What happended to Jesus (or his soul) during the three days he was dead?

You're right, He did not ascend to Heaven until 40 days later, the same thing happen to Jesus, just the same as Lazarus

WHAT JESUS SAID ABOUT DEATH

Jesus Christ spoke about the condition of the dead. He did so with regard to Lazarus, a man whom he knew well and who had died. Jesus told his disciples: “Lazarus our friend has gone to rest.” The disciples thought that Jesus meant that Lazarus was resting in sleep, recovering from an illness. They were wrong. Jesus explained: “Lazarus has died.” (John 11:11-14) Notice that Jesus compared death to rest and sleep. Lazarus was neither in heaven nor in a burning hell. He was not meeting angels or ancestors. Lazarus was not being reborn as another human. He was at rest in death, as though in a deep sleep without dreams. Other scriptures also compare death to sleep. For example, when the disciple Stephen was stoned to death, the Bible says that he “fell asleep.” (Acts 7:60) Similarly, the apostle Paul wrote about some in his day who had “fallen asleep” in death.—1 Corinthians 15:6.

LEARNING FROM THE RESURRECTION ACCOUNTS

The Bible teaches that the dead “are conscious of nothing at all.” They are not alive and have no conscious existence anywhere. The account of Lazarus confirms this. Upon returning to life, did Lazarus thrill people with descriptions of heaven? Or did he terrify them with horrible tales about a burning hell? No. The Bible contains no such words from Lazarus. During the four days that he was dead, he had been “conscious of nothing at all.” (Ecclesiastes 9:5) Lazarus had simply been sleeping in death.—John 11:11.

The account of Lazarus also teaches us that the resurrection is a reality, not a mere myth. Jesus raised Lazarus in front of a crowd of eyewitnesses. Even the religious leaders, who hated Jesus, did not deny this miracle.

Think about this too: If Lazarus had been in heaven for those four days, would he not have said something about it?— And if he had been in heaven, would Jesus have made him come back to earth from that wonderful place?— Of course not!

Yet, many people say that we have a soul, and they say that the soul lives on after the body dies. They say that Lazarus’ soul was alive somewhere. But the Bible does not say that. It says that God made the first man Adam “a living soul.” Adam was a soul. The Bible also says that when Adam sinned, he died. He became a “dead soul,” and he returned to the dust from which he had been made. The Bible also says that all Adam’s offspring inherited sin and death too.

The Scriptural teaching of the resurrection, however, is not compatible with the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. If an immortal soul survived death, no one would need to be resurrected, or brought back to life. Indeed, Martha expressed no thought about an immortal soul that was living on elsewhere after death. She did not believe that Lazarus had already gone to some spirit realm to continue his existence. On the contrary, she showed her faith in God’s purpose to reverse the effects of death. She said: “I know he will rise in the resurrection on the last day.” (John 11:23, 24) Likewise, Lazarus himself related no experiences of some afterlife. There was nothing to report.

Clearly, according to the Bible, the soul dies and the remedy for death is the resurrection.

As someone else said, he descended into hell, and he did this to get all the lost souls that belonged in heaven but were not able to get their, since nobody was allowed in heaven before Jesus died on the cross... this was the whole reason he came to earth in the first place - to re-open the gates of heaven!

