The Bible teaches that hell is eternal

“The teaching of the Church affirms the existence of hell and its eternity. Immediately after death, the souls of those who die in a state of mortal sin descend to hell, where they suffer the punishment of hell, 'eternal fire' "(CCC 1035)

There is no denying the traditional Christian doctrine of hell and honestly calling yourself an Orthodox Christian. No major line or self-proclaimed evangelical denomination denies this doctrine (Seventh-day Adventists are a special case) and, of course, Catholicism and orthodoxy have always kept faith with this belief.

It has often been noted that Jesus himself spoke more of hell than heaven. The following are the main scriptural evidence for both the existence and eternal duration of hell:

The Greek meaning of aionios ("eternal", "eternal") is unquestionable. It is used many times in reference to eternal life in heaven. The same Greek word is also used to refer to eternal punishments (Mt 18: 8; 25:41, 46; Mk 3:29; 2 Thess 1: 9; Heb 6: 2; Jude 7). Also in a verse - Matthew 25:46 - the word is used twice: once to describe heaven and once for hell. "Eternal punishment" means what it says. There is no way out without doing violence to Scripture.

Jehovah's Witnesses render "punishment" as "interruption" in their false New World Translation in an attempt to establish their doctrine of annihilation, but this is inadmissible. If one is "cut off", this is a unique, not eternal event. If I were to cut the phone with someone, would anyone think to say that I am "cut eternally?"

This word, kolasis, is defined in Kittel's Theological Dictionary of the New Testament as "(eternal) punishment". Vine (An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words) says the same thing, as does AT Robertson - all flawless linguistic scholars. Robertson writes:

There is not the slightest indication in the words of Jesus here that punishment is not coeval with life. (Word Pictures in the New Testament, Nashville: Broadman Press, 1930, vol.1, p. 202)

Since it is preceded by aionios, then it is punishment that continues forever (non-existence that continues indefinitely). The Bible could not be clearer than it is. What more can you expect?

Similarly for the related Greek word aion, which is used throughout the Apocalypse for eternity in heaven (e.g. 1:18; 4: 9-10; 5: 13-14; 7:12; 10: 6; 11:15; 15: 7; 22: 5), and also for eternal punishment (14:11; 20:10). Some attempt to argue that Revelation 20:10 applies only to the devil, but must explain Revelation 20:15: "and anyone whose name was not written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire." The "book of life" clearly refers to human beings (cf. Rev 3: 5; 13: 8; 17: 8; 20: 11-14; 21:27). It is impossible to deny this fact.

Let's move on to some annihilating "test texts":

Matthew 10:28: The word to "destroy" is apollumi, which means, according to Vine, "not extinction, but ruin, loss, not of being, but of well-being". The other verses in which it appears clarify this meaning (Mt 10: 6; Lk 15: 6, 9, 24; Jn 18: 9). Thayer's Greek-English New Testament lexicon or any other Greek lexicon would confirm this. Thayer was a Unitarian who probably didn't believe in hell. But he was also an honest and objective scholar, so he gave the right meaning of apollumi, in agreement with all the other Greek scholars. The same argument applies to Matthew 10:39 and John 3:16 (same word).

1 Corinthians 3:17: "Destroy" is the Greek, phthiro, which literally means "to waste" (just like Apollumi). When the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, the bricks were still there. It was not wiped out, but wasted. So it will be with the evil soul, which will be wasted or ruined, but not erased from existence. We clearly see the meaning of phthiro in every other instance of it in the New Testament (usually "corrupt"), where in any case the meaning is as I stated (1 Cor 15:33; 2 Cor 7: 2; 11: 3; Eph 4:22; Jude 10; Rev 19: 2).

Acts 3:23 refers to simple being banished from the people of God, not annihilation. "Soul" means person here (cf. Dt 18, 15-19, from which this passage derives; see also Gen 1:24; 2: 7, 19; 1 Cor 15:45; Rev 16: 3). We see this use in English when someone says, "There was no living soul there."

Romans 1:32 and 6: 21-2, James 1:15, 1 John 5: 16-17 refer to physical or spiritual death, none of which means "annihilation". The first is the separation of the body from the soul, the second, the separation of the soul from God.

Philippians 1:28, 3:19, Hebrews 10:39: "Destruction" or "perdition" is the Greek apolia. Its meaning of "ruin" or "rejection" is clearly visible in Matthew 26: 8 and Mark 14: 4 (a waste of ointment). In Revelation 17: 8, when referring to the Beast, he states that the Beast is not erased from existence: "... They observe the beast that was, and is not, and yet is".

Hebrews 10: 27-31 must be understood in harmony with Hebrews 6: 2, which speaks of "eternal judgment." The only way to summarize all the data presented here is to adopt the eternal point of view of hell.

Hebrews 12:25, 29: Isaiah 33:14, a verse similar to 12:29, states: “who of us will live with the devouring fire? Who among us must dwell with eternal burns? "The metaphor of God as fire (cf. Ac 7:30; 1 Cor 3:15; Rev 1:14) is not the same as hell fire, spoken of as eternal or unquenchable, within which the wicked they suffer consciously (Mt 3:10, 12; 13:42, 50; 18: 8; 25:41; Mk 9: 43-48; Lk 3:17).

2 Peter 2: 1-21: In verse 12, "completely perish" comes from the Greek kataphthiro. In the only other place in the New Testament where this word appears (2 Tim 3: 8), it is translated as "corrupt" in KJV. If the annihilating interpretation were applied to that verse, it would read: "... men of nonexistent minds ..."

2 Peter 3: 6-9: "Perish" is the Greek apollumi (see Matthew 10:28 above), so annihilation, as always, is not taught. Furthermore, in verse 6, which states that the world "died" during the flood, it is obvious that it was not annihilated, but wasted: consistent with the other interpretations above.