BOOK REVIEW / And will there be gnashing of teeth?: 'The Formation of Hell' - Alan Bernstein; UCL Press, 25 pounds

HELL and the threat of eternal damnation loomed large on the curriculum of my Catholic school, as it has for centuries in Western culture. To this day no amount of comforting words from the Bishop of Durham about the notion of the devil's domain being simply a colourful myth can entirely eclipse those deeply ingrained fears of a one-way ticket to a fiery underworld.

Professor Alan Bernstein's scholarly study does, however, add considerable weight to the ongoing process of downgrading hell in Christianity. A historian who never lets his own religious prejudices seep into the text, he traces the development of ideas about the afterlife from the ancient civilisations through to Judaism and Christianity.

The prevailing school of thought in pre-Christian times was that all the dead were held in one vast storehouse with no element of post-mortem judgement on their lives. Lions were laid to rest with lambs, saints with sinners. This tradition of what Bernstein calls 'neutral death', can be seen in Homer's Odyssey. In recounting the hero's voyage to Hades, the author reveals none of the heaven-hell scenario with which we are now so familiar. Instead, he presents the land of shades as far away from the the world of the living, reflecting the preoccupation in ancient Greece with separation from rather than judgement of the dead.

Yet, as Bernstein details, there were dissenters from this view. The growing claims of those who preferred 'moral death' found a champion in Plato who concluded his Republic with a plea for his fellow citizens to join together 'to be dear to ourselves and to the gods both during our sojourn here and when we receive our reward'. Society would be a better place, Plato acknowledged, if the wicked were thought to get their come-uppance when they died.

This dichotomy in Greek thought was reflected in the Jewish scriptures. The prevailing tone in much of the Old Testament - seen in such passages as the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah - is that God will judge the wicked during their lifetimes by premature dispatch to Sheol, which is similar to the catch-all neutral resting place of Hades. However, some of the later prophets like Jeremiah spoke of a fast-approaching day of judgement when those who had been wicked in their lives would be estranged from God forever while the righteous would sit at his right hand.

It was this second view that won favour among the early Christians. However, Bernstein is again at pains to show there was little consensus among Christ's followers. St Paul, for instance, the earliest of the New Testament writers, scarcely deigns to mention hell. He was much more concerned with the preparations for the second coming when everyone could be saved by a God of love rather than a God of retribution.

Satan lurks with uncharacteristic shyness in the background of this chronicle, never quite catching the author's eye despite what many would regard as his status as the king of the underworld. Likewise ignored is the gradual appearance in the history of hell of many of the images associated with the devil's realm - the fire, the torment, the weeping and gnashing of teeth. They are mentioned in passing but never gathered or explored in a coherent way.

At a time when all the churches are struggling to agree a common line on many questions of faith and morals, Professor Bernstein's study should reassure those who see disagreement as antithetical to organised religion. The Bishop of Durham is not a heretic because he doubts hell. Rather he stands four- square in a long and often biblical tradition.

Despite the efforts of those church leaders who continue to stress that there must be a unity of belief around certain basic tenets, history, as The Formation of Hell highlights, teaches a different lesson. Even some fundamental dogmas like hell and eternal damnation are man-made. They were not handed down on tablets of stone. They can be debated and disputed without destroying the church. Indeed, it has often been through dissent that belief has grown and developed.