What is the Lake of Fire, Sulfur and Smoke in the Book of Revelation?

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Guest Post by Dr. Eitan Bar

Lake of Fire = The Dead Sea

During the First-Temple period, what we now know as ‘the Dead Sea’ or ‘the Sea of Salt’ was sometimes called the Lake of Fire, or the Fiery Lake. This historical context is vital for understanding the symbolic meanings behind Revelation’s “lake of fire and sulfur” imagery.

For thousands of years, up to the first century, the Dead Sea was known for its regular eruptions that discharged tar, pitch, bitumen, asphaltites, smoke, sulfur, and flames. Consequently, the Greeks named it “Lake Asphaltites” due to these fiery, asphalt-spewing occurrences.

Philo said that the valley of the Dead Sea was filled with fires, which were very difficult to extinguish, and that many of these fires had been smoking and burning for a very long time.

The first-century geographer Strabo named the valley “a land of fires” because there were frequent boiling outbursts of fire in the region, and the entire area smelled of sulfur and brimstone.

It is common to w…