What did Christ save us from? Discarnate unconsciousness (Hell = Sheol/ Hades + Insight)

Jesus Christ is known to have saved us - but what from?

From what the Ancient Hebrews of the Old Testament called Sheol (which is much the same a what the Ancient Greeks called Hades). And the descriptions of Sheol/ Hades are of a state of discarnate un-consciousness.

So - before Christ, when mortal Men died, they lost their bodies and their 'wits' - they become 'demented', lost self-awareness, lost the meaning and purpose of existence, lost all relationships with other Men and with God.

And this is what Christ saved us from - because after Christ Men are resurrected - that is they have restored and perfected bodies, and become again capable (indeed in an enhanced way) of consciousness: they have real relationships, their lives are self-aware with meaning and purpose.

Sheol/ Hades is the consequence of the death of an incarnate mortal. Yet (Mormons believe, and so do I) that before mortality we had a spiritual existence in which we were conscious souls, had relationships, meaning and purpose.

From this I infer that our incarnation as mortal Men was not merely our souls being given a body - but that the soul and body become one, interpenetrated - such that when the body dies, our souls are left incomplete - as described for Sheol/ Hades.

It was always a part of the plan that Jesus Christ would remedy this state (only the fully-divine Christ being incarnated, dying and Himself being resurrected could accomplish this) - and that Jesus would by his mystical work enable resurrection, and thereby restoration of our wholeness.

Why then did the advent of Christ also bring Hell - a place of tormented rather than 'demented' souls as in Sheol/ Hades?

Because Christ brought post-mortal awareness - we must choose to accept Christ's gift of resurrection and a post-mortal eternal life as Sons and Daughters of God, siblings of Christ - of working towards higher levels of our divinization. And to chose this entails to remain aware in the post-mortal state.

Therefore, Hell is Sheol/ Hades PLUS post-mortal awareness: Hell is Hades but ALSO to know Hades - to know that we chose Hades above Heaven and to experience meaninglessness, purposelessness and existential alone-ness.

(Approximately) Hell = Hades + Insight   

Moral inversion in secular modern society

The most striking aspect of modern secular society, which would have amazed and horrified our ancestors, is the moral inversion by which have redefined bad as good, sin as virtue.

This has happened as part of the modern rejection of Christianity, and as a solution to the fundamental paradox of the human condition – the conflict between spontaneous human desire and spontaneous human morality.

It is, at root, this moral inversion which is causing secular modern societies to commit suicide by a combination of denial of danger and by deliberate policy.

***

It seems that our literate ancestors (such as the ancient Jews) all spontaneously recognized that for a person to live according to their spontaneous desires - living primarily for seeking gratification and avoiding (or minimizing) suffering - was morally wrong.

This was so obvious that it needed (and indeed needs) no argument - it is the natural moral law for humans that a life aiming at selfish hedonism is intrinsically wicked: that is wicked as a basic stance, not merely in terms of its consequences (which vary according to specific circumstances).

Yet it was also recognized that at some level, for humans as they are now, it is also natural and spontaneous to be selfish and hedonic.

So there was a conflict between the way that humans were 'set-up' to be self-gratifying and the moral sense by which we knew that this way wrong.

***

This was the basic situation, the human condition, as perceived by pretty much all humans throughout history - that of conflict.

And therefore the situation was bleak in the extreme, since there seemed to be no solution.

Of course, all humans also believed (in some sense) in the soul, and its potential persistence after death (in some form, perhaps as a ghost, perhaps in Hades - not the same as hell, perhaps returning to be recycled or reincarnated)

The ancient Jews attempted solution was The Law, which prescribed morality in terms (essentially) of behaviour. If a man could live according to the law, his life (in this world) would be good - although the end was the same for all - good and bad - the ghostly and depersonalized realms of Sheol/ Hades.

However, actually men could *not* live by the law. It was impossible, because of their nature. They could never achieve that to which they aspired. The human condition was tragic.

***

This was the basic human situation, about which humans could do nothing, and from which humanity needed to be rescued.

The Christian solution, the Good News, was that God's Grace had provided a solution, since the incarnation meant that God had taken-up humanity; and if a person proclaimed in their heart Jesus as Lord, and repented of his (inevitable) sinly nature, then there would be forgiveness and the soul would (instead of losing humanity in Hades) be granted eternal life with God.

Man's soul after death would become God-like instead of a gibbering, depersonalized ghostly form of persistence.

So, the Christian message is that belief and repentance in this life can lead to a solution of the fundamental paradox, but only in the next world, after death (however this life is temporary, while life after death is eternal).

***

For whatever reason, the Western elite ruling class became increasingly atheist from the advent of modernity (?c 1700). Since the elite ruling class disbelieved in the soul, they were this-worldly; and since they were this-worldly they wanted as much satisfaction from life as possible (there being nothing else).

But spontaneous natural morality gets in the way of worldly self-gratification – so spontaneous natural morality must (somehow or another) be rejected.

Yet since morality really is spontaneous, it cannot be rejected.

***

So emerged moral inversion: the morality that (contrary to the instinct of spontaneous morality) this-worldly self-gratification is the proper primary aim in life.

From this derives the many specific new ‘Laws’ of modernity; which state that what we used to think was necessary is actually un-necessary, that what we thought was bad was actually good, and what we used to think was good was actually bad.

For secular moderns the only *real* sin is to believe in the reality of sin.

***

This is the current situation, this the secular modern ‘solution’ to the fundamental paradox of the human condition – that life in this-world can be, should be, harmonious - *if only* we recognize that our spontaneous self-gratification is actually morally necessary and should be the primary explicit goal of human endeavor.

And because this solution actually solves nothing, and is merely a statement, a wish-that-this-was-so; it has necessarily been embodied in the *coercive* beliefs, practices and laws of atheist totalitarian states (notably the USSR, National Socialism and Communist China) and this process is now advanced in all Western societies (by enforcement of what is termed ‘Political Correctness’).

So the citizens in modern secular societies are not merely *encouraged* to flout the natural morality which they cannot help but feel, they are increasingly *forced* to flout natural morality. They are compelled to live (and to think and to believe) as if hedonic gratification was the primary value in a life which ends with death and extinction.

And there is no hope of resolution in this world, nor the next world (the existence of which is denied).

***

Since there is no hope of resolution, the only alternative is distraction – to lose oneself in hedonic gratification: such that intense, continuous self-gratification *obliterates* our awareness of the fundamental paradox.

Despair, distraction, denial, self-indulgence… and if these do not work, then some kind of suicide of awareness.

By this analysis, the Decline of the West is a willed societal suicide driven by the mass psychological consequences of top-down, enforced moral inversion.

Reincarnation BC - Resurrection AD? - some speculations

Although most Christian apparently don't have this attitude; I find personally it hard to reject-outright the idea of reincarnation.

This mainly because (it seems) that most people, through most of human history, have believed in the reality of one or another form of reincarnation - plus several of the more modern thinkers whom I most respect believe in reincarnation, apparently from directly intuited personal experience.

However, I find that the Gospels tell us that Jesus taught all Men are resurrected after death - not reincarnated - and make their choice of Heaven or Hell. On the other hand, the Gospel discussions of whether or not John the Baptist was some kind of reincarnation of a prophet seem to confirm that, at least until the advent of Jesus's ministry, reincarnation was regarded as possible - if not universal. 

One way I make sense of this is that I think modern religions tend to fall into one of only two categories - either they believe in some version of reincarnation with spirits returning to inhabit a series of bodies; or else that each human spirit is formed at a time related to incarnation. But these two are not the only possibilities.

A further alternative is seldom known or considered - that an eternal pre-mortal human spirit was alive before incarnation, death and resurrection; in other words that the full potential span of human life falls into three stages: pre-mortal spirit, mortal incarnate, and resurrected incarnate.

(However, given the role for agency and choice, presumably it is possible to choose not to be incarnated, and to remain as a pre-mortal spirit. This would presumably be the situation of some angels - who are either awaiting incarnation, or else have - at least currently - declined the offer of incarnation. And it would be the situation of demons - who reject incarnation along with rejecting God's plan for creation and the Love necessary to its accomplishment.)

This three stage understanding of human life (which is the Mormon view) is the one I regard as true - and my interpretation of those modern people who believe in the reality of reincarnation is that they have not sufficiently seriously considered this alternative. That, for example, they have misinterpreted their intuited memories of pre-mortal spirit life (which may include historical actions in this world, and with people in the past) as being incarnated life. In other words, they remember previous spirit lives, but simply assume that these must necessarily have been incarnated lives.

On the other hand, since reincarnation was apparently a possibility for John the Baptist, it is also possible that some modern people happen also to be reincarnates who, like John the Baptist, are spirits that have returned to fulfil some particular function, do a particular job... So when such people seem to recall a previous incarnate life or lives, maybe they are correct.

I find it striking that so far as I know, all simple, tribal, hunter-gatherer type societies believe in reincarnation - in the form of a 'recycling' of spirits within the tribe over time. The concept is apparently that there are implicitly a fixed number of spirits (or souls) who are reborn some time after death - so that the same set of personalities recur across the generations. My presumption is that such societies self-understanding will have been broadly correct - so this would imply that there used-to-be a, probably universal, system of reincarnation.

