The writers of the classics used the Underworld a great deal in their writings. The playwrights explained this life by examining Hell. And this they did, many times, comically. In comparison, the Biblical narrative talks about Hell in serious terms. The bible quotes generally deal with dying and Hell as a quite somber thing to speak about.
These plays are not attached in any way to religious seriousness. The first play is that of Theseus, in which the man goes down to the otherworld in low-brow fashion and is a retelling of a somber story of the labyrinth and the mighty half man half bull. Oddly enough for the Greeks, the otherworld had become a place to poke fun at. Around four hundred years before Christ, only a short time after Euripides, Aristophanes made a little ditty about frogs guarding Hell. The play is starred by a drunk guy who stumbles down to hell with a few of his friends to help him along the way. There they find the froggies that are protecting the way to the underworld. They try to reason with the froggies that all the great poets are gone now and that they should release the great poet. A fierce debate ensures and finally the poet is not allowed to return.
The Greeks seemed to share a special freedom in speaking their mind as long as they veiled their speech. From the second century A.D., the writer Lucian of Samosata, also known as “the blasphemer,” invented the Dialogues from the Dead. This technique is were great dead people could come back to speak their minds on subjects that most could not talk about. With this guys and others, the otherworld had become a place to throw taboo ideas and ways of thinking. I think this is why the Christian perspective grow so rapidly in the Greek world. The bible quotes make it clear that Hell had been a thing extremely real and a thing to generally be feared. This thinking must have made a lot of sense with the level headed thinkers in the society. Bible quotes in which paid attention to the endless condition of man and gave an earnestness to it must have rung correct, unlike the sardonic performances from the top group people.
Now that we have surveyed a few ways that the Greeks talked openly about the afterlife, we can see that they were critically thinking about the religious thoughts. One should not take it as a bad thing, we all need to make light of things now and then. Now to continually go after the pious thoughts could mean that you just don’t agree with them and think that they are a farce.