The Old Testament Belief in Life After Death Essays

The Old Testament Belief in Life After Death Essays The Old Testament Belief in Life After Death Essay The Old Testament Belief in Life After Death Essay Essay Topic: Bless Me Ultima Jaws Nashville Life and death, and much more, life-after-death constitute issues that we may never completely comprehend with our limited human intellect. The question of the possibility of an afterlife is one to which most religions have had to provide answers. Judaism, as a religion, at some point in its history had to confront this question. The aim of this essay then is to point out how the Israelites, as a religious people, came to answer this question of the possibility of an afterlife. We would notice as we progress in this essay that the ancient Jewish belief about an afterlife is one of progression from despair of survival after death to a reassuring hope of Yahweh’s justice and power to preserve the souls of the righteous from torment. The Israelite Conception of Life The concept of life that we find in the Old Testament is one that is strongly theistic. Life, first and foremost, for the Israelites of the Old Testament era, is to be understood as a gift of God. Life is God’s own creation. With the creation of the universe and all that lives in it came life. The Israelites, undoubtedly from their creation account, understood the universe as the work of God. If the universe and all that is contained in it, including man, is the work of God, then life is not something man has by virtue of himself, but something that is given him, namely a gift. The Israelites believed that man did not just begin to exist spontaneously. Man had an origin. This origin is to be located in Yahweh, the God of the Israelites. Man, as well as woman, is the creation of Yahweh. Thus, to be alive is to have been created by God. In as much as this exillic (or probably, post-exillic) creation account of the Israelites speaks of life as Yahweh’s handiwork, the Israelites, from their experiences, saw the ephemerality of this life. Hence the psalmist declares:Yahweh, what is human being for you to notice, a child of Adam for you to think about? Human life, a mere puff of wind, days as fleeting as a shadow. [NJB Psalm 144:3-4] It was in the consciousness of the Israelites that the only kind of life worth living is a life of fidelity to the one true God, Yahweh. As a convenanted people, they believed that the good life consisted in keeping he laws and precepts of Yahweh. Moses’ farewell message to his people sheds light on what the Israelites held to be the right attitude to life: obedience to the laws and precepts of Yahweh. To his people, Moses offered two options, namely life and prosperity on the one hand, death and disaster on the other hand. He enjoined his people to embrace life and prosperity by way faithfulness to Yahweh (NJB Deuteronomy 30: 15-20). Accordingly, the Israelite conception of life was shaped by their relational experience with Yahweh. The Attitude of the Israelites Towards Death Death is an inevitable end for man. The Israelites of the Old Testament period knew this much because of their experience over time with the phenomenon of death. In general, the Israelites see death as the normal term of life, hence, they only ask that they be allowed to live out their days in peace. But they elicited varied reactions to the phenomenon of death. Otto J. Baab has postulated that the common form of attitude towards death was that of indifference. He considers this manifest in the following instances, among others: the struggle between Jacob and his brother, Esau, for their dying father’s blessing without minding the fate of their dying father (Gen. 7); Moses’ defense for the established priestly order by a reaction of destruction, without sympathy or pity, against the 250 laymen that revolted against the priestly hierarchy (Numbers 16:30); and Cain’s remorseless attitude towards the death of his brother, Abel, whom he killed. The attitude of indifference here is that of blatant disre gard for what becomes of the victim of death, or better still, an attitude of life-goes-on with or without the deceased. Another form of attitude towards death was its acceptance with quiet confidence. The death of Abraham is presented in the Old Testament as one that came after a satisfying and fulfilled life (Genesis 25:7-8). Jacob and Moses are equally reported to have died at an advanced age. Joseph, at his ripe old age, knew his death was near and did not wish it away (Genesis 50:22-26). He evinced an humble acceptance of death. Yet, another form of attitude towards death is that of rejection, sadness and pain. Such sentiments are, in the Old Testament, rather connected with suspected early, sudden, and untimely death. Such kind of death is for the wise man a punishment for wickedness. We find in David’s grief and pain a typical Israelite rejection of sudden death. David went aground with sorrow, strict-fast and sack-clothing because he was opposed to the imminent death of the child he bore from his illicit affair with Bathsheba (II Samuel 12:16-25). Only in the book of Job