Hell is the place of punishment for the souls of the damned. Artists often depict it as a huge cavern inside the earth, but it could actually be located in another dimension or a different universe. Whatever its location, it is ruled by the Devil, who is assisted by numerous demons in administering the various punishments.
Although the doomed souls in hell don't have physical bodies, they still feel real pain and experience real terror. This is because they are given the delusion that they do have real bodies, which are repeatedly mutilated, or continuously burned, yet don't suffer any permanent damage. This method of punishment allows the tortures to continue forever, since a soul never dies.
Some medieval writers speculated about possible punishments for these doomed souls. The ideas included relentless flogging with barbed whips, continuous immersion in a vat of boiling blood, confinement in a pit of poisonous vipers, permanent impalement on a thick lance, and repeatedly being ripped apart and eaten by demons.
People are saved from the torments of hell if they believe in Jesus and accept him as their savior. Even a serial rapist-killer can be saved if he repents and accepts Jesus before he dies. Unfortunately, some people have gone through their entire lives without ever hearing about Jesus, and therefore didn't have an opportunity to be saved in this way.
According to the Book of Revelation, the Devil will eventually be punished along with the doomed souls. Revelation 20:10 says that he will be thrown into a "lake of burning sulfur", where he "will be tormented day and night for ever and ever." Other biblical passages indicate that the Beast (Antichrist), the False Prophet, the demons, and all the doomed souls will also end up in this lake.
In some passages this "lake of burning sulfur" is called a "lake of fire", and artistic depictions usually show flames leaping up from its surface. Sulfur (also called brimstone) melts at about 115 degrees Celsius (240 degrees Fahrenheit), well above the boiling point of water, and at higher temperatures it will begin to bubble and give off fumes. People sometimes assume that this hot liquid sulfur serves as the fuel for the leaping flames. But unless there is an endless supply of sulfur, all of it would eventually be used up and the fire would die out. So some people have concluded that the fires of Hell can burn forever without consuming fuel in the normal way.
According to one traditional view, this lake of fire is at the center of hell, which is located in a huge cavern somewhere within the earth. Some people have suggested that such a cavern might be accessible by a long narrow passageway leading down from a hidden entrance on the surface. However, the cavern could actually be located hundreds of miles below the surface, or even at the center of the planet, far too deep to be reached by a passageway from above.
But a cavern isn't the only way in which Hell can be visualized, because some medieval paintings show it as an open pit. This idea of a pit-like hell may come from ancient Jewish beliefs about a place of torment known as Gehenna. Originally this was the name of a ravine beside Jerusalem where the bodies of beggars and outcasts were discarded. A fire was kept burning in the bottom to prevent infections from developing and spreading into the city. Eventually this led to the idea of a pit where the souls of wicked people would burn, and the same name, Gehenna, was used for this eternal pit of fire.
The best known literary description of Hell is the Inferno section of The Divine Comedy by the medieval Italian poet Dante Alighieri. He depicts hell as a huge funnel-shaped underground pit, thus combining the ideas of a cavern and a pit into a single unified conception. Ringing the walls of this subterranean pit are circular terraces, one above the other, with steep slopes between them. There are nine of these terraces, or "circles of hell", and the punishments become progressively worse with each downward step.
But hell might not be located inside the earth. It could be on another planet, or even in a separate universe or a different reality. On the other hand, it could be right in front of our eyes, since some people suspect that we are already in hell now.
Many Christians don't believe in the traditional hell of eternal tortures. They say that a loving and merciful God would never create such a horrible place. But others point out that Jesus himself warned about hell in passages such as Matthew 5:29 and Luke 16:19-31, and this proves that it really does exist.
