What is Heaven or a Heavenly Host?
This is a question that often has no clear answer or if it is answered it is quite vague because it is normally seen as a non physical place that most people cannot investigate while living in physical form.
The word heaven is usually used to describe a non-physical place or realm in the hereafter where our ancestors reside after physical death. The circumstances of those in the beyond are according to a Universal Justice determined by their comportment while having lived on Earth. This is the general idea of the unseen heaven.
There is also a hierarchal nature to the spiritual heaven that has gradations that extend positively and negatively relegating the orderliness of heaven into distinct compartmentalized “zones” according to the nature of those who have been relegated to the specific areas. Consequently, there are the positive and angelic realms and their opposite all being determined by the spiritual maturity of those beings according to their behaviour while having lived on Earth.
Those who, through having lived a “clean life” enter into the positive heaven and those who have lived an “unclean life” enter the negative heaven also called “hell.” The term “clean is the most accurate term to be used. Life on Earth being very much like a school of good and evil is actually made of a substance that if adopted can become a part of us in the form of generally negative habits. The observance of the Commandments is intended to generally prevent the adherence of that which is negative resulting in what might be best described in a clean life. Should the negative substance of life on Earth be adopted by someone it can become a menacing and spiritually blinding process that will tend to draw more of the same onto the being; like attracting like. This added burden makes for a much more difficult and trying spiritual experience that will bear consequences in the astral world (the beyond). The Astral world, where the soul resides is not the spiritual realm. The soul being the harbinger between the spirit realm and physical world protects the spirit from contamination. But, the soul being the body of the spirit can suffer damage from its physical experience that can take a much longer time to repair once in the beyond than while still living within its physical body.
This is why those who have observed all of God’s Laws or have otherwise been “good,” are said to have thereby earned the right to be in that blissful place where the Supreme Being is supposed to reside exclusively. Even though this is generally true, there is, however, an inherent error in this much repeated and widely held mantra like religious belief.
Consider this for a moment. God as the Deity, could not be the Supreme Being without being Master over all. To believe that God as the God of absolute Love would create a place like Hell specifically for the eternal torment of beings who simply “displease” Him would be to deny the very Love that is the essence of God. If instead, Hell would be seen as a place of spiritual cleansing and the metaphorical cleansing fires of Hell seen as a means to separate that which is incompatible with the positive Heaven would explain God’s omnipresence, omnipotence and omnipotence. If God created a place like Hell as part of the whole created existence, then He must also be in absolute control of it and it must serve an ultimately good purpose otherwise, God is not God. God does not and cannot fear Satan and his/her predestined purpose.
Another way of designating the boundaries or the various Heavenly hierarchies and the various Hellish hierarchies would be by the mind sets of those who would inhabit each. Meaning, beings of the same mind set are placed with those of the same mind set, which is completely fair. If they are of a positive mind set they would naturally help one another into a purer and clearer reality. If the beings are contaminated with an illusory negative mind set they would subject each other to the same mind set resulting in torment at each others hands. This being overseen and managed by angels; the demons and devils are actually the beings possessing the negative mind set. In their continuous cycle of almost self inflicted torment the beings are left to question their own behaviour because of their pain and hopefully decide upon a better course of action, otherwise called, repentance and atonement. (Is this experience any different on Earth?) The beings that are believed to be condemned to Hell are subject to their own self condemnation that can be ended by simply and sincerely refraining from their behaviour and is not based on a pre-specified time but on how long it takes for that being to recognize their own false light from the True Light. If this type of redemption is possible even in Hell, then there must be even worse places than Hell that does impose an actual time, often called an eternity, that is reserved for those who do the greatest harm to humanity. World leaders, elected or otherwise, seen or unseen, and other specific professionals beware.
The dogma that those in Hell are continuously tormented by demons for eternity might fill up church pews but, is contrary to God’s Love and reality. A soul that is possessed of many vices will appear deformed according to the nature of its vices which are often already visible in a persons physiognomy while still living alive on Earth. This has been depicted in several rather morbid medieval paintings. The Angelic beings that monitor the progress of the souls in Hell will sometimes appear to a dark tormented soul in a form that is compatible to it in order that that soul would not feel frightened and that it might be more easily reasoned with.
It is not without significance that in many cultures the original words for heaven also meant sky and often the word heaven is used to mean the stellar firmament and that planets and stars are still often called heavenly bodies.
Different cultures have different names for heaven. The Norse had Valhalla, the Germanic; himmel, the Chinese; Tian, the Buddhist Samsara, and so on.
What ever it may be called the concept of heaven itself is a much broader and universal concept and in order to be understood better must be explored further.
In the past the term “heaven” was also used in medical terminology by some healers. They referred to the soul as a heaven, the physical body as a heaven and the spirit as a heaven as well as their respective realms as heavens. This is very interesting because it opens a few other possibilities that would better define the term heaven itself. Several authors have written of this concept and some have also illustrated it.
The concept of heaven is always represented as a highly organized hierarchy of beings each grouped or organized into specific and primordial realms that together govern and maintain existence in a gradual, steady and purposeful course in a lawful and orderly fashion that is determined by the Deity. It makes sense then, that in the Biblical sense heaven is referred to as a ” the kingdom of heaven” would imply much more than it would seem. As in any kingdom, there must be a hierarchy of beings to assist in its governance.
This being the case, then, “heaven,” in addition to being a place where the departed reside, is also made up of the uncounted beings that put order to it and in it. Also, if the order of life on Earth is also governed by unseen hierarchies, Earth itself can be seen as an organized heaven, albeit physical. The idea that there are multiple realms and consequently multiple heavens within a hierarchy is not too farfetched.
This logic can be extended to include the human being and living things in each of their respective kingdoms. The terms, animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms would make absolute sense.
creating your own heaven.
heaven of heavens
In this context heaven would mean
When discussing the concept of heavenly hosts it is important to define the term first before attempting to explain it. The term heaven has already been discussed and now in defining ther term host we will see the concept that arrises from the two terms in unison.
The term “host” has a few general meanings. Of instance it can be an organism harboring another organism on or in itself. It can be
