Lutheranism affirms the reality of hell as eternal punishment for those who die without faith in Christ. The Augsburg Confession Article XVII states that Christ will return to judge, condemning the ungodly and the devil to eternal punishment. This reflects the confessional tradition's sober maintenance of biblical eschatological warnings without elaborating speculative details.

Lutheran confessional documents do not extensively systematize the nature of hell but maintain its reality as separation from God and as suffering. Annihilationism and universalism are not accepted within confessional Lutheranism. Some progressive Lutheran bodies (particularly within the ELCA) include theologians who engage more openly with universalist hope, but this represents a departure from the confessional consensus expressed in the Book of Concord.