Facts and
Theories as to a Future State
CHAPTER X
DEATH
WE have already got a long way towards the settlement of
the question as to what death is according to Scripture. I say according to
Scripture, for it is remarkable how little the class of writers we are speaking
of make it really a question to be settled by Scripture at all. They generally
assume that we know all about it, that the word speaks for itself, and that our
experience of it should settle the matter. So Mr. Roberts speaks : - "The
popular theory will not allow that a dead man is really dead. . . It is
incorrect in orthodox language to say that the man is dead. . . In reality
therefore, the word ‘death,’ as popularly used, has lost its original
meaning."
And thus he defines for us what death is. "In order to understand
death, we must have a definite conception of life. Of this we do know
something, since it is a matter of positive experience. All we have to do is to
bring our know ledge to bear, but this is what the majority of people have
great difficulty in doing. Their minds are so occupied with established
theories, that they are blind to facts under their immediate cognizance.
Throwing metaphysics aside, what is life as known experimentally? It is the
aggregate result of certain organic processes. Respiration, circulation of the
blood, digestion, etc., combine to generate and sustain vitality, and to impart
activity to the various faculties of which we are composed. (!) Apart from this
busy organism life is unmanifested, whether as regards man or beast."*
*Twelve Lectures.
The "experience" itself is more than
questionable. Most people would imagine that instead of "organic processes"
generating life, life itself was necessary in order to the organic processes.
Mr. Roberts has somewhat misread the facts here, and his definition of life
consequently fails. Physiologists do not believe it to be quite so simple a
matter. "No rigid definition of life appears to be at present possible," says a
late writer; but again, - "we are compelled to come to the conclusion that life
is truly the cause and not the consequence of organization."† Much less
then is it the consequence of "organic processes."
†Manual of
Zoology, by Prof. Nicholson, pp. 4, 5. 2d ed. (Amer. ) 1872
But our
business is not with physiology but with Scripture. Mr. Roberts plainly has no
need of it in this matter. Only take for granted that the body is the whole
man, and you need no revelation to tell you what death is. As regards the body
death is plainly the cessation of all practical existence. And if the body be
the whole man, the dust that lies in the tomb, death is for him of course the
extinction of being. "Apart from this busy organism life is unmanifested": that
is all we need say. Revelation there is no need of: we have only to apply the
knowledge we already have.
Mr. Constable’s argument as to death is
mainly founded upon the views of human nature which we have already examined,
and upon those of Hades, which we hope shortly to examine. But he has a chapter
upon death itself; of which it only needs to give a brief outline, as
explanatory of the final argument with which he closes it.
His
propositions are - that "death, which God inflicted upon the human race for
Adam’s sin, was a great calamity for all who should endure it," that this
death has passed upon all men without one exception, and "not part of it, but
all of it" upon every one alike (if it did not, God’s word would fail, and
we have no security for anything); that nothing was said about the duration of
the death threatened, that being left open for God to show His grace: "death
might continue in some or in all, for a short time, or a longer time, or
forever:" that death began for Adam from the very day he disobeyed, and reigns
over believers and unbelievers alike till the day of resurrection. His argument
closes thus:
"If death reigns until the period of resurrection, and if
death during this period is exactly the same thing to the just and to the
unjust, it follows beyond any question that both just and unjust are then
wholly and altogether dead. For no one contends that during this period the
just are in a condition of misery; neither does any one contend that the unjust
are in a condition of bliss: but that condition which is neither one of bliss
or of misery must be a condition of death or non-existence. This is the one
condition that can be common to the redeemed and the lost."*
*Hades. p.
79.
Mr. Constable’s logic and his memory have surely failed
him here. Think of the rashness and flippancy of assertion which would pledge
the whole truth of God upon the position that all men must die, and have died,
exactly according to the threatening to Adam, in the very face of the fact that
neither Enoch nor Elijah died, and that those alive at Christ’s coming
never will! "We shall not all sleep," says the apostle. So God’s
truthfulness is gone for Mr. Constable!
I need not answer this, I am
sure. That not even atonement could righteously set aside the exaction of the
penalty from even one of those subject to it, shows how little there is meaning
in atonement for his soul. But his argument fails signally and entirely upon
quite another ground than this.
For why should non-existence be "the
one condition" upon which death should be the same to just and unjust? Granted
they are dead alike. No one denies it. On the supposition that death is the
sundering of the link between soul and body (and so it is), why cannot just and
unjust alike be in this condition without the question of happiness or misery
being raised by it at all?
His argument is laborious non-entity. To state
it is to expose it. Yet it furnishes Mr. Constable with all the justification
he has for the triumph over orthodoxy which fills the next chapter. I do not
purpose following him in it, because we have to do with Scripture simply here.
I would say, however, that, while every expression of those he quotes from
cannot be justified, yet after all they are more in the spirit of Christianity
than are his own. For with them "Christ has abolished death," -for him, it
would seem, not. For just and unjust alike, alike for Jew or Christian, under
law or under gospel, as to what death is itself there is no difference. There
is no "willing rather to be absent from the body and present with the Lord"; no
"desire to depart and be with Christ which is far better." Of course such texts
are owned to be in Scripture, whatever explanation they may be susceptible of;
but the spirit of them is not in his heart. For him death is still an enemy, a
curse, a penalty which no atonement has effaced or lessened "Death is after all
the king of terrors." says Mr. Constable: has he never read of One who came
that "through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is,
the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime
subject to bondage"?
We have already seen reason to believe that death
is not extinction; that the living soul in man is not extinct, when ceases to
be any longer life to the body. We cannot therefore argue from the effect of
death upon the body, as to what it is upon the spirit or the soul. We have seen
that the word of God does on the one side use the popular language the language
of sense, and identify man with his body. This is seen in the class of texts of
which Annihilationists are so fond. The man is the flesh and blood we see and
touch. A dead body is a dead man. We all speak so, unconscious wholly of being
exposed to the charge of materialism for doing so. Our daily speech in this way
might convict us in the profounder wisdom of another generation, of
disbelieving equally with Annihilationists themselves, in the existence of an
immortal soul. Yet we really do believe it in spite of that, and even the
attacks of Annihilationists have not, as yet at any rate, made us a whit more
cautious. We quote even "Dust thou art," and believe it, and yet do not believe
that we are all dust. And we find on the other side, and use as freely, a
number of texts which Annihilationism cannot teach us how to use, which speak
of man being "in the body," " in the flesh," "at home in the body," "absent
from the body," "out of" it, and yet believe that the body is the man too, in
spite of that.
Let us now fairly put the question apart from any
partial answer it may have gotten in this way: Is the Scripture teaching of
death extinction - is it "ceasing to exist," or, as they delight to quote from
Job x. 19, to "be as though we had not been"?
You put seed into the ground,
and, in the Scripture language, "it is not quickened except it die" (1 Cor. xv.
36). Does the living germ become extinct in order to bring forth the harvest?
Are the "organic processes" extinguished in it? Where would the harvest be if
they were? Yet this is in Scripture twice over spoken of as "death." And, if
you reflect a little, the analogy to the death of man is nearer than it seems.
There is that of the seed which is cast off as refuse, and decays. The germ
within "puts off its tabernacle," but, so far from becoming extinguished in the
process, springs up into the plant thereon. Is there no lesson in that, no
type, no analogy commending the use of the strong word "death" in this case?
Would it ever have occurred to Mr. Roberts or to any of his brethren, that
"except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and DIE, it abideth alone, but if
it DIE, it bringeth forth much fruit"? Does the grain of wheat become extinct
in order to bring forth fruit? They have never (at least, that I can find)
attempted to illustrate their doctrine by it, that death is the cessation of
existence, the extinction of organic processes.*
*Mr. Roberts has tried
to answer this. He asks, "Where is the living germ, when the harvest is brought
forth? Can Mr. Grant find it?" Most certainly; for the stalk of corn is but the
development of that very germ.
His account of the matter is curious
enough. With him "the vegetating process is an "invasion" of the vitality of
the grain, which destroys it; a parasitic life, in short, from which the
sprouting comes! And in this way he finds it a "distinct and striking
illustration of" death being extinction. Upon his view of it no doubt it is so.
But then it is rather a new theory, that the living germ is killed by the
vegetating process!
The death of man is spoken of; moreover, in
language which is not doubtful. I have fully admitted already, and without
hesitation, that there are a large class of passages which (identifying man
with his body) speak in the ordinary popular phraseology about it. Passages too
there are, which will be examined in the sequel, which may present difficulty
in harmonizing them with the language of other parts. But, on the other hand,
the clear full light of the New Testament affords us, in many simple and
intelligible statements, abundant satisfaction as to what death is. Some of
these I shall now proceed to examine, together with the arguments of the class
of writers to whom I am replying.
1. As we have seen, the apostle Peter
styles death the "Putting off of his tabernacle" (2 Pet i. 14). The language of
Paul is similar, and if comment be needed, may supply it: "if the earthly house
of this tabernacle were dissolved" (2 Cor. v. 1).
The language of
Annihilationists upon these expressions shows their perplexity. Mr. Ham says on
the latter passage, "Man, the one compound being, is compared to an
‘earthly house’ or ‘tabernacle,’ which will be dissolved."
Similarly Mr. Constable, " We doubt very much if he speaks here only of the
body. We think he speaks of our entire present being, which is not body only,
but body animated by soul. Of this entire being death is the dissolution."
This is plainly incorrect. The apostle distinguishes between the
tabernacle and the one who dwells in it: "for we which are IN this tabernacle,"
he says a little further on. The tabernacle was to be dissolved, not the
inhabitant; and the man is identified with the latter rather than the former.
2. Another expression for death in the same passage (2 Cor. v. 4) is
"being unclothed": "not that we would be unclothed."
Even Dr. Field,
materialist as he is, speaks here of "a disembodied state." Mr. Dobney on the
contrary maintains that "Scripture recognizes no perfectly disembodied state."
I ask, if there be not something to be disembodied, how can you use the
expression at all? Can one talk of "disembodied breath" or "disembodied life?"
The putting off of clothing, if that is a figure of disembodiment, as
it is, is simple enough, but only when we recognize a part, and that the higher
part, of man, to be something that is not the body, but is in it, as the living
soul is. Mr. Roberts indeed talks, as is common with him when in a difficulty,
of the "inevitable fictions of speech." "The exigencies of mortal speech," he
says, "require us to speak of the person as an entity separate from all that
composes him, and when figure is added, as in this case, the effect is greatly
heightened, and a theory like Mr. Grant’s receives apparent countenance."
Would it not have been wisdom to have inquired why the use of the
figure should so greatly heighten the effect, as he admits it does, and whether
the countenance it gives is not more than merely "apparent"? Surely the use of
a figure for a mere abstract personality, and a figure which makes the
abstraction decidedly the higher thing, - nay, which goes so far as to speak of
the "abstraction" as "putting off" that which is the reality, or being
"unclothed" with it, - is somewhat overbold. But what difficulty will not the
wit and will of man combined surmount?
Mr. Constable, in his comment on
the passage, simply refers this expression to the "hades state." With this we
are content, and shall soon inquire what is that state. But plainly here death
is not cessation of existence, whatever (which for the present I leave open)
becomes of soul or spirit afterwards.
3. In the text in 2 Peter (i. 15)
before referred to, death is called "decease," literally exodus, "departure":
"After my departure."
Now here the man departs; where, is not the question
yet. The man, departs. He leaves the earthly house of this tabernacle. Say, if
you please, and if you can gather it from the Bible, that after dying he
becomes extinct or unconscious. That you must prove, if you can, from
elsewhere. Death is not it: does not infer or imply it. It is my "departure."
4. And to this agrees the expression used again in 2 Cor. v. (verse 8),
"absent from the body."
People contend, I know (and it is their only hope),
that this does not refer to death at all. Mr. Dobney thus attempts to
paraphrase it by "absent from this body," "this gross corporeal investiture"
(investiture of what?). Mr. Ham with absence "from our natural body," "our
present mortal and corruptible nature." Ellis and Read speak in the same way of
the "body" here denoting a "state of corruption and mortality," "this
corruptible body or nature." Roberts says, "What absence from the body was it
that Paul desired? Not disembodiment for he says verse 4 of the same chapter,
‘Not that we would be unclothed.’ " Constable seems on the other hand
to allow that "absence from the body" applies to the death state while he will
not allow that "presence with the Lord" similarly applies to it, but to
resurrection, the two being brought in this way together because between it and
dying there is nothing but a blank. "This" [the resurrection state], he says,
"we have no doubt, is the ‘presence with the Lord’ which Paul here
speaks of, and not the intermediate state, as Calvin and others dream. For Paul
had just expressed himself that this unclothed condition was not his desire or
wish. He could not, with any consistency with his just uttered declaration, say
that he should view it with a good satisfaction."
Yet the "willing
rather" must, according to Mr. Constable’s own view of it, include the
intermediate state, if only as the way to the other, "willing rather to be
absent from the body and to be present with the Lord." Is not that "desire" for
the unclothed state! And that these two things he desires are not successive,
but contemporaneous conditions, is manifest also. For, when he says, "whilst we
are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord," these states, he must
admit, go together how then can it be doubted that the two things he desires,
being the opposite of these conditions, go together also?
Mr. Roberts and
others therefore with better judgment concede this; but then they have the
quite as hopeless task to achieve, of making "absent from the body" also mean
resurrection. They all coincide in opposing the apostle’s "not that we
would be unclothed" to the simple and natural interpretation of his desire to
be absent from the body, as if the two were contradictory. But this is by no
means the case. He does say that what he groaned for was, not to be unclothed,
but clothed upon. He groaned for resurrection, true, and the unclothed state
was not in itself what he or any man desired. Still, knowing that to be absent
from the body was to be present with the Lord, he was after all "willing
rather" to be absent. Death had no terror for him, but the reverse. To make
"absent from the body" apply just to the time when the body will have its
fulness of bliss, is only to make incomprehensible what is very simple.* "In
the body" never has the meaning they attribute to it, and that they have to add
words to make it suit their thoughts, is a plain proof that their thoughts are
foreign to Scripture.
*Roberts substitutes "animal body" for "body" in
the above sentence, and then with great naiveté remarks, that "Mr. Grant
himself would not acknowledge the sentence, thus deprived of its piquancy: yet
this is the form which embodies the facts." So that the language by the apostle
does not, as he admits, "embody (his) facts."
And when the apostle,
speaking of his vision of the third heavens, says he cannot tell whether at
that time he was in the body or out of the body," we have the exact expression
in a way which no wonder they shrink from as they do. Paul could not imagine he
had possibly had his glorious body when caught up there, and lost it afterwards
Yet he supposes he might have been conscious of unutterable things when "out of
the body." If so, why may not one (as this chapter teaches) be "absent from the
body and yet present with the Lord"?
I shall have again to speak of
this, when we come to consider the question of consciousness in the disembodied
state. It is sufficient for us here that such a state exists, if words have
meaning. Death is that disembodiment, the putting off the tabernacle of the
body, being unclothed departing, and being absent from it.
Moreover, we
have already seen that Matt. x. 28 asserts that the death of the body is not
the death of the soul. Our Lord bids us "fear not them which kill the body, but
are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both
soul and body in hell."
Mr. Hudson allows that this teaches that death
is not the extinction of the soul, nor involves it. Mr. Dobney follows on the
same side. Mr. Ham wavers, admitting that it is implied "that the soul is
distinct from the body," but at the same time suggesting that "soul" here may
be merely "life." Ellis and Read interpret it to mean that" wicked men can only
destroy the present being of the righteous, and that God could raise them up
again." Miles Grant interprets "killing the soul" to mean "taking the life to
come." Similarly Roberts makes "soul" to be "a life in relation to those who
are Christ’s, which cannot be touched by mortal man, however they may
treat the body, and the poor mortal life belonging to it.* While others say,
that "the dead in Adam are not destroyed," because "in consequence of the
provision made in Christ for the resurrection of every human being from the
Adamic death, those who can kill the body (take this life), only suspend our
being till the resurrection,"
* He now states that psuche here means
"the abstract power of life, which is in the hands of God," but there is
nothing at all about this in the passage. He further brings in Matt. xvi. 25,
"He that loves his life for my sake" to show that psuche there cannot be
immortal soul, in which we agree. I have before considered the passage.
But the text before us will not bend to any of these criticisms. If
soul be life merely, those who kill the body destroy it. Such a phrase moreover
as "killing life" does not, and could not, exist at all, as I have before said:
because "killing" is in itself "taking life," and you could not speak of taking
the life of the life. "Life to come," or the believer’s life, psuche does
not mean; another word, zoe, is invariably used for it. And the contrast
between suspension of life for the present and utter destruction of it is not
what the passage makes, but between a killing which affects the body only, and
the destruction which will overtake both body and soul in hell. I am only
repeating here what I have said before, and what Mr. Hudson, destructionist as
he is, has said before me. Proof is conclusive, that when man dies his soul is
not touched by it. If it is conscious is another thing, and presently to be
examined. And what destruction of body and soul in hell is, I do not inquire
yet. Suffice it just now, that when we put off the body at death, the soul
still lives.†
†Mr. Edw. White, in his "Life in Christ" (p.
96), while agreeing this, considers it the result of redemption only, and
quotes in proof 1 Cor. xv. 17-19: "If Christ be not raised . . . they also
which have fallen asleep in Christ have gone to nothing"; for thus he explains
the term in the following verse: ‘If in this life only we have hope in
Christ, we are of all men most miserable.’
I deny that it
means "gone to nothing." "Are perished" as in the A. V., is the proper
rendering, and does not refer to material destruction, any more than "if in
this life only" does. To die with a false hope is to perish, but not in the
annihilation sense. For the meaning of this word, see chaps. xx., xxi.
Go To Chapter Eleven
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