Dark Passages of the Bible

6. Method C Exegesis and the Afterlife

196 chapter 6 Method C Exegesis and the Afterlife Whereas the Method C treatment of our first two themes was fairly concise and to the point, I have devoted an entire chapter to treating the theme of the afterlife in order to paint a thorough and concrete portrait of Method C exegesis. The reason why the afterlife was chosen for this task is because of the disproportionately vast amount of biblical evidence we have of ancient Israel’s developing understanding of the afterlife, as well as a correspondingly disproportionate abundance of scholarly ink spilled on the subject—not the least important of which is found in the work of Pope Benedict himself. Review of the Problem from a Method B Perspective As we saw in chapter 1, Method B scholarship demonstrates that the Bible’s portrait of the afterlife is quite diverse at points. Biblical doctrine on the afterlife developed significantly over the course of divine revelation, from Israel’s early view of Sheol to her later hope for bodily resurrection. In his magisterial work on the Bible’s portrait of the afterlife entitled The Resurrection of the Son of God, N. T. Wright observes that the belief in resurrection makes few ap- the Afterlife 197 pearances within the Old Testament, and even then mostly in texts that came late in the development of the canon.1 Pope Benedict further adds that “the doctrine of the resurrection had not been generally accepted in intertestamental Judaism.”2 Certain Old Testament writers like Ecclesiastes went so far as to deny altogether the reality of life after death for man: For Sheol cannot thank thee, death cannot praise thee; those who go down to the pit cannot hope for thy faithfulness (Is 38:18). I am a man who has no strength, like one forsaken among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom thou dost remember no more, for they are cut off from thy hand. (Ps 88:4–5) As the cloud fades and vanishes, so he who goes down to Sheol does not come up (Jb 7:9). As waters fail from a lake, and a river wastes away and dries up, so man lies down and rises not again (Jb 14:11). From the dead, as from one who does not exist, thanksgiving has ceased; he who is alive and well sings the Lord’s praises ... For all things cannot be in men, since a son of man is not immortal (Sir 17:28,30). 1. N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2003), 85. For further reading regarding the dearth of evidence for a postmortem hope of beatitude among the Israelites, one might consult the article by Richard Friedman and Shawna Bolansky Overton entitled “Death and Afterlife: the Biblical Silence,” in Judaism in Late Antiquity, edited by Alan J. Avery-Peck and Jacob Neusner (Boston: Brill Academic Publishers, 2000), 35–59. It is interesting to note that some of the most important of these statements (e.g., Ws 3; 2 Macc. 7 and 12) are found in books only in the Catholic canon of scripture. The presence of the doctrine of resurrection in these texts provides important testimony to the fact that God continued to teach Israel and prepare the nation to receive the Paschal mystery up to the very time of Christ’s coming. 2. Benedict XVI, Eschatology: Death and Eternal Life, translated by Michael Waldstein (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1988), 112. 198 the Afterlife For the fate of the sons of men and the fate of beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts; for all is vanity. All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again (Eccl 3:19–20). For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward; but the memory of them is lost.... Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going (Eccl 9:5,10). Recalling the spectrum of evidence presented in chapter 1, these are just a few passages in which the problem of biblical doctrine on...