"The Sanskrit term Naraka is often mistranslated into English as the Hindu equivalent of the Christian "hell" or Catholic "purgatory." However, this misunderstanding is likely a result of there being no exact word in English equal to Naraka. Naraka is not a place of eternal damnation, as is hell of Western Christian theology. It is also not a place of forced purification where soul must remain until some final Judgment Day, as the Catholic purgatory. Instead Naraka is a place of purification where the spirits of the deceased come to be cleaned through suffering over a span of time (the length of which depends on how much negative karma the spirit accumulated during life). Damnation by a god is not what sends a person to Naraka, but rather their own negative and immoral actions during life."