Jesus Christ said to the “thief on the cross” in Luke 23:43, “Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.” Some believe this means that we may go to heaven when we die. Was Jesus really saying the thief would go to heaven that day? For that matter, did Jesus go to heaven that day?

The first thing to note is 1 Corinthian 15:3-4, which say, “Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.” If Christ were dead and buried for three days, then He would certainly not have been in heaven “today,” as Luke records. In Acts 2:31, we find that Christ was actually in “hell” for those three days, but that He was not left there: “[H]is soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see corruption.” This hell does not refer to fire. The Greek word used for hell in this verse is hades and refers to a grave or pit. Since Christ did not enter paradise that day, we can be certain that the thief also did not.

So what was Christ saying to the thief? In order to have a proper understanding of Luke 23:43, we must consider the punctuation of the sentence. In the original Greek, punctuation simply was not used. Most translations put a comma before the word “today.” This comma was, in fact, added centuries after the original writing. The original order of the words is as follows: “Verily to thee I say to day with me shalt thou be in paradise.” The emphasis is not on when the promise would be delivered, but on when the promise was made: “today.” We can correct this error in punctuation by putting the comma after the word “today.” Now the verse reads: “Verily I say unto thee to day, shalt thou be with me in paradise.” The meaning becomes clear. When the thief enters paradise, he will be with Christ. That is the promise Christ made that day.

The word paradise is not synonymous with heaven. The word actually describes the time when God sets up His Kingdom on Earth. In verse 42, the thief was asking Christ to remember him in the Kingdom. The Thayer’s Greek-English lexicon defines paradise as a garden or pleasure ground. This is not heaven!

Where is this paradise? The Bible reveals that the tree of life is in the paradise of God (Revelation 2:7). That tree of life is found in new Jerusalem, described in Revelation 21-22. Revelation 22:2 reads, “In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life ….” The thief on the cross will be with Christ in new Jerusalem, as Christ promised almost 2,000 years ago.