I met a critic of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints the other day, who believed that the LDS church was in error because of
our views regarding the dead. The critic asked me what I believed happened to a
person’s spirit when they died. I informed him that the spirit lives on
separately from the body and that it lives as a Spirit person in paradise or
prison until the Judgment! He informed me that my views were incorrect because
the Bible teaches that a man’s spirit ceases to exist when his body dies; that
the spirit is not alive and cannot interact in this non-existing state! He
claims this comes from Eccl 9:5 “For
the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not anything, neither
have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.”
The critic claimed his church understands the scripture
above to mean that the dead can’t know anything and they forget or don’t
remember because the spirit is not alive without the body! I had to clarify to
make sure I heard him correctly. These are
the viewpoints in which the critic claims we are in error according to his view
of the Bible:
1. When the body dies the Spirit ceases to exist!
2. This means that the spirit (the Dead) doesn’t think,
speak, or act!
3. The spirit does not come back into existence until
right before the Judgment only!
I will address the three challenges listed above by seeing
what the Scriptures say about
the Spirit person of man and his existence
after death!
What does the LDS
church teach about the Spirit of Man?
There are many doctrines that the LDS hold that help us
understand the spirit of man. For the question above, the following scriptures
should suffice. In the Doctrine and Covenants, we are told very plainly “that
which is spiritual being in the likeness of that which is temporal; and that
which is temporal in the likeness of that which is spiritual; the spirit of man
in the likeness of his person”(D&C
77:2). Alma 40:11,
“Now, concerning the state of the soul between death and the resurrection…the
spirits of all men, as soon as they are departed from this mortal body, yea,
the spirits of all men, whether they be good or evil, are taken home to that
God who gave them life.” So as LDS we believe that every person is made up of
two parts, a body and a spirit person. The spirit person looks like the bodily
person, and that our spirits live on after the body is dead. These statements
are very clear and are conveyed throughout the scriptures.
What happens to
the Spirit of man when they die?
In the book of Ecclesiastes we are told, “Then shall the
dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who
gave it” (Eccl
12:7). The Spirit of man doesn’t
just stop existing, it “returns to
the God who gave it.” The apostle Paul says the same thing in 2 Cor 5:8, “We
are confident, I say and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be
present with the Lord.” Paul confirms that the spirit of man goes to the Lord
just as the book of Ecclesiastes stated.
Paul wasn’t alone in thinking that some form of man (ie his
spirit person) existed after death. When Jesus was dying on the cross he had a
conversation with the two thieves beside him. The thief who recognized that
Jesus was the savior asked the Lord for a favor before Christ died. “And he
said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom”(Luke 23:42).
What was Jesus’ reply? “And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today
shalt thou be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).
Jesus’ promise was that the thief that day would be in paradise and the Lord
would be there with him! What happened to the Thief and the Lord Just a short
time later? They both died! Was the
promise of the Lord then unfulfilled? Was Christ in fact lying to the thief
about being in paradise according to the critic?
Three verses later we read, “And when Jesus had cried with a
loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit: and having
said thus, he gave up the ghost” (Luke 23:46).
Christ commended his spirit to the Father so the spirit could “return unto God
who gave it” (Eccl
12:7).
So where did
Christ and the Thief go after death?
When Christ was resurrected he first appeared to Mary
Magdalene and she was so excited to see him that she tried to hug him. Christ
told her “Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my
brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to
my God, and your God” (John 20:17).
We know that Christ’s body lay in the
grave for three days. We know that
Christ claimed that the Thief would be with him that first day in paradise, and
we know that Christ, up until the third day had still not “ascended to” his
Father! So is the critic right? Is paradise just another way of saying the body
ceases to exist?
Peter tells us what happened to Christ when he was in the
spirit after his death. “For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just
for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which
also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; Which sometime were
disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah” (1Pet 3:18-20).
Peter claims that instead of Christ going out of existence he was quickened by
the spirit, and while he was quickened, Christ went and preached to the spirits
in prison! So we learn two things in 1Pet 3:18-20;
Christ had the ability to preach the gospel as a spirit man and the dead had to
be able to hear that preaching or it would have been in vain!
Peter confirms that the dead were able to hear the message
in the next chapter, “For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them
that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but
live according to God in the spirit” (1 Pet 4:6).
According to this scripture we understand the preaching to the dead was done so
they “might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God
in the spirit”! It would be highly interesting for God to allow the dead to be
taught and judged if they weren’t living “according to God in the spirit”!
Is the Spirit of
Man Conscious after death?
Jesus was teaching his disciples and told them, “verily,
verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall
hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. Marvel not at
this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall
hear his voice, And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the
resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of
damnation”(John
5:25,28-29). Jesus, are you sure “the dead shall hear the voice of the Son
of God”? Because the critic has informed me that the dead can’t hear anything!
In fact according to the critic Christ must also be confused about the “evil”
being raised “unto the resurrection of
damnation,” since after the dead are judged they once again cease to exist!
