In the Bible we find references not only to heaven as the sky where birds fly and clouds form, space where the Sun, the Moon and stars exist, but also to the spiritual realm where God resides. The word for heavens is sometimes used interchangeably with the arc of the sky, with heaven being above and hell being below. Is the spiritual realm a higher dimensional extension of the 3 spatial dimensions we are familiar with? Can the spiritual realm be characterized by hidden dimensions that can be learned with specialised esoteric knowledge?
A Multiverse
A multiverse and parallel universes are not exactly the same thing. But there is now some overlap both in the language physicists use as well as in the ideas around the theorized creation of universes in the multiverse.
A multiverse is a rescue device, or an escape clause, in misotheistic cosmology to get around the Creator. Since, in the known universe, we observe all parameters finely tuned for life (the cosmological fine-tuning problem) to avoid a Creator you just posit that we live in a local bubble universe of a multiverse filled with an infinite number of bubble universes that all have different physical parameters and because we find ourselves in this particular one we self-select and consider it special.
The argument is that this universe is not special, but just an accident of cosmic evolution that we are here. Read On the Origin of Universes by Means of Natural Selection wherein I critique theoretical physicist Lee Smolin’s proposal of cosmological natural selection. One universe being selected / favoured over other randomly forming universes because of the set of physical laws in it that favour its continued existence.
One must understand that today’s ‘mainstream’ cosmology is not science but a pagan philosophy. Because it is philosophy and not science it cannot be ‘proven’ by empirical methods one way or another.
“While many renowned scientists acknowledge the possibility of multiple and parallel universes, many other equally accomplished astrophysicists and cosmologists consider the debate a waste of time — more science fiction or philosophy than science. They argue the nature of empirical science makes it impossible to prove or disprove multiverse theories.”
B. Hays, Have scientists found evidence of a parallel universe?
The author means another universe in a multiverse; that is his parallel universe. String theory or its higher dimensional cousin, M-theory (or Membrane theory) is not a solution to the problems for this universe in cosmology, nor does it explain a parallel universe.
String theory is currently the best theory to unite gravity with the quantum world. But physicists have been working on that theory now for more than 50 years without a single prediction that has been experimentally testable, let alone an actual laboratory test. The closest we might have had was the test of supersymmetry theory (or SUSY for short), a sort of offspring of string theory.
SUSY was ruled out by 10 years of particle physics tests with the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). That experimental run ended in 2010 and the results adjudicated in 2016. One of the winners of the 2004 Nobel Prize in physics, theoretical physicist David Gross, a leading string theorist, along with others, was forced to admit that supersymmetry is a dud. See SUSY is Not the Solution to the Dark Matter Crisis.
Yet Sean M. Carroll in his 2016 book The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe Itself? admits that there are at least 10500 different implementations of string theory—of which it is not known where to look for the real physics of the real universe. In reality string theory rightly belongs in the mathematics department—it is not physics.
String theory posits the existence of many more spatial dimensions than the three (length, breadth and depth) we observe in this universe. Depending on the string excitations it has 10 or 26 spatial dimensions in total, but the number is uncertain. According to the theory, we don’t observe the extra dimensions because they are curled up (compactified) making them too small to observe in the macroscopic world.
“In string theory, ‘constants of nature’ like the vacuum energy or the masses of elementary particles are fixed by the exact way in which the extra dimensions are curled up in any given region of the universe. Elsewhere, if the extra dimensions are curled up in a different way, anyone who lived there would measure radically different numbers.” (Sean M. Carroll, p.308)
See The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe Itself? Part 9 or for a complete critique go to Review of Sean Carroll’s book The Big Picture (parts 1 – 11 combined in single PDF).
Parallel Universes
Theoretical physicist Michio Kaku is well known in popular media. He explores the concept of parallel universes in his 2004 book Parallel Worlds: A Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos, where he presents the idea that our universe may be one of many within a multiverse.
According to Kaku, the leading theory explaining the origin of the universe—the inflationary expanding big bang universe theory—suggests that our universe is a bubble floating in an infinite sea of other bubble universes, with new universes continually being created. Or that we may live on the skin of an expanding bubble in an infinitely developing multiverse.
He says this concept is supported by modern physics, particularly M-theory, which is seen as a potential “Theory of Everything” capable of reconciling the four fundamental forces of nature and explaining what occurred before the big bang.
In his book Kaku discussed how the idea of parallel universes, once dismissed as science fiction or pseudoscience, has gained credibility among physicists due to advancements in cosmology, including data from the WMAP and COBE satellites and the Hubble Space Telescope.
