Where was Jesus during the three days?

What the Bible says

Start with what is plain. Jesus truly died. On the cross he cried out:

Father, into Your hands I commit My Spirit.

Luke 23:46

Between death and resurrection, then, his body lay in the tomb and his spirit was entrusted to the Father. The same day he made a promise to the repentant thief beside him.

And Jesus said to him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.”

Luke 23:43

Paradise (paradeisos, παράδεισος) names the place of blessing in God's presence.

Peter reads Psalm 16 as David speaking about Christ.

that He was not abandoned to Hades, nor did His body see decay.

Acts 2:31

"Hades" is hadēs (ᾍδης), the realm of the dead, the counterpart of the Old Testament Sheol (שְׁאוֹל). Not abandoned there can mean that he entered the realm of death but did not stay. Paul too speaks of a descent.

What does “He ascended” mean, except that He also descended to the lower parts of the earth?

Eph 4:9

Whether the "lower parts of the earth" means the realm of the dead or the incarnation is disputed. The most discussed passage is in 1 Peter.

He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit, in whom He also went and preached to the spirits in prison

1 Pet 3:18-19

A little later come the words "the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead" (1 Pet 4:6).

The number three matters too. Jesus compared his death and resurrection to Jonah.

For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

Matt 12:40

Hosea says, "on the third day He will raise us up" (Hos 6:2), and the New Testament says Christ "was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures" (1 Cor 15:4).

The church's witness

In its received form the Apostles' Creed confesses that Christ, after burial, descended to the dead. The clause is absent from the oldest Roman creed, appears in Western creeds from about the fourth century, and is not in the Nicene Creed The Apostles' Creed. It has been read in three main ways.

The first reading is a proclamation of victory. Eastern icons of the resurrection show Christ standing on the broken gates of Hades and lifting Adam by the hand. Colossians 2:15 and 1 Peter 3:19 support this. Catholic teaching speaks of Christ freeing the righteous who had died before him, and the Lutheran Formula of Concord (Article IX) confesses that the whole Christ, God and man, went down after his burial, defeated the devil and broke hell's power. Gregory reads John the Baptist's question from prison as asking "whether He who in His own person had come into the world, would in His own person descend also to the world below" Gregory. Chrysostom, in the same entry, doubts this reading.

The second reading is that Christ entered the realm of the dead. Then the clause confesses that he went through all that dying means for a human being. The Westminster Larger Catechism (Q. 50) explains it so: he remained in the state of the dead, under death's power, until the third day.

The third is Calvin's. He took the clause to mean the spiritual agony Christ bore on the cross, the judgment of God borne in our place Calvin, Institutes 2.16. The Heidelberg Catechism also teaches that Christ's hellish sufferings on the cross comfort us in our worst anguish and temptation Heidelberg Catechism, Q. 44.

On 1 Peter 3:19 readings divide again. Matthew Henry writes, "As to the old world, Christ sent his Spirit; gave warning by Noah," so that the "spirits in prison" are those who despised the warning Matthew Henry. That reading has been popular since Augustine. Others think Christ proclaimed in the realm of the dead between cross and resurrection. Still others take the "spirits" to be fallen spiritual beings linked to Genesis 6, to whom he announced his victory. Scholars are not agreed, and no creed fixes one of these.

On counting the days, the Fathers pointed to how Scripture speaks. Jerome writes, "Not that He remained three whole days and three nights in hell," but parts of days Jerome. Augustine says "the three days were not three full and entire days" Augustine. Esther asks for a three-day fast and goes to the king on the third day (Esth 4:16; Esth 5:1). Dying on Friday afternoon and rising on Sunday morning fits "the third day."

In the original languages

Hadēs (ᾍδης) is translated "hell" or "Hades" but is distinct from Gehenna, the place of final judgment. Like Sheol it names the realm of the dead. In Luke 16, Lazarus "carried by the angels to Abraham’s side" and the suffering rich man seem to be within sight of each other in that realm (Luke 16:22).

Peter uses two different verbs. In 3:19 "preached" is kēryssō (κηρύσσω), a herald's loud announcement. It is used of the gospel but also of a decree, so the word alone cannot tell an invitation from an announcement of triumph. In 4:6 "was preached" is euangelizomai (εὐαγγελίζομαι), to bring good news.

Common objections

"The clause is not clearly biblical and was added late, so drop it." It was absent from the early creeds, and its biblical basis is hard to interpret, which is why some churches omit it. But the three things it tries to say are all tied to Scripture: Christ truly died, he is Lord even in the realm of death, and he bore judgment in our place. The church has not condemned any of the three emphases.

"If he preached to the dead, is there a second chance after death?" Some theologians are open to it, pointing to God's wide mercy. Others see a clash with "man is appointed to die once, and after that to face judgment" (Heb 9:27). No creed or council has taught a second chance, and 1 Peter 4:6 can also be read of believers who heard the gospel while alive and have since died. What we know for certain is that God is just and merciful. For more see What about those who never heard?.

"If he was in Paradise that day, how was he in Hades? And in John 20:17 he says, 'I have not yet ascended to the Father.'" One explanation is that Paradise and Hades are not two separate places. In Luke 16 the righteous and the wicked appear to share the realm of the dead, but one is comforted at Abraham's side. Paradise could then be the blessed place in God's presence within that realm, and John 20:17 could refer to the bodily ascension. Some Christians, Seventh-day Adventists among them, hold that the dead rest unconscious until the resurrection; since the oldest manuscripts have no punctuation, they read "today" with "I tell you." Either way the promise is to be with Christ.

Going further

Something about this question stays unknown, but what is certain is greater. Jesus went down to the very bottom of death, and he is Lord there too.

the Living One. I was dead, and behold, now I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the keys of Death and of Hades.

Rev 1:18

So the psalmist's words become fresh comfort: "if I make my bed in Sheol, You are there" (Ps 139:8). Matthew Henry says of the thief, "Christ upon the cross, is gracious like Christ upon the throne" Matthew Henry.

You might ask yourself: what part of the fear of death troubles me most? Which reading of the creed's line comforts me most?

To read further, see Did Jesus really rise from the dead?, Why did Jesus have to die? and What happens after death?.