'deep, void'), ṣulā (צוּלָה "sea-deep, deep flood") and the name of the sea monster rahab (רחב "spacious place; rage, fierceness, insolence, pride.
")[2] In the original sense of the Hebrew tehóm, the abyss was the primordial waters or chaos out of which the ordered world was created (Genesis 1:2).
The term could also refer literally to the depths of the sea, the deep source of a spring or the interior of the Earth.
[3] In a later extended sense in intertestamental Jewish literature, the abyss was the underworld, either the abode of the dead (Sheol) or eventually the realm of the rebellious spirits (fallen angels) (Hell).
Paul of Tarsus uses the term in Romans 10:7 when quoting Deuteronomy 30:12–14, referring to the abode of the dead (cf.