Immortality or Resurrection? (Part II)

We must take into account what it meant for the Christians when they proclaimed: Christ is risen from the dead! Above all we must bear in mind what death meant for them. We are tempted to associate these powerful affirmations with the Greek thought of the immortality of the soul, and in this way to rob them of their content. Christ is risen: that is, we stand in the new era in which death is conquered, in which corruptibility is no more. For if there is really one spiritual body (not an immortal soul, but a spiritual body) which has emerged from a fleshly body, then indeed the power of death is broken. Believers, according to the conviction of the first Christians, shall no more die: this was certainly their expectation in the earliest time. It must have been a problem when they ascertained that Christians continued to die. But even the fact that men continue to die no longer has the same significance after the resurrection of Christ. The fact of death is robbed of its former significance. Dying is no longer an expression of the absolute lordship of Death, but only one of Death’s last contentions for lordship. Death cannot put an end to the great fact that there is one risen body.

We should attempt simply to understand what the Christians meant when they spoke of Christ as being the “first-born from the dead.” However difficult it may be for us to do so, we must above all eliminate the question of whether or not we can accept this belief. We must also at the very start leave to one side the question of whether Socrates or the New Testament is right. Otherwise we shall find ourselves continually mixing alien thought-processes with those of the New Testament. We should for once simply listen to what the New Testament says. Christ the first-born from the dead! His body the first resurrection body, the first spiritual body. Where this conviction is present, the whole of life and the whole of thought must be influenced by it. The whole thought of the New Testament remains for us a book sealed with seven seals when we do not read behind every sentence there this other sentence: Death has already been overcome (but really death: not the body); there is already a new creation (but really a new creation: not an immortality which the soul has always possessed); the resurrection age is already inaugurated.

Granted that it is only inaugurated, but still decisively inaugurated. Only inaugurated: for death is still at work, and Christians still die. The disciples experienced this as the first members of the Christian community died. This necessarily presented them with a difficult problem. In 1 Corinthians 11:30 Paul writes that basically death and sickness should no longer occur. We still die, and still there is sickness and sin. But the Holy Spirit is already effective in our world as the power of new creation; he is already at work visibly in the primitive community in the diverse manifestations of the Spirit. In my book Christ and Time I have spoken of a tension between present and future, the tension between “already fulfilled” and “not yet consummated.” This tension belongs essentially to the New Testament and is not introduced as a secondary solution born of embarrassment, as Albert Schweitzer’s disciples and as Rudolph Bultmann maintain. This tension is already present in and with Jesus. He proclaims the Kingdom of God for the future; but on the other hand he proclaims that the Kingdom of God has already broken in, since he himself with the Holy Spirit is indeed already repulsing death by healing the sick and raising the dead (Matt. 12:28; 11:3 ff.; Luke 10:18) in anticipation of the victory over death which he obtains in his own death. Schweitzer is not right when he sees as the original Christian hope only a hope in the future; nor is C. H. Dodd, when he speaks only of realized eschatology; and Bultmann is even less right when he resolves the original hope of Jesus and the first Christians into existentialism. It belongs constitutively to the New Testament that it thinks in temporal categories, and this is because the belief that the resurrection is achieved in Christ is the starting point of all Christian living and thinking. When one proceeds from this principle, then the chronological tension between “already fulfilled” and “not yet consummated” constitutes the essence of the Christian faith. Then the figure I use in Christ and Time must characterize the whole New Testament situation: the decisive battle has been fought in Christ’s death and resurrection; only V-day is yet to come.

Basically the whole contemporary theological discussion turns upon this question: Is Easier the starting point of the Christian Church, of its existence, life, and thought? If so, we are living in an interim time.

In this case, the resurrection faith of the New Testament becomes the cardinal point of all Christian belief. Accordingly, the fact that there is a resurrection body—Christ’s body—defines the first Christians’ whole interpretation of time. If Christ is the “first-born from the dead,” then this means that the End-time is already present. But it also means that a temporal interval separates the first-born from all other men who are not yet “born from the dead.” This means then that we live in an interim time, between Jesus’ resurrection, which has already taken place, and our own, which will not take place until the End. It also means, moreover, that the quickening Power, the Holy Spirit, is already at work among us. Therefore Paul designates the Holy Spirit by the same term—first-fruits (Rom. 8:23)—which he uses for Jesus himself (1 Cor. 15:23). There is then already a foretaste of the resurrection. And indeed in a twofold way: our inner man is already being renewed from day to day by the Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 4:16; Eph. 3:16); the body also has already been laid hold of by the Spirit, although the flesh still has its citadel within it. Wherever the Holy Spirit appears, the vanquished power of death recoils, even in the body. Hence miracles of healing occur even in our still mortal body. To the despairing cry in Rom. 7:24, “Who shall deliver me from this body of death?” the whole New Testament answers: The Holy Spirit!

