Faith First Media

The following is an excerpt from the book Does the Bible Have Contradictions? by Matthew Elton, copyright 2009 Matthew Elton.

Question:

Apart from Jesus there was no-one else (John 3:13) or there were others (2 Kings 2:11) who ascended to heaven?

Answer:

In John 3:13, Jesus says that no man has ever entered heaven. What Jesus said was true. This supposed "contradiction" stems from a misunderstanding of what the Bible means when it says that Elijah was taken up into heaven. There are actually three heavens in the Bible. The word "heaven" can refer to:

1.  Heaven, the spiritual realm where Jesus ascended to the "right hand of God" (Deuteronomy 26:15).

2.  Outer space, also known as "the heavens" (Psalm 8:3, Genesis 26:4, Deuteronomy 1:10, Deuteronomy 28:62, Isaiah 13:10).

3.  The Earth's atmosphere, commonly referred to in the Bible as "heaven" (Genesis 7:11-12, Job 35:11, Jeremiah 16:4)

So how do we know which heaven the Bible is referring to when we see the word "heaven" used in the Bible? It's really just a simple matter of looking at the context:

Then it happened, as they continued on and talked, that suddenly a chariot of fire appeared with horses of fire, and separated the two of them; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.

--2 Kings 2:11

So which heaven was it? It was the Earth's atmosphere. We know this because in 2 Chronicles 21:12-15 Elijah writes a letter to King Jehoram, several years after he was taken into heaven! Obviously, Elijah would not have been able to do this if he had died there and his spirit was in heaven, nor would he have been able to do this if he had entered outer space, since he would have died instantly. The only logical explanation is that the whirlwind carried Elijah into the air (also known as "heaven").  Miraculously, Elijah survived, and several years later, Elijah wrote a letter to King Jehoram.

In conclusion, Jesus was correct. When Jesus said that nobody had ever entered heaven, he really meant it.