Most sedentary (i.e. settled, non-nomadic) totemic and pagan societies apparently either believe in some version of reincarnation, or else they regard life after biological death as being something like Hades or Sheol; that is continued existence of the spirit or soul in a ghostly, demented half-life of present-awareness without agency. Again, I would tend to accept that these people correctly understood their situation - at least in essentials. So, it is possible that this 'underworld' represented the time in-between reincarnations; or that some people/s (e.g. the Ancient Hebrews or Greeks) chose Not to reincarnate - but remained in Sheol/ Hades... implicitly awaiting the Messiah/ Saviour.  

If we accept that the situation up to the time of Jesus's incarnation (i.e. approximately the years BC) was as above - that biological death was followed either by a a kind of suspended animation like Sheol, or else a reincarnation from such a state. Then the further possibility is that this situation was changed by the work of Jesus; and from some point AD onwards - probably the time of Jesus's own resurrection - spirits were resurrected instead of being reborn.

This also applied to the spirits at that point in Sheol/ Hades - some of whom were resurrected at the same time as Jesus. But - given the importance of free choice - it may be that resurrection could be refused, and that some of these may have a job still to do as reincarnates.

If so, modern people who believe they recall earlier incarnations may either be recalling their pre-mortal spirit lives; or they may be people who recall an incarnation (or more than one) before Christ's work in making resurrection, and who have returned to incarnation for some particular purpose.

What survives death? An intuitive account

What of us survives death? The same 'self' that survives through all the transformations of our mortal life; and that same self which came originally from before that embodied life when we were first formed on earth. 

As I look back on my life the memory seems like a dreamy vision which was inhabited by the same self. In my earliest childhood memories, through the development of growing -up and adolescence, and the now-strange events of my early adult life... Everything seems fuzzy, indistinct, dreamy (maybe nightmarish) - but the self continues. 

I can imagine my-self as a four year old, as nine, as thirteen, when I was twenty-one and so on - it is the same self but the situations are as different as can be, and mostly have the quality of a day-dream: fluid, imprecise, fuzzy... 

Was that really me in those situations, in those behaviours? Yet the self that observes these strange occurrences was the same. 

That inner self seem independent of the body - that body which changed so much. Independent of circumstance - which changed so much. 

I think "Was that really me?" about what I did, where I went - but I do not think that about the self that remembers. That was really me. 

It is that self, which was maintained through so many 'bodies' and situation which will be maintained through the transformation of biological death - and will remain.

But what then? What happens to the self when the body has not just changed, but died? It continues in some way, but how?

The tendency is for the self to lose its consecutiveness; its memory and its continuity; to break up into mere awareness of the moment. We have an inkling of this from some dreams, from recollection of descending into delirium... of losing grip on the situation, or our sense-of-being falling-apart; that perplexity, slippery-confusion-angst as we cannot recall how things became as they are, or what we are supposed to do. 

(We may see exactly this in demented people - as reality, purpose, their situation is always slipping away from them.)

This situation seems to be the 'natural', spontaneous fate of the self - called by the ancients names including Sheol and Hades. The self survives biological death to become a witless, demented ghost who does not remember who he is; merely reactive; incapable of purpose and choice. 

(The process of dying is the dwindling of the self towards this state.) 

Death is the state of mere-being, without memory, aware only of the instant now.

This state of Sheol/ Hades is what Jesus called death; it is what he came to save-us-from. Jesus is our saviour from the death that is mere-being of the self. 

We are saved from death by following Jesus. How can this 'following' be imagined? 

All will encounter Jesus after death, and before the dissolution of the self into a witless ghost. 

What is preventing immediate dissolution of the self? God does that  - God the creator - by divine creative power. If we love God; then we allow God to stop the dwindling to nothing, allow God to sustain our-self in a state in which we retain our memory, purpose etc. 

So we remain able to choose. 

We could imagine this choosing as meeting Jesus in a dream; and, as in a dream, we will know that it is Jesus. We realise that Jesus is present with us. And then we decide. 

So, instead of dwindling to mere-being; we will recognise Jesus, and will remember and know what he is offering us: resurrected life eternal in Heaven. And we decide whether to follow him to this everlasting life; or not. 

If we choose to follow Jesus - what then? It is the continual presence of Jesus that will guide us through the transformation of resurrection. It is the continual presence of Jesus that enables resurrection - and for this to happen we must actively wish for this transformation - which transformation is permanent and entails rebuilding from the remnant self wholly in the basis of love. 

If we cannot love, if we reject love, or if we want something else - then we will choose Not to follow Jesus. Indeed we cannot follow Jesus unless we are prepared to make a permanent and irreversible commitment to live only by love; to become forever incapable of not loving. 

As I implied earlier; if someone loves God, but does not want to follow Jesus (e.g. perhaps a theist but not a Christian) - he will Not be transformed. Instead he will remain in the state of consecutiveness of consciousness; being maintained thus by ongoing divine creation. He will be sustained in awareness wholly by God - thus aware only of himself and of God. 

This is the state sometimes called Nirvana; a blissful state of current awareness of God's love and of being in the state of loving God - an eternal now; without memory and without purpose. A passive state. 

Not mere being; but a state of being 'in' love. 

What of Hell? The demons themselves do not die, since they are never incarnated spirits. But what of the ex-Men in Hell: those selves who were once Men but have been through biological death?  

I suppose Hell to be the choice to prevent the dissolution of the self by continual infusion of life energy. So, instead of becoming a witless, demented ghost in the state of Sheol/ Hades; the self is maintained in this world, 'animated', energized by demonic actions. 

Divine creation is primary - it is (as we see it) something from nothing. It is originative and primary - adds to reality. Creation is the opposite of entropy. But creation entails love (in a crude sense, creation requires love). 

So, those who cannot love, or reject love, cannot creation.  

Since demons cannot create, they are bound by entropy. 

That life-energy that sustains continuity, memory and purpose is continually being used-up, needs continual replacement - like fuel in a car. 

Replacement life-energy to sustain a dead-self functionally-above the level of Sheol must therefore be taken from living beings, for example from living Men. 

The process is not creative but parasitic, vampiric. The sustaining life-energy is extracted from one being and redirected into another; just as we consume the energy of coal to warm ourselves when otherwise we would freeze. 

Crudely, one lives because another dies; one dies that another may live - but (because of entropy) only temporarily. 

The Hellish economy is therefore based upon destruction of energy. While Heaven grows as love grows; Hell is always shrinking. 

Hell's intent is to retain functional life without love of God. Hell maintains control of its denizens by the threat of death - if life-energy is not infused (by demonic action), the damned soul will to revert to the insensibility of Sheol. 

Thus the economy of Hell is one of mutual exploitation, of 'dog-eat-dog' - one ex-Man survives only at the price of another Man being consumed (either consumed partially, or - eventually - consumed wholly). 

...Until only one remains - and he will then inevitably die. 

In the end, all will die; so life in Hell is a deferral of ultimate death - the ever more frantic desire to live a little longer, to be the last to die.

In conclusion. When we die biologically, our self will survive; but the state of that self is a matter of choice. And the choices seem to be fourfold: Heaven eternally, Nirvana, Hell - en route to Sheol, or Sheol and the extinction of self awareness. 

In a deep sense, after death we get what we want. And what is that?  

From what most people are saying nowadays, it seems that Heaven is currently the least popular of these destinations - Sheol-direct (i.e. perceived death, annihilation, cessation of all awareness of the self) perhaps the most sought-after. 

And the other two possibilities of Nirvana and Hell, maybe ranking somewhere in between?  

Just a guess... 

Explaining the 'mechanism' of salvation and the necessity of Jesus (from the Fourth Gospel)

The beginning of the Fourth Gospel tells us that it was Jesus, The Word, who made this world; and it is this work of creation which enabled Jesus (and only Jesus) to be our saviour.

*

Having made this world; Jesus was then incarnated-into the world he had created; that is, he was incarnated from his creation, using the stuff of his own creation. This world has that primal and fundamental unity - of being created by Jesus - everything is inter-related and mutually-affecting, by kinship of shared origin.

So we too are all incarnated from this world, from the creation of Jesus. 

When Jesus died and was resurrected; this was the death and resurrection of the creator of this world, Jesus's mortal body and his resurrected body were both of this world (which Jesus himself had made).

We are incarnate from this world, Jesus became incarnate from this world (which he had made); we and Jesus are both Men; and therefore Jesus's death and resurrection had universal significance for Men. 

This it was, that made it possible for other Men to follow Jesus into resurrected life everlasting; and why only Jesus is our saviour.

*

Why then do we need to have faith in Jesus? Why doesn't salvation just-happen?

Because there are two things Jesus gave us; the first is 'physical' resurrection to eternal life, the second is 'dwelling' in Heaven (life 'everlasting', and life qualitatively greater - not merely unending existence...).

