Resurrection, Not “Afterlife”
It came to my attention recently that the word “afterlife,” like the word “hell,” is not a biblical word. The first occasion was a discussion of the Sadducees’ question to Jesus about the resurrection of the dead – their mocking case involving the law that required a man’s brother to father a descendant with the man’s wife if the man dies childless. Later, I heard a priest, preaching on the same text, make the same mistake in an otherwise excellent sermon. The law’s purpose, of course, was to keep a man’s name alive in the community, especially on his land. Many Jews, beginning in the time of the Maccabean war, had come to believe in resurrection from the dead – a revolutionary doctrine because it proposes that individual human life outlasts oppressive regimes. The notion of change implicit in the idea was one reason the Sadducees, very happy with conditions as they were since they were in charge, would not believe it.
During the discussion, several people consistently substituted the word “afterlife” for the text’s “resurrection” (the priest did exactly the same thing). I proposed that we limit our vocabulary to the word in the text, and they wanted to know why. The answer was, and is, that the concepts are not equivalent. Resurrection has to do with a mode of life, whereas afterlife has to do with life at different times. In fact, afterlife requires death, but resurrection does not: Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 (an idea already present in 1 Thessalonians) that “we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.” The deeply-embedded equivalence between “afterlife” and “resurrection” is, once again, a disastrous subversion of the story of the People of God by the Greek philosophers, who laughed Paul off Mars Hill for his assertion of resurrection (Acts 17).
The stakes could hardly be higher. “Afterlife” suggests a discontinuity between the present life and the future state. As the priest said, earthly things like marriage fade away in the “vision of God.” Resurrection, by contrast, insists on a continuity between the present life and the future state. The young men in 2 Maccabees 7 gave up their bodies, their hands, their tongues because they expected to get them back. Their mother gave them up because she expected to get them back. The Daniel 12 hope of resurrection is a hope that we will return to this life. Romans 8 looks forward to the “redemption of our bodies,” i.e., our resurrection, as part of the restoration, and certainly not the destruction, of the physical universe. Jesus returns from the dead not as a ghost, as the disciples first feared, but as one who could be touched, one who could eat, one who could cook breakfast. (His ascension, so that he could fill all things as Ephesians 4 explains, is a separate event and unique to him.) The biblical story looks for the restoration of our lives here, in this created universe of which we are made (Genesis 2).
Resurrection is our hope. That means the world we’re building is the world we’ll live in – free from sin, not least because of our building, our work to defeat the enemies. So what we do not is not important as a condition of our getting from this to some other place. It is important because of what it has to do with the future when we get there.
As a Presbyterian preacher’s son I appreciated what JPB had to say about predestination and the Reformed tradition after the last post. No one is interested in maintaining ecumenical respect than I am (having belonged to practically every tradition). However, it seems to me that some of the various attempts of Christians in history to give specific accounts stand in the same position as various attempts in the Jewish tradition to give specific accounts. The debates within the community between Ezra and 3 Isaiah/Jonah/Ruth, pro-monarchy and anti-monarchy in Samuel, the Deuteronomist and the author of Job, are real debates. Biblical Christianity winds up taking sides among them, such as when the Council of Jerusalem decides against requiring circumcision or Jesus refers to the “sign of Jonah” against the Ezra-minded Pharisees. Where Christian theologians in history failed to see that, and failed to see which moved forward with approval in history because they considered scripture flatly as a revelation of forms, we should reconsider. If a theologian, for example, supports quietism based on Romans 13, aiding and a betting a Hitler, we would suggest another reading. If a theologian takes the position of Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, identifying some “sin” that accounts for Job’s suffering (as did most of the preachers of my youth), I would suggest another reading. We do not have to shore up the divisive systems of the past. Once again, thank God for evolution.
It came to my attention recently that the word “afterlife,” like the word “hell,” is not a biblical word. The first occasion was a discussion of the Sadducees’ question to Jesus about the resurrection of the dead – their mocking case involving the law that required a man’s brother to father a descendant with the man’s wife if the man dies childless. Later, I heard a priest, preaching on the same text, make the same mistake in an otherwise excellent sermon. The law’s purpose, of course, was to keep a man’s name alive in the community, especially on his land. Many Jews, beginning in the time of the Maccabean war, had come to believe in resurrection from the dead – a revolutionary doctrine because it proposes that individual human life outlasts oppressive regimes. The notion of change implicit in the idea was one reason the Sadducees, very happy with conditions as they were since they were in charge, would not believe it.
During the discussion, several people consistently substituted the word “afterlife” for the text’s “resurrection” (the priest did exactly the same thing). I proposed that we limit our vocabulary to the word in the text, and they wanted to know why. The answer was, and is, that the concepts are not equivalent. Resurrection has to do with a mode of life, whereas afterlife has to do with life at different times. In fact, afterlife requires death, but resurrection does not: Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15 (an idea already present in 1 Thessalonians) that “we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.” The deeply-embedded equivalence between “afterlife” and “resurrection” is, once again, a disastrous subversion of the story of the People of God by the Greek philosophers, who laughed Paul off Mars Hill for his assertion of resurrection (Acts 17).
The stakes could hardly be higher. “Afterlife” suggests a discontinuity between the present life and the future state. As the priest said, earthly things like marriage fade away in the “vision of God.” Resurrection, by contrast, insists on a continuity between the present life and the future state. The young men in 2 Maccabees 7 gave up their bodies, their hands, their tongues because they expected to get them back. Their mother gave them up because she expected to get them back. The Daniel 12 hope of resurrection is a hope that we will return to this life. Romans 8 looks forward to the “redemption of our bodies,” i.e., our resurrection, as part of the restoration, and certainly not the destruction, of the physical universe. Jesus returns from the dead not as a ghost, as the disciples first feared, but as one who could be touched, one who could eat, one who could cook breakfast. (His ascension, so that he could fill all things as Ephesians 4 explains, is a separate event and unique to him.) The biblical story looks for the restoration of our lives here, in this created universe of which we are made (Genesis 2).
Resurrection is our hope. That means the world we’re building is the world we’ll live in – free from sin, not least because of our building, our work to defeat the enemies. So what we do not is not important as a condition of our getting from this to some other place. It is important because of what it has to do with the future when we get there.
As a Presbyterian preacher’s son I appreciated what JPB had to say about predestination and the Reformed tradition after the last post. No one is interested in maintaining ecumenical respect than I am (having belonged to practically every tradition). However, it seems to me that some of the various attempts of Christians in history to give specific accounts stand in the same position as various attempts in the Jewish tradition to give specific accounts. The debates within the community between Ezra and 3 Isaiah/Jonah/Ruth, pro-monarchy and anti-monarchy in Samuel, the Deuteronomist and the author of Job, are real debates. Biblical Christianity winds up taking sides among them, such as when the Council of Jerusalem decides against requiring circumcision or Jesus refers to the “sign of Jonah” against the Ezra-minded Pharisees. Where Christian theologians in history failed to see that, and failed to see which moved forward with approval in history because they considered scripture flatly as a revelation of forms, we should reconsider. If a theologian, for example, supports quietism based on Romans 13, aiding and a betting a Hitler, we would suggest another reading. If a theologian takes the position of Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar, identifying some “sin” that accounts for Job’s suffering (as did most of the preachers of my youth), I would suggest another reading. We do not have to shore up the divisive systems of the past. Once again, thank God for evolution.
posted by Gene Stowe at 5:07 PM
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