IV. Proofs of Immortality

These may be summed up in: (1) The consent of all people (G. Roskoff, Das Religionswesen der rohesten Ndturvolker, Leipsic, 1880; O. F. Peschel, Volkerkunde, Leipsic, 1875; Bastian, Beiträge zur vergleichenden Psychologie, Berlin, 1868). (2) Proofs ab utili and a tutiori. The former conceives of the maintenance of the dogma of immortality as in the interest of public morals; the latter treats the theoretical uncertainty as if it were true for the sake of its benefit in this life. (3) The teleological proof. In the destination of the personal individual for perfection is found a means for the completion in a future world of the aim only partly attained here (J. H. Fichte, Idee der Peraonlichkeit und der individuuellen Fortdduer, Leipsic, 1855). (4) The analogical proof. The analogy of metamorphosis (the chrysalis, the sleep of winter, the seed-corn). (5) The astronomical proof is founded on the existence of a multitude of otherwise aimless heavenly bodies, and on the probability that even the particular life of each star is for the sake of enriching human knowledge. (6) The moral proof. According to Kant, the aim of life is the furthering of holiness as complete conformity to moral law; this becomes the postulate of an infinite progress. (7) Proof from the idea of righteousness. Virtue must be rewarded, sin punished, and since both are imperfectly realized here, another sphere of life is required (Athenagoms, Justin, Socinians, Arminians, Rationalists, Calvin Leibnitz). On ~ the other hand, the Stoics and

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Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, IV., vi. 22) emphasized the immanent righteousness which strikes even the wicked in this world. Spinoza holds that although duty is filled with an infinite content, it does not need to be capped with an endless existence (Ethics, v. 41-42). Hant's moral proof, combined with the Christian estimate of life; has lost none of its validity. (8) Metaphysical proof, derived from the simplicity or the immateriality of the soul. From the mere heterogeneity of the spirit, one could infer (a) with Epicurus indifference to being or not being: " while we exist, death is not present; when death is present, we do not exist" (Diogenes Laertius, x. 27) or (b) an extension of immortality to animals. (9) . Ontological. On the ground of a genetic development in language and psychology, one may make use of a metaphysical inference which, in harmony with the total rational view of the world, proves the certainty of the final triumph of life over death, from the immanent eternity of the spirit already manifested in the ethical religious conquest of death (cf. Plato's play on words in the Pbmdo: the soul (a) life, accordingly "not-death," hence (b) " not-dead "-a-thanatoe).

V. The Original Motives: The original motives of belief in immortality correspond to the natural causes of the idea of God, which may be psychologically traced to a fourfold root. (1) Subjective: wish, fear of death, and hope of life. tuod volumus, credimus. Feuerbach: " Man thinks of his god as of his heaven. . . God and immortality are identical. Both originate in the wish" (cf. Ri9veda, x. 14, 8). According to the Talmud, Paradise is a place of bliss which, surpasses the joy of the Messianic time. " The pious are satisfied with the flesh (of the Leviathan) which was preserved for this end since the first day of creation, and they drink wine from clusters which were prepared since the bringing in of the world " (Wilnaehe, Die Vorstellungen vmn Zustonde nach dem Tode each Apokryphen, Talmud uttd Kirchenvaxern, in JPT, 1880, p. 449). On the other hand, the wish for reunion with the dead often yields to fear of the dead and to the desire not to be disturbed by them (cf. the words at the obsequies of Bodo in northeast India: "Take and eat; formerly hast thou eaten and drunken with us, but now thou canat no more; thou Overt one of us, thou art so no more; we come no more to thee, and come not thou nearer to us "). Like the funeral pyre, the funeral meals often celebrate only the separation as a symbolic agreement with the dead. (2) The influence of striking experiences in dreams on the imagination and the view of the world is noteworthy in the lower stages of culture (see!COMPARATIVZ RELIGION, III., vi., 1 2; and cf. E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. i., London, 1871). The New Zealander thinks that the dreaming soul departs from the body and returns again after wandering in the realm of the dead and there communing with its friends. The land of the blessed reflects the popular ideals. The dreaming Indian visits his hunting-ground, the Greek beholds the Elysian fields, the German thought that life in Walhalla consisted of bloody battles. Still more significant are the associations of ideas by which the character of a dream is attributed to the earthly