The foretaste of the End, realized through the Holy Spirit, becomes most clearly visible in the early Christian celebration of the breaking of bread. Visible miracles of the Spirit occur there. There the Spirit tries to break through the limits of imperfect human language in the speaking with tongues. And there the community passes over into direct connection with the Risen One, not only with his soul, but also with his resurrection body. Therefore we hear in 1 Corinthians 10:16: “The bread we break, is it not communion with the body of Christ?” Here in communion with the brethren we come nearest to the resurrection body of Christ; and so Paul writes in the following chapter 11 (a passage which has received far too little consideration): if this Lord’s Supper were partaken of by all members of the community in a completely worthy manner, then the union with Jesus’ resurrection body would be so effective in our own bodies that even now there would be no more sickness or death (1 Cor. 11:28–30)—a singularly bold assertion. Therefore the community is described as the body of Christ, because here the spiritual body of Christ is present, because here we come closest to it; here in the common meal the first disciples at Easter saw Jesus’ resurrection body, his spiritual body.

Yet in spite of the fact that the Holy Spirit is already so powerfully at work, men still die; even after Easter and Pentecost men continue to die as before. Our body remains mortal and subject to sickness. Its transformation into the spiritual body does not take place until the whole creation is formed anew by God. Then only for the first time there will be nothing but Spirit, nothing but the power of life, for then death will be destroyed with finality. Then there will be a new substance for all things visible. Instead of the fleshly matter there appears the spiritual. That is, instead of corruptible matter there appears the incorruptible. The visible and invisible will be spirit. But let us make no mistake: this is certainly not the Greek sense of bodiless Idea! A new heaven and a new earth! That is the Christian hope. And then will our bodies also rise from the dead. Yet not as fleshly bodies, but as spiritual bodies.

The expression which stands in the ancient Greek texts of the Apostles’ Creed is quite certainly not Biblical: “I believe in the resurrection of the flesh!” Paul could not say that. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom. Paul believes in the resurrection of the body, not of the flesh. The flesh is the power of death, which must be destroyed. This error in the Greek creed made its entrance in a time when the Biblical terminology had been misconstrued in the sense of Greek anthropology. Our body, moreover (not merely our soul), will be raised at the End, when the quickening power of the Spirit makes all things new, all things without exception.

An incorruptible body! How are we to conceive this? Or better, how did the first Christians conceive of it? Paul says in Philippians 3:21 that at the End Christ will transform our mean body into the body of his own glory, just as in 2 Corinthians 3:18: “We are being transformed into his own likeness from glory to glory.”

… This glory was conceived by the first Christians as a sort of material-like light; but this is only an imperfect comparison. Our language has no word for it.…

IV

And now we come to the last question. When does this transformation of the body take place? No doubt can remain on this point. The whole New Testament answers:

at the End, and this is to be understood literally, that is, temporally. That raises the question of the “interim condition” of the dead. Death is indeed already conquered according to 2 Timothy 1:10: “Christ has conquered death and has already brought life and incorruptibility to light.” The chronological tension of which I always speak touches precisely this central point: death is conquered; but it will not be abolished until the End. According to 1 Corinthians 15:26, death will be conquered as the last enemy. It is significant that in the Greek the same verb katargeo is used to describe both the already accomplished, decisive victory and the not-yet-consummated victory at the end. John’s Apocalypse 20:14 describes the victory at the end, the annihilation of Death: Death will be cast into a pool of fire; and a few verses further on it is said, Death will be no more.

That means, however, that the transformation of the body does not occur immediately after each individual death. Here too we must once again guard against any accommodation to Greek philosophy, if we wish to understand the New Testament doctrine. This is the point where I cannot accept Karl Barth’s position as a simple restatement of the original Christian view, not even his position in the Church Dogmatics, where it is subtly shaded and comes much nearer to New Testament eschatology than in his first writings. Karl Barth considers it to be the New Testament interpretation that the transformation of the body occurs for everyone immediately after his individual death—as if the dead were no longer in time. Nevertheless, according to the New Testament, they are still in time. Otherwise, the problem in 1 Thessalonians 4:13 ff. would have no meaning. Here in fact Paul is concerned to show that at the moment of Christ’s return “those who are then alive will have no advantage” over those who have died in Christ. Therefore the dead in Christ are still in time; they, too, are waiting. “How long, oh Lord?” cry the martyrs who are sleeping under the altar in John’s Apocalypse (6:10). The saying on the cross, “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43); the parable of the rich man, where Lazarus is carried directly to Abraham’s bosom (Luke 16:22); and Paul’s saying, “I desire to die and to be with Christ” (Phil. 1:23)—these passages do not prove, as is maintained time and again, that in these passages it is to be considered that the resurrection of the body takes place immediately after the individual death. In none of these texts is there so much as a word about the resurrection of the body. It is rather the case that here in these different images is discussed the condition of those who die in Christ before the End—this interim state in which they also, as well as the living, find themselves. All these images express merely a special proximity to Christ, in which those dying in Christ before the End find themselves. They are “with Christ” or “in paradise” or “in Abraham’s bosom” or, according to Revelation 6:9, “under the altar.” All these are merely various images of the special nearness to God. But the most usual image for Paul is: “they are asleep.” It would be difficult to dispute that the New Testament reckons with such an interim time for the dead, as well as for the living, although any speculation upon the state of the dead in this interim period is lacking here.

