It’s a heavy topic. Honestly, if you grew up in a traditional church, you probably heard a lot of fire and brimstone. If you grew up elsewhere, you might think the whole idea is just a medieval invention used to scare people into pews. But when you look at the primary sources—the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—the reality is a bit more nuanced. People often ask, how many times did Jesus speak of hell, expecting a simple tally.
It isn’t that simple.
Translation matters. Language shifts. Depending on which Bible version you’re holding, the word "hell" might appear a dozen times or not at all. Most scholars and theologians who spend their lives digging into Greek and Hebrew texts will tell you that Jesus didn’t just use one word. He used several. He talked about Gehenna. He talked about Hades. He mentioned "outer darkness" and the "furnace of fire."
If we’re counting the specific Greek word Gehenna—the word most modern Bibles translate as "hell"—Jesus uses it 11 times across the Synoptic Gospels. If you broaden the scope to include every metaphor of eternal punishment or separation from God, that number climbs significantly. It’s a recurring theme in his teaching, often appearing when he’s talking to the most religious people in the room.
The Language Barrier: Gehenna vs. Hades
When we ask how many times did Jesus speak of hell, we have to deal with the fact that he wasn't speaking English. He was likely speaking Aramaic, and the New Testament was written in Koine Greek.
The word Gehenna appears 12 times in the entire New Testament. Interestingly, 11 of those occurrences come directly from the mouth of Jesus. The only other person who uses it is James. This suggests that the concept, at least in this specific linguistic form, was central to Jesus’s own warnings. Gehenna wasn't just a mystical, abstract concept. It was a physical place. The Valley of Hinnom sat just south of Jerusalem. Historically, it was a site associated with horrific child sacrifice in ancient Israelite history, and by Jesus’s time, it was essentially the city’s smoldering trash heap.
Imagine a place that always smells like rot. Fires are constantly burning to get rid of refuse. It’s a vivid, visceral image of being "discarded."
Then you have Hades. This is different. In the Greek mindset, and often in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament), Hades was the realm of the dead. It’s more akin to the Hebrew Sheol. Jesus mentions Hades four times. Most famously, he mentions it in the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus in Luke 16.
Why the distinction matters
A lot of people lump these together. They shouldn't.
Hades is often presented as a temporary "waiting room" or the current state of the dead, whereas Gehenna is presented as the final destination of the unrighteous. When Jesus warns someone that it’s better to lose an eye than to have their whole body thrown into Gehenna, he’s using a word that his audience would immediately associate with filth, fire, and total exclusion from the holy city.
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Counting the Occurrences
Let’s get into the weeds of the verses. In the Gospel of Matthew alone, Jesus uses the word Gehenna seven times.
- Matthew 5:22: He warns that anyone who says "You fool!" will be in danger of the fire of hell.
- Matthew 5:29-30: Two mentions here. Better to lose a body part than have the whole body go to hell.
- Matthew 10:28: He says not to fear those who kill the body, but the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
- Matthew 18:9: A repeat of the warning about sin leading to the "fiery hell."
- Matthew 23:15: He blasts the Pharisees for making converts who are twice as much a "child of hell" as they are.
- Matthew 23:33: He asks the religious leaders how they will escape being condemned to hell.
In Mark, we see it three times, all clustered in chapter 9 (verses 43, 45, and 47). Luke records it once in chapter 12, verse 5.
That’s the hard count. 11 times.
But if you’re looking for the concept of hell, you have to look further. Jesus talks about "outer darkness" in Matthew 8:12, 22:13, and 25:30. He talks about the "furnace of fire" where there is "weeping and gnashing of teeth" in the parables of the weeds and the net (Matthew 13).
He’s clearly concerned about it.
The Context: Who Was He Talking To?
This is the part that usually surprises people. Jesus didn't walk around the streets of Galilee screaming at random "sinners" about hell. He almost never used the threat of hell against the broken, the marginalized, or the "tax collectors and prostitutes" he was famous for eating with.
Mostly, he talked about hell when he was talking to religious hypocrites.
