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Loading...Here is the second and last part of my summary of the heart of my forthcoming book Heaven and Hell: A History of the Afterlife. It’s not an outline of the chapters, but a summing up of the key issues, flow, and the ultimate “point” of the book. As a tip, I’ve called this little essay (in my own mind): “There Is Nothing To Fear.”
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The idea of rewards and punishments eventually found its way into Judaism as well, but not until the very end of the Old Testament period. The book of Daniel was the final writing of the Hebrew Bible. This fictitious account of a pious Hebrew young man, Daniel, presents an alternative Jewish understanding of the world, the nature of reality, and of life beyond, quite unlike the rest of the Hebrew Bible.
Scholars have called Daniel’s view “apocalypticism,” from the Greek word “apocalypsis” – which means a “revealing.” Jewish apocalyptic thinkers began to believe that God had “revealed” to them the truth of ultimate reality hidden from all their predecessor, an explanation for the horrible pain and suffering of this world. These do not come from God or even from the harmful assertion of human free will. They are the work of cosmic forces of evil. God had temporarily ceded control of the earth to powers that opposed him and were intent on making his people suffer.
But he will soon intervene in his world to destroy evil and all who side with it. A massive day of judgment is coming, and every human will be caught up in it — not just those living at the time, but all people who have ever lived. Those who have died already will be restored to life either to be rewarded or punished.
Jews in antiquity did not traditionally subscribe to the Greek view that the soul would live on after the body died. For them, a person is …
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I’d love to read a fuller discussion of how you reached your conclusion about what Jesus thought and said. I don’t doubt your conclusion, I’d just like to learn more.
Great! Hope you enjoy the book!
“brought their Greek views world with them.” Don’t know how to make a general response about this typo, so I am doing it as a reply to a comment. Only FYI.
Daniel’s style is very different from the rest of the OT (presumably because it was written later). When were the first apocalypticists write?
He’s the first in the Bible. The first on record is The Book of the Watchers, books 1-36 of 1 Enoch.
Professor,
I recall, I believe, Ellis Rivkin (then Chair of Jewish History, Hebrew Union College) sourced the advent of the Pharisee’s from the Soferim class following the new Seleucid rulers push for Hellenization 2nd century BCE. Within that he saw the Pharisee’s claiming resurrection (into God’s Kingdom on Earth) and eternal life for following the two-fold law (Pentateuch and oral law) as their selling point in claiming authority. Sounded like Jewish apocalyptic thinking was particularly main stream?
My view is that it really was mainsstream: Pharisees, Essenes, apocalyptic writers at the time, followers of John and other prophets. Just about eveyrone we know about apart from the Sadducees.
When do you think the Book of the Watchers was written? I got contradictory results from Google.
It’s probably from 250 BCE – 200 BCE, somewhere in there.
So after Daniel… so Daniel is not only the firs tin the Bible, it is also the first documented?
No, 1 Enoch would be the first documents (the section called The Book of the Watchers, chs. 1-36, usually dated to the early 3rd c BCE)
Dr Ehrman –
Is there reading you think is particularly good on the dating of the pieces of 1 Enoch (esp the Similitudes)?
Thanks much in advance!
Best is probably the Introduction found in the Commentary on 1 Enoch by George Nickelsburg in the Hermeneia Commentary series.
Awesome, thanks!
So where do you date daniel? I would have thought prior to 3rd century BCE (Selucid Era)
It’s normally dated right around the time of the Maccabean revolt, ca. 160-65 CE.
Appreciate the post. Excellent discussion of the implications and basis for our beliefs about the afterlife. However, I disagree with your conclusion. The reason most of us don’t fear going to sleep or being sedated is that we believe very strongly from past experience that we will eventually wake up and when we have, for the most part, we experience a feeling of satisfaction and we also have learned that it is absolutely necessary for life. The problem with death which has no expectation of waking up is the fear beforehand that we will never have experiences again, especially if our experiences to date have been mostly enjoyable. I think it is quite reasonable to fear the loss of the ability to experience life forever. This fear is also possibly a necessary corollary of the drive that causes us to endure suffering, pain and extensive striving to continue to live. Of course some folks may blunt this fear by noting its inevitability and similarities to sleep but our imaginations still may inform us, unconsciously at times, that the finality of it is something very different and that it is may not necessarily be something to be welcomed. This could be interpreted as the good aspect of fear, which clearly is not always bad, as well.
Look forward to reading the book…!!
