Things About Hell Not In The Bible

Popular Beliefs About Hell That Aren’t Actually In The Bible

From the intricate paintings of Hieronymous Bosch to the excessive pulp of movies like Constantine, hell has been depicted in dozens of different ways. However, its most common elements – hellfire, souls screaming in torment, and gruesome demons – cannot be found in the Bible.

Similar to how our beliefs about angels formed, today, the imagery of “hell” is the result of hundreds of years of art, theology, and imagination. The Greeks believed in a punishing afterworld called Tartarus, and Christian artists and writers borrowed heavily from its complex mythological structure. Other influences include the Sumerian afterlife called Kur, an enormous and bleak cave, as well as the Jewish concept of sheol, a hell-like darkness. In more recent centuries, few Christians have had more lasting impact on the perceived landscape of hell than Dante Alighieri (Inferno) and John Milton (Paradise Lost), though dozens of visual artists, Bosch chief among them, have also made the attempt.

And yet, as Western artists and churchgoers have developed a cultural vision of hell, that fiery afterlife moves further from the actual hell of the Bible. Here’s a list of common misconceptions about perdition.

• • Photo:
    • Martin Schöngauer
    • Wikimedia Commons
    • Public Domain
  There Are People Being Punished In Hell Right NowMany Christians believe that when we perish, we are judged by God and sent to either heaven or hell. Christian children worry about people who have passed, hoping they aren’t in the Lake of Fire.It turns out that God doesn’t work that way. Instead, God withholds judgment until the final day. According to the Bible, no one is in hell right now except Satan and his demons. Every single human ever to have lived, from the very best to the very worst, is simply sleeping, waiting for Christ’s return and the final day of judgment.
• People Are Sent To Hell On The Basis Of Their ActionsOne of the most contentious debates throughout Christian history has been on the value of good works versus God’s grace. The gospel of works says that we must perform good deeds in order to be admitted to heaven. The gospel of grace says that God decides where to place us based on criteria beyond our understanding or control.Surprising as it may seem, the gospel of grace is more supported by the Bible. Take Ephesians 2:8-9, which says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.”
• • Photo:
    • Gustave Dore
    • Wikimedia Commons
    • Public Domain
  Hell Is EternalThis is perhaps the most pervasive misconception about hell. Members of the fire-and-brimstone branches of Christianity will be familiar with the phrase “everlasting torment.” However, there is a large contingent of theologians who believe the Bible supports a doctrine of annihilationism.Annihilationism is the belief that, after a period of torment, God simply wipes out the consciousness of those who cannot be redeemed. Annihilationists point to passages like Isaiah 5:24 to support this position:Therefore, as tongues of fire lick up strawand as dry grass sinks down in the flames,so their roots will decayand their flowers blow away like dust;for they have rejected the law of the Lord Almightyand spurned the word of the Holy One of Israel.
• • Photo:
    • Franz Stuck
    • Wikimedia Commons
    • Public Domain`
  Satan Rules HellLucifer was originally known as ha-Satan, a term that simply means “the Adversary.” In the Bible itself, Satan’s powers and provenance are not well defined. It is only much later, through Dante and especially Milton, that we get our image of Satan as a powerful, winged demon – AKA the King of Hell.In the Bible, and in all mainstream post-Biblical theology, it is understood that hell is Satan’s prison, not his kingdom. God rules over hell just as he rules over heaven. However, this is hard to square with events like Satan’s temptation of Jesus during his 40 days in the wilderness. There are also moments in Genesis that seem to imply God allows Satan to be a kind of co-ruler of Earth for his own mysterious purposes.Ultimately, there is no resolution for these contradictions. Some theologians have posited that Satan is used by God as a test or temptation to see who is worthy of entering heaven.
• Hell Is Heavily Featured Throughout The BibleThe modern church puts a great deal of emphasis on hell, so one might expect there to be a similar emphasis in the Bible. However, the truth is that the Old Testament contains zero mentions of hell. There are some passing references to “sheol” and “Gehenna,” but those concepts have little in common with the Christian hell.In fact, “hell” is mentioned 23 times in the New Testament, compared to a whopping 250 mentions of heaven. Why the disparity? Some Christian scholars believe that missionaries commonly used hell as a motivational tool to convert unbelievers, whereas the writers of the gospels were not particularly concerned with spreading the faith because they believed that Jesus’s return was imminent.
• • Photo:
    • Lucas Cranach the Younger
    • Wikimedia Commons
    • Public Domain
  Babies Don’t Go To HellOne of the most difficult things to reconcile in Christian theology is the fate of unbaptized babies. Theology is quite clear that baptism is the only way into heaven, yet a loving God would surely not abandon infants to hell. To answer this question, Christian thinkers developed the idea of limbo, a place where unbaptized babies could escape punishment.There is no evidence for limbo in the Bible, but the idea was posited to soften St. Augustine’s assertion that unbaptized babies would go directly to hell. However, Augustine was on sturdier theological ground than his critics.