Hell as Endless Punishment.
Jesus himself speaks more about hell than any other figure in scripture. Jesus’s teaching relies on Old Testament depictions of final judgment (Isa. 66:22–24; Jer. 7:32–8:3). The Bible describes hell as a place of eternal conscious torment. Eternal conscious torment has been the majority position of the Christian church throughout its 2,000-year history. In the modern era, other views have emerged among Protestants as rivals to the church’s traditional teaching. These alternatives include annihilationism and universalism. Nevertheless, the Bible teaches that Hell involves final separation from God’s mercy and from God’s people, unending experience of divine judgment, and just retribution for sin. By definition, these three characteristics of Hell rule out the annihilationist position (which denies that the torments of hell are everlasting), the universalist position (which holds that all people will eventually be saved), and the notion of purgatory (which views the flames of final judgment as a potential gateway to eternal life).
The person who talks most about hell in Scripture is none other than Jesus himself. Indeed, except for James 3:6, the only person even to use the word hell in scripture is Jesus.
- “Whoever shall say, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the hell of fire” (Matt. 5:22).
- “It is better for you that one of the parts of your body perish, than for your whole body to be thrown into hell” (Matt. 5:29, 30).
- “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matt. 10:28).
- “It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than having two eyes, to be cast into the hell of fire” (Matt. 18:9).
- “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel about on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves” (Matt. 23:15).
- “You serpents, you brood of vipers, how shall you escape the sentence of hell?” (Matt. 23:33).
- “If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life crippled, than having your two hands, to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire” (Mark 9:43).
- “If your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life lame, than having your two feet, to be cast into hell” (Mark 9:45).
- “If your eye causes you to stumble, cast it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than having two eyes, to be cast into hell, where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched” (Mark 9:47–48).
- “I say to you, My friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who after He has killed has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him!” (Luke 12:4–5).
The only other place where the term hell appears in the Bible is James 3:6, “and the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell.”
