Self, death and the afterlife

Question 1

Describe the meaning and purpose of life: to glorify god

Answer 1

• christians see god as the creator and sustainer of all that exists, and define the meaning and purpose of life with reference to god.
• one way of doing this is to question. why god created humans
• there are two creation stories in genesis - each give a different account
  1) ‘let us make mankind in our image’ - stressing that humans are very much like god. god gives commands like be fruitful and multiply, and then says:
  ‘god saw everything that he had made, and it was very good’ - this can be seen as showing that humans are god’s image in the created order. by reproducing and filling the earth, they are supposed to spread the qualities of god that they represent over the whole earth
• for christianity, the ‘goddess’ of god is beyond human understanding so is hard to define in language. the term ‘glory’ is used to describe god’s essential glory, and Isaiah links this with the purpose of life: ‘everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made’. early christians aw this quality in Jesus
• prologue to john’s gospel says: ‘we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only son from the father’ . it follows from this that for many christians the purpose of their life is to represent and spread god’s glory, and so they try to show it in their own life and actions;
• Matthew 5:16 ‘let your light shine before others that they might se your good deeds and glorify Your father in heaven’ - glorifying is about praising and worshipping god. as omnipotent creator god is worthy of worship. we have an important duty to glorify god as we are made image dei - they should reflect god’s glory in their lives. part of this involves caring for his creation
• christians should perform good deeds as this will lead to other thanking/glroifying god (linking ton justification by works) - we should evangelise through actions.
• christians are god’s envoys in the world and their actions should represent him and his loving qualities well
• as st teresa of Avila said, ‘christ now has no body but yours’ - following Jesus’ ascension, christians must continue to perform the good works he did eg showing compassion, helping those in need. christians should put the gospel values into practice, seeking to emulate christ in everything they do. this will in turn encourage others to believe and see christianity as a force for good. they should ‘evangelise’ for religion through actions - ‘fruits’ of belief

Question 2

Describe the meaning and purpose of life: have a personal relationship with god

Answer 2

• by praying to god and seeing him as a Heavenly Father, as Jesus taught. ‘our father’ prayer Luke’s gospel. this helps christians to strengthen their personal relationship with god.
• st Paul says that christians can have a personal relationship with god through faith in Jesus who is god incarnate . Paul, Galatians: ‘in Jesus Christ you are all sons of god through faith’
• they can also develop a personal relationship with god through the Holy Spirit , the third person of the trinity and god’s active presence in the world today

Question 3

Describe the meaning and purpose of life: prepare for judgement

Answer 3

• this also has its roots in the second creation story
• after the creation of the world and its content, Adam and Eve were persuaded by the serpent to disobey god - banished from GOE - breaking the close relationship between god and humans , forcing humans out into. world where they had to work to survive and pain and judgement became part of life
• christianity teaches that the sacrifice of Jesus makes up for human sin - doctrine of atonement, reconciling the relationship between god and the world. but in order to complete god’s reconciliation plan humans must be judged at the end of time
• on the parable of the sheep and goats, Jesus taught that his followers would be judged when they entered heaven on how they treated those less fortunate than themselves . this leads to a view that the ultimate purpose of life is to prepare for judgement, as humanity’s ultimate purpose is union with god which will occur after the end of life
• all will be judged: those who treats others with compassion and justice will be welcomed into god’s eternal presence, but those who are not will be forever excluded from him.d

Question 4

describe liberal christian opposition to the purpose of life being to prepare for judgement

Answer 4

• they down accept the dramatic narrative of a judgement day as factually accurate - they argue ti is a metaphorical story intended to show important things about the pups of human existence
• however, they do believe that some form of eternal existence in the present of god is the outcome of striving for moral perfection. for some, judgement happens in response to christ in this life and being born of spirit and living eternal life is a quality of life in this life

Question 5

describe John Hick’s Sul making theodicy’s opposition to the idea about the purpose of life being to prepare for judgement

Answer 5

• he agrees with irenaeus that the existence of evil sins a flaw in god’s perfect creation but rather an essential plan for god’s creation
• the problem of evil can be stated simply that god created humans as incomplete beings with the potential to achieve a likeness with god. the existence of evil allows humans to grow and develop virtues - if god had instilled the virtues in us they’d be meaningless.
• hick therefore argues god made us free to choose evil so that tree virtues are gained by overcoming temptations/trials - therefore evil is essential to developing moral perfection and the ups of life is soul making
• living in a life where evil exists means that people can choose to overcome evil - christians should respond to evils of hunger/poverty ect. with compassion and generosity so as to become better people
• in Hick’s opinion, this process of overcoming evil continues perhaps through different levels of existence until everybody reaches the kingdom of god
• therefore for hick there is no possibility of god sending anyone to hell