Resurrection just-happens, and it happens to all men. Instead of remaining as a severed soul - as was the case for all Men before Jesus; since the resurrection of Jesus, all Men (including those from before the time of Jesus) are resurrected.

Resurrection is not a choice - it 'just happens' - it is something like a change in physical reality; a change in what happens to the soul after death.

*

But Heaven is a choice, a decision, an act, an opt-in - and salvation therefore happens only through faith - that is love, trust of Jesus.

To understand this requires recalling the fate of the soul after the death of the body, and before the resurrection of Jesus - the soul was a witless, demented thing of little intelligence, little memory, little judgement, no free will... incapable of helping itself...

(This, at least, is how both the ancient Hebrews (with Sheol) and ancient Greeks (with Hades) regarded life after death - and other variants may be understood similarly. The soul after death was a damaged, incomplete, incapable thing - eternal life was merely eternal existence.)

I regard the Good Shepherd parable as providing the key to understanding salvation - which is that while the soul is always resurrected, resurrected Man cannot find his own way to Heaven.

The resurrected soul must be led to Heaven; that is, Man must choose to follow the guidance of the Good Shepherd. This following is not imposed, it is chosen.  

This was made newly possible by Jesus because the resurrected soul has greater capability than the discarnate souls destined for Sheol/ Hades; the resurrected soul has sufficient capability to recognise Jesus, to know him; it has the capacity and necessity to choose whether to follow the Good Shepherd, or not.

Why would the resurrected soul follow the Good Shepherd to Heaven, except that the soul loved and trusted the Good Shepherd?

That is the need for faith.

*

Thus Jesus was necessary to our salvation, only Jesus could give us salvation, only faith in Jesus can lead us to salvation.

 

Death as annihilation, and other desired post-mortal destinations

We are eternal Beings, and at some level we know this. Therefore, the eternal future is a subject of compelling concern - albeit that concern may well be expressed by an absolute refusal to think or speak about it. 

I am suspicious of the common modern 'belief in' (which I interpret as desire-for) death as annihilation. I mean, the standard mainstream belief that biological death of the body also entails a complete destruction of every-thing about that person... There is no 'soul' or 'spirit' separable from the body... Dead means dead and gone.  

As I mentioned, I interpret this belief as a desire; and my understanding of this desire is that it often arises in those who will not repent (perhaps they will not acknowledge the reality of sin?)... People who are deeply and ineradicably ashamed - and who want (more than anything) for their shame to end. 

In sum: those who desire annihilation want permanent annihilation of their own self as a final solution to unendurable existence in a reality with No Hope.  

'Death as annihilation' is a manifestation of existential despair. 

 

In the ancient past - at least among both the Hebrews (Sheol) and the Classical Greeks (Hades) - there was a belief in "death" as becoming witless, demented ghosts; spirits with no memory of life and who had lost self-identity. 

This was not a torment, nor a pleasant state; rather it was neutral - and implicitly a situation of waiting. The fate of the dead soul was undecided, and there was a possibility of being-rescued. 

And this, indeed, happened; since Jesus rescued as many of these souls as wanted to Follow Him.

 

The anticipation of Sheol/ Hades was therefore for a state after death with hope of escape. But it seems a distinctively modern thing to desire death to be irrevocable; death to be a permanent and complete annihilation.

The modern idea of death is the desire to make an eternal commitment of negation. And, once thus conceptualised, I think that modern death can be seen as a mirror of Christian hope for Heaven. 

The Christian believes that he can make an eternal commitment in favour of God; and can thereby join-with God (and others who have made this positive commitment) in the continuing work of loving creation. 

In contrast; the mainstream, modern idea of death as annihilation is the opposite desire; the wish to make an eternal commitment to reject God, love and creation.

...And is, thereby, a decision to join-with the side of Satan and the powers of darkness; working against God. 

 

In sum, the normal, mainstream, modern desire for death as annihilation is evil: it is a manifestation of the unrepented sin of despair: it expresses an active rejection of God, love and God's creation. 

 

Note: A somewhat less 'final' version of the death-as-annihilation desire is the wish for death as a state of 'sleep', 'rest', 'peace' and so on - which seems to have become popular in England in the 19th century; and is still expressed in the unthinking repetition of 'RIP'. 

This seems to express a desire for death-as-annihilation; but of a potentially revocable type; allowing at least the possibility of awakening after a period of sufficient rest/ sleep/ peace.  

Further note: I have not discussed the matter of reincarnation, in its many and contrasting forms; nor what desires they reflect - because I am not yet clear on that matter.

Death as dreaming sleep (and the coming of Hell)

What is it like to be dead?

Modern materialist Man seems to have decided that to be dead is like being permanently in deep sleep, unaware of the self, unaware of anything.

The ancient world also seems to have regarded death as like being asleep; but like dreaming sleep. The Hades of the Greeks and Sheol of the Jews were states of being much like the world of dreams - the self was feeble, agency was feeble, the individual had little control and was merely swept-along by events.

In the ancient underworlds, as in dreams; memories slipped away almost as soon as formed, motivations likewise; understanding likewise. To be dead was thus to be delirious, or demented - to become a ghost - living in a perpetual present mostly dominated (like dreams) by perplexed incomprehension, confusion, angst - but presumably with interludes of pleasure and satisfaction. 

We should note, therefore, that the ancient understanding of death as underworld, Hades, Sheol was Not that all men 'went to Hell'. The state of dead souls was one to be dreaded, as a modern Man would dread delirium or dementia - but it was Not a state of perpetual misery or torment.

*

Among Rudolf Steiner's ideas is that our self is spiritual and not located, and our body is like a mirror for the external self; the self sees-itself in the body. A similar idea from Rupert Sheldrake is that memory is like an electromagnetic field - a radio signal - and the brain is like a receiver - a radio - which intercepts this field, interprets and broadcasts it.

Common to such ideas is the notion that the human brain, the body, are not the origin of our-selves; but these solid things are necessary for our immaterial/ extensive selves to become centred, focused, autonomous, agent...

Back to Steiner... he suggested that during sleep the consciousness and the self left-behind the living body - so deep sleep without dreams is our experience of merely being alive in the body, rather like a plant; whereas dreaming sleep was when we became 'located' with the consciousness outside the body, in the spirit.

By such an account, sleep is closely analogous to death; because with death the physical body dies - but not human consciousness. The body dies, but the soul continues. If our awareness becomes cut-off from our bodies; we might expect that the remaining consciousness would be incomplete, and we would experience its life much as does the dreamer.

An immortal soul detached from its living body is in much the same situation as the dreaming consciousness. 

*

So - until the work of Jesus Christ - Man's death was universally like sleep, but like dreaming sleep; and this state seemed to be the permanent fate of the dead.

But since Jesus; the universal fate of Men has been resurrection; and resurrection reunites consciousness with the body; but with a permanent immortal body.

This suggests that resurrection would be analogous to awakening from dreaming sleep; and with a similar sense of renewed agency, freedom, self-awareness, control. The consciousness returns to its living body - but not to the mortal body left-behind a few hours ago; but instead to to a new living body, the resurrected eternal body.

The choice of Heaven of Hell is a choice of where this resurrected Man will dwell. Indeed, Hell was not possible until resurrection had been instituted.

In sum; BC there was universal Sheol but no Hell; after Christ Sheol was abolished, there was universal resurrection and the possibility of Heaven - but the coming of Christ was also the coming of Hell.

With Sheol there was no possibility of Men choosing Hell, because the dead lacked free will, so the dead could not choose. But Christ's gift of life everlasting brought the post-mortal capacity to choose - to choose evil, as well as to choose Good.

Death before and after Jesus (and the possibility of resurrection)

The coming of Jesus Christ changed the nature of death.

More exactly, I believe that this happened at the point of his baptism by John; the time when Jesus became divine; when the divine spirit rested upon him and stayed with him.

From then; those who loved, trusted, had-faith-in, 'followed' Jesus (those who wanted to be resurrected and dwell in Heaven for eternity) would be resurrected.

So time is real, history is real; the nature of death is divided into before and after that moment. That moment introduced the new possibility after biological death; which was resurrection to eternal life.


Before Jesus, there was no resurrection. When Men died, the spirit was separated from the body. What then?

My understanding is that the body is what enables greater agency, greater freedom; our capacity to be an actor rather than acted-upon. A spirit without a body has a much lesser degree of agency; so when the body dies there is a loss of The Self.

We experience an analogous situation each time we sleep. Sleep itself represents two of the possibilities after death - when we live in the spirit.


Deep sleep is the loss of consciousness. We are alive but don't know it (or barely so); alive but unaware of anything. This is the nearest reality to the subjective perception of death as annihilation.

Genuine annihilation of an individual spirit is impossible since our primordial spirit had no beginning, is eternal, has no end - but self-awareness can be annihilated (which represents a return to our primordial state, before we became Children of God) - alive but unaware.

When this state of alive-but-unaware is pleasurable, blissful - then it is Nirvana; the state of being sought by Hindus and Buddhists. So I am suggesting that deep sleep is a temporary Nirvana.


