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brian
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Posted: Mon Nov 26th, 2007 11:50 pm |
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I ran into this objection on another bulletin board
"In Mat 27:52it describes those who arose from their graves when Jesus rose as "those who slept". Paul uses the same description in 1 Cr 15:20. Paul in 1 Th 4 compares the living with those who were put to sleep, i.e. the dead. Paul tells the Thesselonians that when the Lord descends from heaven, those sleeping (believers) will arise and along with the living (believers) shall meet the Lord in the air (between heaven and earth). The believers who were dead were clearly not in heaven or hell or all of 1 Th 4: 13-18 makes no sense whatsoever."
The question I have is how does this resolve with for instance the ideas in revelation of the saints and martyrs praying, or of Jesus seeing Moses and Elijah on Mt. Tabor. Or the passage that says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord?
And of course the crucial question is, what does the Bible mean to say or not regading our state after earth? How can we ask saints to pray for us if according to the Thessalonians passage they are actually asleep? How can they also be in heaven and hearing us? Do we argue that perhaps their bodies lie asleep as they await ressurection while their soul or spirit is in heaven and doing God's will? I think we believe that only a few people who were assumed into heavan may have their ressurection bodies. But the passage in Thessalonians does not seem to distinguish between their body or soul being asleep.
So what can I make of all this if anything? How do we answer someone who thinks that all the dead are still awaiting ressurection and to go to heaven therfore we can not pray to them? It seems they have at least a few Bible passages that seem to point to the idea that the dead are not in heaven but merely waiting in some other state.
I of course, accept whatever the church teaches, but I am curious how to best understand these passages.
Brian
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David W. Emery
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Posted: Tue Nov 27th, 2007 08:35 am |
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It seems they have at least a few Bible passages that seem to point to the idea that the dead are not in heaven but merely waiting in some other state.
Yes, Brian, this is really the case. Perhaps you have, in your musings over the speculations of others, forgotten (first) of the Limbo of the Fathers and (second) of Purgatory. Both are states of being beyond death that are neither heaven nor hell.
The Limbo of the Fathers explains both the presence of Moses and Elijah at the Transfiguration and the rising of the dead “from their graves” upon Christ’s death on the cross. [You will recall that he immediately “descended to the dead” (Apostles’ Creed) and “preached to the souls in prison” (1 Peter 3:19).]
The existence of Purgatory explains the other passages quite easily. And if this were not enough, we could also speak of the presence of angelic beings and saints on the earth, when they are really in heaven. Let us recall, too, that the Son of God, known as Jesus of Nazareth while he walked the earth, remained all the while in heaven as well.
“Sleep” as a euphemism for “death” is so common in both the bible (Jesus used often) and in tradition that I am surprised you missed it here.
David
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brian
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Posted: Tue Nov 27th, 2007 02:51 pm |
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But I tohught that to declare someone a saint meant that they werein heaven. Are there certain people in heaven while others are not? And we are saying that the righteous dead can hear and pray for us wherever they are? When we die what do we know about our existence besides purgatory. Say we finish the purgatorial process but it is still long before Jesus ressurects us, what is the state we are in? are the saints not really in heven but in this waiting stage? I was pretty sure we thought they were in heaven But it seems a little contradictory to say that some are and some are asleep.
Brian
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Dave Armstrong
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Posted: Tue Nov 27th, 2007 04:44 pm |
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Hi Brian,
Man, you are a question machine! But that's good: inquisitive minds will find the truth if they sincerely seek it and (most importantly) are willing to submit to it when they find it.
I ran into this objection on another bulletin board: "In Mat 27:52 it describes those who arose from their graves when Jesus rose as "those who slept". Paul uses the same description in 1 Cr 15:20. Paul in 1 Th 4 compares the living with those who were put to sleep, i.e. the dead.
This is an instance of what is called "phenomenological" language: the language of outward description or appearance rather than complete metaphysical analysis. So to us the dead appear to be asleep.
Paul tells the Thesselonians that when the Lord descends from heaven, those sleeping (believers) will arise and along with the living (believers) shall meet the Lord in the air (between heaven and earth). The believers who were dead were clearly not in heaven or hell or all of 1 Th 4: 13-18 makes no sense whatsoever."
Of course, the question arises: where does this person think they were? Catholics have no problem interpreting this. There is, as David mentioned, the Limbo of the Fathers (or Hebrew: Sheol / Greek: Hades) or purgatory. These can all be amply defended from Holy Scripture.
The question I have is how does this resolve with for instance the ideas in revelation of the saints and martyrs praying, or of Jesus seeing Moses and Elijah on Mt. Tabor. Or the passage that says to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord?
