Introductory Notes
- My intention is to supply comments to the Author’s Introduction as footnotes thereto.
- Then I will add comments – and a summary – of the rest of the paper below.
Author's Introduction
- "I believe in ... the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. Amen." With these words the Apostle's Creed1 comes to a close, and with them also it expresses, I think, an important element in the orthodox Christian faith. As a very minimum this element involves the claim that the lives of at least some human beings do not come to a permanent end with their bodily deaths here, but that these individuals will either continue their lives beyond the incident of death or else that they will resume their lives at some point in the future, and that this continued or resumed2 life will be everlasting3. An additional element seems to be the claim that this continued or resumed life will be a bodily life, and that it involves the resurrection - presumably somehow or other a reconstitution4 - of the body which died here.
- Naturally, one might think of critical questions to ask about this belief, such as that of what reason or justification5 might be given in favor of supposing that it is true, or that of how such an apparently difficult operation might be accomplished6. I think that Christians have usually been inclined to answer the former of these questions by saying that one knows of such things primarily by the revelation of God. And they usually have not thought of much of interest to say about the second question beyond saying that the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting are gifts of God, who is presumably able to do such things. In this paper I do not intend to pursue these questions at all, and so I will say nothing7 either in support or in criticism of such answers.
- I turn, instead, to a somewhat different question, one which some philosophers apparently think is somehow prior to the questions I have just mentioned. This is the question of what, if any, sense can be made out of the identification8 of the persons who live the life everlasting with persons who began their careers in this world and died here. Some philosophers not only think that this question is prior to the others I have just mentioned - they apparently think it is the only philosophical question about immortality and similar topics. John Passmore, for example, writes, "As for immortality, there have often been doubts about whether this is really a question for philosophy. But insofar as it is, the question is whether it is possible to identify the being who is said to live after death with the living being by any of the ordinary means used in identification - that is, the means by which we determine whether we are both talking about the same person" ([3]: 223).
Works Cited
- These are surprisingly few, and aren’t really from the usual suspects. Two are from a huge encyclopedia and aren’t worth following up.
- Maybe at the time of writing – 1977 – the question was rather niche – and – as Passmore says – not considered philosophical.
- Anyway, the 4 works cited are:-
- Antony Flew, "Immortality," in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy edited by Paul Edwards, Vol. 4, 1967. This is excerpted as "Flew (Antony) - The Cartesian Assumption" in "Edwards (Paul), Ed. - Immortality".
- "Geach (Peter) - Identity".
- John Passmore, "Philosophy," in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy edited by Paul Edwards, Vol. 6.
- "Penelhum (Terence) - Survival and Disembodied Existence".
Notes
- Antony Flew quoted as pointing out the difficulty of the resurrected person being either a ‘mere replica’ or a ‘brilliant forgery’. Mavrodes says there’s no satisfactory answer on the basis of a ‘pure reconstitution9’ theory of resurrection.
- …
- Further comments to be supplied!
Comment:
In-Page Footnotes
Footnote 1:
- This paper presumably assumes that he Apostles Creed is in concord with Scripture, or else supersedes or clarifies it.
- In this case, the Creed is so vague as to be unobjectionable – though it does stress a resurrection of the body, which is not what the man in the street thinks of as life after death.
Footnote 2:
- This is an important distinction.
- Presumably, a ‘continued’ life continues on without intermission, either by an immediate resurrection, or by the continuation of mental life in some way unspecified.
- There’s a question whether a ‘continued’ life really involves a death.
Footnote 3:
- Whether this is a good thing – even if initially pleasant – is disputed.
- See my Note on the Makropulos Case.
Footnote 4:
- It could be a continued bodily life without involving any connection to the body that died.
- This would raise questions as to why the continued life is the same one – and why the resurrected person is the same one – that died.
Footnote 5:
- Really, this can only be from the testimony of the Bible.
- Believers in Reincarnation have some slim hope of interrogating allegedly reincarnated individuals.
- I’m not clear on whether reincarnation is – strictly-speaking – resurrection, given that transmigration can be involved and it’s the Soul rather than the body that is said to continue.
Footnote 6:
- Because divine omnipotence is invoked, in the context of the argument merely practical difficulties can be ignored.
- What cannot be ignored are logical difficulties or matters suggesting the idea is incoherent.
- The ‘believer’ – as the author claims – needn’t bother his head on such matters, maybe, trusting to God who has promised.
- However, the philosopher has to get to grips with the problems.
Footnote 7: Footnote 8: Footnote 9:
Text Colour Conventions (see disclaimer)
- Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2025
- Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)