The warnings about Gehenna are largely directed at his disciples or the Pharisees. In Matthew 23, his most blistering critique of religious performance, he uses the "hell" card repeatedly. He was warning people who thought they were safe. He was warning people who used religion to hurt others.
It’s a complete reversal of how the topic is often handled today.
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Interpreting the "Fire"
There are three main ways scholars like N.T. Wright or the late Tim Keller have looked at these passages. You’ve got the traditional view, which is eternal conscious torment. This is the Dante’s Inferno imagery we all know. Fire, pain, forever.
Then there’s "Conditional Immortality" or Annihilationism. Thinkers like Edward Fudge have argued that when Jesus talks about "destroying" both soul and body, he means exactly that—total cessation of existence. The fire consumes; it doesn't preserve.
Lastly, there’s the "Universalist" hope, suggested by some early church fathers like Origen and modern scholars like David Bentley Hart. They argue that these warnings were pedagogical—meant to lead people to repentance—but that ultimately, God’s love wins out.
Jesus himself doesn't sit down and give a systematic theology lecture on these three views. He uses metaphors. He uses "unquenchable fire" and "the worm that does not die." These are quotes from the Old Testament, specifically the end of the book of Isaiah. He’s painting a picture of a life lived in opposition to God’s kingdom—a life that eventually burns itself out or is cast out of the "feast."
Is it More Than Just Words?
If we only count the phrase how many times did Jesus speak of hell, we miss the parables.
Think about the Sheep and the Goats in Matthew 25. Jesus describes a final judgment where people are separated based on how they treated the "least of these." He mentions "eternal punishment" (Greek: kolasin aiōnion).
He talks about a wide gate and a narrow gate.
He talks about a house built on sand that falls with a great crash.
The weight of his teaching suggests that human choices have eternal consequences. Whether you see that as a literal lake of fire or a metaphorical state of being "locked from the inside," as C.S. Lewis famously put it, Jesus clearly believed the stakes of human life were incredibly high.
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The Discrepancy in the Gospel of John
Here is a weird fact: The word "hell" or Gehenna never appears in the Gospel of John.
Not once.
John focuses on "eternal life" versus "perishing." You know John 3:16. The alternative to eternal life is to "perish" (apollymi). This word usually implies destruction or being lost. John frames the conversation around "judgment" that is happening right now. He says that those who don't believe are "condemned already."
It’s a different vibe, but the gravity is the same.
The Frequency vs. The Emphasis
Some people argue that Jesus talked about hell more than he talked about heaven. That’s actually a bit of a myth. He talked about the "Kingdom of Heaven" or the "Kingdom of God" constantly—it was his main stump speech.
However, he did talk about judgment more than most modern people are comfortable with.
If you count all the mentions of judgment, fire, and exclusion, it makes up a significant portion of his recorded parables. About 1/3 of his parables deal with some form of judgment or accountability.
Actionable Insights for the Curious
If you're trying to make sense of this for yourself or a study, don't just take a word count at face value.
- Check the Greek: Use a tool like Blue Letter Bible to see if the word is Gehenna, Hades, or Tartarus (though Jesus doesn't use that last one).
- Look at the Audience: Ask, "Who is Jesus trying to warn here?" Usually, it's the person who thinks they don't need to change.
- Contextualize the Metaphor: Remember that Gehenna was a real place in Jerusalem. Think about what that meant to a 1st-century Jew.
- Study the Old Testament Roots: Jesus was a Jewish rabbi. Most of his "hell" imagery is actually direct quoting from Isaiah, Daniel, and the Psalms.
Understanding how many times did Jesus speak of hell helps us see that he wasn't a one-dimensional character. He wasn't just a "nice teacher" and he wasn't just a "judge." He seemed to believe that love required warning people about the consequences of rejecting the source of life.
To dig deeper, start by reading Matthew chapters 5 through 7 (The Sermon on the Mount). Pay attention to where the warnings appear. You’ll notice they aren't random; they are tied to how we treat other people—specifically the poor, the angry, and our "enemies." That's usually where the real "hell" starts, according to the text.