Terri Schiavo and the State of the Soul

I'm gonna have to disagree with Donald Sensing at One Hand Clapping in his post "What about Terri's Schiavo's Soul?"  I do this advisedly, recognizing that he is kind of the dean (well maybe co-dean, along with Mark Roberts) of blogging pastors and is unusually erudite and well-spoken.

His post was in response to a question he received about the state of Terri's soul, or the state of the soul of anyone in a persistent vegetative state.  The post is mostly a theological reflection on the relation of the soul to the body and the state of man after death.  So, it really doesn't get into the Schiavo debate very much.

Donald's contention is that our common understanding of the soul as a separate entity from the body, owes its existence to Greek thought rather than biblical thought.  His contention is that the biblical picture is that you can't separate the two. He cites the Abingdon Dictionary of Theology as follows:

The word "soul" has a very different meaning for the biblical writers from the understanding that we usually assign to it. The Hebrew word often translated as “soul” basically means "breath," and is often used simply to designate "a living being" (not always a human, sometimes an animal). The Hebrew word, along with its New Testament Greek equivalent, can mean "life," and even "person" or "self." Both the Hebrew and the Greek words used in the Bible can stand for the unity of personality, since the Jews conceived of human beings as a unity, rather than as a duality of body and soul. In fact, there is no distinctive word for "body" in Hebrew; one is not needed because there is no separate part of a human being, distinct from that person's "soul," that needs to be so distinguished. In the New Testament, Paul uses "body" as a collective noun for the unity of the flesh and soul. He never makes a hard and fast distinction between the two. The biblical view of human being is we are whole persons with no part detachable. We do not have bodies, we are bodies. We are flesh-in-unity-with-soul. (Derived from "Soul," in The Abingdon Dictionary of Theology.)

Given that understanding of the unity of soul and body he says that when we die, all of us dies.  He contends that death is the destruction of the entire person.

In saying this, he doesn't deny the resurrection of the body, in fact he affirms it.

We die in God’s grace. Though dead, we are not abandoned. We are not forgotten by God to oblivion. The promise of Christian faith is the resurrection. The thrust of Jesus’ and the apostles’ teachings is not that we continue to live after death, but that we will live again after we die. By the power of God we will live again in the resurrection yet to come. We know this because Jesus Christ lived and died and was resurrected. Paul knew Jesus' resurrection was the first of the general resurrection yet to come. Jesus Christ is God's bond and proof that God will accomplish what God promises: that we will live again, and forever, after we die. God, having created us once, will re-create us again.

He advocates a kind of "soul-sleep" where, after death, the next thing we are aware of is the general resurrection.  He cites Luther as an advocate of this position of "soul sleep."  Basically when we die we lose consciousness of things here on earth and the next thing we are aware of is the eternal state.

In one's subjective experience, then, the next moment of awareness after death is the resurrection. In this way it makes perfect sense to say that when one dies s/he goes immediately to be with the Lord because, as far as the person is concerned, that's what happened. Subjectively, one passes instantly from death to new life.

He's not being contentious about this matter, so I don't want to be either.  He is aware that there is Scripture which seems to contradict his view, but he just wants to get it out there.

In the same spirit of non-contentiousness, I argue that the Scripture is clear that there is a difference between soul and body.  As I go through all of this I hope I don't come across as being on the attack.  This is really more of a good theological exercise for me than it is an attack on him.  I want to be clear that I am arguing one point and one point only with Donald and that is the relationship of the soul to the body.  There is much of what he has said that I affirm.   I think that the relationship of the soul to the body is something we can distinguish but not separate.  The soul and body are different things but they are bound up together as a unity.  Though I am quibbling on this one matter, I affirm what is implied here as a high view of bodily existence.

So, on to the argument . . .

First of all, we ought to be careful about building a doctrine on the meaning of a word in the original language.  While the good folks who wrote the Abingdon Dictionary are far smarter than I, the excerpt that Donald quoted from them shouldn't be taken too far.  What they have said reflects a faulty understanding of language.

It has become common in recent decades to load a great amount of weight into the meaning of words.  This is what the whole Kittel project was all about and it is what James Barr and others have criticized them so vociferously about.  There is a mentality that every word has a "root" meaning or an etomology which, if we can get at, will uncover for us the literal essence of the word.
But this is not how words are used.  The meaning of a word is determined by it's context.  One of my favorite examples is the sentence "my wife is hot."  What does the word "hot" mean in that sentence?  It can mean:

• It is very hot outside and she is feeling the effects of the sun.
• She has a fever and is sick.
• She is very goood looking, she is sexy.
• It can mean that she is cold - for example.  Let's say the heat is out in our house and the repairman comes in the door and asks how we're doing.  I point to my wife who is sitting on the couch shivering from the cold and say in a sarcastic tone - "can't you see how hot my wife is."  In that context the tone tells you that I mean the opposite of what the word means.
• It can mean she is angry.  I used this illustration one time and a guy said, "knowing you Dave, it means you've done something really stupid and she is really mad at you."