Question 6

explain the problems with the ideas o the meaning of life being 1) building a personal relationship with god and 2) preparing for judgement, and how this might mean that the purpose of life is to bring about god’s kingdom on earth

Answer 6

• these two ideas focus too much on the indoivual, having a good outcome primarily for the people involved
• a more holistic view is that humans are part of the whole fabric of creation, and he purpose of everything is to bring completion to god’s work by bringing about god’s kingdom on earth
• this idea has its roots in the understanding of kingship in the time of Jesus . when Jesus refers to the kingdom of god, he is linking all of creation to the possibility that there will be a time when all of the created order in both heaven and earth follow god’s laws
• the Lord’s Prayer makes this clear: ‘your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven’
• for some christians this hope is an eschatological one relating to the end of time - that one day jesu will return in glory, death and sin eliminated
• other Christina however see their purpose as being to work toward creating perfection on earth - this means that they not only try to build up their own relationship with him and delay virtues to be in his likeness, but also they work to bring about the conditions of a perfect heaven in their own community and in the world.

Question 7

evaluate of the idea that the meaning of life is preparing for judgement

Answer 7

• preparation for judgement can imply simply being good to earn a reward, so some may just be motivated by fear of punishment
• it is unclear how god would judge someones motivations just being fear of jdugement vs doing right for rights sake

Question 8

give the impact of a belief that that the meaning of life is building a personal relationship with god

Answer 8

• this may lead to a life of contemplation, perhaps within a monastic community . some may focus on christian mysticism working through study and prayer to a hoped for transformative experience

Question 9

describe resurrection

Answer 9

• one of the defining features of chrisitnaity.
• christianity in all four gospels teaches that Jesus rose from the dead and wasn’t merely revived b ut through the power of god he overcame the power of death and appeared to his dicisples full of life from god.
• no human has ever experienced this
• the resurrection is symbolic for christians as evidence of the everlasting life christians experience with god after death, with god being the source of all life. it shows that death, a consequence of sin, can be overcome by the power of god.
• the death of Jesus Christ has cancelled out the consequences of sin for everyone and shows that the possibility of eternal life is available for everyone.

Question 10

describe how resurrection relates to the cocnept of the soul - biblical ideas

Answer 10

• the jewish concept of the physical body ebign infused with the ‘breath of life’ infused by god is seen in genesis: god formed Adam and ‘breathed into his nostrils the breath of life’ so that he was made a living being
• life is not only a quality of humans. for jews, everything that breathes has the spirit of god within it. this is also understood with the term ‘ruach’ - there is an idea that the spirit of god was moving over the waters in creation
• ideas about god being eternal meaning life may not end at death began to be seen in the period leading up to Jesus. Book of Daniel: “many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life’

Question 11

describe how resurrection relates to the cocnept of the soul - biblical ideas - plato’s influence on the idea of spiritual resurrection

Answer 11

• plato believed that there were two modes of existence: the physical world which we see around us, which is a reflection of a deeper reality called the world of the forms.
• the world of the forms is made up of perfect ideas and the physical world we see is imperfect copies of these perfect ideas.
• he believed the human soul separates from the body at death and goes to the world of the forms - there it contemplates about the Form of the Good (close to idea of gos) before returning re-enfleshed (reincarnated) into the physical world in the human womb - this is a dualistic idea of both the physical perishable body and the immortal soul
• plato believed that the soul eternally existed and is immortal in its own right
• out ability to know what things are relates to the fact that our Soul belongs to the world of the forms - it can recognise the imperfect copies of the world of the forms

Question 12

describe the idea of resurrection of the flesh as expressed in the writings of Augustine

Answer 12

• for christians, the resurrection of Jesus was the event that mad life after death possible. but overcoming death on the cross he restored to humankind the hop of resurrection and eternal life that had been lost through original sin
• Augustine believed original sin had stained every human spiritually and physically - people’s sousla nd bodies tainted with sinfulness. if the resurrection of christ offered hope for our own resurrection, Augustine argued that this resurrection must be a bodily, physical resurrection where both the physical and spiritual effects of sin were removed.
• Augustine believed that Jesus rose from the dead in a wholly physical way and then ascended to heaven in a physical form. if this is possible to happen to Jesus, then surely God can perform the same miracle for anything that has been created with a soul. Jesus is the prototype for human resurrection
• god will reunite the body and soul in a perfected form, emphasising the integral role of the body. the resurrected body and earthly body retain the same identity, but it is transformed into a glorified state without corruption from sin - the body becoming ‘spiritual’ not in substance but in submission to soul and god’s will
• he op[posed dualistic views, arguing the body is inherently good as it is created by god. the resurrection affirms this
• he also argued that the resurrection serves the purpose of divine justice as well - both righteous/wicked will be resurrected, to heaven and hell respectively.
• he acknowledged that the resurrection is mysterious concept beyond human understanding, trusting in god’s omnipotence to establish the resurrection

