Is hell's punishment unending? (8) (Revelation 14:5-13)

Let us consider passages that teach the eternal torment of the wicked dead.

·        Dan. 12:2: And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.  It does not say everlasting death that might suggest annihilation but that the punishment is everlasting.

·        Matt. 25:46: And these will go away into everlasting punishment (Greek kolasin; not destruction or death but punishment), but the righteous into eternal life.

·        Mark 9:47,48 speak of gehenna (hell) as where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched which seems obviously to speak of something ongoing.

·        Rev. 14:9-11 (today’s passage) is clear in speaking of being tormented with fire and brimstone … and the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever; and they have no rest day or night.  Concerning those, including some calling themselves evangelical, who ridicule this idea consider a quote from J. A. Seiss, in his commentary on this passage (p356 in my edition):

There may be those who mock and jeer at the idea of an eternal hell for the wicked.  Many are the jests they perpetrate at the expense of those preachers of fire and brimstone.  But here a great and mighty angel from heaven is the preacher, and his sermon from beginning to end is nothing but fire and brimstone, even everlasting burning and torment for all who take the mark of Antichrist!  Shall we believe our modern sentimental philosophers, or abide by the word of our God and of his holy angels?  Alas, alas, for the infatuated people who comfort themselves with the belief that perdition is a myth -- the bugbear of antiquated superstition.

·        Rev. 20:10 has a similar phrase, tormented day and night for ever and ever.

·        Luke 16:23-24: in the parable we considered earlier note the ongoing agony of the rich man in Hades.  It is a place of torment; he is said to be in torment.  I have heard Adventists say we cannot take our theology from incidental details of a parable.  But these are hardly incidental details, not to mention that Jesus does not say this is a parable.  Others claim the story is from Jewish folklore; but if Jesus used it He was indicating the folklore had it right.

There is no glee or joy in this subject and its clear teaching in Scripture.  God does not take joy in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 18:23).  He says, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of one who dies,’ says the Lord God.  ‘Therefore turn and live.’  Those words will lead us to one final thought on this subject.