In brief#

This page exists because the passage is frequently cited, not because it advances the positive case. The account says little in support of conditional immortality (CI), the view that unending life is a gift given to the redeemed rather than a property everyone already possesses. It also says nothing in support of eternal conscious torment (ECT), the view that the lost suffer consciously without end, which is why it is worth treating carefully.

The decisive observation is that the rich man's five brothers are still alive while he is speaking, which places the scene before the resurrection and the last judgment. The word for where he is, moreover, is Hades, not Gehenna.

The primary passage#

“Now there was a certain rich man, and he was clothed in purple and fine linen, living in luxury every day. A certain beggar, named Lazarus, was laid at his gate, full of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs that fell from the rich man’s table. Yes, even the dogs came and licked his sores. The beggar died, and he was carried away by the angels to Abraham’s bosom. The rich man also died, and was buried. In Hades, he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and saw Abraham far off, and Lazarus at his bosom. He cried and said, ‘Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue! For I am in anguish in this flame.’ “But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you, in your lifetime, received your good things, and Lazarus, in the same way, bad things. But now here he is comforted and you are in anguish. Besides all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed, that those who want to pass from here to you are not able, and that no one may cross over from there to us.’ “He said, ‘I ask you therefore, father, that you would send him to my father’s house; for I have five brothers, that he may testify to them, so they won’t also come into this place of torment.’ “But Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them.’ “He said, ‘No, father Abraham, but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ “He said to him, ‘If they don’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if one rises from the dead.’”
Luke 16:19-31WEB, World English Bible, which is in the public domain

Why ECT interpreters cite this passage#

The passage is cited because of how direct it is. Jesus himself describes the scene, and he describes a man who is conscious after death, who is in torment, who speaks of agony in fire, who sees and remembers and reasons, and who is told that a great gulf is fixed so that nobody can cross. Conscious suffering, fire, and a fixed and irreversible state are the three things the traditional view most wants to establish, and all three stand together here in the words of Jesus.

Defenders of the traditional view add that Jesus was under no obligation to describe the afterlife this way. If the wicked simply pass out of existence at death, this is an extraordinary picture to paint, and the details are not incidental: the rich man's awareness of his condition drives the whole exchange.

Why this describes the intermediate state#

Conditionalism does not dispute that the scene is conscious, and it does not dispute that it is grim. It observes what the passage indicates about when the scene takes place.

The rich man asks that Lazarus be sent to his five brothers so that they will not come to this place, and Abraham replies that they have Moses and the prophets. That exchange is unintelligible if the resurrection and the last judgment have already happened, because there would be no living brothers left on earth to warn. The scene therefore sits before the last judgment, and so is not a description of the final state.

The vocabulary points the same way. Some translations render Hades, Sheol and Gehenna all as "hell", which flattens three distinct terms into one. The word here is Hades, the place of the dead before judgment, not Gehenna, the term Jesus uses in his warnings about final punishment. Revelation keeps them distinct too, and describes Hades itself being emptied and thrown into the lake of fire:

The sea gave up the dead who were in it. Death and Hades gave up the dead who were in them. They were judged, each one according to his works. Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire.
Revelation 20:13-14WEB, World English Bible, which is in the public domain

Hades is not the last word about anyone in it. Nothing in the account indicates that the rich man was going to live for ever; that he continues in Hades at all is what the section on delayed judgment (S09) addresses.

Parable or report#

Interpreters disagree about whether this is a parable using stock imagery or a report about a real man. The question does not affect the argument. Either way the brothers are alive, and either way the word is Hades.

Two observations the author adds#

The author suggests that the rich man's suffering is likely similar to the weeping and gnashing of teeth described elsewhere, and that if a person can suffer this way before judgment, they could suffer accordingly on the Day of Judgment too, between being judged and being no more. Both are offered as likelihoods rather than conclusions, and are treated in S06 and S23.

He then raises a question rather than an argument. If this is what the intermediate state is like, the traditional account of the lake of fire appears to reproduce the same condition without adding to it. Why raise and judge the wicked only to return them to the state they were already in? That is a question about the coherence of the traditional picture, not evidence about what Luke 16 teaches.

What this argument establishes#

  • The scene takes place before the resurrection and the final judgment, because the rich man's brothers are still alive.
  • Hades and Gehenna are distinct terms and are not interchangeable here.
  • Conscious experience in the intermediate state is not evidence about the final state, in either direction.

What it does not establish by itself#

  • That the passage supports conditional immortality. It is neutral between the two views.
  • Whether the account is a parable or a report about a real person.
  • What the intermediate state is like for anyone else, or whether it is uniform.

Why final judgment is delayed is S09. Weeping and gnashing of teeth is S06. The lake of fire and the second death is S03. The Day of Judgment is S23.

Sources and notes#

Joseph Dear's book treats this passage at greater length from a conditionalist standpoint [Dear].