[Kolokotronis]

"Interesting. Now by condemned, what sense do we mean? Condemned to an existence without theosis, or condemned to the torments of hell? Based on what I know of the Greek Fathers, I would guess the former alone."

It is interesting, isn't it. In the Great Euchologion of the Church we chant:

"O God, the great and most high, Thou Who alone hast immortality"

[7th prayer of Vespers]

"Thou Who alone art life-giving by nature... O only immortal one"

[Ode 5, Funeral Canon for Laymen]

"Thou art the only immortal one"

"The only One Who is immortal because of His godly nature"

[Ode 1, Funeral Canon for Laymen]

These chants are in accord with the comments of +Irenaeus:

"The teaching that the human soul is naturally immortal is from the devil"

+Justin Martyr condemns this concept in his Dialogue with Trypho, warning against these people:

"There are some others who, having supposed that the soul is immortal and immaterial, believe though they have committed evil they will not suffer punishment (for that which is immaterial is also insensible), and that the soul, in consequence of its immorality needs nothing from God"

Life exists only in union with God. Without theosis, there is nothing but death. Since we were created, along with the rest of creation, ex nihilo, it may be that the condemned simply cease to exist, or otherwise "exist" only as the dead existed until Christ destroyed the bonds of death and even that "existence" ceases after the Final Judgment. I think these are the sorts of speculations which have the potential to drive men mad since they come very close to speculation on the Divine Essence. :)

[Claud]

Life exists only in union with God. Without theosis, there is nothing but death. Since we were created, along with the rest of creation, ex nihilo, it may be that the condemned simply cease to exist, or otherwise "exist" only as the dead existed until Christ destroyed the bonds of death and even that "existence" ceases after the Final Judgment.

Frankly, I'm suprised to hear that, as the eventual annihilation of the soul sounds heretical IMHO and I wouldn't have expected that to be a position within Orthodoxy. I'd have to look up Justin Martyr et al. to divine what he was saying, but off the cuff, he may well be right that the human soul is not naturally immortal; but it is possible that it remains so by divine Fiat nevertheless.

Let me do some more homework on this. :)