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Originally Posted by Formendacil
As I understand it, in the original Greek of the New Testament, Hades is used to represent the Hebrew "sheol", which simply means "place of the dead", and is not associated with either good or evil- not heaven or hell, but simply the place of the dead. In much the same way, Hades for the Greeks was the "place of the dead", and not hell.
So I don't know/remember if hell is used as a translation for lack of a word corresponding to "place of the dead", or if it originally meant that, as well as or instead of "place of eternal punishment".
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To me it would seem that the "place of the dead" is obviously the Halls of Mandos. Sure it's not a nice place to be, but it isn't Hell, however, where sinners are punished. All elves go there, regardless of actions in life.
There might be more to this, so I'll be looking through HoME for more. I think there's something about being reborn and all that from Mandos in Morgoth's Ring or some other book.
P.S. I'm surprised that I haven't heard Mandos come up at all yet in this conversation.