Are heaven and hell real?

What the Bible says

In the New Testament it is Jesus who speaks most about hell, and Jesus who speaks most warmly about the kingdom. In his picture of the last judgment, the King says to those on his right:

Come, you who are blessed by My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

Matt 25:34

To those on his left he says:

Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Matt 25:41

Notice: the kingdom was prepared "for you from the foundation of the world," but the fire "for the devil and his angels." What was made ready for people from the start is a kingdom. The scene ends: "they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life" (Matt 25:46).

In Luke 16 Lazarus is "carried by the angels to Abraham’s side," while the rich man is in torment in Hades, and between them "a great chasm has been fixed" (Luke 16:22-26). However literally one takes the details, the point is plain: choices in this life carry lasting consequences.

About heaven, Jesus promised his troubled disciples:

In My Father’s house are many rooms. … I am going there to prepare a place for you. … I will come back and welcome you into My presence, so that you also may be where I am.

John 14:2-3

Revelation shows where this leads: not souls drifting into the clouds but a new heaven and a new earth.

‘He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,’ and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.

Rev 21:4

Isaiah foretold it too (Isa 65:17). Its centre is that "God Himself will be with them as their God" (Rev 21:3) and that they "will see His face" (Rev 22:4).

Judgment, Scripture says, is just. Abraham asked, "Will not the Judge of all the earth do what is right?" (Gen 18:25), and Paul says God shows no favoritism (Rom 2:11). Paul describes hell this way.

They will suffer the penalty of eternal destruction, separated from the presence of the Lord and the glory of His might

2 Thess 1:9

Many have therefore understood hell first as separation from God.

The church's witness

The Apostles' Creed says Christ will come to judge the living and the dead, and confesses the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting The Apostles' Creed. Its heart is God himself, as Matthew Henry says: "the principal happiness of heaven is to be with the Lord, to see him, live with him, and enjoy him for ever" Matthew Henry.

On hell, the church did not hold back. Augustine shows that people were already trying to soften Matthew 25:46, and corrects them: "Some deceive themselves, saying, that the fire indeed is called everlasting, but not the punishment" Augustine.

On the nature of hell, though, Christians hold three main views.

The first is eternal conscious punishment, the view most widely held through church history. It rests above all on the parallel of eternal punishment and eternal life in Matthew 25:46, and on texts such as "the smoke of their torment rises forever and ever" (Rev 14:11). The lost, it notes, share the fire "prepared for the devil" (Matt 25:41), who is "tormented day and night forever and ever" (Rev 20:10).

The second is annihilationism, or conditional immortality. It holds that the soul is not immortal by nature and that eternal life is God's gift. Scripture calls the wages of sin "death" (Rom 6:23), warns of the One who can "destroy both soul and body in hell" (Matt 10:28), and names the penalty "eternal destruction" (2 Thess 1:9); this view reads such words to mean that the unsaved finally cease to exist. It agrees that judgment is real and irreversible. Some evangelical theologians hold it, though it has never been the majority view.

The third is the hope that all will finally be saved. Origen and Gregory of Nyssa spoke of such a hope, leaning on the words that God "wants everyone to be saved" (1 Tim 2:4). Origenist teaching on the restoration of all things was condemned in the sixth century; the church has not taught universalism, finding Jesus' words on judgment too plain, though some today hold it as a hope.

These views differ, but they share much: judgment is real, God is just, salvation is in Christ alone, and hell must never be spoken of lightly. Catholic teaching adds purgatory, a purification after death for some who die in God's grace; it is neither hell nor a second chance. The Orthodox, who pray for the departed, and Protestants do not accept it (see What happens after death?).

In the original languages

More than one word lies behind "hell." Gehenna (γέεννα) comes from the Valley of Hinnom south of Jerusalem, once a place of idolatrous sacrifice, and it echoes Isaiah 66:24, "their worm will never die, their fire will never be quenched." Jesus used it for the place of final judgment. Hades (ᾍδης), on the other hand, corresponds to the Hebrew Sheol and names the realm of the dead. It is the word in Luke 16:23.

The other word is aionios (αἰώνιος), "eternal." The same word is used for "eternal life" and "eternal punishment" (Matt 25:46). Some argue that it means "belonging to the age to come" and speaks of quality, not only length. Traditionally the church read it as endless. Annihilationists reply that, as in "eternal redemption" (Heb 9:12), it can name a result that lasts forever rather than an endless process.

Common objections

"A loving God would not send anyone to hell." If God is love, he would want everyone saved, and endless punishment for the sins of a finite life seems out of proportion. Scripture agrees that God takes "no pleasure in the death of the wicked" (Ezek 33:11). Three things may be said. First, a love that never judged evil would be cold to its victims; a God who passed over every wrong would be no good news to the trampled. Second, Scripture presents hell both as God's just judgment on sin (Rom 2:5) and as the end of loving darkness rather than light (John 3:19), a refusal honoured to the end. Third, the gospel itself is God opening the way out of judgment: Christ died for our sins. On the length and nature of the punishment faithful people truly differ; the traditional view weighs sin by the holiness of the One sinned against, while others hold annihilationism for this very reason.

"Heaven is wishful thinking." The objection is old and not trivial: people invent heaven to soothe the pain of death. But wishing for something does not prove it is not there, and the Bible's heaven is first about being with God, resting on the risen Christ rather than on our wishes. See Did Jesus really rise from the dead?.

"Fire and worms are symbols, so hell is only a symbol." Many take fire, worms and darkness as images, since taken literally they clash. But a symbol points to something real, and nothing guarantees the reality is lighter than the symbol. Their core is being cut off from God and his goodness.

Going further

Scripture's words on heaven and hell are not a map for the curious but an invitation for now. Even Jesus' sternest words were warnings meant to save. The rich man asked that his brothers not come to the same place (Luke 16:27-28). God wants our return more than that. If you are afraid of hell, hold on to this promise: "there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:1).

You might ask yourself: if being with God is the heart of heaven, how much do I want that now? How should I treat a Christian who holds a different view?

To read further, see What happens after death? and What about those who never heard?.