Consciousness after death is clearly taught in Scripture. For example: the soul is described as a separate entity from the body:MATTHEW 10:28 And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
REVELATION 6:9-10 And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
1 KINGS 17:21-22 Then he stretched himself upon the child three times, and cried to the Lord, "O Lord my God, let this child's soul come into him again." And the Lord hearkened to the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived. (cf. Lk 8:53-55)
* * *
JOHN 11:26 And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this? Jesus clearly sets forth the notion that the faithful Christian will always have conscious, unending existence with God. He cannot possibly be referring to physical death, since all men die in that sense. PSALM 116:15 Precious in the sight of the LORD is the death of his saints. The consciousness of the dead is assumed or else the verse becomes ludicrous.
1 SAMUEL 28:11-16 tells us that Samuel returns from the dead and pronounces Saul's death sentence.
Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh-Day Adventists and other sects and cults that teach what is known as annihilationism or soul-sleep (no consciousness after death and no hell, with the sinner being annihilated out of existence altogether) typically rely on the distortion of a few passages in order to "prove" their error:Ecclesiastes 9:5: . . . the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward . . .
If the first clause is understood in an absolute sense, then so must the second clause be interpreted. Thus, the dead would have no "reward" as well as no consciousness. This would deny the resurrection and the rewarding of the righteous (see Rev 20:11-13, 21:6-7, 22:12,14). Obviously, then, a qualification of some sort has to be placed on Ecc 9:5. In the very next verse, we learn that: . . . neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun. In other words, in relation to this world, the dead know nothing, but they are in a different realm, where they do know something. As further examples of this limited sense of "not knowing anything" in Scripture, see 1 Sam 20:39 and 2 Sam 15:11, where an interpretation of unconsciousness would be ridiculous. Ezekiel 18:4 (also 18:20): . . . the soul that sinneth, it shall die.
Here, the spiritual use of "death" in the Bible is overlooked. For instance, 1 Timothy 5:6 reads: But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth. (cf. Eph 2:1 and Lk 15:24) That Ezekiel 18:4,20 refers to spiritual death (i.e., separation from God, not annihilation) is obvious from context, since 18:21 declares: But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. Since all men die physically, this must be talking about the spiritual, or "second" death. So much for this "proof" . . . Psalm 146:4: His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.
This verse's meaning is similar to that of Ecclesiastes 9:5. Here, "thoughts" refer to "unaccomplished purposes" of a person on earth. Death puts an end to those purposes, as anyone would agree. In this sense, one's thoughts "perish" at death. Another similar use occurs at Isaiah 55:7: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteousness man his thoughts . . . This doesn't mean that unrighteous men must cease all thinking and become unconscious and nonexistent. Nor does Ps 146:4. Much of this sort of inadequate and erroneous exegesis results from a profound lack of understanding of the many literary forms and devices used in Scripture, as seen in these three examples. Much of the OT is poetry of one sort or another. One cannot interpret poetry in a wooden, literal way.
And of course the crucial question is, what does the Bible mean to say or not regarding our state after earth? How can we ask saints to pray for us if according to the Thessalonians passage they are actually asleep?
Even Martin Luther and John Calvin admitted that the saints may be praying for us in heaven: Although angels in heaven pray for us . . . saints on earth, and perhaps also in heaven, do likewise, . . .
(Smalcald Articles, 1537, Part II, Article II in Theodore G. Tappert, translator, The Book of Concord, St. Louis: Concordia Pub. House, 1959, 297)
I grant they pray for us in this way.
(Institutes of the Christian Religion, III, 20, 24) Luther and his successor as head of Lutheranism, Philip Melanchthon, also accepted the validity of prayers for the dead: As for the dead, since Scripture gives us no information on the subject, I regard it as no sin to pray with free devotion in this or some similar fashion: "Dear God, if this soul is in a condition accessible to mercy, be thou gracious to it."
(Confession Concerning Christ's Supper, 1528, in Luther's Works, edited by Jaroslav Pelikan, vol. 37, 369)
[W]e know that the ancients speak of prayer for the dead, which we do not prohibit . . .
(Apology to the Augsburg Confession: Article XXIV, 94) The Apostle Paul prayed for the dead: 2 Timothy 1:16-18 May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me; he was not ashamed of my chains, but when he arrived in Rome he searched for me eagerly and found me - may the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that Day - and you well know all the service he rendered at Ephesus.
This passage gives Protestants fits. Protestants can't accept the practice of praying for the dead because of their theology; therefore, they must explain this away somehow. What they do is either deny that Onesiphorus is dead, or that Paul is praying. Most of the nine Protestant commentaries I consulted for this passage admit that he was praying, but deny that the person was dead. Some try to say that Paul was merely "wishing", but I don't see any difference between that and a prayer: it looks like a word game to avoid the implications. The same commentaries said he was possibly dead (two), take no position (two), think he was "probably not" dead (one), or deny it (three). A.T. Robertson, the great Baptist Greek scholar, felt that he was "apparently" dead and that Paul was "wishing" rather than praying. I think it's much more plausible to simply take the Catholic position: the man died and Paul was praying for him.
