What is hell described as in the Bible?

ταρταρόω, 'to cast into Tartarus,' a term used by heathen writers for the 'deepest abyss of the infernal regions,' a place of extreme darkness. 2 Peter 2:4: cf. 2 Peter 2:17 and Jude 13.

Whatever figurative meaning there may be in the use of any of the above words, it is plain and certain from scripture that there is a place of everlasting punishment. It is awfully described as the LAKE OF FIRE, 'the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone.' Rev. 19:20; Rev. 20:10, 15; Rev. 21:8. It was prepared for the devil and his angels, but into it the wicked also will be cast. Matt. 13:40, 42; Matt. 25:41; 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 6, etc. See ETERNAL.

The other word is "hell." Now, unfortunately, two words are translated "hell" in the English Bible — Hades and Gehenna: one meaning the temporary state of departed spirits, the unseen world without saying more; the other used for the fire that never shall be quenched. Its meaning is, etymologically, the valley of Hinnom, where people offered their children to Moloch, and which was defiled by Josiah; and, it seems, a fire kept up to consume what was filthy and unclean out of Jerusalem and called Tophet. Hence we have in Isaiah, "For Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared; he hath made it deep and large; and the breath of the LORD, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it," Isa. 30:33. "And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh," Isa. 66:24. This is, on the face of it, a material fact; there was a constant fire enduring continually, to which those bodies were enduringly subjected. Now Sheol, or Hades, is never confounded with this. It was an actual valley between Zion and what is called the Hill of Evil Counsel, south of Jerusalem, where tradition places the house of Caiaphas, if my memory serve me. This valley, where the unquenched fire consumed what was unclean, which yet, according to Isaiah 66, should remain in the consuming fire unconsumed, an abhorring unto all flesh, was used for an image of a sorer punishment, and was called Gehenna (Anglice, "hell"); that is, literally, the valley of Hinnom. Now this word is found in Matthew 5:22, 29, 30; chap. 10:28; chap. 18:9; chap. 23:15, 33; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Luke 12:5; James 3:6.

In Matthew 5 the statement is general: danger of hell-fire — thy whole body cast into hell; referring to sacrificing one member rather than sin; clearly not the valley of Hinnom. "Fear him which is able to destroy both body and soul in hell," chap. 10:28. It is not the valley of Hinnom. They do not put souls there. It is metaphorically used for the place of final judgment and punishment. Chapter 18:9 is as in chapter 5; in chapter 23:15, a child of hell — one who is the natural heir — belongs to this place. That it is the place of condemnation in judgment Matthew 23:33 shews: "Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the judgment (kriseos) of hell?" (Mark 9:43-48.) We have solemnly repeated the call to sacrifice the dearest thing that is a snare to us, under penalty of being cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. It is a judgment, a judicial punishment, for which there is no relief, of which there is no cessation.

133 In Luke 12 it is used as a known thing, a place, the effect of divine judgment. James 3:6 is only of importance as shewing that it is connected with pure unmitigated evil; where nothing else is. Now a person who reads all this cannot doubt that that which the word "hell" is used for in English is fully contemplated. The desirableness of not confounding it with Hades, the vaguest possible word for the unseen world, no reflecting mind would deny. It is a place into which God's judgment casts the unrepentant and rebellious wicked, where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched. That human figures of fire and worms are used may be; but the force of it is plain enough — it is the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels, where God casts in judgment those that are righteously rejected, where there is no remission, when God says gegone, It is done; and without are whoremongers, and all who love and make a lie. Hades is not Gehenna, and Gehenna in the New Testament is never used as the Valley of Hinnom. The proper English word is "hell"; that is, the place where pure evil, if such a phrase may be used, meets its final doom, after restoring means (even to God's giving His own Son, and beseeching men to be reconciled) are exhausted, and where the effect of judgment remains unquenched.

The Valley of Hinnom, the refuse dump outside Jerusalem, where fires always burned and maggots continually did their work, was known as Gehenna; and this word on the Lord's lips became a terribly apt figure of the abode of the lost. Verily hell will be the great refuse heap of eternity, where all that is incorrigibly evil will be segregated from the good, and lie for ever under the judgment of God. This terrible fact reaches us from the lips of Him who loved sinful men and wept over them.

God's revelation is in the Bible. We get our knowledge of heaven from the Bible, we know nothing of heaven apart from it, but it speaks of hell as well as heaven. If we accept the one we cannot consistently reject the other. Take the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so I would have told you" (John 14:2). If there had been no place and state of blessing beyond this life for us, He would have told us plainly; and if there had been no judgment to come, no retribution for sin, no hell, would He not also have told us? But the strongest language in the Bible as to these things came from His own lips. He spoke of some who would die in their sins and the impossibility of such going where He would be (John 8:21, 23, 24). He said to the proud self righteous hypocrites of His day, "How shall ye escape the damnation of hell?" (Matt. 23:14). He said, "Fear Him which, after He has killed has power to cast into hell; yea, I say to you, Fear Him" (Luke 12:5). He it is who will say to some in the day of judgment of the living nations, "Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels" (Matt. 25:41), and of these He said, "these shall go into everlasting punishment" (Matt. 25:46). He spoke of "outer darkness" and "weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matt. 25:30), and "of their worm that never dies and the fire that is not quenched" (Mark 9:46). Who dares to say that he will listen to the Lord and believe Him when He speaks of blessing, but refuse to hear and believe when He speaks of judgment?