Sure, Death is certainly The Big Sleep. And most of us have already experienced it via sedation. I don’t remember anything about the several times I’ve under sedation for medical procedures. I might as well have been dead. But Socrates still has not overcome the ultimate human fear–fear of non-existence. He still thinks that he can cheat death by believing that there’s a chance that he has a soul that can exist independently of his body after death. Of course neither he or any other human has produced even the slightest evidence that such a soul actually exists.
Epicurus was much more honest than Socrates: Non fui. Fui. Non sum. Non curo. I was not. I was. I am not. I care not. Epicurus followed the evidence. Socrates indulged in wishful thinking. My guess is that humanity is divided 50/50 between Epicurus and Socrates on these issues.
I’m afraid quantum field theory (QFT) has eliminated the concept of the soul with an exceptional degree of confidence. If there are souls, they have nothing to do with us. There is no way to transfer the information that is us (which consists of neural connections in our brains) into some nebulous, immaterial soul thing. In order for souls to interact with us in our natural world, they would have to push around quarks and electrons, and if that was happening, we’d either know it – and it would no longer be supernatural, or we’d have unexplained interactions with our fundamental particles and would still be searching for whatever was causing them. There are no such unexplained interactions and we didn’t find god, soul, devil or ghost forces in innumerable particle accelerator experiments.
You’ve always got Many Worlds and Eternal Inflation kicking around, although it is hard to prove or disprove. One might suppose that there is a sort of eternal recurrence, in that you get to live and re-live every possible variation of your life. If we actually are dealing with infinities, then arguments have been made that every possible event, no matter how improbable, will occur infinitely many times. So, duplicates of you, and then almost perfect duplicates, off to the wildest places and spaces possible. And all you, all the time, although you only get to “experience” one at a time. In short, it’s as hard to say there’s nothing as it is to say there is something. We just aren’t in a position to know.
I ask out of curiosity…will your book be limited to the history of the Christian concept of heaven and hell or will you be discussing other cultural/religious concepts of the afterlife …reincarnation for example?
I will be talking about reincarnation, but in the Christian tradition. The book deals with views in ancient Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome, Israel, and then Christainity — i.e., the ones at the roots of our western civilization (not, e.g., east Asia)
Thank you! 🙂
Robert Graves had an interesting take on the afterlife – I don’t remember in which of his many works it appears – he suggested that the very last thought one experienced prior to death would, in effect last forever. So, if that thought was pleasant, you were in heaven; if horrible, you went to hell, so to speak.
Ha! Well, I have lots of nice thoughts to choose from, and I think that’s what I’ll think! (I’d heard that before, but not about Graves. What a strange idea!)
Buddhism has a similar idea – that your state of mind at the moment of death can affect what happens to your soul or essence. If calm and peaceful, then Nirvana (though that is a very vague notion) … if full of anxiety or other negative emotion, then reincarnation.
First of all, I agree with your analysis. Heaven and Hell are not what Jesus meant, but what Jesus meant demonstrably did not happen, so alternate interpretations were found by pagan converts influenced by Plato and those who followed in his wake.
Secondly, one must ask–why did Plato, being Socrates’ student, come up with such an idea? Because he wanted to encourage people to follow the way of life he believed was best (not women, of course, there’s no point trying with them, as he sees it). He needs a carrot and a stick. His standards for who gets what are different, but the basic idea is the same–and a useful method of social control, if applied on a grand scale. He’d probably rather do the thing with the Philosopher King and the Guardians and taking all the children away from their parents to be educated (that didn’t happen either, though there have been some attempts here and there that didn’t end well).
Socrates may have been more of an individualist, and Plato was looking for ways to apply his teacher’s ideas to more than just a handful of students (who on the whole, didn’t turn out so well, it must be said). More of a mystic–Plato is more in the Grand Inquisitor mode, to reference Dostoevsky.
However, I must ask–you use the term ‘literary transcript’ in reference to the Apology–are you saying you believe Plato had direct access to what was said at the trial of Socrates, which he was pointedly absent from? (Otherwise he might never have had the chance to write anything about it.) We have no evidence there was any direct record of that trial, and Xenophon’s account is quite different. (He wasn’t there either.) Why should we view Plato’s account of his master’s trial and execution any less skeptically than the gospel accounts of Jesus’ ordeal?
Plato could be referencing things he heard from Socrates at an earlier time–but what we know about hemlock poisoning makes it unlikely Socrates was engaged in learned philosophical discourse, and of course he was an old sick man at the time. I think we must assume the dialogue is mostly invented–so you’re agreeing with Socrates the literary character?