Question 13

describe the impact of the belief in the resurrection was described by Augustine

Answer 13

Ethical Living: Augustine’s theology encouraged ethical living as it will be resurrected and judged

Eschatological Hope: promise of bodily resurrection offers hope for a redeemed and glorified existence in the presence of god

Augustine’s resurrection tewschings are significant in christian theology and influential in teaching

Question 14

describe the concept of the dead rising

Answer 14

• it has always been met with confusion and apprehension
• CCC teaches that in death, the soul is separated from the body - the body decays and the soul goes to meet god while awaiting reunion with its glorified body. god in his power will definitively grant incorruptible life to us by reuniting body from soul through the power of Jesus

Question 15

describe the criticism of bodily resurrection

Answer 15

• the idea of immortal soul derives from greek thought.
• some christians argue bodily resurrection doesn’t make sense and the dead body rots away to nothing or is completely cremated. the elements of the body are therefore returned to nature in such a way that the resurrection of the flesh is a non-sensical idea

Question 16

Describe spiritual resurrection

Answer 16

• some christians argue that the soul/spirit of the body is what is resurrected and when the body comes to tis end in death the Sul lives on with god
• they support this view with reference to Paul’s first letter to the corinthians 1 Corinthians 15:42-44 and 50-54 : ‘it is sown a physical body, it is raised a physical body’, and ‘we shall not all sleep, but be changed’
• this implies that the resurrected body will be quite different to the body that has died. some think that Paul’s words imply that there will be some kind of physical aspect to the resurrection, where the soul will be resurrected into a heavenly body with nothing on earth - others argue that a miraculous change will overcome the body meaning it is made physically perfect - bodily resurrection

Question 17

describe the significance of 1 corinthians 15:42-44 and 50-54

Answer 17

• Paul’s purpose in this letter was to intervene in disputes in communities which risked splitting from the early church -eg ideas about the resurrection
• the chapter therefore unpacks Paul’s teachings on the resurrection and its implication for humankind
• paul’s explanation focuses on the idea that resurrection is possible due to Jesus - if the corinthians dont believe in resurrection, he claims faith is pointless: ‘in fact christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who died’ - rising of christ is therefore the beginning of resurrection for all humankind
• Paul distinguished between ‘celestial’ and ‘terrestrial’ bodies - ‘what is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. it is sown a physical body it is raised a spiritual body’
• This is an important piece of scripture because it shows early christian theology 30 yrs after Jesus’ death and people would have actually known Jesus. Paul uses his certainty about Jesus’ physical resurrection to reassure the people of Corinth that belief in resurrection is both rational and essential
• it is also significant as it forms the basis for Christian teaching on the resurrection - according to Paul Jesus’s resurrection wasn’t a one of occasion but rather it was the cause of and evidence for the start of a new relationship between humankind and god no longer damaged by the sin of Adam - death isn’t the end, there is hope for eternal life with christ
• thirdly, it provided hope during periods of persecution and a justification for martyrdom - the belief in resurrection was so attractive that people were willing to die rather than give up their faith.

Question 18

describe the understanding of judgement/heaven/hell/purgatory as a physical reality

Answer 18

• throughout much of christian history people understood it this way as in the same way that they accepted this idea of a physical resurrection, they believed that once raised they physical body would enjoy the delight/pain of heaven/hell
• when these doctrines were being developed people were much more aware of the reality of death - death pain and suffering were much more a part of normal life. they also lived in a time when earthly crime often led to physical punishment - hanging, burning, torture to deter people from committing crime
• people therefore did not find it difficult to understand the reality of hell being a place of eternal suffering literal reality of eternal fire.
• the church hoped that by focusing on the suffering of sinners after death they would be able to deter people from sinning
• in the same way the idea of heaven reflects life at the time - a place with no food shortage, no pain. heaven was often described as a walled city as much of the wealth was in market towns
• the presence of a doom painting in early churches served to remind people that they were under judgement - descriptions of flames torturing the eternally damned
• subsequently people feared death and hell, so they took great lengths to avoid that and purgatory
• ## catholic church developed teaching on indulgences, which gave sinners the opportunity to acquire some of the virtue of risen saints by going on pilgrimages, visiting and touching relics, and making donations to the church - criticism this caused led to the protestant reformation

