ARE THE DEAD CONSCIOUS?
By S.
In The Outlook of January 25 a correspondent, referring to an article which had previously appeared in that journal upon the condition of man after death, makes the following statement with question attached: “Certainly the Scriptures teach the conscious existence of the departed; but would you imply that there is to be no simultaneous resurrection of the dead at some future period? (1 Thess. 4:16; Rev. 20:13; 2 Tim. 2:18.)” Now if the Scriptures do teach the conscious existence of the “departed,” they should not teach what they do teach in the foregoing texts to which the questioner referred. The Bible, being the Word of God, should be consistent with itself. It can not teach two things which are opposed the one to the other. The conscious state of the dead is a doctrine which is diametrically opposed to the future resurrection of the body and a future meting out of reward and punishment. The Bible does—not—can not—teach them both. It does teach one. Which one? Are the dead conscious? Is death the immediate portal to heaven? The inspired record of the first Christian martyr’s death states that “he fell asleep,” (Acts 7:60), not that he entered into the joys of a saints’ reward in heaven. The record concerning David is this: “David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption.” Acts 13:36. But the difference between his condition after death and the condition of Christ after His death is plainly stated in the following verse (37): “But He [Christ], whom God raised again, saw no corruption.” That is, David died, and his mental and physical activities ceased, his flesh decayed, and he will remain in that condition until the morning of the “first resurrection.” Christ died, His mental and physical activities ceased for a short space; but He was called forth from among the dead without decay. Being sinless in His own person, death could not hold Him, decay could not prey upon Him. There is the difference between the death of mortal man and His death who died that man might receive immortality. David “fell on sleep,” and remains to this day holden of death, as the above text shows. Christ died, but rose again, and is now sitting at the right hand of God in heaven. Heb. 12:2. Now, is David’s experience and condition the experience and condition of the rest of the human race? or does God permit him alone to be held in the grasp of death, while all the rest of God’s accepted children go on to heaven without him and before him? Speaking of the change which must take place at the resurrection of the righteous dead, the Word declares: “This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.” I Cor. 15:53. Then the dead have been corruptible; they have seen corruption; in short, they have been dead. They could not have been in heaven, for corruption can not enter there. They have been corruptible up to that time, for the Word declares (verse 52), “The dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” They have not been conscious in the place to which they have gone; for “the living know that they shall die; but the dead know not anything.” “There is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.” Eccl. 9:5, 10. Then is it true that “the Scriptures teach the conscious existence of the departed”?—This part of the Scripture does not. The Lord told Moses (Deut. 31:16), “Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers.” Does that scripture teach the conscious existence of the dead? Men are not conscious in sleep; and the sleep of death is the soundest sleep that man can know. It is true that Moses has not been held in death until the present time. God, for a particular purpose, broke the bands of death for him. See Jude 9, and Mark 9:4. But he slept, was unconscious in death, until the Lord saw fit, by a special resurrection, to release him. Again and again the Lord speaks of death as a sleep, but never as a gate of transition from life to a higher life. The idea of the conscious existence of the “departed” came in through the age-long deception that man has inherent immortality. The one involves the other, and both are contrary to the Word; both militate against the purpose of Christ’s life and death upon the earth. Christ declares, “I am come that they might have life;” that is, the eternal life which man had forfeited by sin. Immortality can not perish; but God “gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16. If man were immortal, Christ’s sacrifice was unnecessary; for man would have had “everlasting life.” Because he did not have it, because he was mortal, and everlasting death would have been his portion on account of sin, Christ was given, a sacrifice for the race, that man need not perish; that man might have what he does not now have, immortality, everlasting life. Man would never have seen immortality but for the work of Christ in his behalf. That was brought to light through the Gospel. 2 Tim. 1:10. Death was the punishment pronounced upon man for sin; but Christ, through His sacrifice, “abolished death;” not that man should not die, but that death should not triumph over him. None could ever be raised from the death into which mankind goes down, were it not for the power of the righteousness of Christ. 1 Cor. 15:22. It is perfectly plain from these scriptures that the Bible does not teach the “conscious existence of the departed.” It does teach that death is a sleep; that man in death knows nothing—is dead; that immortality is the gift of God bestowed at the resurrection (1 Cor. 15:51–55); that the reward of the righteous Christ brings with Him when He comes the second time (Rev. 22:12). The teachings of the Bible are consistent from cover to cover; but the idea of human immortality and consciousness in death finds no support within that sacred Word. S.