The word "gay" is another example.  The etymology of the word really doesn't help you understand it's common use today.

So my point is that there could be more than one concept illustrated by the word "soul."  In this case, at least in the Greek, there are several concepts that the word "soul" can point to.

The Bauer, Arndt, Danker and Gingrich lexicon says this about the Greek word for soul -

soul life; it is oft. impossible to draw hard and fast lines betw. the meanings of this many-sided word

Then the lexicon goes on to speak of the many different ways this word is used in classical  and biblical literature.  It is often used in exactly the way that Donald and the Abingdon Dictionary quote.  But it is also used in reference to the inner life and that which transcends this earthly life.  My point is simply to say that the information Donald and the Abingdon Dictionary gives is correct, but incomplete.  There is not a single meaning of the word "soul" that can be imported into every usage of the word. Thus, we ought not to build a theology on the meaning of this word.

John Frame says that the basic unit of meaning is the sentence, not the word.  Of course there is a reciprocal relationship in that the words of a sentence build the meaning of the sentence, and yet the overall context of the sentence helps determine the meaning of the words.  But my point in bringing this up is to say that we ought to look at clear biblical statements to understand the state of the soul instead of relying on one aspect of the meaning of a word.  The key passage in this regard is II Corinthians 5:1-10:

         Now we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. 2 Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, 3 because when we are clothed, we will not be found naked. 4 For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened, because we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 5 Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.

    6 Therefore we are always confident and know that as long as we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord. 7 We live by faith, not by sight. 8 We are confident, I say, and would prefer to be away from the body and at home with the Lord. 9 So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
    The Holy Bible  : New International Version. 1996, c1984 . Zondervan: Grand Rapids

In this passage in verses 1-2 Paul speaks of three states of being for the Christian - our time in our earthly tent, and a time when we are clothed with our heavenly dwelling.   The third is a time when we are "unclothed" or "naked." The time of our earthly tent would be now, while we live in the flesh here on earth and the time when we are clothed with our heavenly dwelling would be in the new heavens and new earth, after the return of Christ and the general resurrection.  It is possible to interpret verses 6 and 8 to say that to be away from the body (i.e. away from the earthly tent) is to be in the eternal, resurrected state.  But it's that whole idea of being "naked" or "unclothed" that lends credence to the idea that there is an intermediate state where the soul is present with the Lord while the body is not.  This is a state of disembodied, yet conscious, existence.

Such a view is supported by the story of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31.  In that story the rich man and Lazarus are in their respective places - Abraham and Lazarus exist in a place of evident blessedness while the rich man exists in a place of torment.  They exist in these states while the rich man's brothers exist on earth.  Of course there is imagery in this story that indicates the rich man is experiencing bodily pains.  But if these physical pains were taken literally then the bodily existence of the rich man would indicate he is in the eternal state.  This would pose a problem in that there would seem to be a realm of earthly existence which is separate from the earthly eternal state.  It seems better to think that the physical pains of the rich man are to be taken figuratively and that this is describing an intermediate state.

And then there is Revelation 6:9-10:

9 When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?”
The Holy Bible : New International Version. 1996, c1984 . Zondervan: Grand Rapids

In this case, there are disembodied souls under the altar crying out for vengeance for their blood which was slain.  This would indicate that they exist in their disembodied state prior to the second coming and general resurrection.

Donald closes with an illustration from a computer hard drive.  He says that after death we exist in the mind of God the way the data on a computer hard drive exists on some kind of backup disc.  In other words, when a hard drive crashes, all of the data that was on that hard drive is still there, stored on the backup disc.  All of that data can be easily restored.  Similarly, our death is like a hard drive crash.  We cease to exist here but we exist in the mind of God and He restores us at the general resurrection.  Since I think the Scripture is clear that we do exist in a disembodied state I would argue that we exist in the mind of God and in that disembodied state.

What Donald does do very well in this post is portray the glories of the resurrected state as he says:

By the power of God we will live again in the resurrection yet to come. We know this because Jesus Christ lived and died and was resurrected. Paul knew Jesus' resurrection was the first of the general resurrection yet to come. Jesus Christ is God's bond and proof that God will accomplish what God promises: that we will live again, and forever, after we die. God, having created us once, will re-create us again.

I have disagreed with him about what happens between the time we die and the time Christ returns, but one thing I want to point out is that a disembodied state, though a blessed state, is not a perfect state.  In fact, it is not the most desirable state as can be seen in Paul's words where he says that he does not wish to be unclothed.  The souls of believers in heaven are blessed and happy to be there, but they are eagerly longing for the eternal state where Christ will bring justice and where they will be reunited with their bodies.  I wholeheartedly agree with the implications of what Donald is saying - that redemption is for the whole of man, body and soul.

I am not sure how this directly affects the Terri Schiavo case.  Her eternal destiny is not riding on the actions of Michael Schiavo or the courts.  Donald and I agree that, if she is a believer, she will spend eternity in the presence of the Lord and his people.  We may disagree on what happens between now and the eternal state but we agree on the ultimate matter of her eternal destiny.