Dreaming sleep is equivalent to Hades or Sheol; which are seen as conditions of 'delirious', or demented half-being; when men become witless ghosts or similar.

This is seen in the state of dreaming sleep insofar as we are in a passive state of being. Memory constantly slips away, our capacity for agency is feeble so that we 'go along with' whatever is happening.

Dreaming sleep is an experience of passivity, loss of reason and purpose. It is a vision of spirit life without incarnation.


I suggest that these states - Nirvana and Hades, corresponding to deep and dreaming sleep - were the possibilities of spirit life before Jesus.

A further possibility was reincarnation. The spirit could be re-housed in a new body.

Since the body, and its specific nature, affects the spirit - this meant the reincarnated spirit, reborn and leading another life, was 'a different person' - not the same person repeated.

An analogy would be a relative who shares a certain fundamental similarity, the same flavour, deep character - "He's Just Like his uncle John...".


After Jesus a further possibility was introduced, in addition to 'Christian resurrection' - and this was Paradise.

Paradise takes various forms - Valhalla, or the Muslim Paradise. Implicitly, Paradise is a state in which our-selves are retained and our agency; so paradise is a kind of resurrection.

But Paradise is not a resurrection to the presence of God and the participation in the work of creation that is Heaven. It is a place where one's favourite activities become possible, in principle eternally (and subject to the limits of that aspiration, and the constraints of mutual existence).

Paradise (in its variants) is, indeed, pretty much the lower or 'Telestial' Heaven as described in Mormon theology. It is pleasurable and enjoyable, but in Paradise men are not qualitatively different from how they are in this mortal life - there is no ascent to a higher, more conscious and creative and loving, form of life.

In sum; Paradise is essentially uncreative, passive ('contemplative', appreciating, consuming) a reversion to childhood or adolescence; to Original Participation. And I believe it is possible that some people in Heaven are actually experiencing Paradise - e.g. those who are resurrected as (in their essence) children, but who live (as children) with their families who include those who are participating with God in the work of creation.  


What about Hell? Well some will choose that, on the basis of how they choose in mortal life - maybe even a large majority of people in the modern West.

These are self-excluded from heaven, and self-excluded from resurrection; Hell is the exclusion of Love.

Such remain spirits in the condition of Sheol, but isolated by the perspective and priorities of those who choose Hell.

Their state seems terrible to me; and is based upon a primary (pride-full) dishonesty of denying that they are God's children living in God's creation... but Hell is what they get, having rejected all the above.

So, Jesus brought Hell, as well as resurrection in Heaven - because it is deliberate, conscious rejection of the world of God, Good, Creation and Love that makes Hell hellish.

Note added: Resurrection is the single most astonishing, incredible, mysterious thing about Christianity. That is my point. What that means is that resurrection is Not something that can be 'explained' in common-sensical, ordinary, easily intelligible, procedural terms as if it was a chemical manufacturing process. It is incredible. I am not At All surprised if people don't believe it. Nonetheless, resurrection is something near the core of what Jesus taught (and did). I think resurrection is probably a much more important fact of Christianity than commonly regarded. We should work from that, rather than try to make the incredibility go away.
 

Dreaming Sleep and Death/ Hades/ Sheol

It strikes me that dreaming sleep (of the usual, broadly nightmarish or bewildering kind) is often like the 'underworld' death as envisaged by the Ancient Greeks (Hades) and Ancient Hebrews (Sheol) - that is a 'demented', passive state of very partial awareness - with perplexity as the dominant emotion.

In sleep; life happens-to-us and we strive, and fail, to make sense of it, and to cope with it. Our minds are porous and connected with the dream environment - we are like the 'gibbering ghosts' of the underworld.

In dreams the environment affects our mind - and our mind affects the environment in a reciprocal causality. We are acted-upon rather than acting: there is no freedom in a dream...

The gift of Jesus is to be born-again, to waken from this unending nightmare - awaken to resurrected eternal life - that is by incarnation to be separate from the environment and act to act in free agency from it; to be alert and conscious and creative in relation to the environment rather than swept-along passively, uncomprehendingly, in perpetual bewilderment.

Dreaming sleep is a temporary death - although modern Man assumes that death is a non-being much like deep sleep: unconsciousness and oblivion, rather than the underworld, nightmare state of dreaming sleep. But by dreaming sleep, of the nightmarish/ bizarre/ confusing/ helpless kind... we can know what it is we are being rescued-from.

Jesus came to rescue Man from the inevitability of the underworld nightmare of death - by resurrection; and with the offer of a gift of life eternal, which is a creative state of divine being.

(But death is necessary: to be reborn we must die; and death is bitter vinegar, as well as purifying hyssop.)
 

How does salvation-damnation work? A choice of The Moment - described by CS Lewis

From Surprised by Joy The Moment with a choice of salvation: 

The odd thing was that before God closed in on me, I was in fact offered what now appears a moment of wholly free choice. In a sense. I was going up Headington Hill on the top of a bus. Without words and (I think) almost without images, a fact about myself was somehow presented to me. I became aware that I was holding something at bay, or shutting something out. Or, if you like, that I was wearing some stiff clothing, like corsets, or even a suit of armour, as if I were a lobster. I felt myself being, there and then, given a free choice. I could open the door or keep it shut; I could unbuckle the armour or keep it on. Neither choice was presented as a duty; no threat or promise was attached to either, though I knew that to open the door or to take off the corslet meant the incalculable. The choice appeared to be momentous but it was also strangely unemotional. I was moved by no desires or fears. In a sense I was not moved by anything. I chose to open, to unbuckle, to loosen the rein. I say, "I chose," yet it did not really seem possible to do the opposite. On the other hand, I was aware of no motives. You could argue that I was not a free agent, but I am more inclined to think that this came nearer to being a perfectly free act than most that I have ever done. Necessity may not be the opposite of freedom, and perhaps a man is most free when, instead of producing motives, he could only say, "I am what I do."

From That Hideous Strength - The Moment with a choice of damnation:

Still not asking what he would do, or why, Frost went to the garage. The whole place was silent and empty; the snow was thick on the ground by this. He came up with as many petrol tins as he could carry. He piled all the inflammables he could think of together in the Objective Room. Then he locked himself in by locking the outer door of the ante-room. Whatever it was that dictated his actions then compelled him to push the key into the speaking-tube which communicated with the passage. When he had pushed it as far in as his fingers could reach, he took a pencil from his pocket and pushed with that. Presently he heard the clink of the key falling on the passage floor outside. That tiresome illusion, his consciousness, was screaming in protest: his body, even had he wished, had no power to attend to those screams. Like the clockwork figure he had chosen to be, his stiff body, now terribly cold, walked back into the Objective Room, poured out the petrol and threw a lighted match into the pile. Not till then did his controllers allow him to suspect that death itself might not after all cure the illusion of being a soul--nay, might prove the entry into a world where that illusion raged infinite and unchecked. Escape for the soul, if not for the body, was offered him. He became able to know (and simultaneously refused the knowledge) that he had been wrong from the beginning, that souls and personal responsibility existed. He half saw: he wholly hated. The physical torture of the burning was hardly fiercer than his hatred of that. With one supreme effort he flung himself back into his illusion. In that attitude eternity overtook him as sunrise in old tales overtakes trolls and turns them into unchangeable stone.

From this blog - The Moment occuring after biological death:

Heaven is a choice, a decision, an act, an opt-in - and salvation therefore happens only through faith - that is love, trust of Jesus. To understand this requires recalling the fate of the soul after the death of the body, and before the resurrection of Jesus - the soul was a witless, demented thing of little intelligence, little memory, little judgement, no free will... incapable of helping itself... (This, at least, is how both the ancient Hebrews (with Sheol) and ancient Greeks (with Hades) regarded life after death - and other variants may be understood similarly. The soul after death was a damaged, incomplete, incapable thing - eternal life was merely eternal existence.) I regard the Good Shepherd parable as providing the key to understanding salvation - which is that while the soul is always resurrected, resurrected Man cannot find his own way to Heaven. The resurrected soul must be led to Heaven; that is, Man must choose to follow the guidance of the Good Shepherd. This following is not imposed, it is chosen. This was made newly possible by Jesus because the resurrected soul has greater capability than the discarnate souls destined for Sheol/ Hades; the resurrected soul has sufficient capability to recognise Jesus, to know him; it has the capacity and necessity to choose whether to follow the Good Shepherd, or not. Why would the resurrected soul follow the Good Shepherd to Heaven, except that the soul loved and trusted the Good Shepherd? That is the need for faith.


Note:  It might be asked why there needs to be a permanent and irreversible decision on salvation versus damnation. Why can't people change their minds?

There are a couple of aspects to this. First is that all decisions are irreversible - in the sense that they have permanent consequences. This is because Time is real, sequential, and linear. Every decision changes the sequence, changes the future; and Time cannot be rewound - because that is its nature. We know this; albeit are inclined to wish it away and that we might undo our mistakes of the past.