John the Revelator saw the dead in a vision. Look at how he described them, “I saw under
the altar the souls of them that were
slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How
long, O Lord, holy and true, doest thou not judge and avenge our blood on
them that dwell on the earth? And white robes were given unto every one of
them; and it was said unto them, that
they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also
and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled”(Rev 6:9-11). Once again, we see the dead are speaking and
being spoken to. This is another clear sign that the dead do not just stop
existing but live on after this life as a spirit man!
In Luke 16:19-31
Jesus informs his listeners of the fate of two men who died, one righteous and
the other…well, not so righteous. Luke 16:22
says “And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels
into Abraham’s bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried.” So to make sure
there is no confusion as to whether the men died or not, we are told they were
buried. According to the critic the two
men would then be non-existent, meaning they would not communicate, see, feel,
hear, think, reason, etc….but is this what Jesus tells us happened to
these two
men?
“And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and
seeth Abraham far off, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he cried and said, Father
Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his
finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. But
Abraham said, Son,….between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that
they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us,
that would come from thence”(Luke 16:23-26).
From this scripture only one of two things is true- either Jesus has no idea
that the dead are supposed to be non-existing and he is teaching false
doctrines here, or the critic is wrong about the dead and the spirit lives on
after death!
The Dead seen and
heard by the living
Not only are we told that the dead speak, hear, and have
consciousness, but the scriptures show us some examples of the dead appearing
unto men. In 1 Sam 28:3-20,
we are told about a visitation of a former prophet who is dead, to a living
king. “Now Samuel was dead, and all Israel had lamented him, and buried him in
Ramah, even in his own city…and when Saul enquired of the Lord, the Lord
answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by prophets”(1 Sam 28:3,6).
“And Saul disguised himself, and put on other raiment,…they came to the woman
by night: and he said, I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit, and
bring me him up, whom I shall name unto thee…And Saul sware to her by the Lord,
saying, As the Lord liveth, there shall no punishment happen to thee for this
thing” (1
Sam 28:8,10). According to this
account, Saul couldn’t get an answer from the Lord so he went to a woman who
claimed to speak to the dead. Notice in
the next verses that the woman was scared because she didn’t expect Samuel to
appear from the dead (because she was a charlatan).
But Samuel did come back from the dead and delivered a
message from the Lord about the demise of King Saul. “And when the woman saw
Samuel, she cried with a loud voice…and Samuel said to Saul, Why hast thou
disquieted me, to bring me up? And Saul answered, I am sore distressed; for the
Philistines make war against me…Then said Samuel, Wherefore then dost thou ask
of me, seeing the Lord is departed from thee, and is become thine enemy? And
the Lord hath done to him, as he spake by me: for the Lord hath rent the
kingdom out of thine hand, and given it to thy neighbor, even to David”(1 Sam
28:12, 15-17).
Also Saul asked the woman when she saw Samuel how he looked
since he could only have been a spirit at this time (since no one was
resurrected until Jesus). Her response, “And
she said, An old man cometh up; and he is covered with a mantle” (1 Sam 28:14).
We see from the verses above that the Spirit person of Samuel not only was seen
by Saul, but Saul was able to ask him questions and receive answers. Samuel
also prophesied and those prophecies came true!
This is not the only time in the scriptures where dead
prophets have come to deliver God’s messages. In Revelation 22:8-9
an unnamed dead prophet appears to John to deliver a vision and message as an
angel of the Lord. John was so impressed
with this message that he fell down to worship this dead prophet. “And I John
saw these things, and heard them. And
when I had heard and seen, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel
which shewed me these things. Then saith
he unto me, See thou do it not: for I
am thy fellow servant, and of thy
brethren the prophets, and of them
which keep the sayings of this book.” The angel here claims to have
been alive once as a “fellow servant”, and even as one of “the prophets.” Once
again we see that these spirit persons didn’t just stop existing, but they
continued to live, speak, and interact with others.
The early church knew that these kinds of interactions
happened, in fact, a short story illustrates this for us. Peter was being kept
in prison and the church expected that he would be killed. So when he escapes from prison and shows up at
the house of some of the disciples they immediately think they are seeing his
angel (ie spirit person, as we saw in Rev 22:8-9).
“And as Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a damsel came to hearken, named
Rhoda. And when she knew Peter’s voice, she opened not the gate for
gladness…And they said unto her, Thou art mad. But she constantly affirmed that
it was even so. Then said they, It is his angel” (Acts 12:
13-14). The early saints had no problem attributing Rhoda’s tell of Peter
to the fact that she had seen him as a spirit. This of course would not have
been a plausible conclusion if the man’s spirit ceases to exist after death.
Conclusion
Well this conclusion should be short! The Critic claimed
that the LDS view of the dead was wrong because we believe that the spirit of
man continues to live after the death of the body. The critic also believed the
LDS view is wrong because we believe that these spirit persons continue to
hear, speak, move, interact etc… There is only one conclusion to arrive at when
we look at all the scriptures above….The critics argument ceases to exist!
