Psychopannychism
Encyclopedia
Christian mortalism incorporates the belief that the human soul is not naturally immortal, and the belief that the soul is uncomprehending during the time between bodily
death and Judgment Day resurrection
, known as the Intermediate state
. "Soul sleep" is an often pejorative
term so the more neutral term "materialism" was also used in the 19th century, and "Christian mortalism" since the 1970s.
Historically the term psychopannychism was also used, despite problems with the etymology and application Some have identified a distinction between psychopannychism and thnetopsychism, for example Gordon Campbell (2008) identified Milton as believing in the latter though in fact both De doctrina Christiana
and Paradise Lost
make reference to death as "sleep" and the dead being "raised from sleep". The difference is difficult to identify in practice.
or in early Anabaptist
materials, an explanation is required for the origin of the term. Additionally several other terms have been introduced relating to the view.
in the subtitle to his Latin tract Psychopannychia (manuscript Orléans
1534, Latin Strasbourg
1542, 2nd.ed. 1545, French, Geneva
1558, English 1581). The title of the booklet comes from Greek
psyche (soul, mind) with pan-nychis (παν-νυχίς, all-night vigil, all-night banquet), so Psychopannychia, originally, represents Calvin's view, the one he was defending; that the soul was conscious, active.
The title and subtitle of the 1542 Strasbourg
1st edition read:
The title and subtitle of the 1545 2nd Latin edition read:
The 1558 French edition was a translation of that of the 1545 2nd edition:
1558), may have may have caused the confusion that by -pannychis Calvin meant sleep (in Greek -hypnos not -pannychis, vigil). The French subtitle "le sommeil de l'âme" was taken up in German as Seelenschlaf ("soul-sleep"). The tract first appeared in English, translated by T. Stocker, as An excellent treatise of the Immortalytie of the Soule by John Calvin (London, 1581).
Luther's use of similar language (but this time defending the view) appears in print only a few years after Calvin:
(after 582) denounced mortalism as a heresy using this term.
and John of Damascus
of mortalist views among Arab Christians, In the 1960s also this phrase was applied also to the views of Tyndale, Luther and others engaged in mortal introspection, from awareness that Calvin's term Psychopannychia originally described his own belief, not the belief he was calling error as well as in view of the Anabaptists, since their own writings held that the soul dies and the dead sleep. Their view is that the soul dies, with the body to be recalled to life at the resurrection of the dead
, or that the soul is not separate from the body and so there is no "spiritual" self to survive bodily death. In both cases, the deceased does not begin to enjoy a reward or suffer a punishment until Judgment Day.
, Joseph Priestley
, and Samuel Bourne
. Mortalists such as Richard Overton
advanced a combination of theological and philosophical arguments in favor of mortalism. Thomas Hobbes
likewise made extensive use of theological argumentation. Some mortalists viewed their beliefs as a return to original Christian teaching. Mortalist theological arguments were also used to contest the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory and masses for the dead.
expressed the view that the traditional rendering of the Hebrew word nephesh as reference to an immortal soul, had no lexical support. Mortalists in the nineteenth century used lexical arguments to deny the traditional doctrines of hell and the immortal soul.
presented arguments based on physiology. Scientific arguments became important to the nineteenth century discussion of mortalism and natural immortality, and mortalist Miles Grant
cited extensively from a number of scientists who observed that the immortality of the soul was unsupported by scientific evidence.
mentions he would descend into the Sheol
where he thought his son Joseph already was and the Witch of Endor
summons the ghost of the deceased prophet Samuel at the behest of King Saul, modern scholars believe the concept of an immortal soul going to bliss or torment after death entered mainstream Judaism after the exile and existed throughout the Second Temple era, though both ‘soul sleep’ and ‘soul death’, were also held,
Mortalism is present in certain Second Temple Period
pseudepigraphal works, later rabbinical works, and among medieval era rabbis such as Abraham Ibn Ezra
(1092–1167), Maimonides
(1135–1204), and Joseph Albo
(1380–1444).
Some authorities within Conservative Judaism
, notably Neil Gillman
, also support the notion that the souls of the dead are unconscious until the Resurrection.
Traditional rabbinic Judaism, however, has always been of the opinion that belief in immortality of at least most souls, and punishment and reward after death, was a consistent belief back through the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai. Traditional Judaism reads the Torah accordingly. As an example, the punishment of kareth
(excision) is understood to mean that soul is cut off from God in the Afterlife.
:
The date of this synod in Arabia would be during the reign of Emperor Philip the Arab (244-249). Redepenning (1841) was of the opinion that Eusebius' terminology here, "the human soul dies" was probably that of their critics rather than the Arabian Christians' own expression and they were more likely simply "psychopannychists", believers in "soul sleep".
Some Syriac writers such as Aphrahat
, Ephrem
and Narsai
believed in the dormition, or "sleep", of the soul, in which "souls of the dead are largely inert, having lapsed into a state of sleep, in which they can only dream of their future reward or punishments." John of Damascus
denounced the ideas of some Arab Christians as thnetopsychism (‘soul death’). Eustratios of Constantinople
(after 582) denounced this and what he called hypnopsychism (‘soul sleep’). The issue was connected to the that of the Intercession of saints
. The writings of Christian ascetic Isaac of Nineveh
(d.700), reflect several perspectives which include mortalism.
Pope John XXII
inadvertently caused the Beatific vision controversy
(1331–1334) by suggesting that the saved do not attain the Beatific Vision
, or "see God" until Judgment Day, (In Italian: Visione beatifica differita, "deferred beatific vision") which was a view possibly consistent with soul sleep. The Sacred College of Cardinals held a consistory on the problem in January 1334, and Pope John conceded to the more orthodox understanding. His successor, in that same year, Pope Benedict XII, declared it ex cathedra doctrine that the righteous do see Heaven immediately upon death.
, and was promoted by some Reformation
as well as some minor Protestant denominations. Conti has argued that during the Reformation both psychosomnolence (the belief that the soul sleeps until the resurrection) and thnetopsychism (the belief that the body and soul both die and then both rise again) were quite common.
William Tyndale
argued against Thomas More
in favour of soul sleep:
Morey suggests that William Tyndale
(1494–1536) and John Wycliffe
(1320–1384) taught the doctrine of soul sleep "as the answer to the Catholic teachings of purgatory and masses for the dead."
Many Anabaptists in this period, such as Michael Sattler
(1490–1527), were Christian mortalists.
However, the best known advocate of soul sleep was Martin Luther
(1483–1546). In writing on Ecclesiastes, Luther says
Elsewhere Luther states that
Jürgen Moltmann
(2000) concludes from this that "Luther conceived the state of the dead as a deep, dreamless sleep, removed from time and space, without consciousness and without feeling." That Luther believed in soul sleep is also the view of Watts (1985). Some writers have claimed that Luther changed his view later in life.
Gottfried Fritschel
(1867) noted that quotes from Luther's Latin works had occasionally been misread in Latin or in German translation to contradict or qualify specific statements, and Luther's overall teaching that the sleep of the dead was unconscious: These readings can still be found in some English sources.
The two most frequently cited passages are:
Others included Camillo Renato
(1540) Mátyás Dévai Bíró
(1500–1545) Michael Servetus
(1511–1553) Laelio Sozzini (1562) Fausto Sozzini (1563) the Polish Brethren
(1565 onwards) Dirk Philips
(1504–1568) Gregory Paul of Brzezin (1568) the Socinians (1570–1800) John Frith
(1573) George Schomann (1574) Simon Budny (1576)
Soul sleep has been called a "major current of seventeenth century protestant ideology." John Milton
wrote in his unpublished De Doctrina Christiana
,
Gordon Campbell (2008) identifies Milton's views as "thnetopsychism", a belief that the soul dies with the body but is resurrected at the last judgment. however Milton speaks also of the dead as "asleep".