Second is that Heaven would not be possible unless Men were able to make a permanent positive commitment to it; a permanent commitment to Love, God, The Good and God's work of Creation. Therefore, salvation must, at some point before we go to Heaven, be irreversible.

The same need not logically apply to damnation - which is (broadly considered) the negative decision to reject Heaven; because in principle that decision might be reversed.

But in practice - as we know from the experiences of our mortal life - there is a strong tendency for choices in favour of evil to lead to further corruption, to further evil choices... and the tendency is for a choice for Good to become harder and harder, less and less likely.

This is a matter of 'psychology' rather than logic; but I think we can see from the example of Frost in That Hideous Strength how unlikely it would be that someone who has seen reality and then chosen damnation, would later reverse that decision.
     

Problems with re-incarnation

It is not that I regard reincarnation as impossible, rather that I believe it is probably very rare - and the reason I believe this is related to incarnation being irreversible.

We start-out as pre-mortal spirits - and we incarnate in order to make progress towards full divinity.

All Christians at least implicitly believe that to be resurrected - that is, to be incarnate, to die and then to be incarnated again with a perfected body - is 'better' in some vital way than simply to be 'a spirit'. That to be resurrected is a higher state than to be a spirit - otherwise why go to the bother of incarnation and death.

It also seems that there is a very general folk wisdom, spread across many religions and spiritual practises - that to die is to separate spirit from body, but that to be a spirit whose body has died is to be in some way maimed, incomplete, miserable, and indeed to be unselfed. This leads to the 'underworld' of post-mortem spirits - Hades, Sheol and the like - a world of partial and demented spirits, living in an eternal and unpleasant present.

What I take from this is that incarnation is progression, and it is also irreversible - once a spirit has had a body, the body cannot afterwards be detached from that spirit without some maiming, some irreparable damage.

Now - what this seems to mean for reincarnation is that it has to involve 'the same' person coming back. I think this is entailed, because the body would (I think) have to be remade from the surviving spirit - in something I imagine to resemble a complementary process.

In other words after death there is a maimed and incomplete spirit, and resurrection entails re-completing it with 'the same' body it had during life, but this time an immortal, perfect and pure body.

If this person was reincarnated then either they would have to return to earth with this immortal body - in which case they would be an incarnate angel rather than a resurrected human. An example would be the Moroni; who is an important human character featured in The Book of Mormon, and who then becomes the angelic agent for the rediscovery and traslation of the book by Joseph Smith.

(Note: There are also thought to be angels who are pre-incarnate or never-incarnated spirits.) 

A reincarnated human would, I take it, have to be re-born to human parents - and if a post-mortem spirit was indeed reborn in this way he would need to be provided with a new body that was nonetheless in some essential way the same body he had before - not necessarily the same in appearance, but the same in some essential fashion; because otherwise he would remain maimed; and also otherwise because if he had a different body when reincarnated, then he would not be the same person somehow reborn, but someone fundamentally different.

So I can imagine that a reincarnate might arise when (for whatever reason, perhaps a premature death such as being murdered - premature in terms of what they had been incarnated to accomplish, in a spiritual sense) - would instead of being resurrected, have their spirit 're-cycled' t be born again - but this recycling would be the same person, with a body that was the same in its ultimate essential quality (even if it did not look identical).

I expect that this thing has happened, and continues to happen - but such an idea of reincarnation apparently rules out some of the attributes and things it is supposed to achieve in Eastern religions.  It seems to rule out incarnation as other (non human) beings, and also the idea of reincarnation as a way of gathering very different experiences of being different kinds of person.

I think reincarnation is more of a second chance (or maybe third, fourth etc chance) to do what needs to be done - rather than a mechanism for incremental, stepwise spiritual progress. And this conviction of mine comes from my understanding of what happens to the spirit at death and resurrection.

Why did 'Hell' replace 'Sheol' in the New Testament - as a possible situation of the spirit after death of the body?

It was several years ago that commenter WmJas pointed-out that the Old Testament underworld after death - Sheol (much the same in its characteristics as the Hades of Greek religion) which was the destination for all spirits/ souls after death (the good as well as the bad) - was replaced in the New Testament with a much more polarized distinction of Heaven or Hell: Heaven being vastly better than Sheol, but Hell depicted as vastly worse.

Sheol is apparently a shadowy world inhabited be witless, demented spirits/ souls who have forgotten (or cannot hold onto their own identity (presumably, spirits maimed by having been torn apart from their bodies); whereas Hell is some kind of a place of torment.

This - on the face of it - is a rather ambiguous benefit for Jesus to have brought; and seems initially hard to square with the way that a loving father would organize things for his beloved children.

But this interpretation is, I believe, a consequence of our stubborn refusal to acknowledge that Men have agency, or 'free will', and God either will not or (I would say) cannot compel any Man to choose his ultimate destiny.

My understanding is that Sheol was merely a temporary holding-place awaiting the advent of Christ (and not experienced as having any duration by the souls who dwelt there); and we can interpret the Atonement of Jesus Christ as having led to a situation where all souls were brought out of Sheol and each Man was able to choose his own destiny.

*

To understand Christianity (or indeed anything) in this mortal life, we need to know what it is for; and my assumption is that the whole of creation was made by God (in a nutshell) so that some Men (as many as possible) could advance to deity and join The Father and The Son (and Heavenly Mother) in a loving society.

Men are made a spirit children, and incarnated as mortal children - but the point is that we are immature, extremely immature - but our destiny (if we choose it) is to mature towards greater and greater divinity.

Mortal life is designed so that 1. Men can be incarnated and have a body. And 2. Men can have experiences, make choices - including errors, and being to mature such as to make spiritual progress.

So, Jesus Christ made it such that the discarnate spirits from Sheol, and every other Man from then onwards, would be resurrected; and then, by his 'taking away the sins of the world', made it possible for Men to choose their eternal destination.

In sum, I am saying that since Christ (but not before then) Men have been able to choose Hell.

Now, it seems strange that anybody would choose Hell; and most Christians through history have regarded Hell as either the default (from which some, maybe only a few, are rescued by Christ) - but this equates Hell with Sheol which seems false.

Or, they have regarded Hell as a punishment place where those Men are sent who are wicked - whether they like it or not - and are tormented forever. Or at least for those Men who fail to keep to acceptable behaviour. But this set-up seems impossible for a loving God - no loving parent would want this for his children; and when God is envisaged this way He seems worse than some Men.

My assumption, therefore, is that Men get what they really want - and therefore Hell should be regarded as one of the things that Men want and choose for themselves - among various other imaginable alternatives, which are often seen as eternal destinations in other world religions.

*

Hell is to do with Sin - therefore we need to consider how can Sin be conceptualized?

One way is to consider Sin is that all Men are at least somewhat (and some men are very) prone to choose and do what is short-term, pleasurable, pain-avoiding and in a word expedient - rather than what leads to joyousness in an eternal time-frame. This applies to choices during mortal life, and it would presumably also apply to choices concerning destination after death in those who have followed a life of accumulating sin.

The point is that short-term expedient sin sabotages what is best for long-term joyous spiritual progression.

Well, part of the work of Christ was to expunge this accumulation of sin, and allow a fresh choice of destination.

(I will leave aside whether this choice of destination is permanent - but I cannot see why permanence would be enforced: I think the tendency to permanence in long-term destination is due to the self-reinforcing nature of choices, rather than being due to God preventing any resurrected soul from changing his mind.)

From what we know of men and women in the world today, we can see that not everybody want to dwell in Heaven. And, by and large, people will be given what they want - and those who don't want Heaven but instead want something else will have it.

Heaven (a variety of Heavens, in fact) is the destination of choice for those who want to live in loving relationships with their (perhaps several, overlapping) families and loved ones. The highest heaven is for those who wish to become mature, deified 'adults'  - and dwell in contact with deity; and lower heavens for those who want to stay as children, or do not want to grow-up towards divinity - or, at least, not yet.

*

For example, some people do not want to grow-up - but prefer to remain as (immature) children of God. They are allowed to remain as children (maybe they can change their minds again later?).

If you want to lose consciousness, to lose the sense of self, to cease to be aware - to be-absorbed back into divinity, living in a perpetual present of bliss (i.e. the state of Nirvana) then that is allowed.

Perhaps the commonest desire (or belief) among modern Western people is that when they die they will be utterly unconscious - not in Nirvana but simply the extinction of all awareness, as if deeply anaesthetized. If they really want this, that is what they will get.

(Although maybe a merciful God will awaken then form time to time, to see if they want to change their minds? But if they have been utterly unconscious, it is hard to imagine what could happen to make them change their minds...)

Many modern people seem to dislike their birth families, and do not wish to have their own families; they seem not to want to live in a web of loving and responsible relationships - well such people would not want to live in Heaven. What such people seem to want is some kind of shallow, serial, mutually-exploitative (or 'reciprocal') relationships based upon immediate pleasure. I can imagine an after-death world where such people might be allowed to live this kind of life.