life-life a dream; death the moment in which one awakes from the dream of life to its true reality. The Old Testament increasingly discredits the prophetic dream (cf. Deut. xiii.; Jer. xxiii.; Eool. v. 2-6). Yet the actual present is designated as a "being like those who dream" in relation to a higher form of existence (Ps. exxvi. 1). (3) In the lower stages of culture the intellectual riddle of death leads to the idea of a brief extension of life beyond the grave. After death there is to be a separation which either completes the death or prepares for a further lifetime in other regions (so the Fijis, the Guinea negroes, the Greenlanders); or only the chief men continued to exist (so the Tonga Islanders), or only the souls of the good (so the Nicaraguans). The funeral-pyre may condition the continued existence of the dead. For the enduring connection between soul and body, cf. Odyssey, xi. 51 sqq., 73; Iliad. xxiii. 71 sqq.; Vergil, Xneid, vi. 325 sqq., 362 sqq.; Job xiv. 22; Isa. lxvi. 24, xiv. 19; Deut. xxviii. 26; Tylor, ut sup. vol. ii. Danger of the future death of the soul is not excluded. The "second death" is the greatest evil. One can imagine neither unchanging continuance nor absolute annihilation. (4) The idea of retribution is expressed by the ethical faith in a supreme righteousness. The fatal crisis which, according to the belief of the Fijis, awaits the souls of those just dead, visits annihilation upon those who have remained unmarried; perhaps a reference to natural immortality by means of procreation. In all stages of religious culture many ethical arguments for immortality appear; the imperfect adjustment in this life between duty and destiny shapes the thought of future retribution. Mosaism is favorable to the idea of retribution, but it deserves no credit for the existence of the hope of immortality. Greek mythology distinguished the regions devoted to retribution ruled over by Minos and lE&cuS from the shadowy abodes for the undisturbed life of the soul. Hercules' soul prolonged its shadowy existence below while his bodily existence was enthroned in the circle of the blessed (cf. Iliad, i. 4). According to the Greeks, bodily existence is the real existence. The Christian doctrine of hell as Sheol and Gehinnom was made up of two different motives which the Talmud combined in Gehinnom--darkness and fire (cf. Enoch ciii. 8, 9). "Hell" originally signified the dark place, but was gradually blended with the idea of the bright, the fiery. The valley Gehinnom was the place of sacrifice to Moloch, of divine judgment, and of eternal destruction Per. xix. 2, 6; II Kings xxiii. 10; Matt. x. 28). Since the exile in conneotion with the transformation of the Messianic idea, the present life was a vestibule for the future, where the final judgment must assign the proper ethical condition (but cf. Enoch xc. 26, xxvii. 2, 3). The fundamental idea is that of a moral world-order. In the New Testament penal judgment is associated with the continued existence of the departed. Psychological motives for retribution first arose in connection with the Messianic idea, foreign domination, and influenoss of Zoroastrianism. With reference to the eschatology of both the Old Testament and the New Tests-

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went, there is need to preserve the Christian estimate of life so far as this is a matter of feeling and will,, without surrendering the free scientific approach. It must also be recognized that the forms of the creative ideas by which men seek to give expression to the content of these conceptions are changeable and dependent upon the usage of language at a given time (see Future Punishment).