For me, it sounds like a variation on Pascal’s wager. But the wager is mind or body. I’d say we need both.
In the gospel of Luke there is the story of Lazarus and the rich man, in wHich Jesus tells about torment after death. Do you believe it was not in Jesus’ teachings when you say Jesus din’t believed in torment after death?
Yes, I try to show in my book why this is not a parable that Jesus himself spoke, but was added to his teachings later (by Luke himself?)
fine, I wait for the book then, thanks
So, no Hell! Good news!
Thanks for the concise and clear summary about the origin of the concepts of heaven and hell.
Even if there is no way to know for certain, there is a solid scientific argument articulated by physicist Sean Carroll that there is no conscious experience of any sort after death. In which case, yes there is nothing to fear (or look forward to) after death (other than concern about difficulties our death will cause the loved ones we leave behind). But to the extent that we don’t know, that includes not knowing anything about the duration or quality of life after death. It’s all speculative and there is no reason to think that historical figures like Socrates or Jesus had any special insight on the matter that we lack. If we live after death, that could just as easily be extremely unpleasant as it could be enjoyable.
Correct. I wish more people understood this.
I have an off topic question:
I understand that most of the New Testament is forged.
But I’m wondering how the grift was performed.
That is to say, how did Fake Peter of 2 Peter pass off a letter as genuine 50 years after Peter’s death.
Surely people knew he was dead right?
And if the same community received the 1st Epistle
Ah, good question. It was actually pretty simple. “Hey, this letter just arrived here in Ephesus from our friends in Corinth! It’s a letter taht Peter wrote that they’ve been holding on to for 50 years! We had no idea this thing existed, but look what he says!” That sort of thing.
Bart, according to Scripture or the Bible, what happens to those people that died and never knew God or Jesus in their lifetime? I can see children being raised or exalted to heaven, but what about those adults or tribes people in remote areas where the gospel is not preached, or even those who grew up Hindu or Buddhist or Muslim and really never heard of Jesus, how will they be raised and judged if Christianity is the true way? Thanks
It never says.
Dr. Ehrman, I’m looking forward to your next book. If I may react on your blog, you say “Jesus did not teach eternal life of the soul in heaven or hell.” How does that relate to Jesus’ parable about the rich man and poor Lazarus? At least there seems to be the suggestion that there is a consciousness after death.
I’ll be arguing that that is a parable that Jesus himself did not actually speak, but was placed on his lips by a later Christian (maybe Luke himself?). There are very good reasons — as I’ll be pointing out — for thinking so.
To what extent was Greek thought being incorporated into Jewish education in the decades leading up to Jesus? Would you say that the Jews were blending Greek ideas into their religious teaching regarding the soul and the afterlife? If so how does this comport with the popular notion that Hebrew scripture alone was supposed to be their formative source?
There was very little formal education where Jesus grew up — none so far as we know. Greek did signficantly affect educated Jews in major urban locations though.
In light of this, would it be safe to say that Luke 23, “…today you shall be with me in paradise” are words placed upon Jesus’ lips many years later?
Yes, that is a distinctively Lukan view, as I’ll be arguing in my book.
Bart, why do you think Jesus believed we would be annihilated instead of sent to Hell? What about Jesus’s parable of Lazarus and the rich man, Jesus telling the thief on the cross that he would be with Him in paradise, and Jesus saying He was going to prepare a place for you, i.e. many mansions? Thanks.
The major scholarly issue in talking about the historical Jesus is separating the later sayings placed on his lips from the ones that he himself said. Scholars spend their entire lives working to establish which is which. I’ll be explaining that in my book, and showing why these sayings go back to Luke and John (or the story tellers they heard them from), rather than Jesus.
Thanks. But where exactly does Jesus say people will be annihilated, i.e. cease to exist?
Actually, all over the place; we don’t see it because we import our own understanding of eternal torment into texts that don’t say anything about it. As just one example, Matthew 7: there are two paths, one leads to life, the other leads to “destruction”. It doesn’t lead to the eternal torture chamber.
What about Persian beliefs about the afterlife? I always found interesting the speculation that Zoroastrianism influenced Judaism’s eschatological views, from the Last Judgment to the idea of punishment in the afterlife? Either way, thanks Bart, you’re the greatest. I will definitely get the book.