This would correspond to the Paradise which is the aimed-at state for some religions; in which the after-life is envisaged as a perfected form of sensuous (indeed sensual) earthly life - a life of pleasure rather than joy; a human-level life, minus the physical suffering. Life as a cycle, without progression, each day much like the one before - pleasant, but going-nowhere.  

The problem is that exploitation is seldom equal - one gets more than the other, some people tend to give more than they get - would they be happy with this in the long-run? Is such a system sustainable? This contrasts with love, which enhances both parties; and is sustainable for that reason. But there are some social circles on earth - for example among hyper-promiscuous people - which seem to be based on mutual exploitation, novelty and rotation of personnel. If that is what people want - presumably some provision is made for them.

The problem is those who want to impose their will upon others, to exploit them unilaterally and selfishly - habitual murderers, rapists, torturers, con-men, gold-diggers, psychopaths and the like. Now, clearly such people cannot be supplied with the unwilling victims that they crave - however, they utterly reject loving and responsible relationships of any kind. The question is whether such individuals are prepared to acknowledge their objective wrongness, and repent their wicked desire to exploit and impose?

If such individuals will give-up all claim to have what has been their primary desire through life; then they will not go to Hell because Christ has made repentance wholly effectual; but if they will not give-up their core sin, then they will prefer solitude and the torment of perpetual frustration to being cleansed of that sin.

And if that scenario of chosen Hell seems implausible to you - it does not seem implausible to me; since I have seen individuals in an analogous situation in human life - living utterly miserable lives due to their choices, yet refusing always to repent these choices and repelling all chances at loving society; indeed loathing and despising and wanting to make-suffer those who live in loving society.

*

In sum, all after-death states including Hell can be seen as a loving Father giving his children what they want - so long as this does not infringe the consent of his other children. And this explains why Christ brought Hell, as well as Heaven.

Conceptualising Sin - and The Fall

Sin could usefully be defined as 'the condition of mortal life' - since that encompasses its two main aspects of wrong behaviour and death.

The Fall was therefore, primarily, moving into the condition of incarnated mortality - with its consequent inevitability of both death, and those behaviours that are a consequence of being imperfectly aligned with the divine will.

Reading the Fourth Gospel, we can see that the term 'sin' refers to a wider range of phenomena that more recent usage - in particular it is used sometimes to mean death; and by death is meant the ghostly, half-existence of demented souls that have been severed from their bodies, and wander 'witless' in the underworld that the ancients termed Sheol or Hades (later translated and reconceptualised as Hell).


The Fall refers to the choice and decision made by all of us mortal Men to leave the child-like, unfree, un-conscious Eden-paradise of our immortal pre-mortal spiritual life; where we were immersed-in God's will and lacking in personal agency - hence unable to act otherwise than in harmonious accordance with divine motivations.

When we became incarnated, we increased our free agency; but at the cost of becoming separated from God's will. Mortality (as a state) is characterised by change, corruption, disease and decay - as well as inevitable death.

Thus, no mortal Man (except for Jesus) has been fully aligned-with God's creation. We are all, therefore, 'sinners' in the dual sense of being not-fully-aligned with the divine will, and also destined to die.


However, The Fall is sometimes rightly described as a Felix Culpa - a blessed transgression; because it enables us to attain a higher level of divine nature.  

Only after being separated from our previous state of unconscious immersion God's will; are we are (potentially) able to make the free choice of aligning ourselves eternally with God's will; and after mortal death, as resurrected eternal children of God, then actively-participating in God's work of ongoing creation - as ourselves gods.

 (i.e. Small 'g' gods, working within God the creator's reality.),

(All this is made possible by our mortal incarnation, but we are free agents, so it is not guaranteed. Indeed, in the modern West, it looks like only a small minority are choosing to choose salvation and resurrection.)


At the same time, because we are not-fully-aligned with God's will in this mortal life, we will inevitably think, say and do many things that are opposed to God's will: that is, we will inevitably commit 'sins' in the more common usage of the word.

Those familiar lists of behavioural sins (e.g. the behaviours proscribed by the Ten Commandments, or the Seven Deadlys - or mortal and venial sins; or the Scriptural prohibitions from Paul's letters) can be understood as broad categories of behaviour that tend to be characteristic of those who are not-fully-aligned with God's will.

Behavioural sins (such as these lists) are therefore Not to be taken as 'sin-itself' - which is subjective; but observable 'signs' that are typically 'correlated-with' actual sin - sin itself being the mortal state of being unaligned with God's will.


The specific focus of these familiar 'behavioural correlates of sin' tends to be on those behaviours that are either especially tempting, or especially destructive of society in general or church order in particular. That is the reason why sexual correlates of sin are so prominent.

And this focus certainly seems to be necessary - in the sense that we can now observe the subversive effects of removing such restraints. The outcome has been moral inversion: i.e. the worst of all possible outcomes: the one most likely to lead to self-damnation.

However, on the flip side, there is a relative neglect and softness of attitudes to other types of more 'private' sin; such as envy, spite, cowardice, dishonesty and bearing false witness - which are in themselves probably more dangerous to the soul.


In sum; we are all Fallen in the sense that we will all die; and because our mortal lives are never fully-aligned-with God's creative motivations. And the inevitable difference between God's will and our own will leads to many thoughts, words and deeds ('sins') that are a consequence of this disharmony.

And the cure for sin - both mortality and behavioural disharmony - is on the other side of 'biological death'; when we may choose to be resurrected to Life Eternal in a condition of everlasting harmony with the divine work of loving-creation.

Why is it so difficult to repent in Hell? A speculation

It seems to be accepted that it is either impossible, or at least rare and difficult, for a soul in Hell to repent and then be resurrected into Heaven.  

I don't have a solid or fully-articulated understanding of this; but it seems that incarnation makes choice easier and more possible, compared with living as a disembodied spirit. 

To put the same thing differently - the major benefit of incarnation is that agency (i.e. free will) is enhanced - which probably has something to do with the boundaries of 'he self' being more defined. 

I don't think there is anything that prevents a spirit from exercising agency; indeed I regard all living beings as having some degree of agency, and I regard divine creation as consisting of living beings (even the 'mineral' world). 

But agency is somehow much weaker and slower in a spirit than with an incarnated being - perhaps because incarnation is the physical expression of spiritual separation. 

A spirit - who is not spiritually separated from other beings - probably finds agency much weaker and slower to operate. Or perhaps agency in a spirit is more easily confused by 'interference' from the cognitions of other beings? 

In other words; a major benefit of incarnation is the enhancement of agency. And this is - presumably - why Jesus was resurrected as he became eternally-divine; and why men are offered resurrection as the path to eternal divinity as sons and daughters of God.  

Pre-mortal spirits live as not-fully-separate beings, immersed-in an environment that is permeated with God's goodness. Pre-mortal spirits therefore find it difficult Not be be aligned with God.

The existence of demons (pre-mortal spirits that have chosen to leave Heaven and reject mortal incarnation) seems to shows that strong hatred of God can still be formed and expressed as a spirit. But my assumption is that only the most evil (the most innately hostile to God and creation) of pre-mortal spirits are able and willing to make the choice permanently to reject both God's creative will and the chance of  mortal incarnation. 

In other pre-mortal spirits - hatred and rejection of God and creation only becomes clear after incarnation - as we observe with the most innately and deeply evil of Men on earth. 

After death of the body, those who then reject resurrection and remain as spirits - but self-excluded from Heaven; presumably return to this feeble and slow form of spirit agency, exacerbated by the maiming effect of having lost their bodies. 

But are post-mortal spirits necessarily maimed? This is suggested by the accounts of the inhabitants of Hades and Sheol as shades, who do not know their own identity - 'demented ghosts'.

Pre-mortal spirits (before mortal incarnation) are complete beings. Incarnated mortals are also complete being - albeit temporary. 

But a spirit that remains after mortal death of the body is probably not complete. After all, the body and the soul are integrated and not separable during mortal life, therefore biological death of the body probably has a maiming effect on the spirit that remains. 

Such maimed post-mortal spirits then presumably find themselves in some kind of Hell: a God-hostile environment, permeated with many evil cognitions from other beings. 

I therefore think it may be that repentance after death is very difficult and rare for at least three reasons:

1. Being a spirit - hence intrinsically less agent.

2. A maimed spirit - hence incomplete. 

3. Dwelling in an evil (God-hostile) environment - living among other beings that have also rejected resurrection into Heaven. 

In sum; the spirits 'in Hell' could in principle repent their sin and choose resurrection into Heaven (certainly, God would be delighted if they did so). But in practice, and for practical reasons; repentance is much slower and more difficult, thus less likely, than in mortal incarnate life on earth. 

Edited from a comment at William Wildblood's blog

Nirvana is Sheol

This suddenly struck me yesterday, when I was considering that time is intrinsic, and creation is therefore irreversible.

We began as eternal spirits; but when we became incarnated (on earth, as mortal Men) this decision meant that we could never return to that pre-mortal state.

What happens 'naturally' (I mean in the absence of following Jesus Christ to resurrection) is that the body dies and the disembodied soul continues in a kind of life that was called Sheol by the Ancient Jews, and Hades by the Ancient Greeks.

