Before the resurrection of Christ, the soul and spirit of the righteous dead went to the paradise compartment of the underworld. There, Christ met the penitent thief after His death on the cross. On the day of His resurrection, Christ’s soul and spirit returned from the underworld, but He did not return alone: He brought back with Him all the occupants of the paradise section and locked it up and He now has the keys of death and hades (Revelation 1:18). Here death stands for the grave and hades for the underworld. Some of those who came back from the underworld with Christ got their bodies, and rose and ascended with Him as the firstfruits of the resurrection from among the dead (Matthew 27:52–53). The rest were taken up to the third heaven, where Paul was caught up (2 Corinthians 12:1–4). Paul called it paradise . There all the righteous dead who have died since Christ’s resurrection go, that they may be “with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8).