Is the Bible’s Language About Hell Literal or Metaphorical?

The Bible uses very graphic images of hell. Burning. Flames. Darkness. What do we do with that imagery? Sometimes the question is, “Is that literal, or metaphorical, or something else? How do we handle that? And for people who believe in hell there is even some debate there, who believe there is an eternal, conscious punishment called hell.

With hell, images of fire and darkness (which some think to be contradictory images) convey something horrible. If you say that hell is metaphorical then those images are metaphorical, that’s okay as long as you recognize it’s not better than those images—it is conveying something really bad and something that is to be feared. It is not to say, “Oh, this is just metaphorical. I’m okay.” No, it is really bad. And if it is just a metaphor it is worse than that. So, if you take the metaphorical view, it is not a way out of the tension it heightening the tension.

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