Yes, I used to think there was an influence. After reading the scholarship on it, now I’m not so sure. I deal with it in my book, of course, and show why Zoroastrianism may be unlikely to have affected Judean views…..
There is no reason to doubt that
When Jesus taught about the “Kingdom of God” that was coming “very soon,” he, like other Jews at the time, meant an actual kingdom, here on earth, a place of love, harmony, peace, and joy; a place of community with family, friends, and ancestors.
But I think when you go beyond that you are engaging in pure speculation
For example
Where in scripture do you get the idea that
Resurrected life meant a bodily existence forever, HERE ON EARTH.
Granted Jesus and Paul speak of ‘eternal life’ but I don’t see where we can conclusively say that they meant ON EARTH (and less so old testament writers even daniel does not explicitly say that the resurrection is ON EARTH or ETERNAL (as far as I remember))
Where in scripture do you get the idea that
new utopian world God would create for the purpose, a restored earth with NO NATURAL DISASTERS?
(Zech 14:17-18 exactly says the opposite (and note this chapter of Zechariah is considered apocalytic at least according to editors of New American Bible)
Where in scripture does JESUS say
the new utopian world God would create . . with NO PAIN AND SUFFERING OF ANY KIND ?
He said the poor we will ALWAYS have (mk 4:7) and (Lk 13:2) Tower of Siloam seems to imply calamity is not necessarily connected to sin or powers opposed to God. Matt 5:10-12 says if you suffer (on earth) you will be rewarded in Heaven but that does not imply end of suffering in Heaven (on earth or elsewhere)
Even the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ can suffer violence (Matt 11:12) etc
Second
where in scripture do you get that
the horrible pain and suffering of this world. These do not . . from the harmful assertion of human free will ? maybe Jesus thought that but I can’t think of any quote where it can be inferred. I guess apocalyptic Daniel thought that a lot of pain and suffering were result of some evil human choices (free will)
Third
why do we no longer have 4 minutes to review our posts prior to them becoming permanent ?
I don’t understand your question. Third: I have no idea! Don’t you have time to edit them before hitting the button to submit them?
In my study of the Bible I never found evidence of the concept of eternal torment in hell, although I see the passages people mistakenly use to support their belief in this concept. What gets me is, all my friends in the church over the years, why do those who believe that God is loving and merciful hold on to such an unjust concept, when there clearly is an alternative view, presented right in the Bible?! I say unjust because I cannot imagine any offense for which I would condemn someone to an eternity of torment, especially the offense of simply not coming to the “right” faith in the “right” savior, which includes most of the people in the world.
Yeah, I know. I guess it’s ’cause what we were raised to think?
In your book, Professor, do you delve into a bit of psychology? After a lifetime of accumulating knowledge, wisdom, experiences, accolades, joys and sorrows, and all the memories that go with these things, together with the love and companionship of family, in an instant it’s all gone. Finished. Done with. Both as a species and individually the human psyche just cannot deal with it. So it does what it always does when something is too painful to bear. Legend blunts reality and legend becomes myth, with an amazing power of its own. I don’t necessarily buy it but I wonder what you think.
Not at any length, no; I’m more interested in how we can trace the ideas throughout ancient religion to give us the views so many people have today.
the greek word for resurrection does not exactly imply physical body , is the correct ?
it seems to mean ‘to rise up’ ?
Could it as equally likely imply ‘RISING UP (to heaven, to God’s abode)’ as referring ‘RISING UP (of physical body on earth)’ ?
In other words would a different greek word be used if person prophet meant to imply “RISING UP” to Heaven or God ?
Yes, the normal word means to rise up. Only the context indicates what that means, since it could easily mean all sorts of things (e.g., levitation; getting out of bed; emerging from a mudpit; etc.)
think about Acts 23:8
For the Sadducees say there is neither a resurrection, nor angels, nor spirits, but the Pharisees acknowledge them all.
‘spirits’ and ‘angels’ are beings that are understood to exist in a realm other than the physical planet/earth/world, then the ‘resurrection’ maybe means an existence for humans ( an afterlife, after their physical deaths) similarly in a realm other than the physical earth.
is that possible ?
I’d say that in the ancient world, they did not conceive of a different “realm” from the physical/world. God and his angels are literally “up there” — above. That’s why, e.g., the Tower of Babel is a problem: they are getting too close. And why Jesus physically “ascends” — he’s going up to where God is. And … and lots of other examples.
How do you reconcile some of Jesus’ teachings that deal with a soul, judgement, and an afterlife (Lazurus and the rich man, the thief on the cross and paradise, no marriage in heaven for we are like the angles, Parable of the Rich Fool, and so on) with your view about what Jesus thought concerning the after life? Where these stories added later? All of them?
Looking forward to reading the book.
Yes, some of these appear (clearly to me, for reasons I’ll be explaining) not to be things Jesus himself said, but later views put on his lips. And some of them (marriage)( are not talking about “heaven above after death” but “the kingdom of God that is soon to come to this world”
Professor Bart,
If “Jesus did not teach eternal life of the soul in heaven or hell”, then how should we consider the parables in Matt 25:31-46 and Luke 16:19-31? If these are not the authentic words of Jesus, whose ideas could they be?
Yup I have major discussions of them both in the book. I think Jesus did say the former passage, but that it is not referring to what happens when people die; and I think the latter was not a parable he actually spoke, but was put on his lips by someone (Luke himself?) later. The arguments take a bit of time, but I’m pretty convinced by them (they aren’t ones I made up myself!)
Thanks, professor Bart. In 2 Kings 1, Elijah is taken up to Heaven. At this stage, the Jews had no concept of life after death (not until 2 Mac 7), so is this the heavenly court (Job 1, Psalm 82) that he is taken to? Did the Jews see this heavenly court as similar to the Greek concept of gods on Olympus?
Yup, very similar. He’s taken up, without dying, to live in heaven with God. Lucky guy….
In Virgil’s Aeneid, Aeneas, has a journey through the underworld. (I think Book 6.) The souls of humans spend in many cases, a wonderful experience. Only a few end up in a really bad place. And after a 1,000 years they are reincarnated, not remembering their previous lives. Where do you think this fits into the overall belief in the afterlife?
Yes, I just wrote a long chapter on Book 6 of the Aeneid. Long story. It’s very different from Homer’s view in Odyssey 11 (on which it is partially based), and the Xns changed the idea significantly. I think I may have posted on it. Search for Aeneid or Virgil.
A very surprising end to this post — that, in your view, there is some possibility, however unlikely, of not only life after death, but a reward. Do we have to wait for your book to get an explanation of why you think those are our options? Even allowing for the possibility (which I don’t), why must it be pleasant? Wouldn’t it be more likely to be another struggle like our current existence? Isn’t it as likely to be hellish than pleasant? Dying to know what you mean here.
It’s just what I think likely. If htere *is* an afterlife, and I don’t think there is one personally, then it must be because of a superior being in charge, and I have trouble imagining that deity is wicked. Just don’t see it. Just my view, and also the view of Socrates and Jesus, as it turns out!
It’s just what I think likely. If htere [sic] *is* an afterlife, and I don’t think there is one personally, then it must be because of a superior being in charge, and I have trouble imagining that deity is wicked.
Considering the amount of suffering and evil in the world today, and throughout history, I have no difficulty imagining that if a superior being is it charge, it is both wicked and sadistic.
Yes, I’ve pondered that too. But then I can’t understand why there would be so much good as well. It’s possible for me to understand a good God who either allowed or couldn’t stop things running amok. But I can’t udnerstand an evil god who wouldn’t simply pull out stops and make life an actual hell with no remission. Maybe it’s just me.
Bart in this thread in a response you write that Jesus would have trouble imaging a deity that is wicked – but…
Didn’t Jesus believe in the OT God Yahweh?
Didn’t he believe in the flood ?
Didn’t he believe in the story of lots wife and the Sodom and Gomorrah story ?
How can you square that statement with a Jesus that believes in and worships Yahweh?
Traditionally Jews (and Christians) did not believe that these acts made God wicked, but righteous and just.
Agreed…but now extrapolate that view to hell. Anyone who can see all the horrors and terror and violence delivered by Yahweh in the OT on humans as just and righteous – would have no trouble believing in eternal punishment in fire. Indeed that’s why most Christians have for its history.
That’s right. And for these people, eternal torture is not thought of as evil, but just. As weird as that seems to an outsider!
Thanks ! One last follow up question just for my own clarification:
Do you think Jesus saw the flood as a real historical event ?
And is it the consensus view of most scholars that Jesus saw the flood as a real historical event ?
I know H. Avalos does because he says so in one of his books !
Thanks for your time !
I think the answer to both questions is absolutely yes. Which Jew in antiquity didn’t? (None that we know of!!) (Or Christian — until the rise of modern science) He also certainly thought the earth was the center of the universe.
Hi Bart,
I have been hoping to ask you a question about this for a while, so I’m very glad that this topic has come up.
Did Jesus hold the view that the body and soul are one and the same? And if so, how does that make sense when you consider “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise”. Presuming that he knows that his BODY will shortly be in a tomb, but yet HE will be with the robber in paradise. It seems like Jesus must have believed and taught that the body and soul are separate, is this the first example of this phenomena in Jewish thinking?
Clearly I will also need to get a copy of the book. Have a great Christmas!
He didn’t think they were the *same* thing but they were, in a sense, the two parts of what makes a person a living being. Neither exists without the other. The passage in Luke you quote has a very different view, and is not something that Jesus himself thought, in my judgment. It’s a later view put on his lips (by Luke himself?)
There was a woman named Rebecca Springer who wrote a book around the time of the Civil War titled, “Within Heaven’s Gates” (originally published as Intra Muros). I didn’t read it but browsed through it and recognized it as a little piece of fiction. My wife read it and as many Christians do, they ask a non believer….”Don’t you want to see your loved ones and friends again in heaven?” Well, actually there are some who I would try to avoid because they were annoying. But can you duck around corners and hide in closets in heaven? I doubt it. My thought is that I pretty much experienced what death is like before I was born which is nothingness. I look forward to reading your new book.
I understand your argument that Jesus is saying that “eternal punishment” means annihilation, perhaps being burned up with fire or devoured by the worm. But I have to ask how you deal with passages such as in Luke 16, where the rich man is being tormented by the fires but not consumed by them?
I don’t think it’s something Jesus himself really said; I’ll be dealing with it to explain why in the book.
I’m always comforted by the words of an agnostic philosopher (Humes maybe?) who said, “Do I worry about what happens after this life? No more than I dwell on my existence before this life.”
Already a view in Lucretius, ancient Epicurean philosopher!
I wanted to ask about the rich man and Lazarus, but a couple of hundred people have beaten me to it.
Oh well, maybe you will address it in your book.
An interesting take on the issue is a debate of the motion, Death is Not Final, held on the show “Intelligence Squared U.S.” on May 7, 2014. You can Google it and watch the debate, or read the transcript. The format of the show is that the audience votes a position on the motion before the debate, listens to the debate, and then votes again.
For the motion were Dr. Eben Alexander, an academic neurosurgeon at Harvard, and Dr. Raymond Moody, a psychiatrist and author of the 1975 book, “Life After Life,” which described near death experiences (NDEs). Against the motion were Dr. Sean Carroll, a physicist at Cal Tech, and Dr. Steven Novella, a neurologist at Yale.
One of the striking things to me that Dr. Novella said was that “every element of [an NDE] can be duplicated, replicated with drugs, with anoxia, with lack of blood flow, by turning off circuits in the brain. Every single component is a brain experience that we could now reproduce.” His point was that the mind is the brain; if the brain dies, the mind dies. It does not live on in some afterlife.
The majority audience position before the debate was for the motion, that death was not final. After the debate, the majority audience opinion was decidedly against the motion.
Yup, once you actually read the evidence, it’s easy and common to change one’s mind on this one….
But do you think you’re being a little too generous with your interpretation. Jesus mentions ‘an unquenchable fire’ and ‘The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’ or the tale of Lazardus and the separation of heaven and Hell.
It sounds like you do not (understandably) want modern humans to feel bad about existential hellfire, and you’re reading that interpretation into scripture.
The above examples show Jesus was meaning torture and fire for the unlucky in the afterlife. Thoughts?
Nope, I don’t think that is what he’s teaching. He’s teaching people will be catastrophically destroyed. When you burn a log in a fire or a heretic at the stake, they don’t burn forever. They burn until they die/no longer exist.
Like many others, I’m also very much looking forward to reading your book. I wonder though how much we can really say about people’s views of the afterlife in ancient times, especially in the centuries before Jesus. I think there is a danger in relying too heavily on written sources – whether ancient or modern (e.g. modern scholarship) – in determining what the ordinary person in antiquity may have believed. As we know from the modern archaeological study of the Holy Land, the religious practices of the general population were far different than what we would conclude from just looking at the books included in the Old Testament. As you’re aware, these books were written by a vastly unrepresentative educated elite, in most cases centuries after the events they describe. I think in making statements about the average man or woman on the street in antiquity, we really need to go beyond the written sources and look at the physical evidence “on the ground”.
