Class: On Eternal Life (Death and Dying)

Scriptural context:  Ecclesiastes 9: 3b-4; St. John 1:12-13; 3:16.  Truly the hearts of the children of men are full of evil; madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead. But for him who is joined to all the living there is hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion.  For the living know that they will die; but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward, for the memory of them is forgotten …  But as many as received [Christ], to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God (through Baptism; St. John 3:5) … for God so loved the world that He gave His only-Begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him may have eternal life.

 The Materialistic View. (see Life after Death:  the evidence by Dinesh D’Souza for a good review) 

• When we die, our bodies decay, as do the brains that gave rise to our notion of “self”.
• Ecclesiastes: 3:18-20.  I said in my heart, “Concerning the condition of the sons of men, God tests them, that they may see that they themselves are like animals.” For what happens to the sons of men also happens to animals; one thing befalls them: as one dies, so dies the other. Surely, they all have one breath; man has no advantage over animals, for all is vanity. All go to one place: all are from the dust, and all return to dust.
• At best we live on through the good (and evil) we have done. 
• Ecclesiastes: 2:15b-19.  “ This also is vanity.”  For there is no more remembrance of the wise than of the fool forever, since all that now is will be forgotten in the days to come.  And how does a wise man die?  As the fool!  Therefore I hated life because the work that was done under the sun was distressing to me, for all is vanity and grasping for the wind.  Then I hated all my labor in which I had toiled under the sun, because I must leave it to the man who will come after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will rule over all my labor in which I toiled and in which I have shown myself wise under the sun. This also is vanity.
• Remember that Ecclesiastes describes a worldview “under the sun”; as Christians, we live a life in the “Sun of Righteousness”(Malachi 4:2; Psalm 84:11; Luke 1:78; John 1:4; 8:12; 9:5; 12:46; Nativity Tropar).

 The Spiritual View (summarized well in Life after Death:  the evidence by Dinesh D’Souza).

• Ancient Greek.  The body decays and dies (then decays some more), but the soul is immortal.
• Eastern Religions.  The soul goes on to the state that is most appropriate to its development.
• Modern New Age Science.  The body dies, but the soul transcends the physical and temporal.
• Supported by scientific and popular observations and ideas such as the conservation of energy and information; Quantum spirituality; the remembrance of “past lives”; the body as a “soul receptor”; Near Death Experiences.
• Also supported by the decline in traditional scientific and Christian skepticism, training, and  authority.  
• Note:  many people mix these ideas. Christians tend to do this using religious words.

 The Orthodox Truth.

• 1 Corinthians 15 summarizes the Orthodox understanding of “what comes next” (as does the Anaphora of St. Basil).
• There is some truth in both the materialist and spiritual views.
• There is no person apart from the body; there is no person apart from the soul.  We are composite.  Nor is there a “person” apart from others.  Christ is the “new Adam”.
• There is no lasting life separate from the Source of Life (God).  All things decay apart from Him.  This is one of the great powers of being in “The Church”.  Life in the Church (i.e. as part of the “new Adam”) is full and eternal.

So what happens when we die?  It seems that when we “die”, the souls of the righteous are brought into the “Bosom of Abraham”; the souls of the wicked rest (alone) in Hades.  The “repose” that most of us will enjoin (and the activity that the saints will enjoy) is sustained by the grace of God.  In the Great Remaking, all souls will be rejoined to their perfected bodies and given new life in a new paradise that is spiritually filled with the “fire” God’s energies.  This will be the source of unending joy for the saints and a source of great (and cleansing?) discomfort for the wicked. 