Those holding this view include: 1600s: Sussex Baptists d. 1612: Edward Wightman
1627: Samuel Gardner 1628: Samuel Przypkowski
1636: George Wither
1637: Joachim Stegmann
1624: Richard Overton
1654: John Biddle (Unitarian)
1655: Matthew Caffyn
1658: Samuel Richardson 1608–1674: John Milton
1588–1670: Thomas Hobbes
1605–1682: Thomas Browne
1622–1705: Henry Layton
1702: William Coward
1632–1704: John Locke
1643–1727: Isaac Newton
1676–1748: Pietro Giannone
1751: William Kenrick
1755: Edmund Law
1759: Samuel Bourn
1723–1791: Richard Price
1718–1797: Peter Peckard
1733–1804: Joseph Priestley
Francis Blackburne
(1765) (1765).
Others include: Millerites
(from 1833), Edward White
(1846), Christadelphians
(from 1848), Thomas Thayer
(1855), François Gaussen (d.1863), Henry Constable
(1873), Louis Burnier
(Waldensian, d.1878), the Baptist Conditionalist Association (1878), Cameron Mann
(1888), Emmanuel Pétavel-Olliff
(1891), Miles Grant
(1895) George Gabriel Stokes
(1897),
, some Lutherans, the Seventh-day Adventist Church, Christadelphians
, the Church of God (Seventh Day), Church of God (7th day) - Salem Conference
, the Church of God Abrahamic Faith, and various other Church of God organizations including most Related Denominations which adhered to the older teachings of Herbert W. Armstrong
's Worldwide Church of God
and the Bible Student movement
.
Jehovah's Witnesses
also teach a form of mortalism but represent a special case. They believe that 144,000 believers
began to be raised from the dead in October 1914 to receive immortality in heaven, but all other believers will be raised from the dead on Judgment Day to receive eternal life on earth.
between death and Judgment Day is immortality of the soul followed immediately after death of the body by particular judgment
. Most Protestants believe the soul is judged to go to heaven
or hell
immediately after death. In Catholicism
most souls temporarily stay in purgatory
to be purified for heaven
(as described in the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church, 1030–1032). In Eastern Orthodoxy, the soul waits in the abode of the dead
until the resurrection of the dead
, the saved resting in light and the damned suffering in darkness. According to James Tabor
this Eastern Orthodox picture of particular judgment is similar to the 1st-century Jewish and early Christian concept that the dead either "rest in peace
" in the Bosom of Abraham
(mentioned in the Gospel of Luke
) or suffer in Hades
. This view was also promoted by John Calvin
in his treatise attacking "soul sleep".
Opponents of psychopannychism and thnetopsychism include the Roman Catholic Church
, most mainline Protestant denominations, and most conservative Protestants, Evangelicals, and Fundamentalists.
affirms a conscious interim state, denying that the interim state of rest or suffering is the final state of 'heaven' or 'hell'.
could write "That there is no definite affirmation, in the Old Testament of the doctrine of a future life, or personal immortality, is the general consensus of Biblical scholarship.". The modern scholarly consensus is that the canonical teaching of the Old Testament
made no reference to an "immortal soul" independent of the body. This view is represented consistently in a wide range of scholarly reference works.
According to Donelley, "Twentieth century biblical scholarship
largely agrees that the ancient Jews had little explicit notion of a personal afterlife until very late in the Old Testament period," and "only the latest stratum of the Old Testament asserts even the resurrection of the body
." Scholars have noted that the notion of the "disembodied existence of a soul in bliss" is not in accordance with a Hebrew world view: "While Hebrew thought world distinguished soul from body (as material basis of life), there was no question of two separate, independent entities." Gillman argues that
However, N. T. Wright suggests that "the Bible offers a spectrum of belief about life after death." While Goldingay
suggests that Qohelet
points out that there is no evidence that "human beings would enjoy a positive afterlife," Philip Johnston argues that a few Psalms, such as Psalm 16, Psalm 49
and Psalm 73
, "affirm a continued communion with God after death," but "give no elaboration of how, when or where this communion will take place."
Neyrey suggests that, "for a Hebrew, ‘soul’ indicated the unity of a human person," and "this Hebrew field of meaning is breached in the Wisdom of Solomon
by explicit introduction of Greek ideas of soul. Avery-Peck argues that
is unreal. Paul does not seek a life outside the body, but wants to be clothed with a new and spiritual body (1 Cor. 15; 2 Cor. 5)."
The mortalist disbelief in the existence of a naturally immortal soul, is affirmed as biblical teaching by a range of standard scholarly Jewish and Christian sources. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Modern Christian Thought (1995), says "There is no concept of an immortal soul in the Old Testament, nor does the New Testament ever call the human soul immortal.", Harper's Bible Dictionary
(1st ed. 1985), says that 'For a Hebrew, ‘soul’ indicated the unity of a human person; Hebrews were living bodies, they did not have bodies", the New Bible Dictionary’ (3rd. ed. 1996), says "But to the Bible man is not a soul in a body but a body/soul unity", the Encyclopedia of Judaism’ (2000), says "Scripture does not present even a rudimentarily developed theology of the soul", the New Dictionary of Theology’ (2000), and "The notion of the soul as an independent force that animates human life but that can exist apart from the human body—either prior to conception and birth or subsequent to life and death—is the product only of later Judaism", Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000), says "Far from referring simply to one aspect of a person, “soul” refers to the whole person", the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia says "Possibly Jn. 6:33 also includes an allusion to the general life-giving function. This teaching rules out all ideas of an emanation of the soul.", and "The soul and the body belong together, so that without either the one or the other there is no true man", Eerdmans Bible Dictionary (1987), says "Indeed, the salvation of the “immortal soul” has sometimes been a commonplace in preaching, but it is fundamentally unbiblical.", the Encyclopedia of Christianity (2003), says "The Hebrew Bible does not present the human soul (nepeš) or spirit (rûah) as an immortal substance, and for the most part it envisions the dead as ghosts in Sheol, the dark, sleepy underworld", The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2005), says "there is practically no specific teaching on the subject in the Bible beyond an underlying assumption of some form of afterlife (see immortality)", and the Zondervan Encyclopedia of the Bible (rev. ed. 2009), says "It is this essential soul-body oneness that provides the uniqueness of the biblical concept of the resurrection of the body as distinguished from the Greek idea of the immortality of the soul".
The mortalist disbelief in the existence of a naturally immortal soul, is also affirmed as biblical teaching by various modern theologians, and Hebblethwaite observes the doctrine is "not popular amongst Christian theologians or among Christian philosophers today".
Body
With regard to living things, a body is the physical body of an individual. "Body" often is used in connection with appearance, health issues and death...
death and Judgment Day resurrection
Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the Dead is a belief found in a number of eschatologies, most commonly in Christian, Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian. In general, the phrase refers to a specific event in the future; multiple prophesies in the histories of these religions assert that the dead will be brought back to...
, known as the Intermediate state
Intermediate state
In Christian eschatology, the intermediate state or interim state refers to a person's "intermediate" existence between one's death and one's resurrection from the dead...
. "Soul sleep" is an often pejorative
Pejorative
Pejoratives , including name slurs, are words or grammatical forms that connote negativity and express contempt or distaste. A term can be regarded as pejorative in some social groups but not in others, e.g., hacker is a term used for computer criminals as well as quick and clever computer experts...
term so the more neutral term "materialism" was also used in the 19th century, and "Christian mortalism" since the 1970s.
Historically the term psychopannychism was also used, despite problems with the etymology and application Some have identified a distinction between psychopannychism and thnetopsychism, for example Gordon Campbell (2008) identified Milton as believing in the latter though in fact both De doctrina Christiana
De Doctrina Christiana (Milton)
De doctrina Christiana is a Latin manuscript found in 1823 and attributed to John Milton, who died 148 years prior. Since Milton was blind by the time of the work's creation, this attribution assumes that an amanuensis aided the author.The history and style of Christian Doctrine have created much...
and Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...
make reference to death as "sleep" and the dead being "raised from sleep". The difference is difficult to identify in practice.
Etymology and terminology
Since the phrase "soul sleep" does not occur either in the BibleBible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
or in early Anabaptist
Anabaptist
Anabaptists are Protestant Christians of the Radical Reformation of 16th-century Europe, and their direct descendants, particularly the Amish, Brethren, Hutterites, and Mennonites....
materials, an explanation is required for the origin of the term. Additionally several other terms have been introduced relating to the view.
"Soul sleep"
The phrase soul sleep appears to have been popularised by John CalvinJohn Calvin
John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530...
in the subtitle to his Latin tract Psychopannychia (manuscript Orléans
Orléans
-Prehistory and Roman:Cenabum was a Gallic stronghold, one of the principal towns of the Carnutes tribe where the Druids held their annual assembly. It was conquered and destroyed by Julius Caesar in 52 BC, then rebuilt under the Roman Empire...
1534, Latin Strasbourg
Strasbourg
Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace are historically German-speaking,...
1542, 2nd.ed. 1545, French, Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
1558, English 1581). The title of the booklet comes from Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
psyche (soul, mind) with pan-nychis (παν-νυχίς, all-night vigil, all-night banquet), so Psychopannychia, originally, represents Calvin's view, the one he was defending; that the soul was conscious, active.
The title and subtitle of the 1542 Strasbourg
Strasbourg
Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace are historically German-speaking,...
1st edition read:
- They live to Christ and do not sleep those souls of the saints who die in faith of Christ. Assertion.
The title and subtitle of the 1545 2nd Latin edition read:
- Psychopannychia – Or a refutation of the error entertained by some unskillful persons, who ignorantly imagine that in the interval between death and the judgment the soul sleeps.
The 1558 French edition was a translation of that of the 1545 2nd edition:
- Psychopannychie – traitté par lequel est prouvé que les âmes veillent et vivent après qu'elles sont sorties des corps ; contre l'erreur de quelques ignorans qui pensent qu'elles dorment jusque au dernier jugement..
"Psychopannychism"
In the Latin it is clearer that Psychopannychia is actually the refutation of, the opposite of, the idea of soul sleep. The French version, Psychopannychie – La nuit ou le sommeil de l'âme ("Psychopannychia – the night or the sleep of the soul", GenevaGeneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
1558), may have may have caused the confusion that by -pannychis Calvin meant sleep (in Greek -hypnos not -pannychis, vigil). The French subtitle "le sommeil de l'âme" was taken up in German as Seelenschlaf ("soul-sleep"). The tract first appeared in English, translated by T. Stocker, as An excellent treatise of the Immortalytie of the Soule by John Calvin (London, 1581).
Luther's use of similar language (but this time defending the view) appears in print only a few years after Calvin:
- "so the soul after death enters its chamber and peace, and sleeping does not feel its sleep" (Commentary on Genesis – Enarrationes in Genesin, 1535–1545).
"Hypnopsychism"
"Hypnopsychism" from hypno- + psyche ("sleep of soul") was a more correct coinage from Greek than that of Calvin's editor. Eustratios of ConstantinopleEustratios of Constantinople
Eustratios, Presbyter of Constantinople was a pupil of Patriarch Eutychius of Constantinople and writer.He is remembered as the author of a tract against belief in soul sleep entitled A Refutation of Those Who Say That the Souls of the Dead Are Not Active and Receive No Benefit from the Prayers...
(after 582) denounced mortalism as a heresy using this term.
"Thnetopsychism"
A possibly contrasting phrase is (from Greek thnetos (mortal) + psyche (soul, mind)). However the term has its origin in the descriptions of Eusebius of CaesareaEusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea also called Eusebius Pamphili, was a Roman historian, exegete and Christian polemicist. He became the Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine about the year 314. Together with Pamphilus, he was a scholar of the Biblical canon...
and John of Damascus
John of Damascus
Saint John of Damascus was a Syrian monk and priest...
of mortalist views among Arab Christians, In the 1960s also this phrase was applied also to the views of Tyndale, Luther and others engaged in mortal introspection, from awareness that Calvin's term Psychopannychia originally described his own belief, not the belief he was calling error as well as in view of the Anabaptists, since their own writings held that the soul dies and the dead sleep. Their view is that the soul dies, with the body to be recalled to life at the resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the Dead is a belief found in a number of eschatologies, most commonly in Christian, Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian. In general, the phrase refers to a specific event in the future; multiple prophesies in the histories of these religions assert that the dead will be brought back to...
, or that the soul is not separate from the body and so there is no "spiritual" self to survive bodily death. In both cases, the deceased does not begin to enjoy a reward or suffer a punishment until Judgment Day.
Mortalist arguments
Historically, Christian mortalists have advanced theological, lexical, and scientific arguments in support of their position.Theological arguments
Some early eastern Christians argued for mortalism on the basis of the identity of blood with life in Leviticus 17:11. Theological arguments for mortalism which contended it was not taught in the Bible were made by mortalists such as Francis BlackburneFrancis Blackburne
Francis Blackburne PC KS was an Irish judge and eventually became Lord Chancellor of Ireland.-Background:...
, Joseph Priestley
Joseph Priestley
Joseph Priestley, FRS was an 18th-century English theologian, Dissenting clergyman, natural philosopher, chemist, educator, and political theorist who published over 150 works...
, and Samuel Bourne
Samuel Bourne
Samuel Bourne was a British photographer known for his prolific seven years' work in India, from 1863 to 1870...
. Mortalists such as Richard Overton
Richard Overton
Richard Overton was an English pamphleteer and Leveller during the Civil War. Little is known of the early life of Overton, but he is believed to have matriculated at Queens' College, Cambridge, before working as an actor and playwright in Southwark. Here he picked up Leveller sympathies, and...
advanced a combination of theological and philosophical arguments in favor of mortalism. Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury , in some older texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work on political philosophy...
likewise made extensive use of theological argumentation. Some mortalists viewed their beliefs as a return to original Christian teaching. Mortalist theological arguments were also used to contest the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory and masses for the dead.
Lexical arguments
In the late eighteenth century, the standard Hebrew lexicon and grammar of John ParkhurstJohn Parkhurst (lexicographer)
-Life:The second son of John Parkhurst of Catesby House, Northamptonshire, he was born in June 1728. His mother was Ricarda, second daughter of Sir Robert Dormer. He was educated at Rugby School and Clare Hall, Cambridge, where he proceeded B.A. 1748, M.A. 1752, and was elected Fellow...
expressed the view that the traditional rendering of the Hebrew word nephesh as reference to an immortal soul, had no lexical support. Mortalists in the nineteenth century used lexical arguments to deny the traditional doctrines of hell and the immortal soul.
Scientific arguments
The eighteenth century mortalist Henry LaytonHenry Layton
Henry Layton was a minor British philosopher, theological writer, and contemporary of John Locke.-Life:He was the eldest son of Francis Layton of Rawdon, West Riding of Yorkshire. His father was one of the masters of the jewel-house to Charles I and Charles II...
presented arguments based on physiology. Scientific arguments became important to the nineteenth century discussion of mortalism and natural immortality, and mortalist Miles Grant
Miles Grant
Rev. Miles Grant , Adventist preacher and teacher at Armenia Seminary. Advocate of conditional immortality during from 1860-1890s and author of Positive theology...
cited extensively from a number of scientists who observed that the immortality of the soul was unsupported by scientific evidence.
Historic proponents of the mortality of the soul
The mortality of the soul has been held throughout the history of both Judaism and Christianity.Judaism
Although in the Book of Genesis JacobJacob
Jacob "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel , as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.In the...
mentions he would descend into the Sheol
Sheol
Sheol |Hebrew]] Šʾôl) is the "grave", "pit", or "abyss" in Hebrew. She'ol is the earliest conception of the afterlife in the Jewish scriptures. It is a place of darkness to which all dead go, regardless of the moral choices made in life, and where they are "removed from the light of God"...
where he thought his son Joseph already was and the Witch of Endor
Witch of Endor
The Witch of Endor, sometimes called the Medium of Endor, was a woman who called up the ghost of the recently deceased prophet Samuel, at the demand of King Saul of the Kingdom of Israel in the First Book of Samuel, chapter...
summons the ghost of the deceased prophet Samuel at the behest of King Saul, modern scholars believe the concept of an immortal soul going to bliss or torment after death entered mainstream Judaism after the exile and existed throughout the Second Temple era, though both ‘soul sleep’ and ‘soul death’, were also held,
Mortalism is present in certain Second Temple Period
Second Temple period
The Second Temple period , in Jewish history, is the period between 530 BCE and 70 CE, when the Second Temple of Jerusalem existed. It ended with the First Jewish–Roman War and the Temple's destruction....
pseudepigraphal works, later rabbinical works, and among medieval era rabbis such as Abraham Ibn Ezra
Abraham ibn Ezra
Rabbi Abraham ben Meir Ibn Ezra was born at Tudela, Navarre in 1089, and died c. 1167, apparently in Calahorra....
(1092–1167), Maimonides
Maimonides
Moses ben-Maimon, called Maimonides and also known as Mūsā ibn Maymūn in Arabic, or Rambam , was a preeminent medieval Jewish philosopher and one of the greatest Torah scholars and physicians of the Middle Ages...
(1135–1204), and Joseph Albo
Joseph Albo
Joseph Albo was a Jewish philosopher and rabbi who lived in Spain during the fifteenth century, known chiefly as the author of Sefer ha-Ikkarim , the classic work on the fundamentals of Judaism.-Early life:Albo's birthplace is generally assumed to be Monreal, a town in Aragon...
(1380–1444).
Some authorities within Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism is a modern stream of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s.Conservative Judaism has its roots in the school of thought known as Positive-Historical Judaism,...
, notably Neil Gillman
Neil Gillman
Neil Gillman is an American rabbi and philosopher, affiliated with Conservative Judaism.-Biography:Gillman was born in Quebec City, Canada. He graduated from McGill University in 1954. He was ordained as a rabbi at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in 1960. He received his Ph.D...
, also support the notion that the souls of the dead are unconscious until the Resurrection.
Traditional rabbinic Judaism, however, has always been of the opinion that belief in immortality of at least most souls, and punishment and reward after death, was a consistent belief back through the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai. Traditional Judaism reads the Torah accordingly. As an example, the punishment of kareth
Kareth
In Judaism, Kareth is a divine punishment for transgressing Jewish law.It is the punishment for serious crimes that were not brought to justice by a human court...
(excision) is understood to mean that soul is cut off from God in the Afterlife.
Second to eighth centuries
The most well known case of mortalism in the early church is that recorded by Eusebius of CaesareaEusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea also called Eusebius Pamphili, was a Roman historian, exegete and Christian polemicist. He became the Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine about the year 314. Together with Pamphilus, he was a scholar of the Biblical canon...
:
- The Dissension of the Arabians. "About the same time others arose in Arabia, putting forward a doctrine foreign to the truth. They said that during the present time the human soul dies and perishes with the body, but that at the time of the resurrection they will be renewed together. And at that time also a synod of considerable size assembled, and Origen, being again invited there, spoke publicly on the question with such effect that the opinions of those who had formerly fallen were changed." (Ecclesiastical History VI,37)
The date of this synod in Arabia would be during the reign of Emperor Philip the Arab (244-249). Redepenning (1841) was of the opinion that Eusebius' terminology here, "the human soul dies" was probably that of their critics rather than the Arabian Christians' own expression and they were more likely simply "psychopannychists", believers in "soul sleep".
Some Syriac writers such as Aphrahat
Aphrahat
Aphrahat was a Syriac-Christian author of the 4th century from the Adiabene region of Northern Mesopotamia, which was within the Persian Empire, who composed a series of twenty-three expositions or homilies on points of Christian doctrine and practice...
, Ephrem
Ephrem the Syrian
Ephrem the Syrian was a Syriac and a prolific Syriac-language hymnographer and theologian of the 4th century. He is venerated by Christians throughout the world, and especially in the Syriac Orthodox Church, as a saint.Ephrem wrote a wide variety of hymns, poems, and sermons in verse, as well as...
and Narsai
Narsai
Narsai was one of the foremost of Syriac poet-theologians, perhaps equal in stature to Jacob of Serugh, both second only to Ephrem the Syrian...
believed in the dormition, or "sleep", of the soul, in which "souls of the dead are largely inert, having lapsed into a state of sleep, in which they can only dream of their future reward or punishments." John of Damascus
John of Damascus
Saint John of Damascus was a Syrian monk and priest...
denounced the ideas of some Arab Christians as thnetopsychism (‘soul death’). Eustratios of Constantinople
Eustratios of Constantinople
Eustratios, Presbyter of Constantinople was a pupil of Patriarch Eutychius of Constantinople and writer.He is remembered as the author of a tract against belief in soul sleep entitled A Refutation of Those Who Say That the Souls of the Dead Are Not Active and Receive No Benefit from the Prayers...
(after 582) denounced this and what he called hypnopsychism (‘soul sleep’). The issue was connected to the that of the Intercession of saints
Intercession of saints
Intercession of the saints is a Christian doctrine held by Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and some Anglican churches, that deceased saints and the Blessed Virgin Mary intercede for believers, and that it is possible to ask deceased saints for their prayers...
. The writings of Christian ascetic Isaac of Nineveh
Isaac of Nineveh
Isaac of Nineveh also remembered as Isaac the Syrian and Isaac Syrus was a Seventh century bishop and theologian best remembered for his written work. He is also regarded as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church...
(d.700), reflect several perspectives which include mortalism.
Ninth to fifteenth centuries
Mortalism evidently persisted since various Byzantine writers had to defend the doctrine of the veneration of saints against those who said the saints sleep. John the Deacon (11th C) attacked those who "dare to say that praying to the saints is like shouting in the ears of the deaf, as if they had drunk from the mythical waters of Oblivion."Pope John XXII
Pope John XXII
Pope John XXII , born Jacques Duèze , was pope from 1316 to 1334. He was the second Pope of the Avignon Papacy , elected by a conclave in Lyon assembled by Philip V of France...
inadvertently caused the Beatific vision controversy
Beatific vision
The beatific vision - in Christian theology is the ultimate direct self communication of God to the individual person, when she or he reaches, as a member of redeemed humanity in the communion of saints, perfect salvation in its entirety, i.e. heaven...
(1331–1334) by suggesting that the saved do not attain the Beatific Vision
Beatific vision
The beatific vision - in Christian theology is the ultimate direct self communication of God to the individual person, when she or he reaches, as a member of redeemed humanity in the communion of saints, perfect salvation in its entirety, i.e. heaven...
, or "see God" until Judgment Day, (In Italian: Visione beatifica differita, "deferred beatific vision") which was a view possibly consistent with soul sleep. The Sacred College of Cardinals held a consistory on the problem in January 1334, and Pope John conceded to the more orthodox understanding. His successor, in that same year, Pope Benedict XII, declared it ex cathedra doctrine that the righteous do see Heaven immediately upon death.
The Reformation
After a brief hiatus, mortalism emerged in Christianity during the Late Middle AgesLate Middle Ages
The Late Middle Ages was the period of European history generally comprising the 14th to the 16th century . The Late Middle Ages followed the High Middle Ages and preceded the onset of the early modern era ....
, and was promoted by some Reformation
Protestant Reformation
The Protestant Reformation was a 16th-century split within Western Christianity initiated by Martin Luther, John Calvin and other early Protestants. The efforts of the self-described "reformers", who objected to the doctrines, rituals and ecclesiastical structure of the Roman Catholic Church, led...
as well as some minor Protestant denominations. Conti has argued that during the Reformation both psychosomnolence (the belief that the soul sleeps until the resurrection) and thnetopsychism (the belief that the body and soul both die and then both rise again) were quite common.
William Tyndale
William Tyndale
William Tyndale was an English scholar and translator who became a leading figure in Protestant reformism towards the end of his life. He was influenced by the work of Desiderius Erasmus, who made the Greek New Testament available in Europe, and by Martin Luther...
argued against Thomas More
Thomas More
Sir Thomas More , also known by Catholics as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist. He was an important councillor to Henry VIII of England and, for three years toward the end of his life, Lord Chancellor...
in favour of soul sleep:
And ye, in putting them [the departed souls] in heaven, hell and purgatory, destroy the arguments wherewith ChristChristChrist is the English term for the Greek meaning "the anointed one". It is a translation of the Hebrew , usually transliterated into English as Messiah or Mashiach...
and Paul prove the resurrection...And again, if the souls be in heaven, tell me why they be not in as good a case as the angels be? And then what cause is there of the resurrection?"
Morey suggests that William Tyndale
William Tyndale
William Tyndale was an English scholar and translator who became a leading figure in Protestant reformism towards the end of his life. He was influenced by the work of Desiderius Erasmus, who made the Greek New Testament available in Europe, and by Martin Luther...
(1494–1536) and John Wycliffe
John Wycliffe
John Wycliffe was an English Scholastic philosopher, theologian, lay preacher, translator, reformer and university teacher who was known as an early dissident in the Roman Catholic Church during the 14th century. His followers were known as Lollards, a somewhat rebellious movement, which preached...
(1320–1384) taught the doctrine of soul sleep "as the answer to the Catholic teachings of purgatory and masses for the dead."
Many Anabaptists in this period, such as Michael Sattler
Michael Sattler
Michael Sattler was a monk who left the Roman Catholic Church during the Protestant Reformation to become one of the early leaders of the Anabaptist movement. He was particularly influential for his role in developing the Schleitheim Confession.Born in approximately 1490 in Staufen, Germany....
(1490–1527), were Christian mortalists.
However, the best known advocate of soul sleep was Martin Luther
Martin Luther
Martin Luther was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517...
(1483–1546). In writing on Ecclesiastes, Luther says
Salomon judgeth that the dead are a sleepe, and feele nothing at all. For the dead lye there accompting neyther dayes nor yeares, but when they are awoken, they shall seeme to have slept scarce one minute.
Elsewhere Luther states that
As soon as thy eyes have closed shalt thou be woken, a thousand years shall be as if thou hadst slept but a little half hour. Just as at night we hear the clock strike and know not how long we have slept, so too, and how much more, are in death a thousand years soon past. Before a man should turn round, he is already a fair angel.
Jürgen Moltmann
Jürgen Moltmann
Jürgen Moltmann is a German Reformed theologian. The 2000 recipient of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion.-Moltmann's Youth:...
(2000) concludes from this that "Luther conceived the state of the dead as a deep, dreamless sleep, removed from time and space, without consciousness and without feeling." That Luther believed in soul sleep is also the view of Watts (1985). Some writers have claimed that Luther changed his view later in life.
Gottfried Fritschel
Gottfried Fritschel
Gottfried William Leonhard Fritschel was a German-born Lutheran who emigrated to Iowa.His father was Martin Fritschel a minister, his brother Conrad Sigmund Fritschel was a professor at Wartburg College, and his son George J...
(1867) noted that quotes from Luther's Latin works had occasionally been misread in Latin or in German translation to contradict or qualify specific statements, and Luther's overall teaching that the sleep of the dead was unconscious: These readings can still be found in some English sources.
The two most frequently cited passages are:
- "It is certain that to this day Abraham is serving God, just as Abel, Noah are serving God. And this we should carefully note; for it is divine truth that Abraham is living, serving God, and ruling with Him. But what sort of life that may be, whether he is asleep or awake, is another question. How the soul is resting we are not to know, but it is certain that it is living."
- "A man tired with his daily labour...sleeps. But his soul does not sleep (Anima autem non sic dormit) but is awake (sed vigilat). It experiences visions and the discourses of the angels and of God. Therefore the sleep in the future life is deeper than it is in this life. Nevertheless, the soul lives to God. This is the likeness to the sleep of life."
Others included Camillo Renato
Camillo Renato
Paolo Ricci was a former Franciscan, then Anabaptist and Antitrinitarian. He also adopted an academic pseudeonym Lisia Fileno , Fileno Lunardi, and finally the baptismal name Camillo Renato.-Paolo Lysias Philaenus Ricci:He was born Paolo Ricci and became a Franciscan...
(1540) Mátyás Dévai Bíró
Matthias Dévay
Mátyás Biró, also known as Matthias Dévay , was a Protestant Reformer who has been called the "Luther of Hungary."Dévay was born in Deva, Hunyad County, Transylvania in the late 15th century or early 16th century...
(1500–1545) Michael Servetus
Michael Servetus
Michael Servetus was a Spanish theologian, physician, cartographer, and humanist. He was the first European to correctly describe the function of pulmonary circulation...
(1511–1553) Laelio Sozzini (1562) Fausto Sozzini (1563) the Polish Brethren
Polish Brethren
The Polish Brethren were members of the Minor Reformed Church of Poland, a Nontrinitarian Protestant church that existed in Poland from 1565 to 1658...
(1565 onwards) Dirk Philips
Dirk Philips
Dirk Philips was an early Anabaptist writer and theologian. He was one of the peaceful disciples of Melchior Hoffman and later joined Menno Simons in laying out practical doctrines for what would become the Mennonite church.- Biography :...
(1504–1568) Gregory Paul of Brzezin (1568) the Socinians (1570–1800) John Frith
John Frith
John Frith was an English Protestant priest, writer, and martyr.Frith was an important contributor to the Christian debate on persecution and toleration in favour of the principle of religious toleration...
(1573) George Schomann (1574) Simon Budny (1576)
Seventeenth to eighteenth centuries
Soul sleep was a significant minority view from the eighth to the seventeenth centuries, and soul death became increasingly common from the Reformation onwards.Soul sleep has been called a "major current of seventeenth century protestant ideology." John Milton
John Milton
John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...
wrote in his unpublished De Doctrina Christiana
De Doctrina Christiana (Milton)
De doctrina Christiana is a Latin manuscript found in 1823 and attributed to John Milton, who died 148 years prior. Since Milton was blind by the time of the work's creation, this attribution assumes that an amanuensis aided the author.The history and style of Christian Doctrine have created much...
