![]() ![]() Even this, however, while an instinctive presumption, can hardly be called a proof of survival after death, and it does not yield an idea of "immortality" in any worthy sense. It is only as we assume such a deeper root for the belief that we can account for its universality and persistence. Religion, 281.) Dreams, etc., may help this conviction, but need not create it. What more natural than to suppose that it persists in some other state apart from the body? (Compare Max Muller, Anthrop. At death this thinking, feeling something disappears, while the body remains. Before, however, a dream can suggest the survival of the soul, there must be the idea of the soul, and of this there seems a simpler explanation in the consciousness which even the savage possesses of something within him that thinks, feels and wills, in distinction from his bodily organs. To what is it traceable? A favorite hypothesis with anthropologists is that it has its origin in dreams or visions suggesting the continued existence of the dead (compare H. In some sort the belief in the survival of the spirit or self at death is a practically universal phenomenon. The subject must now be considered more particularly in its different aspects. It is not a condition simply of future existence, however prolonged, but a state of blessedness, due to redemption and the possession of the "eternal life" in the soul it includes resurrection and perfected life in both soul and body. It implies, therefore, deliverance from the state of death. ![]() The "immortality" the Bible contemplates is an immortality of the whole person-body and soul together. The soul, indeed, survives the body but this disembodied state is never viewed as one of complete "life." For the Bible "immortality" is not merely the survival of the soul, the passing into "Sheol" or "Hades." This is not, in itself considered, "life" or happiness. It will be seen as we advance, that the Biblical view is different from all of these. If, on the other hand, as in the hope of immortality among the nobler heathen, it is conceived of, as for some, a state of happiness-the clog of the body being shaken off-this yields the idea, which has passed into so much of our modern thinking, of an "immortality of the soul," of an imperishableness of the spiritual part, sometimes supposed to extend backward as well as forward an inherent indestructibility. distinguished several parts, the Ka, the Ba, etc., which survived death often the surviving self is simply a ghostly resemblance of the earthly self, nourished with food, offerings, etc.), there is the more serious consideration that the state into which the surviving part is supposed to enter at death is anything but a state which can be described as "life," or worthy to be dignified with the name "immortality." It is state peculiar to "death" (see DEATH) in most cases, shadowy, inert, feeble, dependent, joyless a state to be dreaded and shrunk from, not one to be hoped for. This is commonly what is meant when we speak of "a future life," "a future state," "a hereafter." Not, however, to dwell on the fact that many peoples have no clear conception of an immaterial "soul" in the modern sense (the Egyptians, e.g. It is the assertion of the fact that death does not end all. In hardly any subject is it more necessary to be careful in the definition of terms and clear distinction of ideas, especially where the Biblical doctrine is concerned, than in this of "immortality." By "immortality" is frequently meant simply the survival of the soul, or spiritual part of man, after bodily death. Preliminary-Need of Definition and Distinction: Grace and Redemption-The True Immortalityġ. THE BIBLICAL DOCTRINE-THE OLD TESTAMENTģ. Preliminary-Need of Definition and Distinction I-mor'-tal, im-or-tal'-i-ti (athanasia, 1 Corinthians 15:53 1 Timothy 6:16, aphtharsia, literally, "incorruption," Romans 2:7 1 Corinthians 15 2 Timothy 1:10, aphthartos, literally, "incorruptible," Romans 1:23 1 Corinthians 15:52 1 Timothy 1:17):ġ. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |