June 16, 2004
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On Being and Nothingness
Oh, yes, I know, I stole the title from one of those philosopher guys I enjoy reading, but it fits for today. Yesterday over on Kris' site, she posed a question from one of her readers ... What do you think about the idea of -"What if after you die- nothing happens"? No reincarnation, no heaven or hell, or God- nothingness? (If you aren't a regular Krisinluck reader, you're missing out. She addresses deep questions and isn't afraid of the reality implied in her answers. She talks about God without doing Godtalk. I mean, don't you just know that anyone who can make an atheist commenter feel comfortable asking the above question is someone that it's safe to talk with?) She has said that she'll be writing her answer to that question and invited people to comment in advance on the topic. My comment was becoming blog length so I decided to bring it back over here and write out some of the thought that question inspired in me.
Yes, this will be a God blog, but I'll try to keep my preaching down to the level where we are all dismissed in time to have a day. (That's a Southern church joke. You've heard it right? Two children, one Catholic and one Protestant are best friends and they invite each other to share worship. First they attend the Catholic mass and that child carefully explains each part of the service to the other. Then they attend the Protestant service and that child returns the favor, until the moment the pastor steps into the pulpit. The pastor removes his watch and lays it on the lectern beside the microphone. "What does that mean?" and the Protestant child says, "Not a blessed thing.") See I'm back enjoying a Southern Fellowship, and in my mind that gives me permission to crack a few insider's jokes.
When I read the question on Kris' site yesterday, my mind went immediately to the nature of salvation and the location of heaven. My little nephew asked me the other day how far out into space you have to go to find heaven. It's a reasonable question for a 6 year old to be pondering. I'm not sure he picked the right relative to ask ... Anyway, I find that we start off with that kind of literal thinking and we hold on to it a lot tighter than we realize, clinging to the idea of a physical/temporal location of a physical heaven even after we try to grasp the concept of a super-physical God.
When I was a child I had a certain understanding of the Christian doctrine of salvation, that if we were good kids, and loved God some day we'd be going to a really cool place that was a cross between Disney World and study hall. I pictured heaven as a sort of cosmic amusement park where we had to tiptoe around being good so we could earn wings and go on the big rides. Tucker says that heaven is a place where God sleeps in a cloud bed and angels fly around. Compared to God the angels aren't big, he says, compared to God the angels look like fairies.
When I came back to salvation as an adult, my mind couldn't accept the childish metaphors that worked for me when I was seven, and rightly so. I'm capable of understanding that heaven isn't a construct of time or space. I came to salvation with a void - a nothingness in the place where my vision of heaven used to be. I didn't come to salvation because of the promise of pie in the sky, I came inspite of my intellectual conviction that it didn't exist. I came to salvation not because of any promise for my future but because I came to an understanding of the reality of God that demanded a response in the here and now.
Salvation isn't something that happens to me when I die if I stay the course and perform the proper steps in the proper order. There is value in spiritual discipline, just like there's value in eating food to stay alive. But life isn't found in food and spiritual life isn't in religious exercises or future rewards. My reward and my life is right now. The salvation I experience isn't some privileged position from which I can point to someone else and say "You don't have it." Salvation is being related to God. Right here, and right now. Salvation makes a heavy demand on me, I am called to live my life as nearly aligned with my understanding of the command to love the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength and love my neighbor as myself as I possibly can. The reward of Salvation is that when I fail (and I do that on a daily, sometimes hourly basis) the Grace of God keeps me in relationship with the Infinite not because of me, but in spite of me.
I've had almost 20 years to develop my understanding of heaven and I'm not sure I grasp it yet. I fall back on the childish metaphor more often than not, leaning toward a literal vision. What's the best part of heaven? Well, since I have a more grown-up imagination, I'm led to an idea posed by questioner to C S Lewis - Is there sex in heaven? He said that question was like the small child trying to understand why grown-ups were all enthused about sex and asking, "Is it something you do with chocolates?" because chocolates are the richest pleasure the child knows. And leaving aside the picture of chocolate sex, I love that way of approaching the question of heaven. It is simply outside any possible frame of reference I possess.
When I consider heaven it is a vast nothingness, not because nothing is there, but because my mind is inadequate to imagine it.
