When Yuri Gagarin made his orbital flight it was widely reported that he remarked: “I see no heaven here.” Or something to that effect. I was pretty young and I thought that was a strange thing to say. Surely heaven isn’t a place, like Montana or outer space. But then again, if heaven is ultimately going to be populated by physical bodies, whether the bodies are transformed into something imperishable or not, it must be a “place”. Notice all those ascensions into the sky we read about in the Bible. Jesus going up and up into the clouds. This fits a naive cosmology but it doesn’t make a lot of sense now. I don’t see how fundamentalists and those with a literal interpretation of scripture can make peace with these “ascensions” of actual bodies into– where? And of course, for Catholics, the Virgin Mary was another instance of a physical body ascending into what can only be a physical, in some sense, heaven. To me, all this is very, very, strange and in total defiance of all common sense. It’s one thing to imagine an afterlife in some other dimension or spiritual realm, but having to house bodies that have come back to life or that have been reconstructed in some way doesn’t compute at all. And yet I have not noticed much comment on such beliefs.
I could add that I have heard a Baptist pastor sermonize to the effect that he is super eager to trade his old and battered body for a glorified model in heaven. He also thinks that there will be exciting jobs to do; it won’t be all hymn singing. Since the glorified body can go anywhere instantly, he imagines a scenario in which God will gather a bunch of guys and say: “Men (of course, MEN), we got us a problem in the Omega Galaxy. Seems like the devil is raising heck like a drunken cowpoke over there, and I need you to kick some serious butt. Pack up your heavenly AR-15s (Never Needs Reloading!!) ’cause you’ll need ’em.” So, again, this seems to be taking place in some real location, at least in his theology. But you can’t help but ask questions about these glorified bodies– Jesus appeared to His followers bearing the wounds of His crucifixion. Was that a glorified body? What if He had been decapitated. Would He carry His head around like a valise? Or was this body a limited edition model, for dramatic effect, to be traded in later for a proper glorified body? Many questions here. You know, even though there is a creed, Christianity could still evolve, over issues like these, and some other things, like evolution and cosmology. I have heard some say that the things we see in the sky that suggest a vast and ancient cosmos are illusions, and meant to snare the unworthy, for many are called, etc. I have heard the same Baptist preacher referenced earlier suggest that God created the earth with a fake history, to snare the unworthy, for many are called but few are chosen etc. And I don’t see an obvious Biblical basis for any of the fake history/cosmic illusion scenarios.
I am fascinated by the issue of the Christian afterlife because bodily resurrection opens such a pandora’s box of problems, and I am surprised that there have not been more detailed examinations of the implications. It seems that there could be profound doctrinal issues here, but they have never been pursued or elucidated in any way, that I am aware of. I have mentioned the risen body of Jesus and the descriptions in canonical scripture. Wounds are evident but there is no blood. The risen body is said to speak but that requires a set of functioning lungs moving air past the vocal chords. So, is blood circulating? Surely not. If no blood is circulating, there is no reason for the lungs to be operating. A functioning brain requires oxygen, yes? No circulating blood, no respiration– can we presume no brain function? And yet this body speaks and seems to be thinking. I can’t help but wonder what an autopsy would have revealed. Why hasn’t someone suggested, at any time, that the risen body of Jesus had to have been, to some extent, an illusion? Or at least a kind of sockpuppet. We are either talking about an animated corpse, which is grotesque, or something with the appearance of a human body only. Maybe nothing inside. Or if internal organs are present, they are doing nothing. The eyes are only there for similitude’s sake. They see nothing. The brain thinks nothing because it is not functioning. We have to wonder about the status of the risen bodies of the faithful. What age are they? What are these “physical” bodies made of? What sort of anatomy do they have? Are there genitalia? If there are arms and hands what would there be to grasp? If there are eyes, what radiation are they sensitive to? What would there be to “see”? What would there be to stand on, if these are physical bodies and subject to gravity? And there is always the question of where these risen or raptured or ascended bodies reside in space and time. Since all of these questions are valid, and the scenarios strain credibility to the limit, I am not able to understand the absence of analysis. There seems to have been little discussion among early Christians, and not much interest in the problems posed. And not much since then, either. Some sort of blind spot seems to exist. Maybe I don’t share that blind spot. I find the Christian afterlife illogical in the extreme, due to the insistence on some sort of physical life after death. Surely, there were early Christians who saw the same problems I see, and offered more credible alternatives. Perhaps the Gnostics?
