Matthew 25:41-46: Is it biblically accurate to translate aion/aionios as eternal (i.e. is hell eternal)?

Dealing with 2 terms/words used in Scripture

• Aion = ever, forever, eternal, everlasting, age-long, an age (Strong’s 165)
• Aionios = everlasting, eternal, ages (Strong’s 166)

Many universalists, or annihilationists (though for different reasons and with different end results), argue that neither one should be translated eternal, and thus it’s theologically inaccurate to consider hell eternal.

Translation of these terms depends on context

• Aion: Matthew 12:32 → context referring to something not everlasting “not be forgiven in this age or” | Luke 1:33 → context referring to something everlasting “He [Jesus] will reign over the house of Jacob forever” (Luke 20:34, 35 show both contextual meanings of this word in back to back verses)
• Aionios: Matthew 19:16 → context clearly referring to something everlasting “what must I do to have eternal life?”

Mark 10:30 actually shows this excellently: two different usages that support the same idea: “who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life” (in the aion which is coming life aionios). If aion can never mean eternal, then the second half of that phrase is logistically impossible. One cannot have eternal life in a time frame that is temporary.

“Only aidios means eternal, not the other two”

• First, just as a note of context, all three have the same root: aei = ever, always, unceasingly (Strong’s 104)
• Aidios = everlasting, eternal (Strong’s 126) → now we have a new problem. If this statement is to be accepted as true, that “only aidios means eternal, and since it’s never used with Hell, Hell cannot be eternal” then our salvation is also not eternal…
• Aidios is used just twice in the NT. Romans 1:20 to describe God’s eternal power and Jude 1:6 to describe the chains God uses to bind the fallen angels. Aidios is not used to describe our salvation.
• John 6:51 “If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever” (aion, 165); John 3:16 “should have life eternal” (aionios, 166) (just two examples, one for each word)

So to answer the original question, yes, it is Scripturally accurate to translate either aion or aionios as “eternal” and therefore to understand Hell as eternal, which is Scripturally consistent (Revelation 14:11).

FOLLOW UP QUESTION:

If Hell is indeed eternal, what does that mean for Psalm 30:5 “His anger is but for a moment” - does the Bible contradict itself?

Short version: Psalm 30:5 is not talking about Hell.

Expanded version: God does not send people to Hell in a fit of anger; people justly receive their sentence when they reject Him (John 3:18-21, 32-36; Romans 1:20-32). God is also perfectly holy and perfectly just; He cannot abide sin and if there was no consequence to sin, He would cease to be perfectly just (Joshua 24:20; Romans 2:5-8). So an eternal Hell is not God perpetually angry at an individual, but the just consequence for the person’s sin. Hell was meant for the devil and his demons (Matthew 25:41); Hell is not an angry reaction from God, but a just one.