VI. The Principal Elements of the Christian Ideal of Immortality: The Christian estimate of life subordinates all motives of the hope of immortality to belief in God; he is " not the God of the dead, but of the living." Presuppositions for correct deduction are: (1) Negatively: proof maynot be adduced from rational psychology. If the soul of man is immortal because it is simple and immaterial, the same must be true of animals and of plants: these no less than the soul of man may be regarded sub specie o=tewnitatis. Moreover, the thought of immortality is developed from simple psychical experiences. The child lives in the joy of the unending moment. Many savages have need only to project thought forward for a year or a month; the abstract idea of immortality matures first with monotheism. Even then "absolute endlessness" remains only a half-understood problem. The question of immortality retires to the background in comparison with the ethical social interests and with faith in God in which the true endlessness is felt (Ps. lxxiii.). If with Berkeley, Fichte, and Schopenhauer one conceives the idea not as result, but as cause of the entire world, including time and apace, then the thinking subject as thinking can not be destroyed by the object which it has itself produced-time. The notions of subject, object, idea, time, infinite, and the like are not original; still more elementary is language, which originates in a practical motive. (2) Positively; the verbal condition of the solution of the problem. (a) Soul is the man as a unity; body is the man as an organism of many factors. The word "soul" in popular use is associated with the idea of the sea in motion. In the notion of soul lies life, change, inconstancy, death. The nature of psychg is perishableness. Even knowledge will not shield from destruction (Gen. iii. 17-19). Yet the soul, according to its notion, is essentially life. (b) The negative ideas of the intransient, the infinite, arose from the power of abstraction and negation. The underworld (cf. the notions of the Egyptians, New Zealanders, Enoch, the Greeks, and the Middle Ages) was identical with the place of the sun setting in the west. (c) Both the sun (cf. Egyptian and Aecadian-Babylonian myths) and the seed-corn are at the same time result and cause, and this sensuous form of imperishableness has contributed to the terms dealing with immortality (the cult of Persephone; I Cor. xv.; poetical uses, as Schiller's Noch kostlicheren Samen bergen). Metempsychosis is only a further step forward (degradation and elevation; punishment and purification). In the Christian view the soul as substance of the body is wakened by the light of the creative sun of God to a new individual corporeity (John xii.; I Cor. xv.). The soul rests "in God" (Col. iii. 3; Rev. xiv. 13), receives a new glorified body whose principal' features have already on

earth been developed through ethical growth, suffering, and victory (cf. Matt. xxii. 30; Acts ii. 31 sqq. with Pa. xvi., Rev. xxi. 4 with Isa. xxv. 8 ).

VII. The Truth of These Forms of Experience: In the degree to which the naturally true and ethically grounded idea creates a corresponding expression can the truth of its affirmation be removed from doubt. This is proved by the religion of Buddhism. Although one may never say that the soul is or is not in Nirvdna, yet this is designated as the " land of peace," the " immeasurable, abysmal sea of eternity." Even to a philosopher such experiences compel the thought of a positive, ideal imperishableness. Mightier than with the Buddhist is the Christian's longing for absolute emancipation and blessedness. The fulness of God's love, as it fills the Christian heart absorbed in the kingdom of God, is immediately infinite. In the degree to which there is given the real basis for an idea true to life must the positive joy in the picture of the Christian hope of glory be affirmed.

In conclusion, the attitude toward immortality will be positive in case (1) the certainty of God as the supreme concrete content of the consciousness is presupposed, (2) the one miracle which lies in the being of the entire world is beheld under the correct figure of a creative divine deed, and accordingly (3) the hope of the future which corresponds to the Christian valuation of life is directly related to the. idea of the creative divine deed. The twofold contents of the Christian spirit of life are (1) the idea of the Father-God as the free creative love, and (2) the hope that nothing hereafter can separate from the "infinite" worth of the love of God. If the real grounds of both of these ideas are inexhaustible, then the endeavors after a formal presentation of faith in God and immortality must be just as enduring as the power of language (see also Eschatology).

For extended discussion and proof of this thesis cf. G. Runze, Btudien zur wgleicAenden Religions wasaenschaft; II., Die Psychologie des Ur:sterblich keitSglaubens und der Unsterblichkeitaleugnung, Ber lin, 1894. G. RuNzE.

VIII. Additional Note: The arguments from data furnished by the Society of Psychical Research, to the effect that authentic messages have been received from those who have passed from the earthly life, lack convincing cogency (cf. F. W. H. Myers, Human Personality, London, 1903). Not to accentuate the still incomplete evidence for the alleged communications, this, if valid, would at best prove only that some who have ceased to live here continue their life in other conditions. But whether this is true for all, or whether any or all of those who have been supposed to manifest themselves from the other world will live forever does not yet appear. The Biblical evidence for the immortality, i.e., the resurrection, of all, including the wicked, is not perhaps decisive. This involves the critical interpretation of three passages which are open to other values than those which have been assigned to them (Luke xx. 34-38; John v. 28, 29; Acts xxiv. 15). In the last reference Paul is reported as teaching the resurrection of the wicked, no trace of which is found in his own authentic writings.