Going on in this vein, I believe Bart has pointed out that many early Christian ideas were only viable in a primitive cosmology. Paul and the various followers of Jesus knew next to nothing about how the world is actually constructed or how things actually worked. Anatomy? Physiology? Chemistry? Physics? Psychology? Astronomy? Nada nada nada. The list is long. It was not until the 19th century that anyone could point to passages in the Bible and say: “That’s counter-factual!” Although it would have been possible to say much earlier: “That’s illogical!” But look at Luther; reason as the enemy of faith. So anyone crying foul on the basis of logic and reason would have been pilloried. It’s sad to say but early Christianity owes a vast debt to ignorance. It’s easy to make any belief system hang together if you don’t have many facts and you are also willing to reject logic and reason. Please don’t bring up Aquinas. Aristotle gone wrong. Quiddities? Substance and accident? He reasoned in a void. He had no data. The results are largely pathological. As I see it, Christianity is still saddled with the same primitive cosmology– doctrines were frozen in an age of ignorance. What happens to Christianity going forward? By the way, we could also look for evidence that Jesus know more than his followers. As God made man, what was the state of HIS knowledge? Should we expect God in the flesh to know more about the workings of nature than mere humans? Are there any signs that He, as God (assuming the Orthodox got things right) might have had at least some knowledge of how the world actually works?
On the other hand, adopting the premise that Jesus was fully human, then, whether or not he was God, one would expect him to have the ordinary suite of human limitations. Administer an IQ test and he would have a finite score, unlike God, who would be off the charts. In fact, years ago I ran across an estimate of HIS IQ, based on his verbal performance in the Gospels: 125, plus or minus one standard deviation. It seems reasonable to suppose that a God who assumes the human dress, so to speak, also assumes every limitation that comes with that dress. I’ve always found it peculiar that a fully human Jesus could live a sinless life. This implies to me that it is certainly possible for any human being to live a sinless life as well. Difficult, maybe but not impossible. If, as so many theologians assert, it is impossible for a human to live a sinless life, then Jesus was exceptional and not, in fact, fully human. You really can’t have it both ways. How could Jesus have been without the taint of original sin, if he was fully human? Again, you can’t have it both ways. Theology seems to me to be the “dismal sport”, and not economics. I’ll have more to say on this and related topics touching on the “afterlife”.
I’ve been trying to determine what the Jewish contemporaries of Jesus thought about an afterlife. There is no consensus. It seems not to have the big issue among Jews of that time, just as it is not an especially big issue to modern Jews– as far as I can tell. It seems that some did anticipate a sort of bodily resurrection, but they would have been among those with an apocalyptic bent. What does Jesus tell us about the afterlife? I’m trying to get that from Mark. The problem, of course, is that we have no idea of what he actually said. Whatever Jesus is said to have said about an afterlife is just as suspect and problematic as all the other things he is said to have said long after the fact. I have heard some say that it is unthinkable to imagine that anyone who goes to heaven could be happy, knowing that some loved one failed to make the cut. And if the “saved” are shielded from that knowledge, how could the “saved” be happy not knowing? And the answers I’ve heard suggest that those in heaven are in a rapturous union with God and all other considerations are null, and/or the knowledge that one who was loved in the earthly existence is toasting in hell for eternity will be a source of JOY, as a demonstration of God’s wonderful justice. So it seems that going to heaven, whatever it might be like, absolutely strips one of every human virtue– all kindness, all mercy, all compassion, all empathy, all fellow-feeling, vanishes! To be replaced by an inhuman and inhumane sense of “justice”. And total self-indulgence. Ahhhhh! And it matters not that others suffer eternal torment. GOD IS GOOD! Ahhhhhh! There is something about this picture that I, for one, find absolutely vile, and even contemptible.