The question posed on Kris' site was about what happens after death. I don't know what happens at that point, I have an idea. Of course, I believe I can support my idea based on a careful reading of scripture, but this isn't the place for complicated exegesis, so I'll just tell you what I think. I think that when we die we do enter into nothingness. I think that at the moment of my death, my existence is extinguished. And I believe that my existence remains extinguished until God calls me back into being. I believe that God will call me back into being, but it doesn't make any difference to the reality of my life here and now. I don't believe that the physical atoms that make up my present body are necessary for the make-up of a future body. When I consider the fact that matter is neither created nor destroyed, it makes no sense to think that my body must in some way be preserved in order for me to be preserved. The matter that forms my body has been here since the creation of the cosmos, and it will have other life after I'm done borrowing it for my clothing.
I believe that there is a resurrection in the future, and I have a lot of reasons for believing that. I don't believe that resurrection means reanimation. I believe that it's more like a re-creation. God holds all of me in His hand. He doesn't need to scrounge around and find these clothes to pour me back into. In fact, one of the most beautiful metaphors of heaven is that God will give us new "clothes" - clean white robes. I believe that being demands some kind of corporeality simply because otherwise there is no individual. If my existence has no boundary I'm not me. The very concept of a self, *I*, demands the limit of a body of some sort to contain *me.*
I like to deal in knowns. God is the great unknown - not because He isn't knowable, but because He is infinitely knowable and I'm a finite creature. Rather than spend a lot of time on speculation about that which I cannot know apart from revelation, I'd rather focus on what I can know. The here and now.
Comments (25)
If it can't be found here and now it can't be found at all.
Well, even though we believe different things, we have arrived at the same place. It is all about today, the here and now, how we treat those people we encounter in our lives and how we impact the world around us. I have known many people who call themselves Christians yet are some of the meanest, most selfish and vindictive people possible. Yet they believe they will go to heaven and sit with God. They have obviously missed the whole point. Sin is basically those things that hurt other people. One doesn't have to be religious to avoid hurting others and love those around him and live a "good" life, yet most Christians are quick to tell you that no matter how good you are, if you don't acknowledge God in their proscribed way, you are still going to hell. I just can't believe that, no matter what the Bible says.
I admit that I don't really believe in any kind of afterlife, but I also don't rule out the possibility that there might be a God and that a part of us could possibly live on past our death in the form of a soul. I don't claim to have all of the answers, but I do know that in the long run the only thing that matters is what is in our heart and how we relate to the world around us. I do have some beliefs and one of them is that self-righteous, scripture quoting, holier-than-thou folks who go around condemning those not like themselves will NOT go to heaven and are in fact already living in a hell here on Earth.
Since it's Bloomsday, a catholic joke to honouor the occasion...from Joyces' "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man"....When Stephen Dedalus tells his friend Cranly he has lost his faith, Cranly asks him does that mean he will now become a Protestant. stephen says--I have lost my faith, not my self respect
Kris' question is a bit insane...if NOTHING exists after you die, then you won't have a single thought in the world, you know
great blog!
Does nothing exist like like utter nothing just death? Or is it your soul wandering in a void? I don't know. Wiccans beleive in reincarnation but I don't like that idea. Mostly because I don't want to come back. But it's not forever, there are lessons to be learned. And at the end of it all, there is heaven like place. I like the idea of becoming one again with Spirit. But if there is nothing then that's how it is. If I'm just dead, then I'm just dead. If I wander around in a black void for the rest of ever then I'll have even more time to think. And I can go and talk to other dead people like Abraham Lincoln and Socrates or something. And by that time we should have at least one language so we can all understand each other.
Well, I had something else to say but I've forgotten.
(Random thoughts after reading your blog:) I have a hard time taking anything seriously that speaks about God, but I do believe in the infinite and in the unknowable and that those things are synomymous with anything we might call "God." Calling it "God" makes us look, like you say, for a literal man in the sky.
I find it interesting that most children (in my experience) will say they believe in God, even children like mine who have not been taught to believe in him in that literal way. They know that I will say I don't believe in a man in the sky, but then I will try to explain what I do believe. It's easier in some ways to speak of "God" and "heaven" than to speak of the infinite and the "here and now," but I strive to avoid speaking of a literal being and a literal place. There are no such things because they are everywhere. This is the ultimate meaning of "being and nothingness."
Oh, dang. We can't delve a little more into the chocolate sex concept............??
I'm fascinated by your conception of the afterlife. As you know, I thing if there's anything there no human has yet managed to properly describe it (let alone codify it), but my own guess (assuming anything is there to be guessed at) lies somewhere in the realm of the linked-minds idea. There would be no corporeal element at all to an afterlife; just a unified set of thoughts, capable of melding or existing singley at will.