He outlines multiple highly speculative scientific frameworks that support the existence of parallel worlds: quantum mechanics, through the “many-worlds interpretation” where every quantum decision spawns a new universe; cosmology, via eternal inflation creating a multiverse of bubble universes; and string theory, which predicts a vast “landscape” of possible universes, with our own being just one (as discussed above).
Kaku speculates that if parallel universes exist, advanced civilizations might one day escape the eventual demise of our universe—predicted to end in a “big freeze” after trillions of years—by using hypothetical hyperspace wormholes to migrate to a younger universe.
He claims that these parallel universes are not mere fantasies but are grounded in serious scientific inquiry, with physicists actively seeking ways to test the multiverse theory using sophisticated instruments like gravity lenses and wave detectors.
His book also highlights how the multiverse concept has transitioned from theoretical physics into popular culture, influencing films and television series that explore alternate realities. That may be true but it does not add a shred of evidence in what remains a fact-free science.
But this is where it gets interesting. Kaku is really “out there” because he blends ideas of parallel universes with the multiverse. That includes the idea that the decisions humans make in some quantum physics experiment create ever increasing numbers of parallel universes.
This subject is not about a multiverse per se but a hyper-verse of separate universes existing within the same space and time. In such a situation you could even say all universes occupy the same space in a higher dimensional hyperspace.
This idea involves the decision making process. Some quantum mechanical theorists suggest that every time a decision is made a new universe is created, one with the decision taken one way, and the other with the decision taken the other way. So you end up with an infinite set of parallel universes.
Suppose that there exists two parallel universes occupying the same space and time. In one universe, for example, the white is white and black is black, but in the alternate universe, white is black and black is white. These black and white colours are placeholders for the issues people perceive in the world around them, upon which they make decisions.
The idea is found in many science fiction books and movies but it is also studied by theoretical physicists as a possible explanation of events in the real world, so they allege.
What if it is a real thing? Not within a physical hyperspace, but within a spiritual one. I explored that idea in Are You Living in a Parallel Universe?
Then there is the concept of interdimensional or extradimensional beings crossing over from a parallel universe into this universe. They cross over in the sense that they come from another universe that occupies the same space as ours but dimensionally separate.
That idea tries to dress up the only possible real explanation with language that makes it sound scientific and therefore acceptable. That is that these beings are in fact demons who cross over some sort of divide from the spiritual world. See Interdimensional Beings are Extradimensional Beings and They are Real | Aliens Dressed Up in Scientific Language are Still Demons.
This is not the same as the multiverse of different bubble universes existing side by side, even bumping into each other. But the idea of a different parallel universe occupying the same physical space as this one yet it not detectable by any physical experiment. It would be as if non-detectable extra spatial dimensions exist orthogonal to the spatial dimensions which we can detect in our universe.
All known physics, including well established laws, tells us the number of dimensions in this space is exactly 3. No more, no less. Therefore, from a purely physical argument, there are no other macroscopic spatial dimensions in this universe. For that reason theoretical physicists who explore additional dimensions in some new physical theory must compactify any additional dimensions down to being much much smaller than the size of subatomic particles. That makes those extra spatial dimensions undetectable.
Lessons from the Bible
Sometimes I run into Bible believers who speak of higher dimensions, whether citing string theory or some other exotic ideas, and they make the claim that that is where heaven is. They equate the heavenly realm to an higher dimensional extension of the present universe.
I am a firm believer in the spiritual realm, which, from my understanding, is beyond known physics. I would characterise it as a category problem. The physical 3D realm is not in the same category as the spiritual realm. It does not have the same physical laws as we are governed by in this realm.
But before any further discussion on this let’s review what the Bible can tell us in this regard. From the biblical texts we can find mention of three different meanings of the heaven(s). First let’s have a look at those and their meaning from their context. After that we’ll discuss the physical and spiritual implications.
In the creation of the universe,
14 … God said, Let luminaries [lights] be in the expanse of the heavens, to divide between the day and between the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years. … 16 And God made the two great luminaries:
the great luminary to rule the day, and the small luminary and the stars to rule the night. 17 And God set them in the expanse of the heavens, to give light on the earth,Genesis 1:14, 16, 17 KJ3
God created the Sun, the Moon and the stars and placed them in the expanse of the heavens. That equates to space in the solar system and beyond. But that is not the same space where birds fly.
20b … and let the birds fly over the earth [and] the expanse of the heavens.
Genesis 1:20b KJ3
20b … and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens.
Genesis 1:20b ESV
The best way to reconcile this is to see it from the Earth’s surface. Birds fly through he sky across the face of the heavens. Thus heavens here means the arc of the sky, and the atmosphere. Birds do not fly through the vacuum of space.