,
Inasmuch then as the whole man is uniformly said to consist of body, and soul (whatever may be the distinct provinces assigned to these divisions), I will show, that in death, first, the whole man, and secondly, each component part, suffers privation of life.
Gordon Campbell (2008) identifies Milton's views as "thnetopsychism", a belief that the soul dies with the body but is resurrected at the last judgment. however Milton speaks also of the dead as "asleep".
Those holding this view include: 1600s: Sussex Baptists d. 1612: Edward Wightman
Edward Wightman
Edward Wightman was an English radical Anabaptist, executed at Lichfield for his activities promoting himself as the divine Paraclete and Savior of the world...
1627: Samuel Gardner 1628: Samuel Przypkowski
Samuel Przypkowski
Samuel Przypkowski was a Polish Socinian theologian, a leading figure in the Polish Brethren and an advocate of religious toleration. In Dissertatio de pace et concordia ecclesiae, published in 1628 in Amsterdam, he called for mutual tolerance by Christians...
1636: George Wither
George Wither
George Wither was an English poet, pamphleteer, and satirist. He was a prolific writer who adopted a deliberate plainness of style; he was several times imprisoned. C. V...
1637: Joachim Stegmann
Joachim Stegmann
Joachim Stegmann Sr. was a German Socinian theologian, Bible translator, mathematician and rector of the Racovian Academy....
1624: Richard Overton
Richard Overton
Richard Overton was an English pamphleteer and Leveller during the Civil War. Little is known of the early life of Overton, but he is believed to have matriculated at Queens' College, Cambridge, before working as an actor and playwright in Southwark. Here he picked up Leveller sympathies, and...
1654: John Biddle (Unitarian)
John Biddle (Unitarian)
John Biddle or Bidle was an influential English nontrinitarian, and Unitarian. He is often called "the Father of English Unitarianism".- Life :...
1655: Matthew Caffyn
Matthew Caffyn
Matthew Caffyn was a British General Baptist preacher and writer.-Early life:He was born at Horsham, Sussex, the seventh son of Thomas Caffin, by Elizabeth his wife...
1658: Samuel Richardson 1608–1674: John Milton
John Milton
John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...
1588–1670: Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes
Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury , in some older texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work on political philosophy...
1605–1682: Thomas Browne
Thomas Browne
Sir Thomas Browne was an English author of varied works which reveal his wide learning in diverse fields including medicine, religion, science and the esoteric....
1622–1705: Henry Layton
Henry Layton
Henry Layton was a minor British philosopher, theological writer, and contemporary of John Locke.-Life:He was the eldest son of Francis Layton of Rawdon, West Riding of Yorkshire. His father was one of the masters of the jewel-house to Charles I and Charles II...
1702: William Coward
William Coward
William Coward was an English physician, controversial writer, and poet. He is now remembered for his sceptical writings on the soul, which Parliament condemned as blasphemous and ordered to be burned in his presence.-Life:...
1632–1704: John Locke
John Locke
John Locke FRS , widely known as the Father of Liberalism, was an English philosopher and physician regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers. Considered one of the first of the British empiricists, following the tradition of Francis Bacon, he is equally important to social...
1643–1727: Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton PRS was an English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian, who has been "considered by many to be the greatest and most influential scientist who ever lived."...
1676–1748: Pietro Giannone
Pietro Giannone
Pietro Giannone was an Italian historian born in Ischitella, in the province of Capitanata. He opposed the papal influence in Naples, for which he was imprisoned for twelve years until his death.-Early life:...
1751: William Kenrick
William Kenrick
William Kenrick was an American nurseryman. When 28 years of age he was taken into partnership by his father, a pioneer nurseryman, whose gardens were planted in 1790 upon the ground where John Eliot commenced preaching the gospel to the Indians...
1755: Edmund Law
Edmund Law
Edmund Law was a priest in the Church of England. He served as Master of Peterhouse, Cambridge, as Knightbridge Professor of Philosophy in the University of Cambridge from 1764 to 1769, and as bishop of Carlisle from 1768 to 1787....
1759: Samuel Bourn
Samuel Bourn
Samuel Bourn was an English Dissenter minister.Bourn was the third Samuel Bourn, as second son of Samuel Bourn the Younger, and was educated at Stand grammar school and Glasgow University. In 1742 he became dissenting minister of Rivington, Lancashire, where he enjoyed the friendship of Hugh...
1723–1791: Richard Price
Richard Price
Richard Price was a British moral philosopher and preacher in the tradition of English Dissenters, and a political pamphleteer, active in radical, republican, and liberal causes such as the American Revolution. He fostered connections between a large number of people, including writers of the...
1718–1797: Peter Peckard
Peter Peckard
Peter Peckard was an English Whig, Church of England minister and abolitionist.From 1781 he was Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge. He was incorporated at Cambridge in 1782, appointed vice-chancellor in 1784, and created D.D. per literas regias in 1785. In April 1792 he became Dean of...
1733–1804: Joseph Priestley
Joseph Priestley
Joseph Priestley, FRS was an 18th-century English theologian, Dissenting clergyman, natural philosopher, chemist, educator, and political theorist who published over 150 works...
Francis Blackburne
Francis Blackburne (archdeacon)
Francis Blackburne was an English Anglican churchman, archdeacon of Cleveland and an activist against the requirement of subscription to the Thirty Nine Articles.-Life:...
(1765) (1765).
Nineteenth to twentieth centuries
Belief in conditional immortality and the annihilation of the unsaved became increasingly common during the nineteenth century, entering mainstream Christianity in the twentieth century. From this point it is possible to speak in terms of entire groups holding the belief, and only the most prominent individual nineteenth century advocates of the doctrine will be mentioned here.Others include: Millerites
Millerites
The Millerites were the followers of the teachings of William Miller who, in 1833, first shared publicly his belief in the coming Second Advent of Jesus Christ in roughly the year 1843.-Origins:...
(from 1833), Edward White
Edward White (Free-Church minister)
Edward White was a leading London Free Church minister. He was brother of George Frederick White .He was one of the several Free Church ministers to write in favour of Christian mortalism.-Works:...
(1846), Christadelphians
Christadelphians
Christadelphians is a Christian group that developed in the United Kingdom and North America in the 19th century...
(from 1848), Thomas Thayer
Thomas Thayer
Thomas Baldwin Thayer was the leading Universalist theologian in the late nineteenth century.-Works:* Theology of Universalism* Christianity against infidelity: or, the truth of the gospel history 1836...
(1855), François Gaussen (d.1863), Henry Constable
Henry Constable
Henry Constable was an English poet, son of Sir Robert Constable. He went to St John's College, Cambridge, where he took his degree in 1580. Becoming a Roman Catholic, he went to Paris, and acted as anagent for the Catholic powers. He died at Liège...
(1873), Louis Burnier
Louis Burnier
Louis Burnier was a Swiss Valdensian pastor and author of educational and religious works.Louis Burnier was pastor at Lutry, Lucens, La Chaux, Vich, Rolle and Morges.-Works:...
(Waldensian, d.1878), the Baptist Conditionalist Association (1878), Cameron Mann
Cameron Mann
Cameron Douglas Mann is a retired Canadian professional ice hockey player. He finished his career with the EIHL's Nottingham Panthers, initially signing with the team on July 22, 2009...
(1888), Emmanuel Pétavel-Olliff
Emmanuel Pétavel-Olliff
Dr. Emmanuel Pétavel-Olliff was a Swiss pastor and biblical scholar.He was son of Abram-François Pétavel , Neuchâtel pastor, pro-Jewish writer and author of the poem La fille de Sion; ou, le rétablissement d'Israël...
