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Bible Dictionaries
Brimstone
Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary
or נפרית , Genesis 19:24; Deuteronomy 29:23; Job 18:15; Psalms 11:6; Isaiah 30:33; Isaiah 34:9; Ezekiel 38:22 . It is rendered θειον by the Septuagint, and is so called in Luke 17:29 . Fire and brimstone are represented in many passages of Scripture as the elements by which God punishes the wicked; both in this life, and another. There is in this a manifest allusion to the overthrow of the cities of the plain of the Jordan, by showers of ignited sulphur, to which the physical appearances of the country bear witness to this day. The soil is bituminous, and might be raised by eruptions into the air, and then inflamed and return in horrid showers of overwhelming fire. This awful catastrophe, therefore, stands as a type of the final and eternal punishment of the wicked in another world. In Job 18:15 , Bildad, describing the calamities which overtake the wicked person, says, "Brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation. This may be a general expression, to designate any great destruction: as that in Psalms 11:6 , "Upon the wicked he shall rain fire and brimstone." Moses, among other calamities which he sets forth in case of the people's disobedience, threatens them with the fall of brimstone, salt, and burning like the overthrow of Sodom, &c, Deuteronomy 29:23 . The Prophet Isaiah, Isaiah 34:9 , writes that the anger of the Lord shall be shown by the streams of the land being turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone. See DEAD SEA .
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Watson, Richard. Entry for 'Brimstone'. Richard Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/wtd/b/brimstone.html. 1831-2.