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The words in John, alleged to have been spoken by Jesus, are alien to the rest of his teaching both in this Gospel and in the synoptics. The statement in Luke is not so conclusive as it seems at first eight, for it must be interpreted by the practical interest which elsewhere dominates the Master's teaching, and particularly by verses 35, 36. With Jesus, life was a supremely ethical affair, and neither he nor Paul appears to have considered life or immortality from $ speculative point of view. The argument that the permanence of life is based on the fact that life is a thought of God, and God will no£ suffer his thought to perish, is open to three serious questions: (1) Whether in the sight of God human life is such a thought that even though it is at present the highest expression of his will, God can not permit it to fall back into the order from which it arose, as is the case with all other forms of existence. (2) Whether this preservation would be true of all souls or only of those who cooperate with him in the fulfilment of his thought. (3) Whether, finally, the human type is the basis of a yet higher disclosure of the divine purpose, and this being realized, the type as such shall pass away. Conditional immortality may not be ruled out of court as if it had no rational standing (see Annihilationism). For, first, appeal may be made to the biological law that function determines structure and ultimately organism: accordingly degeneration even to the loss of important organs is as truly characteristic of evolution as is progress. Secondly, it is especially true of man that the ideals of personality are either achieved by conscious striving, or lost by ,inattention. In comparison with lower orders of life, man may have reached that degree of stability whereby he survives the shock of death (cf. J. Fiske, Destiny of Man Viewed in the Light of His Origin, Boston, 1884), but even this would not necessarily involve for every one an endless existence. That which has been gained by the "will to five" (Schopenhauer) may also ultimately perish by refusal to live. According to the Gospel of John life is not a necessitated natural duration, but an ethical endeavor: Greek immortality gives place to " eternal life'; (John xvii. 3). After all, the truest description of man's relation to a future life may be "immortality" (cf . S. D. McConnell, Evolugora of Immortality, New York, 1901; W. R. Huntington, Conditional Immortality, ib. 1878. See EscHAToLooy). The deepest reason for immortality is teleological: on the one hand, in the infinite ideals addressed to the human will; on the other hand, in the progressive realization of these ideals in which alone the universe becomes intelligible for consciousness. In the partial but increasing meaning of reality which is disclosed in individual consciousness is a ground of hope that this consciousness will endure as a center in which the purpose of the universe shall be both revealed and realized (cf. J. Royce, Corue

ptian of Immortality, Boston, 1900). Since all life is controlled by ends that attract and yet are hidden, and man does not fully reach these ends in this world, and can progressively attain them, if at all, only in an endless advance, his very incompleteness is his mightiest witness to immortality. For the perplexing problem of the relation of personal

identity and memory to the life after death, of. H. Mtunsterberg, The Eternal Life (Boston, 1905). The most important recent literature bearing on this subject is the series of Ingersoll Lectures on Immortality given annually at Harvard University as follows: G. A. Gordon, Immortality and the Neto Theodicy, Boston, 1897; W. James, Human Immortality, Boston, 1898; B. I. Wheeler, Dionysius and Immortality, Boston, 1899; J. Royce, Conception of Immortality, Boston, 1900; J. Fiske, Life Everlasting, Boston, 1901; W. Osler, Science and Immortality, Boston, 1904; S. M. Crothers, The Endless Life, Boston, 1905; H. Milnsterberg,, The Eternal Life, Boston, 1905; C. F. Dole, Hope of Immortality, New York, 1906; W. Ostwald, Individuality and Immortality, Boston, 1906; W. S. Bigelow, Bud dhism and Immortality, Boston, 1908.