4 And I will leave you on the land; I will hurl you on the face of the field and will make all the birds of the heavens to dwell on you. And I will fill the beasts of all the earth from you.
Ezekiel 32:4 KJ3
The atmosphere is also called heavens. It supports clouds that give rain.
12a Jehovah shall open to you His good treasure, the heavens to give the rain to your land in its season, and to bless all the work of your hand.
Deuteronomy 28:12a
Then we have the expression ‘heaven of heavens’ and ‘above the heavens’. I have discussed these waters above the heavens before, but suffice to say here that in the following the Psalmist is again referring to space in the solar system and beyond.
3 Praise Him, sun and moon; praise Him, all stars of light. 4 Praise Him, O heavens of heavens; and O waters that are above the heavens.
Psalm 148:3-4 KJ3
The phrase ‘above the heavens’ is saying ‘above the atmospheric heavens’. The ‘heaven of heavens’ is also referred to as the ‘highest heaven’ in some translations. That is all space in the universe. God is greater than that.
18 For is it true that God shall dwell with men on the earth? Behold, the heavens, and the heaven of heavens, do not contain You. How much less this house that I have built!
2 Chronicles 6:18 KJ3
In the following we see that God speaks out of heaven to man. So this reference to heaven is clearly a spiritual reference. We have a blending of the spiritual realm with the physical.
16 And having been baptized, Jesus went up immediately from the water. And, behold! The heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God coming down as a dove, and coming upon Him. 17 And behold! A voice out of the heavens saying, This is My Son, the Beloved, in whom I have been well-pleased.
Matthew 3:16-17 KJ3
Heaven is up. The Spirit of God is seen coming down as or like a dove. It is a metaphor, but the figure of speech used is always that heaven is above. For spirit beings like angels they are seen descending from heaven or ascending to heaven.
51 And He says to him, Truly, truly, I say to you, From now on you will see
Heaven opened, and “the angels of God ascending and descending” on the Son of Man.John 1:51 KJ3
This is a reference to Jacob’s ladder, which he dreamed of, with its top reaching to the heavens, the heavens where angels come from (Genesis 28:12).
The spiritual realm does not exist in the 3 dimension space we inhabit. Then the biblical language used throughout the Bible, like in the above, is for our human mind, which cannot comprehend ‘where’ the spiritual Heaven is. The language uses ‘opened’ referring to Heaven. Some sort of portal was opened and humans were permitted to see angels, even Jesus Christ in Heaven with God the Father.
55 But being full of the Holy Spirit, looking intently into the heaven, he saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right of God.
Acts 7:55 KJ3
In this verse Stephen was looking into the heaven, yet because he was full of the Holy Spirit he was actually seeing into the spiritual realm. There is a reality there that is sometimes opened to us to see. But humans have no control or ability to open a portal into the spiritual realm.
3 And no one in Heaven was able to open the scroll nor to look at it, neither on the earth, nor underneath the earth.
Revelation 5:3 KJ3
Notice here the language of Heaven above. Below that is Earth and under the Earth is the netherworld, which we call hell. All three places are regions where beings reside.
In the book of Revelation, which uses highly symbolic language, a burning star, perhaps a comet or asteroid falls out of heaven. That is consistent with standard physics. We call such heavenly bodies stars, though not meaning stars like our Sun.
10 And the third angel trumpeted. And a great burning star, like a lamp, fell out of the heaven. And it fell onto the third part of the rivers, and onto the springs of waters. 11 And the name of the star is said to be Wormwood. And the third part of the waters became changed into wormwood. And many men died from the waters, because they were made bitter.
Revelation 8:10-11 KJ3
But in the following chapter of Revelation the star symbolizes a spiritual being, an angel.
1 And the fifth angel sounded his trumpet. And I saw a star out of the heaven falling onto the earth. And the key to the pit of the abyss was given to it.
Revelation 9:1 KJ3
Thus here heaven is the spiritual realm. The region we call outer space, filled with stars, is used as a figure of speech for the place spirit beings, angels, inhabit. But also it is a place where fallen angels have access to.
3 And another sign was seen in the heavens. And, behold, a great fiery red dragon having seven heads and ten horns! And on his heads were seven diadems, 4 and his tail drew the third part of the stars of the heaven, and he throws them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman being about to bear, so that when she bears he might devour her child.
Revelation 12:3-4 KJ3
Though the red dragon here is symbolic language it illustrates the power of Satan over the angels who chose to follow him. They comprised a third of all angels, and they were cast out of Heaven to the Earth. These angels we now call demons.