(1891), Miles Grant
Miles Grant
Rev. Miles Grant , Adventist preacher and teacher at Armenia Seminary. Advocate of conditional immortality during from 1860-1890s and author of Positive theology...
(1895) George Gabriel Stokes
George Gabriel Stokes
Sir George Gabriel Stokes, 1st Baronet FRS , was an Irish mathematician and physicist, who at Cambridge made important contributions to fluid dynamics , optics, and mathematical physics...
(1897),
Modern Christian groups
Present-day defenders of mortalism include many Anglicans, such as N. T. Wright and Nicky GumbelNicky Gumbel
Nicholas Glyn Paul Gumbel is an ordained Anglican priest, vicar and author. He is most famous as the developer of the Alpha course, a basic introduction to Christianity supported by churches of many Christian traditions....
, some Lutherans, the Seventh-day Adventist Church, Christadelphians
Christadelphians
Christadelphians is a Christian group that developed in the United Kingdom and North America in the 19th century...
, the Church of God (Seventh Day), Church of God (7th day) - Salem Conference
Church of God (7th day) - Salem Conference
The Church of God – Salem Conference is a seventh-day Sabbath-keeping Christian denomination. The Church of God observes the seventh-day Sabbath, which is ) the Biblical Sabbath for the Judeo-Christian tradition.-History:...
, the Church of God Abrahamic Faith, and various other Church of God organizations including most Related Denominations which adhered to the older teachings of Herbert W. Armstrong
Herbert W. Armstrong
Herbert W. Armstrong founded the Worldwide Church of God in the late 1930s, as well as Ambassador College in 1946, and was an early pioneer of radio and tele-evangelism, originally taking to the airwaves in the 1930s from Eugene, Oregon...
's Worldwide Church of God
Worldwide Church of God
Grace Communion International , formerly the Worldwide Church of God , is an evangelical Christian denomination based in Glendora, California, United States. Since April 3, 2009, it has used the new name Grace Communion International in the US...
and the Bible Student movement
Bible Student movement
The Bible Student movement is the name adopted by a Millennialist Restorationist Christian movement that emerged from the teachings and ministry of Charles Taze Russell, also known as Pastor Russell...
.
Jehovah's Witnesses
Jehovah's Witnesses
Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The religion reports worldwide membership of over 7 million adherents involved in evangelism, convention attendance of over 12 million, and annual...
also teach a form of mortalism but represent a special case. They believe that 144,000 believers
Jehovah's Witnesses and salvation
Jehovah's Witnesses teach that salvation is possible only through Christ’s ransom sacrifice and that individuals cannot be saved until they repent of their sins and call on the name of Jehovah. Salvation is described as a free gift from God, but is said to be unattainable without good works that...
began to be raised from the dead in October 1914 to receive immortality in heaven, but all other believers will be raised from the dead on Judgment Day to receive eternal life on earth.
Immortality of the soul
The more common Christian belief about the intermediate stateIntermediate state
In Christian eschatology, the intermediate state or interim state refers to a person's "intermediate" existence between one's death and one's resurrection from the dead...
between death and Judgment Day is immortality of the soul followed immediately after death of the body by particular judgment
Particular judgment
Particular judgment, according to Christian eschatology, is the judgment given by God that a departed person undergoes immediately after death, in contradistinction to the General judgment of all people at the end of the world....
. Most Protestants believe the soul is judged to go to heaven
Heaven
Heaven, the Heavens or Seven Heavens, is a common religious cosmological or metaphysical term for the physical or transcendent place from which heavenly beings originate, are enthroned or inhabit...
or hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
immediately after death. In Catholicism
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
most souls temporarily stay in purgatory
Purgatory
Purgatory is the condition or process of purification or temporary punishment in which, it is believed, the souls of those who die in a state of grace are made ready for Heaven...
to be purified for heaven
Heaven
Heaven, the Heavens or Seven Heavens, is a common religious cosmological or metaphysical term for the physical or transcendent place from which heavenly beings originate, are enthroned or inhabit...
(as described in the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church, 1030–1032). In Eastern Orthodoxy, the soul waits in the abode of the dead
Hades in Christianity
According to various Christian faiths, Hades is "the place or state of departed spirits".-Hades in the Old Testament:In the Septuagint , the Greek term "ᾅδης" is used to translate the Hebrew term "שׁאול" in, for example,...
until the resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the Dead is a belief found in a number of eschatologies, most commonly in Christian, Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian. In general, the phrase refers to a specific event in the future; multiple prophesies in the histories of these religions assert that the dead will be brought back to...
, the saved resting in light and the damned suffering in darkness. According to James Tabor
James Tabor
James D. Tabor is Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte where he has taught since 1989. He previously held positions at Ambassador College , the University of Notre Dame , and the College of William and Mary .-Background:Tabor was born in...
this Eastern Orthodox picture of particular judgment is similar to the 1st-century Jewish and early Christian concept that the dead either "rest in peace
Rest in peace
"Rest in peace" is a short epitaph or idiomatic expression wishing eternal rest and peace to someone who has died. The expression typically appears on headstones, often abbreviated as "RIP"...
" in the Bosom of Abraham
Bosom of Abraham
"Bosom of Abraham" refers to the place of comfort in sheol where the Jews said the righteous dead awaited Judgment Day.-Origin of the phrase:The word found in the Greek text for "bosom" is , meaning "lap" "bay"...
(mentioned in the Gospel of Luke
Gospel of Luke
The Gospel According to Luke , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Luke or simply Luke, is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension.The...
) or suffer in Hades
Hades
Hades , Hadēs, originally , Haidēs or , Aidēs , meaning "the unseen") was the ancient Greek god of the underworld. The genitive , Haidou, was an elision to denote locality: "[the house/dominion] of Hades". Eventually, the nominative came to designate the abode of the dead.In Greek mythology, Hades...
. This view was also promoted by John Calvin
John Calvin
John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530...
in his treatise attacking "soul sleep".
Opponents of psychopannychism and thnetopsychism include the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...
, most mainline Protestant denominations, and most conservative Protestants, Evangelicals, and Fundamentalists.
Roman Catholic Church
The Roman Catholic Church has called soul "mortality" a serious heresy.Whereas some have dared to assert concerning the nature of the reasonable soul that it is mortal, we, with the approbation of the sacred council do condemn and reprobate all those who assert that the intellectual soul is mortal, seeing, according to the canon of Pope Clement VPope Clement VPope Clement V, born Raymond Bertrand de Got was Pope from 1305 to his death...
, that the soul is [...] immortal [...] and we decree that all who adhere to like erroneous assertions shall be shunned and punished as heretics. Fifth Council of the LateranFifth Council of the LateranThe Fifth Council of the Lateran was the last Ecumenical council of the Catholic Church before reformation.When elected pope in 1503, Pope Julius II , promised under oath that he would soon convoke a general council. However, as time passed the promise was not fulfilled...
(1513)
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Eastern Orthodox ChurchEastern Orthodox Church
The Orthodox Church, officially called the Orthodox Catholic Church and commonly referred to as the Eastern Orthodox Church, is the second largest Christian denomination in the world, with an estimated 300 million adherents mainly in the countries of Belarus, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece,...
affirms a conscious interim state, denying that the interim state of rest or suffering is the final state of 'heaven' or 'hell'.
