Question Five
Which region of the penal places is greater
It is asked which is the greater region of the penal places.
To this it is answered that, if we wish to consider the extent of the aforesaid regions, nothing occurs from which we can quantify them except the multitude of the inhabitants of each.
Therefore, on the supposition that every soul stripped of its body, like every spirit, determines for itself a certain corporeal space, the smallest of the aforesaid regions seems to have been Abraham’s bosom. In it were all the saints of the Old Testament absolved from the punishment of Purgatory. They seem to have been few in comparison with those who were still held in Purgatory; these in turn were, and still are, few in comparison with those who are held in hell, and perhaps at times fewer than those who are held in the region of Limbo.
Consequently, I say from these things that the greatest of these regions is the region of lower hell. This can become apparent to anyone willing to consider attentively the number of those who are to be saved, the number of the damned, and the number of bodies to be assumed after the judgment.
For first, after the general resurrection the number of the good who are to be saved will perhaps not be smaller - indeed, perhaps it will be greater, as will be disputed elsewhere - than the multitude of damned human beings and demons. But the number of those who are to be saved will fill the Empyrean Heaven, which is far more capacious than all the space beneath the concavity of the lunar orb, indeed beneath the starry heaven, as is evident from the spheres of the heavens enclosing one another. Therefore the place of hell must be exceedingly spacious.
Second, this same thing is evident from the number of the damned. For now, over the course of more than six thousand four hundred and ninety-four years elapsed from the beginning of the world, the souls of the damned have descended to hell from all the regions of wayfarers, both faithful and unbelieving. If to them are added all the demons, who according to some are as many as the blessed angels, or more, and likewise the evil persons who exist at present and will exist in the future, who will die and be damned, then the multitude of the damned is exceedingly great, as is evident. Therefore the lower place of hell, wherever it may be, is of wondrous and astonishing magnitude and amplitude, and is greater than all the other aforesaid regions.
Third, this same thing is especially evident from the number of bodies assumed by human beings after the general resurrection, which occupy circumscribed places. Therefore, because of the exceedingly great multitude of the damned, those who wish to quantify the place of hell speak in diverse ways.
For some say that although the number of the damned will be greater than the whole number of those who are to be saved, it will nevertheless not be necessary on this account that the space of hell be as spacious as that of Paradise. This is because hell has the character of a prison that confines and crushes, and not the character of a pleasant and unrestricted breadth; for a narrow place is given to the damned as punishment.
Hence it is said in the Psalm that the damned “have been placed in hell like sheep,” animals that are packed very tightly together in sheepfolds.
Others say that the place of hell will extend spherically from the center of the earth and of the world toward the concavity of the lunar orb as far as will suffice for that multitude.
Others say that after the judgment the whole elemental region will be the place of hell, so that those who sinned in the elements of this world will be punished in them: the avaricious, namely, in earth; the lustful in water; the wrathful in fire; and the proud in air.
Others say that the center and hollow of the earth are more spacious than the part of the earth uncovered by the waters and inhabited by human beings. That part of the earth could never be filled completely over its surface by all human beings present, past, and future - granted that the world is to come to an end - so that not even its smallest part remained empty.
Others say, and more reasonably, that just as God from the beginning created the place of hell to detain and the instrument of fire by which the wicked would be punished there, so also from the beginning God in his providence provided for the capacity of the place: namely, that hell would be capable of receiving the damned locally and distinctly.
These things are from Henry of Hesse on Genesis.