Of course, I may have spent a little too much time with the scifi writers, as a lass, in lieu than the Bible
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Uh -- that would be THINK, not "thing," of course
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You have expressed so many of my thoughts and done it so well.
I wish I had time to read all the comments here, I'm sure they're interesting. This was a fascinating read- I linked to you in my own blog today.
You remind me of a conversation between a priest and a scientist.
"Eternal life in heaven awaits you," said the priest.
"I'll believe that when I see it," said the scientist.
"No," replied the priest. "You will see it when you believe it."
Thanks for tackling this, too. It's more fun that way.
First, if it's about the here and now, we're in trouble, because in the scheme of things, our 70-ish year lifespan is miniscule in light of time and space. De-emphasizing the majority of eternity is like saying the cherry on an ice cream sundae is all there is to the dessert.
Secondly, if nothingness were to follow death, then Christ would've lied to the thief on the cross when He said "Today you will be with me in Paradise." He also would've lied to His followers when He explained the afterlife in the parable of Lazarus and the rich man (who were both - upon death - sent to separate places in a conscious state). Which would mean that anyone who calls themselves a follower of Christ would be, in essence, calling themselves a follower of a liar and fraud. Which is why I cannot (as a Christ-follower) say that nothingness follows death. My Lord is neither liar nor lunatic.
Third... you're absolutely right - there will be a resurrection... it's another fascinating read in scripture. Resurrection cannot mean reincarnation, because Christ explicitly said "In My Father's house there are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare a place for you (conscious afterlife). And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto Myself, that where I am, there ye may be also."
Fourth... wow, when you tackle a topic, you go wayyy into it. LoL!! I never even touched salvation, wasn't quite that in-depth, was I? That's all right... we all see different focal points in the same picture. Just so long as the picture is in line with scripture, we're okay.
Anna - I obviously see things a little differently than you do, like you said, there are different perspectives. I further believe I can support my position from scripture.
In answer to your first point that my blog improperly emphasizes the here and now, I would look to the verse "Today is the day of salvation" - I believe Scripture places the emphasis on the here and now. References to heaven are almost nonexistent in the Old testament and are scarce in the New. So I would say that I have proportioned my emphasis in the same way the Holy Spirit did.
Your second point makes the assertion that there is a conscious state between death and resurrection. It doesn't follow logically that the functions of awareness continue to exist simply because the matter of the body continues to exist after death. The body decays and becomes dust, but we have no justification for believing that dust is aware.
You use as your proof texts two troublesome pericopes (I say troublesome because I believe they can be interpreted in ways that make your conclusion less certain.) First you refer to the words of Jesus to the thief on the cross. The thief says "Lord remember me when you come into your Kingdom" - Jesus answers, "Today you will be with me in Paradise." When is the Kingdom of Christ? The message Jesus preached for three years was that the Kingdom was already there - he invited people into an existent Kingdom. He spoke of the Kingdom in present tense "The Kingdom of heaven IS ..." not the Kingdom WILL BE. I would argue that it is an equally valid interpretation of his words to say that his answer to the thief referred to that moment and that day - not later after death.
Your second text is a parable. The problem with parables is that they are stories meant to illustrate a point and are not meant to be literally interpreted. The particular parable you mention isn't about what happens after death, it's about what happens in life. The rich man is saying send someone to warn them, and the answer is that seeing a messenger return from the dead will not convince them. The point of that parable is what is sufficient to cause a man to believe.
I would offer for consideration the texts that refer to people who are "asleep" in Christ. Sleeping and Conscious are two very different states of existence. It's a difficult passage and has spawned a lot of disagreement in interpretation over the years - but 1 Corinthians 15:12-58 discusses the dead in Christ. In verse 51 Paul says, "I'll tell you a secret, we won't all sleep but we will all be changed." At the second coming those who are alive will be changed instantly, but those who are sleeping must be wakened.
Paul uses the metaphor of sleep again in other passages, for example 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 - and specifically verse 16 speaks of timing - "For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God and the dead in Christ will rise first. If the dead are immediately with Christ in heaven, from where do they rise on the Day of the Lord?
I MAY be completely wrong. I know that the way I see things is not the way that many people see it. But like I said above, I believe there is enough room for interpretation of passages that discuss the dead in Christ that my view is at least worthy of consideration.
