Episode 7 - Hell Diminished
September 16, 2026September 18, 2026
Summary: #
This episode of The Spanish Bible Podcast examines the issue of hell in the Spanish Bible, with particular attention to the Reina-Valera 1960. The King James Bible uses the word hell in both the Old and New Testaments. In the Old Testament, the word is translated from the Hebrew Sheol, while several Greek words are translated as hell in the New Testament, including Hades. But what happened to the word hell in the Spanish Bible? In this episode, we look at the change made in the Reina-Valera 1960, where the translators removed infierno from the Old Testament and instead used the transliteration Seol for the Hebrew word Sheol. We also examine the New Testament, where Hades was used in places where the earlier Reina-Valera had translated the word as infierno. Luke 16:23 receives particular attention because it is one of the clearest passages describing a man suffering in hell. The episode also compares this approach with modern English Bible versions and discusses the claim that these changes affect the clarity of biblical doctrine. Finally, the episode introduces the Reina-Valera Gómez as a Spanish Bible that retains the word infierno rather than replacing these occurrences with the transliterations Seol and Hades. #SpanishBiblePodcast #SpanishBible #ReinaValera1960 #KingJamesBible #Hades #Hell #Seol #Transliteration #BibleVersions