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A Selection from the Anaphora of St. Basil the Great

Master and Lover of Mankind, with these Blessed Powers we sinners also cry out saying: Truly You are Holy and All-Holy, there is no measure to the magnificence of Your Holiness. And Holy are You in all Your works, for in righteousness and true judgment You have brought about all things for us. O God, when You had fashioned mankind, taking dust from the earth, and had honored them with Your Image, You set them in a paradise of plenty promising immortal life and the enjoyment of eternal good things in the observance of Your Commandments. But, when they disobeyed You, the True God Who had created them, and were led astray by the serpent being slain by their own trespasses, You banished them from paradise into this world in Your righteous judgment, O God, and turned them back to the earth from which they were taken, dispensing salvation for them through regeneration which is in Christ Himself.

Yet You did not turn away until the end from the creatures which You had made, Good One, and neither did You forget the work of your Hands, but You watched over them in many ways through Your tenderhearted mercy. You sent forth prophets. You performed mighty works through the saints who In every generation have been well-pleasing to You. You spoke to us through the mouths of  Your servants, the prophets who foretold to us the salvation which was to come. You gave the Law as an aid and You appointed angels as guardians. And when the fullness of time had come, You spoke to us through Your Son Himself through Whom You made the ages. Being the brightness of Your Glory, the express likeness of Your entity, and upholding everything by the Word of His Power, He deemed it not robbery to be equal to You, God and Father. But, although he was God before the ages, yet he appeared on earth and lived with humans. And He was Incarnate of a Holy Virgin, by emptying Himself and taking on the form of a servant, becoming conformed to the humility of our body that he might conform us to the image of His Glory. For since by humanity sin entered the world and by sin Death, so Your Only-Begotten Son, Who is In Your Bosom, God and Father, was well pleased to be born of a woman, the Holy Birth-Giver of God and Ever-Virgin Mary. He was born under the Law that He might condemn sin in His Flesh, that they who were dead in Adam might be made alive in Your Christ Himself.

And becoming a citizen in this world giving ordinances of salvation, He removed the delusion of idols bringing us to a knowledge of You, the true God and Father, having acquired us for Himself as His own People, a Royal Priesthood, and a Holy nation. And being purified with water and sanctified by the Holy Spirit, He gave Himself as a ransom to Death, by which we were held captive being sold under sin. And having descended into the abyss through the Cross that He might fill all things with Himself, He loosed the pains of Death being raised again from the dead on the third day making a path for all flesh to resurrection from the dead – for it was not possible that the Originator of Life should be constrained by corruption –  that He might be the First-Fruits of those who have fallen asleep and the First-Born from the Dead, that He might be all, being first in all. And ascending into Heaven, He sat at the Right Hand of Your Majesty on High, and He shall return to render to everyone according to their works.

And He has left with us as remembrances of His saving Passion these things which we have set forth according to His command. For when He was about to go to His voluntary, celebrated, and life-creating death, on the night in which He gave Himself up for the Life of the world, He took bread into His Holy and Undefiled Hands, and when He had shown it to You, God and Father, given thanks, blessed, sanctified, and broken it He gave it to His Holy Disciples and Apostles, saying: Take, eat, this is My Body which is broken for you for the forgiveness of sins (Amen).  Likewise, having also taken, mixed, given thanks, blessed, and sanctified the cup of the fruit of the vine: He gave it to His Holy Disciples and Apostles, saying: Drink of this, all of you: this is My Blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins (Amen).  Do this in remembrance of Me, for as often as you shall eat this bread and drink of this Cup, you proclaim My Death and profess My Resurrection.

(Genesis 2:7; 3:19, 23; Baruch 3:27; Daniel 3:28; Job 38:14; Esther 9:27; Isaiah 8:20; Psalms 114: 5, 14; 137:8; Mark 14:22; Matthew 16:26; Luke 1: 70, 78; John 1:18; 17:3; Acts 2:24; 3:15; Romans 2:6; 5:12; 8:29; 7: 3, 6, 14; 15:16; 1 Corinthians 11:23; 15: 4, 20, 22; Colossians 1:10, 18; Galatians 4:4; Philippians 2:6,7; 3:21; Ephesians 4:10; 5: 26; Hebrews 1:1-3; Titus 2:14, (24?); 1 Peter 2:9 )