Does Hell really burn ‘forever and ever’?

Will the wicked be cast into “unquenchable fire”?

Do death and Hades (the grave) persist forever, or is the message of “lake of fire” that whatever goes into it ceases to exist forever?

A good place to start with Apostolic Writings passages is to see if they are quoting from or alluding to passages in Hebrew Scriptures. And indeed they are. Why they are is critical to understanding these passages.

Undying worm? Unquenchable fire?

“If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off; it is better for you to enter life crippled, than, having your two hands, to go into hell, into the unquenchable fire” …. “If your eye causes you to stumble, throw it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye, than, having two eyes, to be cast into hell, where ‘their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.’”

Mark 9:43, 47-48 NASB 1995

A good place to start with Apostolic Writings passages is to see if they are quoting from or alluding to passages in the TaNaKh, and that’s the case with Mark 9:43–48. The phrase in question is a partial quotation:

“‘Then they will go forth and look On the corpses of the men Who have transgressed against Me. For their worm will not die And their fire will not be quenched; And they will be an abhorrence to all mankind.’”

Isaiah 66:24 NASB 1995

Key context is “corpses” and “abhorrence to all mankind.”
But also key context is when the worm (decomposition of the corpse) and fire (cleansing of the corpses) will happen:

“‘For just as the new heavens and the new earth Which I make will endure before Me,’ declares the LORD, ‘So your offspring and your name will endure. And it shall be from new moon to new moon And from sabbath to sabbath, All mankind will come to bow down before Me,’ says the LORD.”

Isaiah 66:22-23 NASB 1995

There’s a similar message to the fire and “smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever” for the wicked and Babylon (Rev. 14:11; 18:9, 18; 19:3). Those are allusions first to the fire and smoke of the judgment of Sodom Inc. (Gen. 19:28) and ultimate judgment against the the enemies of the people of God and the Holy One Himself (Isaiah 34):

“For the LORD has a day of vengeance, A year of recompense for the cause of Zion. Its streams will be turned into pitch, And its loose earth into brimstone, And its land will become burning pitch. It will not be quenched night or day; Its smoke will go up forever. From generation to generation it will be desolate; None will pass through it forever and ever.”

Isaiah 34:8-10 NASB 1995

This is an example of how “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” should be considered on a matter, noting that all the elements are true together:

• Will the worm not die? Yes.
• Will the fire not be quenched? Yes.
• Will the smoke rise forever? Yes.
• Will the wicked be dead/consumed? Yes.
• Will “the heavens and the earth” — a mereism, meaning all creation — be recreated with no more death? Yes.

All taken together, there will be no escape for those who Heaven condemns, and that judgment will be a lasting one for all time. Any who saw the Twin Towers on fire in 2001 or saw the smoke of the 2017-2020 California North Coast wildfires remembers those events long after the fires burned out or the buildings came down.

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Eternal lake of fire?

And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

Rev. 20:10 NASB

Here is the key to start unlocking how long the lake of fire continues to burn:

Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.

Rev. 20:14 NASB

Do death and Hades (the grave) persist forever, or is the message of “lake of fire” that whatever goes into it ceases to exist forever?

Along with Rev. 20:14 pointing to the lake of fire being a destroying force for death, there’s the lake of fire for the beast (Rev. 19:20). The parallel for that is the beast’s being “slain, and its body was destroyed and given to the burning fire” in Dan. 7:11. Like with death, the beast, false prophet and other will be destroyed by the lake of fire.

Now for a look under the hood of the Greek word βάσανος basanos, translated “torment” in Revelation 20:

Elsewhere in the OT basanos denotes means of reparation for guilt (1 Sam. 6:3–4, 8, 17), shame or disgrace (Ezek. 16:52, 54), a cause of sin or misfortune (3:20; 7:19), or God’s punishments (16:52, 54, of Jerusalem; 32:24, 30, of the heathen nations).

New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology

Look particularly at Ezekiel 32:24, 30, which talks about basanos in the grave, in other words, disgrace by being brought low and ended. That’s what will happen to death, the beast and the false prophet in the lake of fire.

Another point is with the phrase in Rev. 20:10 translated “forever and ever.” Because Revelation is rooted deeply and sources heavily from the Hebrew Scriptures, we should look at how those words are used in the Greek translation of the Hebrew (i.e., the Septuagint, what the apostles most often quoted from).

The Greek word translated “forever” in Revelation 20 is αἰών eon. As with basanos for “torment,” Revelation and the rest of the NT takes its cue for meaning from the Hebrew Scriptures. In the LXX (Septuagint), aeon translates with the Hebrew word עולם olam, which is closely linked to the life of the person or thing described.

One must also observe that the NT does not use the phrase ‘eternal death,’ because the idea of eternity is so closely connected with life that the negation of eternal life can also only be understood as the experience of ruin.

New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology

For example, words of God are olam eternal, but the temple is olam only until the One leaves it.

So the disgrace of the lake of fire persists only until the beast and false prophet are destroyed. That’s why the lake of fire is called “the second death” in Rev. 20:14.