a direct rendering of this meaning. The King James Version translates the word in Revelation as "bottomless pit."

Meaning Across Scripture

In Romans 10:7 the term is used nearly synonymously with the place of the dead, that is, Hades. In Luke and Revelation it is a place where evil spirits are confined. Revelation distinguishes the Abyss from the "lake of fire," the place of final judgment: after the thousand years Satan is released from the Abyss for a short time and is then cast into the lake of fire (Revelation 20:7–15). For this reason many interpreters understand the Abyss not as the place of final punishment but as a place of confinement until the Last Judgment. 2 Peter 2:4–5 and Jude 6, which speak of fallen angels being held in confinement, are often cited alongside it, although these passages use different words.

Interpretation and Debate

How one reads the binding in Revelation 20 is closely tied to one's understanding of the millennium.

• Premillennialism (the view that Christ returns before the millennial kingdom) and dispensationalist interpretation: Satan will literally be confined in the Abyss during a future millennial kingdom.
• Amillennialism (the view that the millennium symbolizes the entire church age): the binding is read as the restriction, since Christ's first coming, of Satan's power to "deceive the nations." This is often connected with the binding of the strong man in Matthew 12:29.

The view that equates the Abyss with hell is also widespread. As noted above, however, the text distinguishes the Abyss from the lake of fire. Accounts that describe the location or shape of the Abyss in concrete detail go beyond what the biblical text says.

In the Korean Church

The term is frequently treated in expository preaching on Revelation and in sermons on eschatology. It is also mentioned, together with Luke 8, in sermons explaining the activity of demons and Satan. In everyday Korean it is used figuratively to mean "a deep chasm from which it is hard to escape."