"I always intepreted is as that we fell from God's grace, but we haven't been entirely removed from his warmth, since we still qualify for salvation."
I don't know God's pretty bitter in genesis. I thought being banished to a world where you feel pain and hunger always kind of synched up with hell(eternal pain right).
Another way to look at it is that humans disobeyed god or "Sinned" and were sent here. Isn't hell where god sends sinners ;O
I hope it's not too uncouth for me to talk about other forms of Hell:
http://www.buddhanet.net/wheel1.htm
Here's an interactive wheel I just found when I was looking for a picture, it's pretty cool, if you hold it above different parts of the wheel it gives you information on them. According to this some of the sections are depicting firey/icey hells. It's the one on the bottom.
Read the top big portion of the pie, it's the abode of false gods! I always liked that about buddhism, that you could feel that you are enlightened and supreme and eventually you still succomb and fall again.
Also check out the cardinal sins of the world in the center ;O Ignorance hatred and greed. Anyway the thing to notice is that this wheel is saying suffering, torture and torment exist everywhere within this world. Also notice that the lord of death(or "monster of impermanance" as they call him here but I thought it was supposed to be yama traditionally), the big scarey guy, is holding the entire world in his clutches.