Heavenly Space in Hebrews and Its Jewish and Christian Environment: Passing through the Heavens (The Library of New Testament Studies)

Stephen Wunrow addresses the pressing question of what the author of Hebrews meant by his descriptions of heaven, arguing that the author intended his references to heavenly space to be interpreted as realistic descriptions of a real place.Wunrow posits that language about heaven is neither metaphor nor a description of a “place” outside the creation, by examining other early Jewish and Christian texts that narrate or describe humans ascending into heaven.Given the nature and the function of heavenly space as described in these texts, Wunrow suggests it is most probable that the authors of the texts intended their descriptions of heavenly space to be understood as realistic.Wunrow thus explores 1 and 2 Enoch, 4 Ezra, 2 and 3 Baruch, the Apocalypse of Abraham, the Testament of Levi, the Testament of Abraham, the Ascension of Isaiah, and Revelation; investigating how other roughly contemporary authors described heavenly space, and considering that the rhetorical aims of most of these aut