PoE and LaD: resurrection, reincarnation and rebirth

Question 1

Explain resurrection

Answer 1

• Based on faith and scripture (cf Nature of Belief)
• Paul: Christ’s resurrection is a symbol of salvation
• Hick: replica theory (20th century): shows it’s a logically coherent concept and that personal identity would be maintained

Question 2

Evaluate resurrection

Answer 2

+ avoids continuity of identity problem that dualist face
CP: Vardy: continuity problem (a replica can surely never be the same person), Mona Lisa example
- would you return in the same state that you died (beheaded?)
- question of who receives salvation (cf Calvin) => if it is in fact not you who is resurrected then you do not get salvation for your suffering
+ Kierkegaard: leap of faith is needed, it may seem absurd but that is what makes it more profound

Question 3

Explain reincarnation

Answer 3

• Plato’s argument from opposites: death must produce life and life must produce death, argument from soul: our soul transmigrates
• Hinduism is a form of dualism
• two layers to universe:
  1. Brahman = one reality underlying all (God)
  2. Maya = false/illusion reality that you experience trapped in your physical body
• teleological: aim of atman is to escape from Maya in order to go into Brahman, done by intellectual and moral enlightenment

Question 4

Evaluate reincarnation

Answer 4

+ Ian Stevenson ‘Twenty cases suggestive of reincarnation’
CP: 20 cases => sample size is very small, potential for cultural reinforcement
Cryptomnesia – when someone thinks they remember something but in fact has heard about in from another source i.e. parents
+ trauma of death and birth buries our memories, we do not remember first two years of our life, does not mean that they didn’t happen
+ solution to PoE: we are suffering as a direct result of our past actions
CP: realm of extremity (untouchables)
- personal identity
CP: Locke, prince and cobbler analogy
- Peter Geach: our physicality represents our identity=> a break of such a connection means it cannot be us

Question 5

Explain rebirth

Answer 5

• Buddism
• Annata = no self => no permanent identity
• Rebirth isn’t a good thing as it is a continuation of the illusion of individualisation
• Salvation is about the dissolution of the self => philosophically against reincarnation and resurrection
• Nirvana = end goal/moment of the dissolution of the self

Question 6

Evaluate rebirth

Answer 6

+ detaches salvation and personal identity, as salvation is about overcoming personal identity
+ Heraclitus problem of flux: everything is constantly changing => there cannot be a grounded self
+ optimistic way of living as there is an end point that is achievable and it prevents an egotistical outlook
+ appeal to atheists as it is a Godless doctrine
- clashes with lived experience
- impersonalises salvation, yet majority claim it is something meaningful to them and Nirvana undermines that