Answer:
When Jesus died, His soul, His immaterial part, descended into the righteous portion of Sheol or Hades. In Matthew 12:40, Jesus predicted that He must go down into the heart of the earth where Sheol or Hades is located. Ephesians 4:9 states that Jesus descended into the lower parts of the earth.
1 Peter 3:18–19 points out that, in His spirit, Jesus preached unto the spirits in prison. These spirits were the unrighteous ones in Hell. Some have misunderstood this verse and taught that since He preached, He preached the gospel to them and gave them a second chance to be saved. However, the Greek word that is used here is not the Greek word that means, “to preach the gospel,” but it is a Greek word that simply means, “to make a proclamation.” What happened when Yeshua descended is that His spirit made a proclamation that the His death guarantees the judgment of the unsaved. Jesus made the proclamation to those in Hell. Because of this, some assumed that Yeshua descended into Hell and this He did not.
He told the dying thief on the cross that on that very day, the both of them would be in Paradise, not in Hell. When Jesus died, His spirit descended to the righteous side of Sheol or Hades, Abraham’s bosom. As we see in Luke 16:19-31, if one were in Abraham’s bosom, he could see those in Hell and converse with those in Hell. So, the spirit of Jesus descended into Abraham’s bosom, and He made the proclamation that the death of the Messiah guaranteed their future judgment. Those who were to benefit from the death of Jesus were the souls of Abraham’s bosom only, not the souls of Hell.
When the Messiah ascended into Heaven, He took the souls of the Old Testament saints with Him; he led captivity captive (Eph. 4:8–10). Those who had been captured within the confines of Abraham’s bosom were now taken out of Abraham’s bosom. All the righteous souls who had died before the death of Jesus, whose sins were only covered with the blood of animals, whose sins were now placed upon Jesus, ascended with Jesus into Heaven. As a result, Abraham’s bosom, the righteous side of Sheol or Hades, has been eliminated and Paradise is no longer in Abraham’s bosom. Paradise is now in the Third Heaven (2 Cor. 12:1–4).
Extract from Dr Arnold Fruchtenbaum’s Manuscript, Ariel’s MBS107 The Place of the Dead pg 19-20