I most definetely believe in the here and now. Here and now what is important. Be your best and try your hardest. It sounds easy, but it isnt.
Without leaving a comment longer than the blog, I'll just say that you present some interesting thoughts here and I would only add that our consciousness depends on our spirits inside us and actually would have nothing to do with our bodies so we could be aware even while the body crumbles to dust. I also once read an interesting book that brought forth the idea that if we depend on time but God is timeless, it is entirely possible that everyone throughout time could actually, through death and entering into eternity, arrive at heaven at the same time.
o/ 
God Bless - Dale
I've concluded that whatever heaven is like.....there darn well better not be any dust around.....or dirt....'cause I'm NOT cleaning for eternity I tell you.....I'm NOT! They say cleanliness is next to Godliness.....so that's what I'm betting on.....no dust or dirt in heaven. What more could a Mom ask for, really?
The stuttering lump of coal here, expressing how glad I am I didn't read this before I wrote my reply. I would have just linked over here and been done with it. lol!
DawnsEarlyLight's comment made me laugh, because the idea of mansions in heaven always made me wonder if the folks in hell had to be the servants! lol...and oy! That would keep me walkin' the straight and narrow, if I believed in that heaven!
I believe that here and now is absolutely important, but not because it is all there is. It is important in our progress to the next step. I believe the Kingdom of Heaven is *within us* - not that place far away in the sky that we all have visions of now and then. The idea of streets of gold makes my human ego want to take a chisel along for the ride so I don't have money worries like I have now, and the many mansions, yes, makes me hope they have maid service. A gold crown and a blinding white robe? My human ego thinks that is a plan, but my spirit sniffs and says "I don't need no stinkin' crown".
See what I mean?
I like the metaphor of sleeping and awake. I guess my thing is to speak of those things in such a way as to not shut down those who are non-believers - to wake them gently, perhaps? - rather than be the biggest, baddest alarm clock ever heard. I figure God will take care of that, with each person, in His own time and His own way.
I feel pretty honored that this discussion is crossing lines of Christian and athiest. I don't ever want anyone to feel shut out by my faith, or that they can't participate if they choose to.
Terri. Thank you for being part of this.
I emailed you regarding the car situation.. I got her down to $5000 for you....
Very interesting. I followed Kris' blog to you, of course....
Your concept of salvation is the most succinct I have read in a while - I am currently going through a discussion with a friend of mine who espouses that notion that he has taken Christ as his personal saviour, but since I have not, I'm on the outside somehow.....you mention something very important to me - the grace of God. I think that is a very key point to salvation - we try and we fail, but through the grace of God we are accepted, our failings and all.
Your post and Kris' have got me thinking about this subject myself - perhaps I'll write about it, too.
Rather than spend a lot of time on speculation about that which I cannot know apart from revelation, I'd rather focus on what I can know. The here and now.
My feelings exactly.
And I love your warning label, by the way.
Great Blog!! I found you via Krisinluck. I'll be reading regularly
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PS... where do I get those cool smileys??
~*~ HUGS ~*~ Suz
Your blog has triggering long reactions . I will say simply I believe in God and in the resurrection but as St John says , we don' t know how we will be .
BtW , the philosoph who has written " the being and the nothingness " is the French Jean- Paul Sartre in the years 1940 . I don' t like him very much .
Love
Michel
Well said.
Mike
OK, no fair, foul, I know, I know. But one must catch up when one can.
I hope your time isn;t skewed due to my revisits to older blogs once you're up and running in the new place, but really, I can't help it.
This one was so well done, so inspired, I must say, I have a difficult time coming across in a reply as you did above to Anna's comment, becasue I fear offending, but you are right about different interpretations and I can see it from either perspecive. One thing I'm learning (present verb instead of past-have learned) is that even though so many in the christian world, even though beliefs in the basics are there, have widely and wildly differring opinions of the scriptures sited by you and Anna.
Were I to begin pulling and copying the high points from your entry, I'd be reposting in my comment, nearly your complete blog! But my favorite I think is this...
Salvation is being related to God. Right here, and right now.
The fact that a couple people (commenters on this one) who struggle with acceptance of the whole christian ideal and a God or a need to be 'saved' but accept so easily your perspective says tons! You're not church speaking, you're real. It's real for you, to you. That's something not found often within the walls of many an established church these days, sad, but true.
Thanks for another profound and heart-changing entry. we can always count on you Terri.
Now hurry and get back online up there!
hugs,
Deb
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