And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the pool of fire.
και ει τις ουχ ευρεθη εν τω βιβλιω τη βιβλω της ζωης γεγραμμενος εβληθη εις την λιμνην του πυρος
7 Church Fathers comment on this verse
This book is not for reminding God, as though He might forget. It indicates the predestination of those to whom eternal life will be given. God knows them, and He does not read this book in order to know. His own foreknowledge of them, which cannot be deceived, is this book of life in which they are written, that is, foreknown.
There is no need to wonder that all who are not written in the book of life will be thrown into the lake of fire. For just as there are many mansions with God and the Father for those who are saved, so also the modes and places of torment are manifold. Those who were not deemed worthy to be written in the book of life will receive them. Some will be most severe, and others more moderate.
In evil men God begins His judgment by abandonment and completes it by torments. Even now, when God abandons wicked men who have turned away from Him, He does not accomplish in them what displeases Him, but what pleases Him. Afterwards He will repay them what they have deserved according to His justice.
They will receive punishment not because God made good use of their evil deeds, but because they themselves misused the benefits of God. Therefore God has prepared such people for destruction in punishment, which the just Judge appointed for the sinner by just predestination.
That is, He prepared them not for sin, which man began not by divine predestination, but by his own will and evil desire, and completed by evil action. For desire, when conceived, produced sin, and sin, when accomplished, brought forth death.
Therefore enemies are not predestined to the first death of the soul, but to the second, that is, to the lake of fire and brimstone (see Rev 20:10, 14-15; Rev 21:8). Concerning it blessed John says: “The devil who deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone” (Rev 20:10).
And elsewhere: “Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire” (Rev 20:14). This second death is the lake of fire, and whoever was not written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.
Again he says: “But as for the cowardly and unbelieving, the polluted and murderers, fornicators and sorcerers, idolaters and all priests, their portion shall be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone. This is the second death” (Rev 21:8).
He calls that death the second which follows from the sentence of the just Judge, not the one which precedes in the evil desire of sin. Thus the first death, which man brought upon himself, is the cause of the second. The second death, by which God repays man, is the punishment for the first.
Those who remained in sins and were not deemed worthy to be written in the book of life will suffer the same thing. And if even those who were moderate in sins are, as it says, cast into the lake of fire with the devil and the antichrist, this should not surprise us. He had already related this beforehand. For even there punishments differ. Just as the degree of fire differs, being in one place steadily more burning, in another weaker and less painful, though all acknowledge them to be fire, so, I think, one must reason here as well.
In this prophetic vision of John, interpreters of Revelation see the dread Judgment of God. Then the dead will live again (see Jn 5:25), and their souls will be united with their bodies, changed only into a better form and made incorruptible (see 1 Cor 15:35-44). They will appear to give account for their earthly deeds and to receive their due recompense (see 2 Cor 5:10).
“Every body will be composed and restored from that into which it was dissolved, whether it was committed to the earth or to the sea,” says St. Andrew.
Death and Hades are cast into the lake of fire. In St. Andrew’s opinion, this means that the evil demons, guilty of the source of death, namely sin, will be cast into the fire. They have Hades as their refuge, and they escort there those who obey them. Thus death and Hades here name their authors, just as a city may mean those who dwell in it.
Hades itself and death are depicted as cast into the lake of fire in the sense that they will vanish and cease forever for mankind. Glorified and saved people will no longer fear either death or Hades, as they do here on earth. The lake of fire, or second death, is the eternal condemnation of sinners whose names were not found written in the book of life before the Lord God.
When the full thousand years have passed, the world will be renewed by God, the heaven will be rolled up, and the earth will be changed. God will transform man after the likeness of the angels. They will be white as snow, and they will remain before the face of the Almighty. They will offer sacrifice to their Lord and serve Him in eternity.
Then the second and universal resurrection of all will come, in which the unjust will be consigned to eternal torments. These are those who worshiped what was made by hands, and who either did not know, or did not wish to know, the Master of the world and Father.
Their lord also, with his servants, will be seized and condemned to punishment. Together with him, the whole multitude of the ungodly will likewise be ceaselessly burned in eternal fire for their deeds, before the eyes of the angels and the righteous.
Passages read together with this verse.
Greek text, 17 words with lemma, transliteration and Strong’s number. Tap to expand.
THEOSIS