Modern scholarship
As early as 1917 Harvey ScottHarvey W. Scott
Harvey Whitefield Scott was an American pioneer, newspaper editor, and historian.Scott was born in on a farm in Illinois and migrated to Oregon with his family in 1852, settling in Yamhill County. He and his family moved near Olympia, Washington in 1853. At age 18, he fought in the American Indian...
could write "That there is no definite affirmation, in the Old Testament of the doctrine of a future life, or personal immortality, is the general consensus of Biblical scholarship.". The modern scholarly consensus is that the canonical teaching of the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
made no reference to an "immortal soul" independent of the body. This view is represented consistently in a wide range of scholarly reference works.
According to Donelley, "Twentieth century biblical scholarship
Biblical criticism
Biblical criticism is the scholarly "study and investigation of Biblical writings that seeks to make discerning judgments about these writings." It asks when and where a particular text originated; how, why, by whom, for whom, and in what circumstances it was produced; what influences were at work...
largely agrees that the ancient Jews had little explicit notion of a personal afterlife until very late in the Old Testament period," and "only the latest stratum of the Old Testament asserts even the resurrection of the body
Resurrection of the dead
Resurrection of the Dead is a belief found in a number of eschatologies, most commonly in Christian, Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian. In general, the phrase refers to a specific event in the future; multiple prophesies in the histories of these religions assert that the dead will be brought back to...
." Scholars have noted that the notion of the "disembodied existence of a soul in bliss" is not in accordance with a Hebrew world view: "While Hebrew thought world distinguished soul from body (as material basis of life), there was no question of two separate, independent entities." Gillman argues that
In contrast to the two enigmatic references to EnochEnoch (ancestor of Noah)Enoch is a figure in the Generations of Adam. Enoch is described as Adam's greatx4 grandson , the son of Jared, the father of Methuselah, and the great-grandfather of Noah...
and Elijah, there are ample references to the fact that death is the ultimate destiny for all human beings, that God has no contact with or power over the dead, and that the dead do not have any relationship with God (see, inter alia, Ps. 6:6, 30:9–10, 39:13–14, 49:6–13, 115:16–18, 146:2–4). If there is a conceivable setting for the introduction of a doctrine of the afterlife, it would be in JobBook of JobThe Book of Job , commonly referred to simply as Job, is one of the books of the Hebrew Bible. It relates the story of Job, his trials at the hands of Satan, his discussions with friends on the origins and nature of his suffering, his challenge to God, and finally a response from God. The book is a...
, since Job, although righteous, is harmed by God in the present life. But Job 10:20–22 and 14:1–10 affirm the opposite.
However, N. T. Wright suggests that "the Bible offers a spectrum of belief about life after death." While Goldingay
John Goldingay
John E. Goldingay is the David Allan Hubbard Professor of Old Testament in the School of Theology of Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California....
suggests that Qohelet
Ecclesiastes
The Book of Ecclesiastes, called , is a book of the Hebrew Bible. The English name derives from the Greek translation of the Hebrew title.The main speaker in the book, identified by the name or title Qoheleth , introduces himself as "son of David, king in Jerusalem." The work consists of personal...
points out that there is no evidence that "human beings would enjoy a positive afterlife," Philip Johnston argues that a few Psalms, such as Psalm 16, Psalm 49
Psalm 49
Psalm 49 is the 49th psalm from the Book of Psalms. The psalm was written by the sons of Korach after recognizing their father's greed for wealth as the root of his downfall, and to teach that the purpose of one's life on earth is to enhance his spiritual development and the prepare for the World...
and Psalm 73
Psalm 73
' is the 73rd psalm from the Book of Psalms. It was written by Asaph , a 10th century BCE Levite. It grapples with one of life's most troublesome questions as to why the wicked prosper and avoid punishment. It goes into saying that the glamor of the wicked is futile, and is really a form of...
, "affirm a continued communion with God after death," but "give no elaboration of how, when or where this communion will take place."
Neyrey suggests that, "for a Hebrew, ‘soul’ indicated the unity of a human person," and "this Hebrew field of meaning is breached in the Wisdom of Solomon
Book of Wisdom
The Book of Wisdom, often referred to simply as Wisdom or the Book of the Wisdom of Solomon, is one of the deuterocanonical books of the Bible. It is one of the seven Sapiential or wisdom books of the Septuagint Old Testament, which includes Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon ,...
by explicit introduction of Greek ideas of soul. Avery-Peck argues that
Scripture does not present even a rudimentarily developed theology of the soul. The creation narrative is clear that all life originates with God. Yet the Hebrew Scripture offers no specific understanding of the origin of individual souls, of when and how they become attached to specific bodies, or of their potential existence, apart from the body, after death. The reason for this is that, as we noted at the beginning, the Hebrew Bible does not present a theory of the soul developed much beyond the simple concept of a force associated with respiration, hence, a life-force.Regardless of the character of the soul's existence in the intermediate state, biblical scholarship affirms that a disembodied soul is unnatural and at best transitional. Bromiley argues that "the soul and the body belong together, so that without either the one or the other there is no true man. Disembodied existence in Sheol
Sheol
Sheol |Hebrew]] Šʾôl) is the "grave", "pit", or "abyss" in Hebrew. She'ol is the earliest conception of the afterlife in the Jewish scriptures. It is a place of darkness to which all dead go, regardless of the moral choices made in life, and where they are "removed from the light of God"...
is unreal. Paul does not seek a life outside the body, but wants to be clothed with a new and spiritual body (1 Cor. 15; 2 Cor. 5)."
The mortalist disbelief in the existence of a naturally immortal soul, is affirmed as biblical teaching by a range of standard scholarly Jewish and Christian sources. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Modern Christian Thought (1995), says "There is no concept of an immortal soul in the Old Testament, nor does the New Testament ever call the human soul immortal.", Harper's Bible Dictionary
Harper's Bible Dictionary
Harper's Bible Dictionary is a scholarly reference book of the Bible, containing the texts of the Old Testament, the Apocrypha, and the New Testament. It is written by 180 members of the Society of Biblical Literature, edited by Paul J. Achtemier, and containing 3500 articles and 400...
(1st ed. 1985), says that 'For a Hebrew, ‘soul’ indicated the unity of a human person; Hebrews were living bodies, they did not have bodies", the New Bible Dictionary’ (3rd. ed. 1996), says "But to the Bible man is not a soul in a body but a body/soul unity", the Encyclopedia of Judaism’ (2000), says "Scripture does not present even a rudimentarily developed theology of the soul", the New Dictionary of Theology’ (2000), and "The notion of the soul as an independent force that animates human life but that can exist apart from the human body—either prior to conception and birth or subsequent to life and death—is the product only of later Judaism", Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000), says "Far from referring simply to one aspect of a person, “soul” refers to the whole person", the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia says "Possibly Jn. 6:33 also includes an allusion to the general life-giving function. This teaching rules out all ideas of an emanation of the soul.", and "The soul and the body belong together, so that without either the one or the other there is no true man", Eerdmans Bible Dictionary (1987), says "Indeed, the salvation of the “immortal soul” has sometimes been a commonplace in preaching, but it is fundamentally unbiblical.", the Encyclopedia of Christianity (2003), says "The Hebrew Bible does not present the human soul (nepeš) or spirit (rûah) as an immortal substance, and for the most part it envisions the dead as ghosts in Sheol, the dark, sleepy underworld", The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2005), says "there is practically no specific teaching on the subject in the Bible beyond an underlying assumption of some form of afterlife (see immortality)", and the Zondervan Encyclopedia of the Bible (rev. ed. 2009), says "It is this essential soul-body oneness that provides the uniqueness of the biblical concept of the resurrection of the body as distinguished from the Greek idea of the immortality of the soul".
The mortalist disbelief in the existence of a naturally immortal soul, is also affirmed as biblical teaching by various modern theologians, and Hebblethwaite observes the doctrine is "not popular amongst Christian theologians or among Christian philosophers today".