The dead in Christ share in the tension of the interim time. But this means not only that they are waiting. It means that for them, too, something decisive happened with Jesus’ death and resurrection. For them, too, Easter is the great turning point (Matt. 27:52). This new situation created by Easter leads us to see at least the possibility of a common bond with Socrates, not with his teaching, but with his own behavior in the face of death. Death has lost its horror, its “sting.” At bottom, though it remains as the last enemy, Death has significance no longer. If the resurrection of Christ were to designate the great turning-point of the ages only for the living and not for the dead also, then the living would surely have an immense advantage over the dead. For as members of Christ’s community the living are indeed even now in possession of the power of the resurrection, the Holy Spirit. It is unthinkable that according to the early Christian point of view nothing should be altered for the dead in the period before the End. It is precisely these images used in the New Testament to describe the condition of the dead in Christ which prove that even now, in this interim-state of the dead, the resurrection of Christ—the anticipation of the End—is already effective. They are “with Christ.”

Particularly in 2 Corinthians 5:1–10 we hear why it is that the dead, although they do not yet have a body and are only “sleeping,” nevertheless are in special proximity to Christ. Paul speaks here of the natural anxiety which even he feels before death, which still maintains its effectiveness. He fears the condition of “nakedness,” as he calls it; that is, the condition of the inner man who has no body. This natural dread of death, therefore, has not disappeared. Paul would like, as he says, to receive a spiritual body in addition, directly (ependusasthai) while still living, without undergoing death. That is, he would like to be still alive at the time of Christ’s return. Here once again we find confirmation of what we said about Jesus’ fear of death. But now we see also something new: in this same text alongside this natural anxiety about the soul’s nakedness stands the great confidence in Christ’s proximity, even in this interim state. What is there to be afraid of in the fact that such an interim condition still exists? The confidence in Christ’s proximity is grounded in the reality that our inner man already is grasped by the Holy Spirit. Since the time of Christ, we the living do indeed have the Holy Spirit. If he is actually within us, he has already transformed our inner man. But, as we have heard, the Holy Spirit is the power of life. Death can do him no harm. Therefore something is changed even for the dead, for those who really die in Christ, in possession of the Holy Spirit. The horrible abandonment in death, the separation from God, of which we have spoken, no longer exists, because the Holy Spirit does exist. Therefore the New Testament emphasizes that the dead are indeed with Christ, and therefore not abandoned. Thus we understand how it is that, just in 2 Corinthians 5:1 ff., where he mentions the fear of disembodiment in the interim-time, Paul describes the Holy Spirit as the “earnest.”

Here we find connected, fear of a bodiless condition and firm confidence that even in this condition no separation from Christ supervenes (among the powers which cannot separate us from the love of God in Christ is death—Rom. 8:38). This fear and this confidence are bound together in 2 Corinthians 5, and this confirms the fact that even the dead share in the present tension. Confidence predominates, however, for the decision has indeed been made. Death is conquered. The inner man, divested of the body, is no longer alone; he does not lead the shadowy existence which the Jews expected and which cannot be described as life. The inner man, divested of the body, has already in his lifetime been transformed by the Holy Spirit, is already grasped by the resurrection (Rom. 6:3 ff.; John 3:3 ff.), if he has already as a living person really been renewed by the Holy Spirit; although he still “sleeps” and still awaits the resurrection of the body, which alone will give him full life. Thus, even in this state, death has lost its terror, although it still exists. And thus the dead who died in the Lord can actually be blessed “from now on,” as the author of the Johannine Apocalypse says (14:13). What is said in 1 Corinthians 15:54b, 55 pertains also to the dead: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?” So the apostle in Rom. 14 writes: “Whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord” (v.8). Christ is “Lord of the living and the dead” (v.9).