Existence continued, but 'the self' was lost; the spirits remained alive, but lost self-consciousness - and therefore the free agency that comes from consciousness. This was seen in qualitative terms of existing as witless, demented ghosts - who were aware on a moment-by-moment basis; but had no memory, no anticipation of future, no sense of eternity.


This is indeed probably what the reality of Nirvana actually is. Since the consequences of incarnation are irreversible; the return to original unconscious passive spiritual life can only be simulated, sibjectively.

I mean, post mortal souls can subjectively experience Nirvana (blissful re-absorption into the abstract divine), they can believe (on a moment by moment basis) that they have re-absorbed into the divine - but the reality will be Sheol.


The experience of Nirvana is that the division between self- and the whole is lost; the individual merges-with, melts-into the divine - where the divine is seen as the totality of everything.

This may be understood to be a state of bliss; and for some people I expect it is - since some people are tormented by their separation from reality, are tormented by consciousness and want it to end.

Whether this unresurrected after-life is regarded as Sheol or Nirvana may depend on the way that the divine is understood: either as an impersonal abstraction (Deism; as with Hinduism and Buddhism) or as a personal God (Theism) - and if personal, further what the nature of the personal God is understood to be.

If the personal God is understood to be a loving Father, and we his children; then the state of souls in Sheol would presumably be pleasant - on a moment-by-moment basis: maybe even blissful. But if God is understood to be otherwise motivated (vengeful, tyrannical etc), then Sheol would be understood as more-or-less miserable.


As for Hell - it is different from Sheol, although Hell is also inhabited by spirits.

My best guess is that Hell is chosen by those souls who wish to retain self-awareness but to work against God's creation. The hellishness of Hell is that of a child of God and a product of creation, eternally in rebellion against these facts.

A parable of Hell (and how it is chosen) is a teenager who hates their loving family; and flees them, and cuts-off all familial relations; in order to live in the worst part of the city as a thief, prostitute, drug addict - and who exploits and is-exploited-by, torments and is-tormented-by, the other denizens.

Such people exist, such things happen; and therefore (by analogy) presumably some have chosen, and will continue to choose, Hell rather than Heaven or Sheol/ Nirvana.


Note added: As is probably obvious - the above is an explanation from my particular Christian perspective. I would not expect those with a different understanding of reality to agree with it!

Why is reincarnation so rare?

My assumption is that reincarnation can happen and has happened - but that it is rare and exceptional - and very far from the normal thing for most people.

http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=reincarnation

I state as a starting assumption that the Mormon view of life is correct - beginning as eternal primordial essences; we were made spirit children of God (that is, children of Heavenly Parents); who chose to be incarnated into mortal life and to die in order to enable spiritual progression towards deity - and that after our mortal death we are resurrected to continue spiritual progression, if we so choose and behave thus, towards the ultimate goal of full deity.

As an implication of this, there is a distinction between spirit, body and soul. We used to be spirit beings, but on becoming incarnated into bodies - en route to resurrection to eternal beings with bodies - the soul became a combination of the spirit and the body.

This is why mortal death is a terrible thing from which we needed to be saved by the work of Jesus Christ - because after incarnation, the death of the body is a tearing apart of that which has been fused, and it leaves the remaining spirit in a maimed state. This maimed state was described in the inhabitants of Hades or Sheol along the lines of being a demented ghost, without self-awareness or agency.

Resurrection is therefore a restoration of the unity of body and spirit which we have in mortal life - but (if we accept this gift of Christ) in a perfected and purged unity suitable for eternity.

In some primary sense, resurrection is a restoration of that 'old body' which the spirit was fused with in mortal life. So that resurrection is to be reborn with the same body - but that body made divine and immortal.

My point is that therefore reincarnation can only be either one of two:

1. Restoration. A return of the resurrected (purged and perfected) person to the world of mortal life - with the 'old body'.

The resurrected soul is thus restored to the mortal world instead of going to Heaven - presumably to do some divinely-appointed task (eg. be a prophet or angel).

2. Recycling. Some situation in which the first 'attempt' at mortal life is simply 'scrapped' - and the now-maimed human spirit is resurrected (i.e. has the integrity of its incarnated wholeness restored) but with the 'old body' restored but in a non-divine form.

With 'recycling'; presumably the first 'attempt' at mortal life had been such a failure (for whatever reason - perhaps the person did not live long enough to achieve what was necessary) - and they are simply given a second chance (if they choose to accept it) to experience mortal life a second time, and with what is in some essential fashion the same mortal body they had the first time.

My point is that if reincarnation is to be a return of a person to the mortal world and with a body, then that body must be the old-body restored; either restored in divine form or restored in a non-divine form - but the same body. The fact of having-been incarnated means that it can only be the same person if he also has the same body; and anything other than a completion of the same body represents a maiming.

In other words, our premortal spirit is not incarnated into mortal life as a ghost in a body-machine (the ghost being the real me, and my body merely its temporary dwelling); but that incarnation works by a profound process in which the spirit and body are made-one so intimately and wholly that they can never again be severed without loss of identity.

This is why true eternal life of the human soul is, and can only be, in the form of resurrected beings with bodies. But the consequence of this is that reincarnation can only be a very limited process, to achieve limited goals, as described above. 

What is not possible, I think; is that you or I could be reborn multiple times, in multiple bodies, in order to experience multiple lives for the purpose of some kind of stepwise spiritual progression.

This is impossible if my assumptions are taken as correct; because such a view of repeated reincarnation necessarily assumes that the soul is actually a spirit, which can - and does - inhabit multiple bodies like a diver putting-on and taking-off multiple diving suits.

The classic view of reincarnation is therefore one which requires that we are ultimately, in our essence, only-spirits - and that bodies are no more than secondary and exchangeable garments. And this seriously challenges why - if we are spirits - eternal divine life should be as resurrected and incarnate beings, instead of simply remaining as spirits.

Indeed, the reason for mortal life becomes hard to understand at all. Why should we want or need to gain experience as mortal incarnates (with bodies) if our eternal essence does not actually need a body? Why be resurrected, indeed why be incarnated in the first place?

So - my belief is that resurrection can occur, and has occurred - but only seldom and as an exception. The normal and destined progression is that each life goes through incarnate mortality only once, en route to incarnate immortality and aimed at increasing fullness of deity.

This further implies that the full benefit of mortal life can be, and usually is, achieved from a single mortal life and death; therefore, given that most humans in history have died in the womb or as young chidlren, the main and only essential benefit of mortal life must be the experience of death. 

Christianity is (or should be) a religion of inequality

Equality is supposed to be 'a Good Thing', but isn't; as William Wildblood demonstrates in a forthcoming book - which I have had the privilege to read in manuscript.

As well as equality being a Bad Thing to aim-at; indeed, equality is not even a real thing. 

The word and concept of equality is, of course, very vague in terms of its actual (i.e. rhetorical) usage, which resembles an hypothetical black box, more than a useful category; but 'equality' can usually validly be reduced to an assertion of sameness... 

Either an assertion that some-particular-things are, or ought to be, The Same. 

But are things ever the same? 

Well, in some sciences, especially the physical science, science there has been an assumption of sameness among things like particular chemicals or atomic particles. Yet even here, the progress of science has usually been towards finding differences among things that were originally assumed to be the same: for instance all atoms were originally assumed to be identical - even between different elements and substances. And in biology, an assumption of sameness is much less frequent, and soon breaks-down, the closer we look. 

Perhaps the only genuine sameness is in mathematics (and formal logic), where the sameness is axiomatic and wholly abstract: a matter of definition. 

But mathematics is not the real world. 

What about in religion? Well, so far as I know, there has never been any actual, viable religion where all people are judged to be the same. 

In the past, human differences were often simplified (for practical purposes) into categories, or classes of Men - but even there, there was always provision for making distinctions. 

e.g. Priests may have been in a different category than non-priests; but priests were internally differentiated in many way - even down to the individual level.  

But what of a divine level? Again, it seems there has never been equality of divine regard of Men - but sometimes this has been simplified into categorical levels of classes of divine esteem; which often reflected social organization.  

So where does the idea of equality come into religion? Well, sometimes there is an equality of 'destination' in terms of post-mortal, afterlife fate. In some religions it seems that all Men will (sooner or later) end-up in the same situation. 

For instance, the Ancient Greeks and Hebrews seem to have regarded the afterlife of all Men as a an underworld of demented ghosts: Hades/ Sheol. 

Or the Eastern Religions Hinduism and Buddhism have sometimes envisaged all Men as sharing the same fate of eventually (after varying numbers of incarnations) being re-absorbed back into the divine, from which they came - at least, that goal was the same for all Men. 

Christianity has always divided the destinations between at least two (not-equal) possibilities: Heaven and Hell; and this has sometimes been elaborated by additional possibilities such as Limbo and Purgatory; and by differentiation of fates and roles within both Heaven and Hell (e.g. the circles of Hell, or the layered Mormon 'Heavens') - sometimes differentiation by categories of people, sometimes at the individual level. 