do we find an unusual desire for death. Of course, his desire for death was precipitated by the bleakness and utter dismay he experienced in his moments of affliction, loss and desolation. In the midst of his misfortunes, Job wandered whether it was not better if he had died by still-birth or as soon as he left his mother’s womb (Job 3:11). Put differently, he thought he was better off dead than alive to live miserably with no hopes like a dead man. It may be insightful to take another look at the attitude of David towards the death of the child he begot with Bathsheba. David’s mood changed immediately he realized that the child for whose sake he had grieved and kept fast had died. His reply when asked by his retinue about his changed mood, â€Å"But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him but he cannot come back to me,† (II Samuel 12:22) bespeaks of a belief in a place of reposition for the dead. For the Israelites of the David’s time, the abode of the dead is sheol. The Israelites would usually locate sheol in the depths, a place of shadowy existence. Thus, it is variously described as the â€Å"depths of the underworld†(Proverbs 9:18), and the â€Å"depths of the earth† (Psalm 63:10). It is believed that sheol accepts all, kings and beggars, masters and slaves, old and young, innocent and evil doers, without distinction. It is a place, which once descended into, no one returns to earthly existence (Job 7:9-10). Its victims are kept in it pitilessly (Song of songs 8:6) and none can see the light forever (II Samuel 12:23). The Question of the Belief in Afterlife in Old Testament Thought With regard to the idea of an afterlife, ancient Israel, biblical scholars have opined, was much closer to the beliefs of Mesopotamia and Canaan than it was to the beliefs of Egypt. The Egyptian idea of an afterlife conceives of survival after death as a two-dimensional continuation of earthly human existence and not as a genuinely new and different state. For the Egyptians, the joys of the world beyond the grave are the carnal joys of normal experience. People could share in the life of the gods, but only in a purely human way. The Egyptian afterlife is thus a thoroughly secularized world. In contrast to the Egyptian belief in an afterlife is the Mesopotamian belief that there is just no hope of survival after death. For the people of Mesopotamia, the world of the dead is a vast tomb where the bodies of the dead lie inert or are no more than semi-conscious at best. Death in Mesopotamia was usually greeted with deep pessimism. It was believed that to the gods alone belonged life. It is man’s lot to die, and after death, no hope of survival because the gods do not deign it fitting that man should share in their immortality. In fact, they believed that life was meant to be enjoyed with all the pleasures that may come with it and more since there can be no sure pleasure beyond death. The Israelite attitude toward the possibility of life after death shows no appreciable difference from Mesopotamian belief. Scholars would generally hold that this belief in no hope of survival after death was expressed in the Old Testament before some of its latest passages, which were probably written in the 2d Century BC. The Israelite belief that there can be no hope of survival after death may be understood from their conception of human nature. For the Israelites, the constitution of the human person does not contain in it any principle of survival. Neither the â€Å"soul† nor â€Å"spirit† survives death. Since they believed that the soul cannot exist independently, it then means that the Israelites of antiquity understood the human person as a unity that cannot be bifurcated radically into a body and soul with the possibility of individual existence. The implication of this anthropology is that, when a human person dies, it is the whole person that dies. No part of the deceased survives. Death, thus, becomes an absolute end; and this precisely is the view of death over wide stretches of the Old Testament, especially in the earlier period of Israel’s history. As much as it could be said that the ancient Israelite conception of human nature does not support a distinction, as is often made today, between the body that perishes and the soul that survives bodily death; just as much as the very idea of sheol seems no different from the ancient Mesopotamian conception of Arallu, the world of the dead, a place where the dead lie hopelessly inert, there is some modification that could be made with regard to the ancient Israelite conception of a possible afterlife. In order words, there is reason to belief that the Israelite pessimism of non-survival at the face of death underwent a further development. There are certain passages in the Old testament that seem to suggest a latter Israelite inclination towards a belief in survival after death. The development of the idea of an afterlife probably gained a strong impetus from the emphasis prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel began to place, at their time, upon the fate of the individual rather than the whole people. From the period of the