Greek Thought on the After-Life: Its Influence on Christian Teachings

APPENDIX III: Greek Thoughts on the Afterlife

by Inge Anderson

As noted in the body of the paper, Eternal Life - Gift of God or Man's Inherent Nature? the Bible provides no grounds for the popular concept of an immortal soul existing independent of the body. How then has this concept become so widely accepted in Christian circles?

The answer lies in the uncritical acceptance of "educated" thinking prevalent at the time that the early church became the state church, some time in the fourth century.

The Greeks had been the undisputed arbiters of wisdom and knowledge for centuries, demonstrating that the pen is indeed mightier than the sword, as they conquered their military conquerors with their philosophies. Even today much of the anti-biblical philosophy entering education, politics, and religion has its roots in the teaching of the ancient Greeks. "Educated" Jews had absorbed their teaching, as indicated in Appendix II. The apostolic church discarded the rubbish of accumulated tradition and again taught clearly that man’s life is dependent on the Creator, that the first death is an intermediary state best compared to sleep, and that eternal rewards and punishments are to be dispensed after the resurrection. However, when the church gained political power, the main body adopted the popular concepts of the day, just as Christian churches in the 20th Century have generally accepted the basic tenets of the evolutionary theory, adapting it only slightly to make it "theistic." What follows is a rather lengthy excerpt from Plato’s Dialogues which documents the roots of "immortal soulism" in the western world. The reader will also note the basis of "Christian" asceticism and monasticism.

May the reader recall that Plato was the star pupil of Socrates, and we have record of the teachings of Socrates only through the writings of Plato. The Dialogues, as Plato records them, are supposedly between Socrates and his pupils.

This extract is from "Phaedo," Plato: Five Great Dialogues, trans. B. Jowett, ed. Louise Ropes Loomis (Roslyn, NY: Walter J. Black, Inc., 1942), beginning on p. 93* in my hard copy:

". . . Do we believe that there is such a thing as death?"

"To be sure," replied Simmias.

"Is it not the separation of soul and body? And to be dead is the completion of this; when the soul exists in herself, and is released from the body and the body is released from the soul, what is this but death?"

"Just so," he replied.

– Plato, p. 93

"What again shall we say of the actual acquirement of knowledge? Is the body, if invited to share in the inquiry, a hinderer or a helper? I mean to say, have sight and hearing any truth in them? Are they not, as the poets are always telling us, inaccurate witnesses? And yet, if even they are inaccurate and indistinct, what is to be said of the other senses – for you will allow that they are the best of them?"

"Certainly," he replied.

"Then when does the soul attain truth? – for in attempting to consider anything in company with the body she is obviously deceived."

"True."

"Then must not true existence be revealed to her in thought, if at all?"

"Yes."

"And thought is best when the mind is gathered into herself and none of these things trouble her – neither sounds nor sights nor pain nor any pleasure – when she takes leave of the body, and has as little as possible to do with it, when she has no bodily sense or desire, but is aspiring after true being?"

"Certainly."

"And in this the philosopher dishonors the body; his soul runs away from his body and desires to be alone and by herself?"

"That is true."

"Well, but there is another thing, Simmias: Is there or is there not an absolute justice?"

"Assuredly there is."

"And an absolute beauty and absolute good?"

"Of course."

"But did you ever behold any of them with your eyes?"

"Certainly not."

"Or did you ever reach them with any other bodily sense? – and I speak not of these alone, but of absolute greatness, and health, and strength, and of the essence or true nature of everything. Has the reality of them ever been perceived by you through the bodily organs? or rather, is not the nearest approach to the knowledge of their several natures made by him who so orders his intellectual vision as to have the most exact conception of the essence of each thing which he considers?"

"Certainly."

"And he attains to the purest knowledge of them who goes to each with the mind alone, not introducing or intruding in the act of thought sight or any other sense together with reason, but with the very light of the mind in her own clearness searches into the very truth of each; he who has got rid, as far as he can, of eyes and ears and, so to speak of the whole body, these being in his opinion distracting elements which when they infect the soul hinder her from acquiring truth and knowledge – who, if not he, is likely to attain to the knowledge of true being?"

"What you say has a wonderful truth in it, Socrates," replied Simmias.

"And when real philosophers consider all these things, will they not be led to make a reflection which they will express in words something like the following? ‘Have we not found,’ they will say, ‘a path of thought which seems to bring us and our argument to the conclusion, that while we are in the body, and while the soul is infected with the evils of the body, our desire will not be satisfied? and our desire is of the truth. For the body is a source of endless trouble to us by reason of the mere requirement of food; and is liable also to diseases which overtake and impede us in the search after true being: it fills us full of loves, and lusts, and fears, and fancies of all kinds, and endless foolery, and in fact, as men say, takes away from us the power of thinking at all. … It has been proved to us by experience that if we would have pure knowledge of anything we must be quit of the body – the soul in herself must behold things in themselves: and then we shall attain the wisdom which we desire, and of which we say that we are lovers; not while we live, but after death; for if while in company with the body, the soul cannot have pure knowledge, one of two things follows – either knowledge is not to be attained at all, or, if at all, after death. For then, and not till then, the soul will be parted from the body and exist in herself alone. … ’"

. . .

"And what is purification but the separation of soul from the body, as I was saying before; the habit of the soul gathering and collecting herself into herself from all sides out of the body; the dwelling in her own place alone, as in another life, so also in this, as far as she can; the release of the soul from the chains of the body?"

"Very true," he said.

"And this separation and release of the soul from the body is termed death?"

"To be sure," he said.

"And the true philosophers, and they only, are ever seeking to release the soul. Is not the separation and release of the soul from the body their especial study?"

"That is true."

"And, as I was saying at first, there would be a ridiculous contradiction in men studying to live as nearly as they can in a state of death, and yet repining when it comes upon them."

"Clearly."

"And the true philosophers, Simmias, are always occupied in the practice of dying, wherefore also to them least of all men is death terrible. … "

– Plato, p. 94 - 97

As is evident from this short excerpt, in the teachings of Plato are found the seeds of the doctrine of an immortal soul with an existence distinct from the body, as well as the basis for asceticism, monasticism, and gnosticism. (Socrates and Plato did not originate these doctrines but inherited them from the Egyptians and the Persians.) Protestants have rejected the latter three on the basis of sola scriptura. However, the doctrine of an immortal soul existing independent of the body can not be sustained on the teaching of the Scriptures alone any more than the afore-mentioned doctrines.

Notes: * This section of the " Phaedo" is called "Death and the Philosopher" in the etext at University at Evansville, and you can read the whole section here, though the pagination is different.