The main assertion of, and emphasis upon, 'equality' in Christianity is almost-wholly modern (coming after the emergence of political leftism, with is promiscuous talk of actual or aspirational 'equality'), and is related to God's supposed attitude of Love to all Men being absolutely 'equal'. 

But God's 'equal' love can only be entertained as a possibility either if Love is regarded in an extremely abstract way (because in real life, including in the Bible itself, love is always differentiated and selective) -- and/or if equality is redefined into a very vague notion that because God Loves all His children, this 'must' (or should) mean that God (somehow, for some reason) loves all his children in exactly the same way and to exactly the same degree...

This supposed 'equality' has been spun into highly abstract assertions of God's absolute and unconditional - therefore equal - Love; rather as if God's love was an evenly-distributed gas, or a radiation of completely equal intensity that bathed all Men without distinction. 

To my mind, this (frequent) attempt to express God's Love as equal and unconditional is probably an alien import to Christianity; either derived from politics; or apparently derived by back-projection from the (not Christian - but nonetheless held by some self-identified Christians) idea of post-mortal Men all returning to be assimilated-into the divine...

Maybe the argument hinges on the idea that if all Men end-up equally, then this happens because God regards all Men as the same. 

At any rate, these two ideas of the supposedly unconditional and universally-equal Love of God, and a Nirvana-like life after death destination of all Men - seem to go-together. 

For a Fourth Gospel derived and focused Christianity; I would regard it as obviously wrong to regard equality in Christianity as a Good Thing. 

Christians ought instead to be trying to understand God's plans for men in the most differentiated and individualistic way possible; much as the ideal attitude of earthly human parents to their children is one that recognizes each child as individual, unique; and needing (ideally) to be regarded as such in terms of their destined and best path through mortal life and beyond. 

Ideal earthly parents would not love all their children 'equally'. Neither would they love their children in a rank-order. Instead they would 1.) love all their children, and 2.) love and value each child in a particular and unique way to correspond with his or her individuality.  

In other words, it is high time Christians set-aside 'equality-talk'; and began to recognize that the traditional categories and classes of past-Christianity were an imperfect representation of what is actually - from God's point of view - an individual-level scheme of Man's salvation and theosis.  

Is it "wishful thinking" to believe in continued existence after biological death?

It is more accurate to talk of “continued existence” after biological death, rather than an “after life” – because, while all pre-modern societies agreed that death was not the end; there was a very wide range of fates described. 

Even the post-mortal fate of “reincarnation” – which has probably been the majority view through the whole of history, due to its dominance in the East, as well as the earliest known societies – has multiple, and incompatible, sub-types. 

I find it very striking, and important, that most ancient and historical societies that believed in continued existence after death, anticipated a more-or-less miserable post-mortal fate – Sheol and Hades for example, or Ragnarok. 

This tells me that “wishful thinking” was certainly Not a major motivation through most of history and in most places; and to suppose it was is just a typical piece of modern self-willed ignorance and "projection": a consequence of our endemic incapacity for coherent thinking. 

And the Good News of resurrection and Heaven after death for those who followed Jesus Christ, was surely the single most powerful reason why Jews and early pagans embraced Christianity. 

If pagans or Jews came to believe that Jesus was divine, and that Jesus’s promises were true, then it was a “no brainer” to become a Christian because it was already assumed that there would be continued existence after death; and Christianity offered a far better continued existence than any other religion.

Note: The above came from a comment I made to a meditation on death by Bonald at the Orthosphere. Bonald responded to my comment thus: 

"Even Christianity and Islam only hold out heaven as a possibility, not a certainty. I can’t think of any religion whose idea of the afterlife matches what anyone would wish for". 

In other words; if religions really did manipulate the masses by offering to fulfil wishful thinking, then they could do a much better job of giving people exactly what they most wanted after death, and making this reward easier, surer, and more straightforward to obtain. 

If wishful thinking really was the basis of after-life claims; then it would be expected that religions would compete in offering better and better lives beyond death, on easier and easier terms. 

But this does not happen - to any significant degree, and not between the major religions.

This is one reason why I tend to believe that - in some overall sense - all religions are broadly accurate in terms of their claims for the after-life; because (within constraints) God gives people "what they ask for" or "what they want" after death. 

(What they want/desire provided subjectively, in his experience, for that person - not necessarily or usually in terms of what he wants for other persons: God does not sacrifice his children to each other. ) 

Damnation is therefore, in its essence, inducing an individual to ask-for and want damnation after his death; and annihilation is what (apparently) many or most modern people ask for and want, following death. 

Perhaps a womanly and procreative aspect of God is necessary for a solid belief in eternal life?

I am re-reading Geoffrey Ashe's fascinating study The Virgin (1976), which is focused on Mary, Mother of Jesus Christ (Ashe was a Roman Catholic) - but takes in the broader perspective of goddesses throughout history, in a non-hostile - indeed sympathetic - fashion. 

He makes the stimulating suggestion that a Goddess was primal in ancient spirituality, because she was the assumed basis of the procreative hence creative; and that some form of female deity is needed for Men really to believe in a life beyond life. 

The idea is that a supreme male deity cannot sustain belief in a full life beyond life. So that when the ruling Goddess goes; the afterlife becomes very partial, ghostly, and all-but irrelevant. 

Male deities could never bestow life of their own nature as the Mother had done. Zeus and his colleagues were immortal, but they did not transmit that quality to their human subjects... 

Through most civilized and semi-civilized lands... death ceased to be a passage to a future life... the dead were no longer pictured as significantly existing. They were reduced to feeble, bloodless shades in a gloomy underworld. For the Greeks this was Hades...

With the fading of the Eternal-Womanly, with her cutting-down or anathematisation, [for the vast majority, with extremely few exceptions] death had become the end with no prospect of rebirth. 

Israel's shift was similar... The Old Testament has no doctrine of survival or return... the dead become shades. They do down to an underworld called Sheol, The Grave.

The sole Israelite immortality is collective... God's chosen community...  

I think it likely that Ashe is "on to something" here. 

In the book; Ashe is preparing the ground for an attempted explanation of the rise of Mary the mother of Jesus as a more and more important focus of Christian faith - recognizing that this phenomenon cannot be accounted for by Scripture, or by the practices of the earlier generations of Christians. 

With Mariolatry (Ashe says) we seem to be dealing with some kind of deep and direct apprehension of spiritual reality, probably coming from grassroots, bottom-up, the "masses". Christian leaders and theologians seem merely to have been trying to explain and validate theoretically something that already was beginning to become important in practice. 

From my own experience; I find it striking that Mormonism included a very strong element of the "Eternal-Womanly" with its dyadic deity composed of Father and Mother in Heaven. 

And - perhaps in consequence? - the "Mormon culture of salvation" was (at least until fairly recently) probably the most vividly lived and believed-in form of Christian afterlife among the major Christian churches. 

The spiritually unsatisfactory and unconvincing nature of one-sidedly masculine, Christianity is something I find very striking. I mean the monochrome hardness, negativity, heartlessness, legalism and this-worldliness of Mary-rejecting forms of Protestantism is something I feel is very evident. It is one reason why England ceased to be "Merrie" with the reformation.

But there is something of this in all of Christianity. 

(And this defect has not-at-all been ameliorated, let alone cured, by the dominant trend towards secular materialism in all the Christian churches, which comes-in on the back of leftist ideology. Spiritual problems can only be made worse by "liberalization" - which is actually and always covert apostasy.) 

Insisting upon the non-sexual nature of God does not work either - this is just an attempt to escape contradictions absences and by raising abstractions; which has the effect of confusing people - and thereby impairing motivations.

Furthermore, the idea and ideals of ultimate transcendence of sexuality point away from Christianity (rooted in Jesus, the divine incarnate mortal Man) and towards Oneness spirituality, where (eventually) every-thing merges with everything else - in a timeless stasis.   

The problem is that it does not really make deep theoretical and theological sense to insert Mary alongside the (masculine) Trinity; and she is therefore always accorded an ultimately secondary and intercessionary" role in creation - no matter how central is her position in everyday worship (eg. devotion to the Rosary, or Marian icons). 

But even worthwhile degrees of habitual lifestyle and provision of psychological comfort are insufficient motivations in a world so dominated by evil-affiliated institutions. 

In our unavoidably self-conscious era; these inner contradictions about Mary have become nigh-lethal to strong Christian faith - as is evident all around us.

 

This is why I regard Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic Mariolatry as "on the right lines" but ultimately insufficient and unsatisfactory. 

And, as Ashe described , this requisite kind of development can only come from directly apprehended knowledge - it is not already existent. 

To emphasize: what is required is not something that can honestly be derived from existing Scripture, theology or history.

Furthermore it needs to arise bottom-up; which means from individuals, not institutions.  

If modern Men are to grasp and retain the needful structuring-focus on resurrected eternal life; if we are to live-by knowledge of Heaven; then we will need explicitly to discover and embrace what will be new truths of eternal verities concerning women in relation to creation and salvation.