Lake of Fire and Brimstone

Upon being judged, they go into the place prepared for them (2 Nephi 12:4). This place is for those who are grasped with “death and hell” and is called “a lake of fire and brimstone” — a lake, because it engulfs them so tightly they are flooded with the guilt; fire, because it is designed to purge and refine; brimstone, because of the bitterness of the experience. Covenant of Christ describes it as a fiery lake that burns like lava, which is endless torment (2 Nephi 12:4 CE). The torment there is “endless,” meaning from God (see T&C 4:1–4). This purging does not confer blessings but merely balances out the claims of justice for those who would not accept mercy (see T&C 4:5).¹ In the New Testament, the image of a lake of fire and brimstone is what the burning dump outside Jerusalem looked like as it shimmered in the day and night. It was rather a mirage when viewed from a distance, but the image of that lake was associated with destroying the refuse of the city. In the revelation to Joseph about the afterlife, the devils are sent to a place where their worm dies not and the fire is not quenched (T&C 69:8). Like the Egyptian symbol of the Ammit, this New Testament imagery and Joseph’s revelation about the doom of the devils combine to communicate a destiny in which their present organization will be undone and everything about them reduced back to the residue of disorganization and native element. It is not possible for an organized intelligence to comprehend that fate because it involves a process of “undoing” that the organized cannot grasp without undergoing the process. It is literally something which is understood unto none save to them who are made partakers thereof (ibid.). While it can be and has been shown unto many by the Lord, it still remains something beyond the grasp of those who are obedient to God. It is unthinkable and quite literally impossible to grasp.²