One could ask whether in this fashion we have not been led back again, in the last analysis, to the Greek teaching of immortality, whether the New Testament does not assume, for the time after Easter, a continuity of the “inner Man” of converted people before and after death, so that here, too, death is presented for all practical purposes only as a natural “transition.” There is a sense in which a kind of approximation to the Greek teaching does actually take place, to the extent that the inner man, who has already been transformed by the Spirit (Rom. 6:3 ff.), and consequently made alive, continues to live with Christ in this transformed state, in the condition of sleep. This continuity is emphasized especially strongly in the Gospel of John (3:36; 4:14; 6:54; and frequently). Here we observe at least a certain analogy to the “immortality of the soul,” but the distinction remains none the less radical. Further, the condition of the dead in Christ is still imperfect, a state of “nakedness,” as Paul says, of “sleep,” of waiting for the resurrection of the whole creation, for the resurrection of the body. On the other hand, death in the New Testament continues to be the enemy, albeit a defeated enemy, who must yet be destroyed. The fact that even in this state the dead are already living with Christ does not correspond to the natural essence of the soul. Rather it is the result of a divine intervention from outside, through the Holy Spirit, who must have already quickened the inner man in earthly life by his miraculous power.

Thus it is still true that the resurrection of the body is awaited even in John’s Gospel—now, of course, with a certainty of victory because the Holy Spirit already dwells in the inner man. Hence no doubt can arise any more: since it already dwells in the inner man, it will certainly transform the body. For the Holy Spirit, this quickening power, penetrates everything and knows no barrier. If he is really within a man, then he will quicken the whole man. So Paul writes in Romans 8:11: “If the Spirit dwells in you, then will he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead call your mortal bodies to life also through the Spirit dwelling in you.” In Philippians 3:21: “We wait for the Lord Jesus Christ, who will conform our mean body to the body of his glory.” Nothing is said in the New Testament about the details of the interim conditions. We only hear: we are nearer to God.

We wait, and the dead wait. Of course the rhythm of time may be different for them than for the living; and in this way the interim-time may be shortened for them. This does not, indeed, go beyond the New Testament texts and their exegesis, because this expression to sleep, which is the customary designation in the New Testament of the “interim condition,” compels us to the view that for the dead another time-consciousness exists, that of the “sleeping.” But that does not mean that the dead are not still in time. Therefore once again we see that the New Testament resurrection hope is different from the Greek belief in immortality.

On his missionary journeys Paul surely met people who were unable to believe in his preaching of the resurrection for the very reason that they believed in the immortality of the soul. Thus in Athens there was no laughter until Paul spoke of the resurrection (Acts 17:32). Both the people of whom Paul says (in 1 Thess. 4:13) that “they have no hope” and those of whom he writes (in 1 Cor. 15:12) that they do not believe there is a resurrection from the dead are probably not Epicureans, as we are inclined to believe. Even those who believe in the immortality of the soul do not have the hope of which Paul speaks, the hope which expresses the belief of a divine miracle of new creation which will embrace everything, every part of the world created by God. Indeed for the Greeks who believed in the immortality of the soul it may have been harder to accept the Christian preaching of the resurrection than it was for others. About the year 150 Justin (in his Dialogue, 80) writes of the sort of people, “who say that there is no resurrection from the dead, but that immediately at death their souls would ascend to heaven.” Here the contrast is indeed clearly perceived.

The emperor Marcus Aurelius, this philosopher who belongs with Socrates among the noblest figures of antiquity, also perceived the contrast. As is well known, he had the deepest contempt for Christianity. One might think that the death of the Christian martyrs would have inspired respect in this great Stoic who regarded death with equanimity. But it was just the martyrs’ death with which he was least sympathetic. The whole alacrity with which the Christians met their death displeased him. The Stoic departed this life dispassionately; the Christian martyr on the other hand died with spirited passion for the cause of Christ, because he knew that by doing so he stood within a powerful redemptive process. The first Christian martyr, Stephen, shows us (Acts 7:55) how death is bested quite otherwise by him who dies in Christ than by the ancient philosopher: he sees, as it is said, “the heavens open and Christ standing at the right hand of God!” He sees Christ, the conqueror of death. With this faith that the death he must undergo is already conquered by him who has himself endured it, Stephen lets himself be stoned.

The answer to the question, “Immortality of the soul or resurrection of the dead in the New Testament,” is unequivocal.…

Oscar Cullmann is Dean of the Theological Faculty of the University of Basel and Professor of the Sorbonne in Paris. He holds the degrees D.Theol., D.D. (Edin.) and D.D. (Manchester). This two-part article comprises most of Dr. Cullmann’s Ingersoll Lecture for 1954–55 at Harvard University. The complete text (including footnotes), copyrighted 1958 by Dr. Cullmann, has just been published under the title Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead? by The Macmillan Company, with whose permission, as well as Dr. Cullmann’s, this excerpt is used. This same material is being published in Great Britain by the Epworth Press of London.

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