C. A. B.

Bibliography: The earlier literature in wonderfully complete and classified form is in E. Abbot,' The Literature of the Doctrine of a Future Life, included in W. R. Alger's Destiny of the Bout, a Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life, Boston, 1880; cf. J. H. Hurst, Literature of Theology, pp. 496-497, New York, 1896. For the Biblical belief, besides the O. T. Theology 'of H. Schultz, London, 1892, and the N. T. Theology of W. Beyxhleg, Edinburgh, 1896, consult: J. Challis, An Essay on the Scripture Doctrine of Immortality, London, 1880: F. Schwally, Das Leban n ach deft Tode nach den Voretetlungen des alten Israel and des Judenthums, Giessen, 1892; A. Chambers, Ow Life q/tw Death: or, the Teaching of the Bible con cerning the Unseen World, London, 1894; J. Frey, Tod, Seaknglaubs and Swlsnkuu i m alfrn larast, Leipsic, 1898; L. A. Muirhead. The Terms Life and Death in the old and New Testament, Glasgow, 1908.

On the general subject, besides the works named in the text, consult: H. Schultz, Die Voraueastmngen der christ lichen Lshre von der Unsferbliehkei4 G Sttingen, 1861; A. lmmer, Der Uneterbliahkoeuglaube i m Lwhte der Geschichte und d er peoerewdrtiqen Wiwmaehaf4 Bern, 1868; R. S. Candlish, Life in a Risen Savior; an Exposition of .

1 Cor. xv., London, 1883; K. wilmarehof, Due jenseus, tin wissenechafelicher Versuch sur LGeung der UnsterbliChkeiitafrage, Leipsic 18&3-66; L. Figuier, The To-morrow of Deal,% or, the Future Life according to SeiencA Boston, 1872; T. A. Goodwin, The Mode of Man's Immortality, New York, 1874; A. B. Blackwell, Physical Basis of Immortality, New York, 1876; B. Stewart and P. G. Teat, The Unssen Universe, London, 1876 (from the standpoint of physical science); J. W. Rinck, Vom Zudandt der Seele nach deft Tode. Basel, 1878; G. Teichmilller, Ueber die Unetarblirhkeft der Seele, Leipsic, 1879 W. R. Hart, Eternal Purpose; a Study in the Scripture Doctrine of Immortality, Philadelphia, 1882; G. A. Gordon, The Witness to Immortality in Literature, Philosophy' and Life, Boston, 1883; L. Schneider, Die Unetwbiichkeitaidet i m Olauben und der Philosophic der Vdlker, Reganeburg, 1883; E. Neville, La Vic ltermlle Paris, 1884; E. Petavel-Ollif, Le Probalme de limmortolitE, 2 vols., Lausanne, 1891-92, Eng. transl., The Problem of Immortality, New York. 1893; A. Sabstier, Essai cur l'immortalitt au point de vue du naturalisme 6rolutioniete, Paris, 1895; E. Rohde, Psyche, Freiburg. 1898 (a classic; dels with Greek and Roman ideas); V. L. Bernier, SpirituadiM et immortalitd, Le Chapelle-Montligeon, 1901; H. Cremer, Ueber don Zustand reach deft Tede, Gütersloh, 1901; S. D. F. Seamond, The Christian Doctrine of Immortality, Edinburgh, 1901; w. Schneider, Due andere Leben, Paderborn, 1902; A. Chambers, Our Life after Death, London, 1903; W. Chest, Immortality a Rational Faith, New York, 1903; G. T. Feohner. Barhtein von den Leben reach den. Tode, Hamburg, 1903; C. W. Leadbmter, The Other Side q/ Death S eienfiftcouy Examined, Chicago, 1903; H. A. A. Kennedy, St. Paul's Conarptiane of the Last Things, London, 1904; L, Elb6. La Vie future, Paris, 1906; J. H. Hyslop, Science and a Future Life, London, 1906; K. Andersen, Die Vnetarbliehkeifafrape, Leipsic, 1906; G. Fell. Immortality of do Human Soul Philosophically Explained, London, 1906; L. Elb6, Future Life in the Light of Ancient Wisdom and Modern Science, London,

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1907; H. Q. Keyserling, UnaterbliehkeiE Munich, 1907; R. J. Thompson, Proofs of Life after Death: a Collation of Opinion., London, 1907; E. E. F. A. Albe, New Light on Immortality, London, 1908; F. C. Kempeon. Future Life and Modern Difficulties, ib. 1908. The subject of course receives treatment in the various works on systematic theology.