Question 19

describe the understanding of heaven/hell as a spiritual reality

Answer 19

• we now tend to reject the idea of a proper bodily resurrection.
• the concepts must be readjusted to fit with the idea that the spiritual bodies will enjoy eternal life/suffering
• this changes the nature of how people understand the joy/suffering of heaven/hell
• if heaven is a spiritual reality rather than a physical one, the qualities you enjoy are more spiritual rather than material - eg joy and being reunited with loved ones and the knowledge god is always present rather than a banquet
• in the same way the suffering of the damned in heaven is understood as spiritual loss - the eternal absence of god, with no source of joy, goodness or pleasure - eternal separation from god and loved ones
• for some christians who believe in spiritual judgement, the idea of individual judgement and final judgement are conflated into one - they argue that for god time has no meaning so there is no difference to god between the time when an individual person dies and the end of time itself - therefore there is only one final spiritual judgement which decides the destination of souls
• having left the physical world and their bodies behind, the afterlife begins with judgement and eternity in heaven/hell follows
• the idea of purgatory loses force in this world view, since a time of suffering to cleanse the soul

Question 20

what does process theology teach

Answer 20

• rejects the idea that god create the universe out of nothing, proposes instead that both the physical universe and god are unchanged and have always existed
• reality, then, is both mental and physical - and just as humans exist as a unity of mind and body, reality as a whole is made up of mind and matter
• to describe this relationship, process theologians say that god and the universe exist pantheistically - the universe is god, and god is in the universe.
• just as humans have embodied minds, it makes sense to think of god as the soul of the universe. Just as human body experiences are integrated by the mind, the experiences of the entire universe are integrated by the mind of god.
• since god and the universe exist pan-theistically, god must therefore experience every process in the universe - including L.A.D

Question 21

describe objective immortality in process thought

Answer 21

• the idea that after death, all individual entities in the universe remain forever as ‘objects’ in the mind of god, therefore they never die
• therefore, all our actions/thoughts/ideas continue to exist in every minute detail as objects in God’s memory - as god is eternal in some sense we are eternal too, but objectively and not subjectively
• subjective immortality, by contrast, is the view that beings such as ourselves have the potential to exist forever as ‘irreducibly subjective units of experience’ - this means that when we die we exist always as thinking beings with our own thought processes, memories and continued experiences - nobody else will experience them, not even god.

Question 22

evaluate the idea of objective immortality in process thought

Answer 22

• most christians believe in subjective immortality for humans
• the idea of objective immortality does at least do away with the anthropocentric view that only humans have sufficient value in god’s eyes to be granted immortality after death.
• the idea that humans are more valuable than the rest of god’s creation is seen to be wishful thinking by some - it is perhaps better that with process thought all entities have equal value
• however, some criticise O.I as a meaningless form of words. After death, ‘I’ am no longer conscious, sp ‘I’ no longer have any subjective experiences about anything, so ho can it matter to ‘me’ that I am objectively present in god’s mmeory
• if the next life is simply a form of objective immortality, I will not exist subjectively to know that my suffering has been redeemed, so as far as I am concerned it has never been redeemed.

Question 23

describe ideas about L.A.D as a psychological reality

Answer 23

• There are many Christians today who find notions of resurrection, judgement and eternal joy or suffering to be out of date. There is no empirical evidence for any kind of existence after death, and so the idea that behaviour in human physical life can make a difference to their experience after death seems pointless. For some Christians, then, eternal life is reinterpreted in terms of the quality of living in this life: if Christ’s teachings on right living are followed, then this can bring about heaven on Earth
  ‘‘And this is eternal life, that they know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent’
• LAD may just be a psychological reality - the product of the human mind rather than the external power of god.
• Freud argued that religion was merely the result of neurosis, but Jung argued that religious experience is essential as an individual develops an understanding of who they really are. joy and suffering may therefore be experienced as a psychological reality.
• A person who is spiritually fulfilled experiences a state of contentment, and one who is spiritually in conflict experiences psychological suffering. Where a person lives a life wholly in harmony with their deepest beliefs and spiritual instincts, they will experience inner peace, contentment and joy akin to the idea of heaven. Where someone’s beliefs and spiritual instincts clash with each other and with the way they live their life, the result is inner conflict and suffering, misery and a sense of failure that seems to have no hope, and may lead to self-destructive behaviour - in other words, a psychological hell.
• those who find themselves in a pschyological hell can be treated using psychoanalysis. Therapy and self-reflection may restore those who find themselves in a state of psychological hell, through a process which, over time, allows them to separate from the things that cause them to suffer and offers the possibility of psychological wholeness.