Lake of fire
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A
lake of fire appears, in both
ancient Egyptian and
Christian religion, as a place of
after-death destruction of the wicked. The phrase is used in four verses of the
Book of Revelation. Such a lake also appears in Plato's Phaedo, explicitly identified with Tartarus, where the souls of the wicked are tormented until it is time for them to be reborn, and where some souls are left forever. The image was also used by the
Early Christian Hippolytus of Rome in about the year 200 and has continued to be used by modern Christians. Related is Jewish
Gehenna which, among other things, like hell, is a valley near Jerusalem where trash was burned.
Richard H. Wilkinson has written:
According to the
Coffin Texts and other works, the underworld contained fiery rivers and lakes as well as fire demons (identified by
fire signs on their heads) which threatened the wicked. Representations of the fiery lakes of the fifth "hour" or "house" of the
Amduat depict them in the form of the standard
pool or lake hieroglyph, but with flame-red "water" lines, and surrounded on all four sides by
fire signs which not only identify the blazing nature of the lakes, but also feed them through the graphic "dripping" of their flames. Some temple texts and modern books have said that the Lake of Fire in the Egyptian Religion is the lake that Ra would pass through in his daily journey in the Duat. He goes in the west gate and exit through the east gate and after that, it would say that the boat was renewed.
[1]An image
[2] in the
Papyrus of Ani (ca. 1250 BC), a version of the
Book of the Dead, has been described as follows:
The scene shows four cynocephalous baboons sitting at the corners of a rectangular pool. On each side of this pool is a
flaming brazier. The pool's red colour indicates that it is filled with a fiery liquid, reminding one of the "Lake of Fire" frequently mentioned in the Book of the Dead.
[3]The 1995 edition of the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia says that the Egyptian lake of fire is too remote to be relevant to the use of "lake of fire" in the Book of Revelation.
[4]"Lake of fire" in the Book of Revelation[edit]
The
Book of Revelation, written some time in the last half of the first century
AD, has five verses that mention a "lake of fire":
Revelation 19:20: "And
the beast[5] was taken, and with him the
false prophet[6] that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the
mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into
a lake of fire burning with
brimstone."
Revelation 20:10 "And the
devil that deceived them was cast into
the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever."
Revelation 20:14-15 "Then Death and Hades
[7] were cast into
the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into
the lake of fire."[NKJV]
Revelation 21:8 "But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers,
idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in
the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death."
[8]A commonly accepted and traditional interpretation is that the "lake of fire" and the "second death" are symbolic of eternal pain, pain of loss and perhaps pain of the senses, as punishment for wickedness.
[9][10][11][12][13][14][15]"Lake of fire" in other religions[edit]
Jehovah's Witnesses interpret the "lake of fire" and "second death" of the Book of Revelation as referring to a complete and definitive annihilation of those cast into it.
[16]Christian Universalists interpret the "lake of fire" as an instrument of purification/refinement that will bring all people into a relationship with God. The word for "torment" in Revelation 14:10 is the Greek "basanizo" which has a primary meaning of testing with a
touchstone. The lake of fire is not only for torment but for "testing": the analogy is in testing metal with a touchstone to make sure it is pure.
"Lake of unquenchable fire" in the third century[edit]
Hippolytus of Rome (d. 235) pictured Hades, the
abode of the dead, as containing "a lake of unquenchable fire" at the edge of which the unrighteous "shudder in horror at the expectation of the future judgment, (as if they were) already feeling the power of their punishment", while the righteous "are brought to a locality full of light" (called the
Bosom of Abraham), "enjoying always the contemplation of the blessings which are in their view, and delighting themselves with the expectation of others ever new".
[17]The third-century writing explicitly pictures the "lake of unquenchable fire" as the eternal destiny of the unrighteous,
[18] who, while awaiting execution of the judgement upon them, are tortured in the abode of the dead (Hades) by the vision of their doom.
Mark 9:43 has Jesus himself use the image of a punishing unquenchable fire: "If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into
Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire." [New American Bible, Revised Edition]
[19]"Sea of fire" in the twentieth century[edit]
The
Catholic Portuguese visionary
Lúcia Santos reported that the
Virgin Mary (
Our Lady of Fatima) had given her a vision of Hell
[citation needed] as a sea of fire:
"Our Lady showed us a great sea of fire which seemed to be under the earth. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke, now falling back on every side like sparks in a huge fire, without weight or equilibrium, and amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear."
[20]wiki
Vie Ago 09, 2013 3:48 am
, are cast into it. When the same is affirmed of death and Hades (20:14), it is doubtful whether this is meant as a mere figure for the cessation of these two evils personified, or has a more realistic background in the existence of two demon-powers so named (compare Isaiah 25:8; 1 Corinthians 15:26,54; 2 Esdras 7:31)" (