Jesus was the perfect sacrifice, the perfect lamb, in order to atone for all sins, past, present and future....it is even historically documented that He was the only one ever crucified that did not have His knees broken...if His knees were broken He would not have been a perfect sacrifice...and the wound to His rib was made After His death on the cross....with that said, upon His death, God the Father mourned and Jesus ascended to Heaven, but first He had to go to "hell" (whatever u believe hell to be) as He was the sacrifice for All!! He had to go and offer those who were not in Heaven the chance to believe upon Him and love Him as they deserved the grace we take for granted today that He gave to us with His death.........He said, "Do not hold onto me, for I have not yet returned to the Father", because Jesus went to His throne in a transfigured body, thus His appearance on the Mount of Transfiguration, or Mount Zion (remember in the Old Testament, Moses and Elijah both were transfigured, they did not suffer a flesh death...that is why they appeared with Christ on the Mount when He was transfigured)..........He could not be touched as to touch Him before He was transfigured would be to "soil" Him, or make Him impure as a flesh hand can not touch the devine..He could not come unto His Father impure and thus could not be touched until His sacrifice and all it did and meant was complete with the final step of His transfiguration.....Thomas was permitted to touch Him, but He went to Thomas after He was transfigured..........it's all there, all one needs do is to read a good translation of the Holy Bible.......Our Father and His Son, Jesus Christ gave the Holy Bible to us for a reason........they want us to read it and do our best to follow its teachings......it's all in the Gospels and in the Old Testament......you can find Elijah, the prophet who was transfigured, in Kings in the Old Testament and that will explain all u need to know about transfiguration if you don't understand that term or what it means to be transfigured.......hope u have recieved some good answers and understand better now! Be well!

It's widely believed that Jesus went to Hell for those three days. It is indicated that he freed those who had trusted in Him before he appeared (like the Old Testament patriarchs; Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, etc.)

[You'll find an indirect reference to that in one of Peter's letters, I think. I don't have my concordance handy, so you might want to check on that for yourself.]

In that Jesus' sufferings had to be sufficient to cover all our wrongdoing, it seems reasonable that he did go to Hell at least for a little while. The fact that He began to experience total separation from His Father (which is the basic definition of Hell) even while He was still dying on the Cross, suggests that Jesus did go to Hell.

However, since Jesus was innocent, He did not have to stay in Hell forever to pay for our sins. Even a temporary separation from God, for an innocent man, is of infinite value, because both Jesus (as a man) and His Father (as God) were both pure and innocent.

The thing I wonder about, is why three days. Wouldn't one day have been enough. But I suppose that was to make sure it was long enough to take care of anybody who tried to say He wasn't really dead or something like that.

In the catholic religion there is a concept called Limbo. It's possible that Jesus spent the interim time there. Or if you're not catholic, maybe you could just say his soul stayed earth bound. OR if you're not religious at all you could say that the historic figure of Jesus passed into a coma due to blood loss and came too 3 days later.

Many refer to the Apostles creed here that He descended into hell. Through our history the truth about Jesus Christ has often come under attack and it is the churches defense of the truth that they would put down as creeds and confessions. This part appears to be from a heresy that said that Jesus did not have a true human soul. The church repudiated this and pointed to Psalm 16:

Psalm 16:10

For You will not leave my soul in Sheol,Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption.

The common translation of Sheol is hell. It referred to the state of death that all men went to. We know this is a separation of soul and body.

This passage is also used by Peter on Pentecost to prove Jesus is the Christ-see Acts 2:22-39.

The church then used this phrase to testify that the Scriptures prove that Jesus was true man with a true human soul. When he died His soul went into Sheol (hell) as for three days it was separated from His body. His body lay in the grave, His soul (in that state referred to as Sheol) went to heaven as He promised the thief on the cross. He also said just before He died "Father into your hands I commit My Spirit"

He descended into Hell proper (which is where all the good people were being kept since no one could enter His Kingdom because of Original Sin), and then he preached to the "souls in prison" (aka purgatory), then he opened the gates of heaven for those who followed His teachings.

He descended into hell and on the third day he rose again in fulfillment of the scriptures and joined God the father in heaven. Him going to hell made it possible for us to bypass hell and go directly to heaven.

he went into hell and got the keys to death and the grave, plus he couldn't have gone to heaven with all the sins he took from us unto himself.

This is a very good question. I have heard that particular scripture several time and never thought about it like that. I will have to ask around about that one myself. GREAT QUESTION!

He went to hell and took back the keys from the devil. (the keys to death and the grave)