The Bible is relatively quiet on the specifics of where the dead go after death, and what is said permits a number of different interpretation. Western theologians in the Middle Ages came up with the purgatory as the place where the dead go to complete their "satisfaction" of temporal punishment for their wrongdoings, before they are permitted into heaven. It is "an intermediate place where those not bad enough for hell nor good enough for heaven might make further expiation" (Roland Bainton). The idea of purgatory sat well with, and provided the theological context for the idea of indulgences and both ideas were milked of their possibilities for enrichening the Church coffers and feeding clerical abuse. The reformers of the 16th Cent repudiated both ideas, which remain part and parcel of Roman Catholic theology, though they are treated with "as less said about them the better."
©ALBERITH