Yes indeed, I completely agree. My book will not be talking about beliefs and practices “on the ground,” for which we have very, very little information (virtually all of it archaeological, and therefore subject to very wide-ranging interpretations), but beliefs as embodied in the written wrecords. Some of these were certainly held by lots of people, but generalizations and abstractions from teh written record to “what everyone thoght) are hopelessly problematic.
I really like your narrative and believe that heaven and hell as concepts were added into Christianity afterwards – maybe not until Crusades.
However, I thinking that there might be some occasions where immortality of soul is referenced in 1st century Jewish texts:
Antiquities of the Jews: “The Essenes … live the same kind of life as do those whom the Greeks call Pythagoreans”
Pythagoreans are credited inventing the concept of immortal soul. Could Essenes have hold the same view?
Apocalypse of Mose: “God stretches out his arm, and hands Adam over to Michael to be carried to the third heaven until the last day.”
This sounds almost like the current Christian belief: soul gets into the heaven until the last judgement.
What do you think? Could there be something more to study behind these text?
Yes, good point. I argue in my book that it’s not true that every Jew believed in only the resurrection of the flesh and not the immortality of the soul or that every Greek believed the opposite. Josephus though is tricky on this point, becuase he is writing to a Roman audience and wanting to convince them that Jewish thinkers were very much in line with what Greeks had said, and sometimes can be shown to have put a spin on their views in light of his audience. In any event, Christians were belieiving in heaven and hell many centuries before the Crusades — already by the second century. The Christian writings from that period are unambivalent on the point.
Recent advances in the field of Quantum Mechanics are suggesting models of our existence in a computed, virtual reality with consciousness being the only fundamental. These models are similar in that our consciousness is outside of this physical reality, and plays this “game” so to speak in a series of avatars (us) not much unlike the elf or wizard in a World of Warcraft game or the Sims. Physicist and consciousnesses researcher Tom Campbell has written a lengthy trilogy ‘My Big T.O.E.’ (Theory Of Everything) that attempts to meld Newtonian Principals, Quantum Physics, Philosophy, and Theology into this model. He also has numerous videos on the internet and gives talks all over the world. He proposes that Jesus, Buddha, Plato, and other ‘enlightened’ individuals were trying to teach this model but they had nothing to describe it in their times not knowing any details of the sciences that exist today because it was out of their experience. Like the bacteria that live in our intestines, things like sunlight, plant and food production, interstate highways and rail transport are vital to their existence, but unknown to them because their reality frame is limited. After life in this model consists of our consciousnesses unit jumping back into the game in another avatar, the goal being lowering entropy of ourselves (our consciousness), and as a result the entire consciousness system. Very interesting stuff indeed.
Eastern religions has the idea of reincarnation. Doesn’t this idea fit anywhere in Christianity?
Yes, there is a strand of reincarnation in ealry Christianiyt, especially in the writings of Origen. I’ll be dealing with that in my book!
There is more to understand of Socrates’ conclusions regarding the immortality of the soul. In Plato’s Phaedo Socrates argues that birth and death are complimentary opposites. A universal characteristic of complimentary opposites is that each produces the other – therefore if he is born he will die, and if he dies he will be born:
“Let us see whether in general everything is generated in this way and no other – opposites from opposites . . . the living have come from the dead no less than the dead from the living . . . a sufficient proof that the souls of the dead must exist in some place from which they are reborn.”
Understanding this is important not because Socrates’ is deducing what will happen after death, but because duality is at the heart of all of the word’s great philosophies. A few hundred years before Socrates, Heraclitus described the characteristics of duality (reversal/change, relativity, non-absoluteness) and wrote that all things proceed accordingly, even succinctly stating that God IS duality: “God is day and night, winter and summer, war and peace.” Complimentary opposites are not only the foundation of western philosophy, but also the yin/yang foundation of eastern philosophy.
Understanding how complimentary opposites interact explains pain and suffering. (As opposites both are necessary, and create each other. Difficulties make us stronger and wiser, and good times make life a joy. It’s all good. Suffering, however, is a choice born of ignorance). It also explains the fundamentally dualistic teaching in the sermon on the mount (the rich and power will be brought down, the low and weak will be raised up). If Jesus was preaching an impending end of the world, what would rich or poor, powerful or weak matter – its all coming to and end soon so who cares? Was the purpose to announce that our team will win and your team will lose? – a foolish message even if it were true.