What about the fate of unbelievers? Again, Scripture is decisive in this matter. The Lord Jesus said, "Cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Mt.25:30). On another occasion He spoke of hell as a place where "the fire ... shall never be quenched ‑ where their worm does not die" (Mk.9:43‑44). In a coming day He will say to some, "Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels

And these will go away into everlasting punishment" (Mt.25:41,46). Revelation 20:10 describes hell as a place where there is torment day and night forever and ever. Though we should not wish this torment on our worst enemy, yet we do not decide it. God does! And we can only bow to what He says. One who refuses this has a faulty view both of the love and the holiness of God.

All man's good is in the manifestation of God thus to the soul. In a world which His hands have made, and into which, though fallen, still His mercies come continuously, where His sun shines on the evil and the good, and His rain falls on the just and on the unjust, men vainly deem that they can do without Him. Alas! with the goods of his father in his hand, man can enjoy his pleasure in a far-off country, disregarding the famine that will surely come. They can think of doing without God in a world from which, though hidden, He is not withdrawn. Once withdrawn, they will find too late what they have chosen; for as heaven is God's dwelling-place, hell is the place whence He is forever absent: if God is light, hell is the place of utter and unimagined darkness.

There are several names used for this: “the furnace of fire” (Matt. 13:42, 50; cf.Rev.9:2), “everlasting fire” (Matt 18:8), “hell, … the fire unquenchable” (Mark 9:43). The everlasting fire of hell (Gehenna), the lake of fire, is prepared for the devil and his angels (Matt. 25:41; cf. Rev.20:10). The fact that it will not only be angels but also people who will be cast into this unquenchable fire — eternally in the company of the fallen prince of angels — will be because, during their life here on earth, they didn't turn away from the prince and god of this age who blinded their minds (2 Cor.4:4).

And so when we come to look at the details. There is no doubt that annihilation has been helped in many minds by the tendency to take literally the expressions used in Scripture to image to us the awful realities of eternal punishment. A "lake burning with fire and brimstone," if taken literally, would suggest to many the idea of utter extermination of the bodies at least of those cast into it. But how should the devil, a spirit, be tormented there? And what was the "flame" which tormented the spirit of the rich man in hades? The truth is, these are figures, which Scripture itself explains, where over and over again God's wrath is compared to fire. Thus, in the Lord's solemn words in Mark 9:48, the worm that dieth not is the gnawing of awakened conscience: who will suppose a literal undying worm? And so the fire that is not quenched is as surely that wrath of God which "abideth on" the wicked.

You will observe that it is God who is prominent through this portion, exactly answering to what we saw in 1 Cor. 15:28. "And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he saith [to me], Write; for these words are true and faithful" (verse 5). He speaks that sits on the throne. We do not get the Lamb mentioned. It is the glory of God in the fullest possible sense that we have here. "And he said to me, They are done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end." No doubt Christ is the Alpha and the Omega too, as we find in Revelation 22:13; but it is not the Lord as such that acts and speaks here, but God. "I will give him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. He that overcometh shall inherit these things; and I will be a God to him, and he shall be a son to me" (verses 6, 7). Nothing can be plainer than that it is God as such who is speaking all through. "But for the cowardly, and unbelievers, and abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers and idolaters, and all the false, their part [shall be] in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death" (verse 8). A most awful word of warning, and especially as used here! For mark the force of it. It is then God shall be all in all — God who is love. But He is not merely love, which is a false and infidel thought; He is light as well as love. It as much appertains to God to be holy as to be gracious; and the very same portion of His word teaches us both these truths. And here is the final proof of it. In love He comes down to be with His people. They may be men, but they are no longer in weakness and sorrow; for God Himself has wiped away every tear from their eyes. But He is light, and therefore in presence of all things new, where righteousness dwells in peace, when there is no evil or sin, but separation from it for ever by the power of God; even then the portion of the wicked is in the lake burning with fire and brimstone. Note well that this is the eternal state. Remember that in the eternal state there is the doom, the never-ending doom, of those who have rejected Christ and taken their stand on their own miserable self. Here is the award from God Himself. Their part is the second death, where their worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched, as the Lord Jesus so touchingly expresses it. No declaration can be more solemn than that of Rev. 21:8, not only because of its character, but because of its place. When God will have rest in the new heavens and earth — when He will come down to abide among men, because there will no longer be any evil to check — His dwelling with them — then it is that the awful scene presents itself of evil and its hopeless unending torment. This is what God teaches us in His picture of the eternal world. There is not only the bright side, but none the less the lake of fire, which has its course; nor does a word intimate that its horrors will ever come to an end.

Other pictures used are those of an abyss and a prison (Luke 8:31; Rom.10:7; 1 Peter 3:19-20; Rev.9:1-2,11; 11:7; 17:8; 20:1,3 cf. verse 7. The Greek words are abyssus and phulakee (1 Peter 3:19). The word in 2 Peter 2:4 translated “hell” in the King James translation and “the deepest pit of gloom” in the J.N.D.translation is the Greek word tartarus. This is the only place where it occurs in the New Testament. It is a term used by heathen writers for the “deepest abyss of the infernal regions”. However, these are mainly references to the punishment in an interim state; of the deceased unbelievers, of angels who have sinned and are kept until the judgment of the great day, and of Satan himself during the millennium. According to Vine's Expository Dictionary the abyss (abyssus) or “bottomless pit” is a description of an immeasurable depth, the underworld, the depths of sheol. In Romans 10:6-7 the abyss is contrasted with heaven, the present dwelling place of the exalted Christ.