Symbol key · Forces
Smoke of their torment
Smoke rising after the fire has done its work — evidence of complete, final destruction, not of unending conscious torment
Where Scripture defines it
“And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.” (Revelation 14:11)
Confirmed at Psalm 37:20
But the wicked shall perish... into smoke shall they consume away.
Confirmed at Isaiah 34:10
It shall not be quenched night nor day; the smoke thereof shall go up for ever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste...
Confirmed at Malachi 4:1, 3
...the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch... and ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet...
Confirmed at Jude 7
...even as Sodom and Gomorrha... are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Read it for yourself
Every reference opens in the two-book reader with commentary, chain references and original-language notes.
Keep pulling the thread
Where this leads next
Symbol key · Forces
Unquenchable fire
Fire that no one can put out until it has consumed what was given to it — its result, not its duration, is the point
Symbol key · Persons
Souls under the altar
The lives (the poured-out life-blood) of the slain martyrs crying for justice — living beings, not conscious spirits in heaven
The ending both books share
The stone kingdom
A stone cut out without hands becomes a mountain that fills the whole earth — the only kingdom in the vision with no successor.