On the other hand, perhaps Jesus wasn’t a crazy “end of the world is coming soon” type and he was saying that the Kingdom of God is here (of course it is – as Thomas Paine wrote in Age of Reason the universe IS the Word of God*). Perhaps Jesus was simply teaching the fundamental reality of experience of the Word of God – and being the fundamental reality, one that has been realized and expressed in wisdom traditions throughout human history.
Nice article Dr. Bart!
I’m a new subscriber. Can’t wait to read your new book!
Hi, you mention Daniel is spurious. Where can I read about the problems associated with the book of Daniel?
A good overview is in John Collins commentary on Daniel in the Hermeneia Bible Commentary series; or check the article in the Anchor Bible Dictionary? If neither suit, let me know.
Thanks, will follow through and check it out.
This was probably not top of my list of topics of interest in the field of early Christianity but as always you have made it fascinating and I look forward to reading your book which I have just pre ordered. Many thanks, Dr Ehrman.
I am interested in the arguments you make here. Do you think the parts of Matthew 25:31-46 are historical? In one part he says that the fire is eternal which wouldn’t imply that the punishment is eternal. But verse 46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” We tend not to think a sort of deep sleep is punishment. I guess compared to eternal life it could be.
What was Paul thinking happened with Jesus physical body? I mean he doesn’t describe his vision as Jesus literally falling out of the sky to appear before him with a thud. I don’t think he thought Jesus was physically hiding in the woods somewhere outside of Damascus and snuck up on him. Because none of this is clear I tend to be very guarded about what Paul may have thought. I take it you think 2 Corinthians 12 is not Paul, or that Paul is not being literal?
After reading the bible, other ancient documents, as well Vatican documents dealing with the question, I have come to the conclusion this is the most accurate description of heaven:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaDGYFNmtyY
Yes, I do think so. The punishment is indeed eternal. It’s the death sentence. Can’t be reversed. I’ll be talking about this at length in my book. Paul’s views are complicated: he thinks that the actual physical body of Jesus was transformed into a spiritual body that was immortal and could reappear at will — just like the angels in the OT.
I will look forward to this book on audible.
On second reading of Matthew, even that passage that I quoted (thinking it suggests eternal suffering of some sort) Jesus contrasts “punishment” with “life.” So it may indeed be my prior beliefs about some sort of eternal suffering that lead me to read it that way. But if it was meant to be read that way Jesus would say the righteous go to an “eternal life of bliss” which he does not say. He just says that they will have “eternal life” as though “eternal life” is reward enough.
as a former Jehovah’s Witness(I got better) I must say your view is basically identical to their view. However there are some serious flaws in their (and your view) that I learned post JW.
There are verses that seem to contradict all of this:
1st the Rich man being dead and in torments in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus.
2nd Jesus saying don’t fear those who can kill the body but not the soul.
3rd the cries of the souls of the martyrs under the throne of God awaiting resurrection(revelations)
4th A re-created person made up of a former dead soul and a new body would only be a copy without actual connection to the original person other than in the mind of others… without some sort of vessel to carry the disembodied person awaiting a new body, there is only data stored in the mind of God… God could in principle use such data to create a new you right now and you would know it was not YOU and so there is no reason it would be you in the future either.
As you might imagine, I deal with all of this in my book! One very big problem is that the English translations can lead one astray (e.g., when we use the word “soul” we mean something about it that ancient Jews decidedly did *not* mean!)
“My kingdom IS NOT of this world”.
“There are many rooms in my father’s mansion”.
“I GO to prepare a place for you”.
” Eye has not seen nor ear has heard. . .”
Someone else said this?
Not sure what you’re asking. The first three are in the Gospel of John, which, as I’ve said, does not generally record the words of the historical Jesus; the fourth is not a saying of the historical Jesus (in the NT it’s Paul)
,,,well,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,I still think / believe I walk within a biblical realm,,,,,,,,,,,,,,even though it may tend to the more esoteric views found among the founders of the Hebrew Bible.
Maybe they would have expressed,,,,,,,,,,,,From what may ANYONE be saved? Only from themselves! That is, their individual hell; they dig it with their own desires!
Really enjoyed reading Heaven and Hell a History of the Afterlife. I was wondering if you have heard of or read The Fire That Consumes by Edward Fudge? This book was instrumental in my journey away from Evangelical Christianity. His discussion of Aionios was eye opening for a layman like myself and reinforced what you elaborate on in your own book.
Thanks again!
It sounds vaguely familiar, but I don’t think I’ve read it.