Therefore we have biblical language that describes three types of heaven. The sky or atmosphere, outer space of the solar system and the rest of the universe, and Heaven where Jesus Christ, and angelic beings reside. The latter is a spiritual realm and the former are the physical realm of 3 dimensional space.
1 Really, to boast is not profitable to me, for I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. 2 I know a man in Christ fourteen years before—whether in the body, I do not know, or out of the body, I do not know, God knows—such a one was caught up to the third Heaven. 3 And I know such a man—whether in the body or out of the body, I do not know; God knows—4 that he was caught up into Paradise and heard unspeakable words which a man is not permitted to speak.
2 Corinthians 12:1-4 KJ3
In this passage the Apostle Paul is describing, I believe, his own experience of a vision he had. He was taken up to the third Heaven. Up is used because Heaven is above, figuratively. The man taken into Paradise and experienced that spiritual realm. This is the same spiritual realm that angels reside in and that Jacob saw in his dream.
40 And there are heavenly bodies, and earthly bodies. But the glory of the heavenly is truly different, and the ones of the earthly one different; … 47 The first man was out of earth, an earthy one. The second Man was the Lord out of Heaven.
1 Corinthians 15: 40; 47 KJ3
There are two types of bodies, heavenly and earthly. The second Man here is Christ who comes from Heaven, the spiritual realm.
The implication is that the two types of bodies are not interchangeable. That would mean Paul was in vision when he said that he was taken to the third Heaven.
Without a celestial body, which is made of different essence to the natural body in this present world, we cannot pass into the heavenly realm.
40 There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial: but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another.
1 Corinthians 15:40 AKJV
You say, well what about Enoch who “walked with God” and God took him (Genesis 5:24). True but he never came back. We don’t know what God did to his body. But we do know that corruptible flesh cannot enter heaven.
51 Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. 53 For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 54 So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.
1 Corinthians 15:51-54 AKJV
To enter through the portal into the spiritual realm we must die, or be changed. Death is not the end but only the beginning to those who believe.
Discussion
There is this question: can we in anyway influence what heaven is or will become? That is, do human decisions create a parallel universe? I mean, in the sense of the afterlife, which we call heaven and hell.
Biblically our decision for or against the Lord Jesus does influence our fate, but that is not the same thing as influencing or creating a higher dimensional space.
We will all be judged, whether we love the Lord or not. So all humans will experience the spiritual world in the afterlife in some way. When you enter that world it is best that your name is written in the Book of Life, which is a record of all those who trust in Jesus Christ (Revelation 20:12, 15).
Is the spiritual realm a higher dimensional extension of the 3 spatial dimensions we are familiar with? Absolutely not. No physical theory would or could even suggest that. As I have already stated — it is a category problem, and not one of unknown physics.
Death is not a revolving door. It is more like a one-way door that only opens into the spiritual realm. A spiritual incorruptible body is needed to pass through and therefore the earthly corruptible body is shed in the process.
And the departed do not return as ghosts or spirits to annoy the living. All biblical evidence is that those spirits people experience that way are all demons posing as the departed dead.
There are, of course, good angels who the Lord uses as messengers and soldiers in the spiritual realm. They have the spirit bodies that can pass from one realm to another. They can materialise in this realm. I avoid using the term ‘dimension’ because it is misleading.
Demons can also materialise, and also with their vehicles. Read Understanding UFOs: Military, Interstellar, and Interdimensional Insights. That is all under the superintendence of God. Even their craft can manifest on military radar screens. They are observed on video and by humans to morph and change as they move in and out of this physical realm. See videos in this piece: Big UFO Secrets Revealed | Real According to Testimony at US Congress Hearing.
Demons are all liars, like their leader Satan. Therefore it is their nature to lie and tell humans, who listen to them, that they are aliens from another star systems, or that they are from another universe, a parallel universe. That is the strong delusion that God sends to those who reject His Son Jesus Christ. Read Gods of the Present Age are Lying Spirits.
The standard model of particle physics, a quantum mechanical description of all the subatomic particles we observe in experiments, is probably the best physical theory ever developed by man. It has made exquisite predictions and has had phenomenal success. So we can say it is a very good description of the natural world. And it only relies on 3 spatial dimensions and 1 time dimension.
String theory or M-theory doesn’t even come close. With their higher dimensional spaces they have made zero successful predictions, and as mentioned above, supersymmetry theory (SUSY) has been disproven after 10 years of experiments on the LHC.
No matter the advancements in physics, quantum particle physics, or any other, will the human mind ever be able to understand the workings of the spiritual world. It will always remain beyond human knowledge to understand.
18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but to us which are saved it is the power of God. 19 For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. 20 Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
1 Corinthians 1:18-20 AKJV
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