Well, after examining Mark I find that not much was said about the afterlife. No one is given in marriage. OK. The unjust dwell where the maggot never dies. OK. But, of course, whether Jesus actually said anything at all about an afterlife is unknown. I’m not even sure what “The Kingdom of Heaven” is meant to be. Does anybody really know? A distinctive feature of Christianity seems to be the emphasis on “right belief”. Not only is there a right way to behave, there is a right thing to believe. And among Protestants, at least, belief trumps behavior. Unfortunately for those who, like Agent Mulder (?) want to believe, there are too many choices. Some of the choices are more than a little esoteric, revolving around subtle theological points. We can’t even console ourselves with Pascal’s Wager. Believe what, precisely? I never quite appreciated this until I began to read Bart’s books. I think the problem of deciding what to believe, in the face of dire and eternal consequences if we choose the wrong options, has the potential to drive people crazy. If you take heaven and hell seriously, the need to choose the right belief is actually pretty horrifying. But suppose you’ve convinced yourself that you’ve got it right. Good luck with that. But suppose you have. In most cases many of the people you know, like, or love, might not have made the same decision. They go to OTHER CHURCHES! Oh no! Maybe they are not even Christian! Even worse. So, as much as you might like them, you have to live with the “knowledge” that certain friends and perhaps family members are going to toast in hell. Maybe you have read about the Holocaust. And in your Christian faith you realize that those poor Jews, after such horror and suffering, do not even find release in death. A mother, after seeing her child thrown living into a ditch full of burning corpses, who is subsequently gassed to death, finds that she is suffering a torment infinitely greater than anything she has experienced at the hands of the Nazis. As a Christian you must believe that this is just. No matter how exemplary her life might have been, no matter how much she loved her child, and loved others, and served her community, now matter how much she suffered in this life, she rots in hell. Not only did she not belong to just the right Christian sect, she was not a Christian at all! Maybe you have trouble with this picture. You have a little talk with the pastor of your church. And he shakes his head and tells you, yes, it is true, that horrible picture is true, and he must tell you so. But don’t blame him! He picks up his Bible and waves it in your face. It’s all in this BOOK, he says. God’s HOLY WORD! And we must accept it! And believe it! Lest we burn! My inclination at that point would be to take that book from him and insert it into his nether orifice, with great and violent force, and walk away, vowing to have no more to do with him, his church, or his book. I would probably give voice to a few choice expletives as I left. This, really, is how I’ve come to feel about the matter. I’m in the process of washing my hands of the whole sordid matter of faith and correct belief or incorrect belief. To me, a simple paganism, a simple-minded nature worship, is looking ever more attractive. It’s a bit difficult for me to think of the Jewish/Christian/Islamic faith complex with anything other than disgust. I do try to be tolerant of those trapped in these insidious, toxic, paranoid systems (as I see it), but it’s not easy. Probably my last post here. Great blog. I love Bart’s books. I’m learning a lot.
I guess I will do another post here because I thought of something else grotesque: Jesus, post resurrection, is said to have eaten a fish. I guess to show that he was “real”. Hard to determine in what sense he was “real” because his wounds were not bleeding, nor were they healed, evidently. Soooo, assuming that the fish was ordinary stuff as opposed to the transmogrified but rather corpse-like stuff Jesus was made of, and that the chewed up fish (was there saliva? digestive acids?) went into the transmogrified stomach as ordinary fish, one must ask whether it began to ROT there? Was the transmogrified body perhaps purged of ordinary bacteria? In which case I guess the fish would have dried out. But if it was digested in the ordinary way, or even in an extra-ordinary way, would a bowel movement have followed? I won’t pursue this in detail, although I would like to, but I merely attempt here to point up the incredibly bizarre and rather awkward consequences of a bodily resurrection, such as Jesus is said to have experienced. If the gospel accounts are taken at face value, we have to cry foul, because they make no sense whatsoever, and lead one to astoundingly grotesque scenarios, such as the ones I’ve given here.
BDEhrman
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