As for saints praying for us: if these saints are alive, aware of earthly events, and pray for us (because they possess love and concern), then it is not wrong to ask them to pray for us. How do we know they are aware? Because of Hebrews 12:1:". . . we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses . . ."
Word Studies in the New Testament (Marvin R. Vincent, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1980; originally 1887; Vol. 4, p. 536), a famous, standard Protestant reference work, comments on this verse as follows: 'Witnesses' does not mean spectators [Greek martus, from which is derived martyr], but those who have borne witness to the truth, as those enumerated in chapter 11. Yet the idea of spectators is implied, and is really the principal idea. The writer's picture is that of an arena in which the Christians whom he addresses are contending in a race, while the vast host of the heroes of faith who, after having borne witness to the truth, have entered into their heavenly rest, watches the ontest from the encircling tiers of the arena, compassing and overhanging it like a cloud, filled with lively interest and sympathy, and lending heavenly aid. Saints in heaven are therefore aware of, and observe events on earth, "with lively interest," as Vincent puts it. Also: Revelation 6:9-10 . . . I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had borne; they cried out with a loud voice, "O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before thou wilt judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell upon the earth?"
Here the martyrs in heaven are saying what are known as "imprecatory prayers": pleas for God to rescue and vindicate the righteous. Examples can be found particularly in the Psalms (Psalms 35,59,69,79,109,139) and in Jeremiah (11:18 ff., 15:15 ff., 18:19 ff., 20:11 ff.). An angel offers up a very similar prayer in Zechariah 1:12. Jesus mentions a type of this prayer in Matthew 26:53, in which He stated that He could "pray" to the Father and receive legions of angels to prevent His arrest had it been the Father's will.
Therefore dead saints are praying for Christians on earth. If they can intercede for us, then why shouldn't we ask for their prayers? Clearly, they're aware of what is happening on earth. They are more alive, unfathomably more righteous, and obviously closer to God than we are. Omniscience isn't required for them to hear our prayers, as is often charged. Rather, we have reason to believe that they are out of time, by God's power, because to be in eternity is to be outside of the realm of time. That allows them to answer many requests for prayer because they have an infinite amount of "time" to do it.
How can they also be in heaven and hearing us?
Because God gives them that power, and because heaven is another dimension. The saints are out of time with God, and thus have all the "time" they need to listen to our petitions.
Do we argue that perhaps their bodies lie asleep as they await ressurection while their soul or spirit is in heaven and doing God's will?
Yes. Their bodies await resurrection.
I think we believe that only a few people who were assumed into heaven may have their resurrection bodies. But the passage in Thessalonians does not seem to distinguish between their body or soul being asleep.
This is simply phenomenological language, explained above. Jesus even seems to play around a little with this sort of language, when He described the daughter of Jairus, who had died: "Do not weep, for she is not dead, but sleeping" (Lk 8:52). Jesus then "prayed" both to the dead (by addressing a dead person) and for the dead (by commanding a dead person to return to earthly life), because He was talking to a dead child, and saying, "Child arise" (Lk 8:54). The next verse states "and her spirit returned," thus proving that it was separae from her body.
So what can I make of all this if anything? How do we answer someone who thinks that all the dead are still awaiting resurrection and to go to heaven therefore we can not pray to them?
I think I have shown various strong biblical arguments along those lines.
It seems they have at least a few Bible passages that seem to point to the idea that the dead are not in heaven but merely waiting in some other state.
Luke 16 about Lazarus and the rich man clearly teaches a third state.
I of course, accept whatever the church teaches, but I am curious how to best understand these passages.
I hope this has been helpful to you. For much more, see my web page:
Saints, Purgatory, & Penance
____________________
I'm happy to offer whatever theological & personal assistance I can. My blog, Biblical Evidence for Catholicism, contains 1900+ papers & web pages (absolutely free) & 16 apologetic books (for sale):
http://www.biblicalcatholic.com/
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CajunRick
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Posted: Tue Nov 27th, 2007 10:52 pm |
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I think we must also consider a cultural reality.
The Jews of the time were very concrete in their thought. They did not have a concept of abstract thought. That's why they were so concerned with such matters as how many steps they were allowed to take before it was considered "work" and therefore forbidden on the Sabbath. Is cooking work? Is childcare work? Are those things forbidden on the Sabbath? That's why they had so much difficulty understanding Jesus' teaching that the law was made for man, not man for the law. That's why there are nearly 700 Levitical laws that cover practically everything. And that's why Jesus and the apostles, who were more mature in their faith, abandoned most of them.