exile onwards, it gradually came to the Israelite consciousness that the good or evil life of each person mattered before God. This led to reflections on the question of what happens to the good man who dies without recognition or blessings in this life. Would such a person be destined to the same faith as the wicked? The faintest hope of this survival may be seen expressed in Psalms 49 and 73 which reflect about the futility of wealth and the triumph of justice respectively. In both instances, the psalmist points out the universality of death, yet we see in each a ray of hope for the preservation of the righteous. The righteous, though mortal by their human nature, cannot come to the same end as the wicked, otherwise the exhortation to be righteous is needless and unrewarding. Psalm 49 speaks of Yahweh ransoming the souls of the honest and righteous from the clutches of sheol to which the wicked and avaricious are held bound (Psalm 49:1). The idea of preservation from the jaws of sheol that the psalmist speaks of can scarcely mean that the righteous will not experience death. This conclusion has already been precluded by the admission that death comes both to the righteous and to the wicked. With regard to Yahweh’s preservation of the souls of the righteous, the psalmist apparently strikes upon communion with Yahweh, the experience of happiness, and not dejection, that comes from having lived well on earth. The psalmist came upon this conclusion from the premise that Yahweh must have some way in which communion with him can be preserved for those who are faithful to him; otherwise there would ultimately be no difference between righteousness and wickedness. But this idea was not fully developed here, partly because of the ancient Israelite conception of human nature and human life, which knows of no principle that could survive death. When the hope for survival after death came be to expressed, the only possible form that it could take in the Israelite thought was the resurrection of the body. The first clear expression of this hope of resurrection took place in the Maccabean period of persecution and martyrdom with these words: Of those who are sleeping in the Land of Dust, many will awaken, some to everlasting life, some to shame and everlasting disgrace. Those who are wise will shine as brightly as the expanse of the heavens, and those who have instructed many in uprightness, as bright as stars for all eternity [NJB Daniel 12:2-3]. Still another expression of this belief in life after death is found in the Book of Wisdom probably written in Alexandria in the first Century BC:But the souls of the upright are in the hands of God, and no torment can touch them. To the unenlightened, they appeared to die, their departure was regarded as a disaster, their leaving us like an annihilation; but they are at peace. If, as it seemed to us, they suffered punishment, their hope was rich in immortality; slight was their correction, great will their blessings be [NJB Wisdom 3:1-4]. The history of the development of this Israelite idea of resurrection in not completely clear. Nevertheless, it could not have been an idea that evolved out of nothing. A good number of Old Testament scholars think it is very probable that this change in the Israelite conception of afterlife is not without Persian and Greek influences. Perhaps, what we find quoted above from the Book of Wisdom proves a decisive Greek influence in the Israelite ormation of the conception of the immortality of the human spirit. This belief saw a greater appreciation in later Judaism and, subsequently, in Christianity. Conclusion The life man has was given him by God at creation. However, man’s life on earth as a matter known from experience has to terminate at some point. Death ends its all for the Israelites of antiquity. Death does not discriminate against the wealthy or poor; nor does it discriminate against the upright or wicked. It affects all and sundry. The Israelite knew this much to be true of death. Initially, they believed death was an absolute end and that the dead are consigned to a place where they are forever inert, namely sheol. However, this view had to undergo modifications over time, partly due to probable Persian and Greek influences, and partly due to a better understanding of Yahweh’s justice. Thus, the Israelites of old were led to understand that there is another life beyond death. Christians today can boast of a robust belief in a flourishing life after death because it has become a heritage revealed through the person of Christ, the only Son of God. BIBLIOGRAPHY Baab, J. Otto. The Theology of the Old Testament. New York: Abingdon Press, 1949. Boadt, Lawrence. Reading the Old Testament: An Introduction. New York: Paulist Press, 1984. Heinisch, Paul. Theology of the Old Testament. Minnesota: The North Central Publishing Company, 1955. McKenzie, L. John. â€Å"Aspects of Old Testament Thought,† The New Jerome Biblical Commentary. Edited by Raymond Brown et al. New Delhi: Indira Printers, 2007, pp. 1284-1315 Rad, Von Gerhard. God at Work in Israel. Translated by John H. Marks. Nashville: Parthenon Press, 1980.