The Jews had no real concept of the "soul" as we believe it today. To them, the lifeforce was carried in the blood. When you spilled blood, you spilled life. That's why kosher laws (even today) demand bleeding an animal. When you drain its blood, you take away its lifeforce. Death to them was an end. They had no real concept of an afterlife, so if you were dead, it was over.
Jesus came to bring us eternal life. If the mind is a concrete thing that cannot imagine the abstract, then those who are dead are finished. So Paul uses the description of "sleep" as a way to say they are not truly dead (as in "finished") but only appear to be dead. They are still alive in Christ, even though they appear to be dead, like those who are asleep.
Everyone understood the concept of a coma, although they didn't know why. They knew that people who appeared to be dead could sometimes return to life. That's why we have "wakes". We watch the body to see if the person wakes up. In that case they truly were asleep and not dead.
Paul uses the metaphor of sleep to indicate a person who is not truly dead (as in obliterated) but rather still alive in a manner we don't understand. In this jargon, all are asleep for all eternity. Some will rise to glory and others to damnation, but all will rise at the last judgment, at which time they will be reunited with their glorified bodies for all eternity in either heaven (glory) or hell (damnation).
So "sleep" is a metaphor used to explain an abstract concept to a people who only understood extremely concrete examples.
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Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
Rick Luquette
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Dave Armstrong
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Posted: Wed Nov 28th, 2007 04:34 pm |
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The Jews had no real concept of the "soul" as we believe it today. To them, the lifeforce was carried in the blood. When you spilled blood, you spilled life. That's why kosher laws (even today) demand bleeding an animal. When you drain its blood, you take away its lifeforce. Death to them was an end. They had no real concept of an afterlife, so if you were dead, it was over.
I think they developed this mostly in the inter-testamental period, so that we don't see much of it in the OT itself, but it was present more so in the time of Jesus (i.e., in the Pharisaical school, but not the Sadducees). I wrote a little about this very topic:
The Development of Old Testament and Jewish Views of Sheol, the Afterlife, and Eternal Punishment
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CajunRick
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Posted: Wed Nov 28th, 2007 09:13 pm |
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Dave Armstrong wrote: They had no real concept of an afterlife, so if you were dead, it was over.
I think they developed this mostly in the inter-testamental period, so that we don't see much of it in the OT itself, but it was present more so in the time of Jesus (i.e., in the Pharisaical school, but not the Sadducees).
I agree, but I was trying to stress that the term "dead" did not mean the same thing to them as it does to us today. I am no expert, but it is my understanding that they considered "dead" to mean the end of all existence, where those who experienced life after death were believed to be in a state of non-corporeal existence. We believe today that the body is dead but the soul remains alive eternally, and the Pharisees might well have understood it that way, but I don’t believe the average Jew would have understood "dead" in this manner. I think that's why Paul used a metaphor of "sleep" for those who had eternal life. He was trying to make certain they understood that for those who believed in Christ and persevered in their faith to the end, life was changed, not ended.
When reading scripture, we must always look to the time and culture in which the scriptures were written. That's why we Catholics reject a fundamentalist, literal interpretation of individual bible passages. We must read scripture in the context of the entire bible as well as 2000 years of sacred tradition and magisterium to truly understand the meaning. We know what the Church teachfes today, and we know that Paul's writings cannot contradict anything otherwise written in scripture, the writings of the Fathers, or the teachings of the Church. Only then are we able to understand the meaning of those scripture passages.
Again, I am not by any means an expert, but this is my understanding of the references to death as "falling asleep".
____________________
Understanding is the reward of faith. Therefore seek not to understand that you may believe, but believe that you may understand. - Augustine
Rick Luquette
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Dave Armstrong
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Posted: Wed Nov 28th, 2007 10:23 pm |
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That's interesting, Rick. It may cast more light on use of the metaphor "falling asleep" beyond the phenomenological aspect.
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David W. Emery
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Posted: Thu Nov 29th, 2007 12:42 am |
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1 Kings 14:20: And the time that Jeroboam reigned was twenty-two years; and he slept with his fathers.
1 Kings 15:8: And Abijam slept with his fathers; and they buried him in the city of David.
2 Kings 14:16: And Jehoash slept with his fathers, and was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel.
2 Kings 15:7: And Azariah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David.
2 Chronicles 21:1: Jehoshaphat slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David.
2 Chronicles 26: He built Eloth and restored it to Judah, after the king slept with his fathers.
Et cetera. I have not, however, found earlier examples. So the euphemism “sleep” for “death” is probably post-exilic Jewish in origin, and in any event it was not invented by Christians.
David
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Dave Armstrong
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Posted: Thu Nov 29th, 2007 03:20 pm |
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More great stuff! I love these little discoveries in the Bible.
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