Bruce Charlton's Notions

I am not sure how many people in the modern world really believe in reincarnation; because so much reincarnation talk seems to operate at a superficial and 'lifestyle' level... Something to chat-about and speculate-on - or a stick with-which to beat mainstream Christians. 

But presumably some people at least have reincarnation as a deeply-motivating kind of belief, that might sustain courage in the face of adversity? 

But I must admit that I find it hard to imagine why a Christian who believed in Heaven (at least, who believed in heaven as I understand it to be) could want to be reincarnated after their biological-death,  instead of being resurrected.   

To my way of thinking, reincarnation is a natural and spontaneous way of thinking in childhood and during human history - and therefore I suppose it to be true: I suppose that Men (or at least some Men) were reincarnated after death, through much of human history. Reincarnation is therefore true, or a real possibility - or, at least, it was. 

Although I also note that beyond the mere fact of reincarnation there are many and very different 'schemes' of reincarnation. Perhaps there were different reincarnations in different types of human society? I tend to think this is likely.  

But what I do find difficult to understand about reincarnation for a modern Man (although here I will make an attempt to understand it) is why someone who knew of the reality of Heaven and the possibility of his own resurrection - and who also desired resurrection into Heaven... 

...Why such a Christian would instead want to defer resurrection, and be reincarnated, and live another life in this world (in which this current life would not be remembered)? 

When Heaven is both within one's grasp, and is wanted as an ultimate destination (and a situation in which the real business of living can begin, full-time) - it seems like a strange choice to defer entry. 

I know-of, and greatly esteem (overall), several real Christians who also believe-in reincarnation, and apparently want to be reincarnated - who believe in reincarnation as both true and good: examples include Rudolf Steiner, Owen Barfield, and William Arkle - who are among my spiritual mentors.

This is find it hard to understand - because at best it seems like merely delaying - putting-off an achievable perfect outcome available Now - in order to engage in yet-more preparatory stuff. 

But at worst it risks that my next incarnation might choose damnation and reject Heaven altogether - which would be the ultimate disaster. 

However it may have been in the past; the hope of reincarnation nowadays strikes me as akin to kicking-the-can; as if just wanting to delay and defer the unavoidable and final decision.

And that strikes me as rather uncomfortably close to that delayed repentance, that refusal to repent Now; which is actually just a disguised refusal to repent. 

The plea of Augustine of Hippo "Lord, make me chaste - but not yet" has often been misunderstood as a viable life-option for Christians. Of course, it merely means that Augustine was not yet a Christian when he said that (and meant it). 

Analogously, when thought-through to its implications; for a modern Christian to desire reincarnation after death seems close to asking God for "Salvation - but not yet!" - which may well be functionally identical with rejecting salvation. 

Note: It may be that some Christians regard reincarnation as something that just happens, that God 'does to us' (for our own good) whether we want and choose it, or not. Something that we need in order eventually to be allowed into Heaven and to assume the place God desires for us. If so, then this would surely be a cause for sadness and an attitude of resignation to God's will? Yet, many of those who argue for reincarnation clearly do not see it as a sad thing thus to be compelled to delay our admission to Heaven - on the contrary, they apparently have a positive and enthusiastic interest in the subject. This seems to me to display an implicit positive preference for reincarnation as their personal destination post-mortem - which I what I am criticizing here. 

The idea of an evolution of human consciousness throughout history has been a part of spiritual thinking for more than a century - I know it mainly through considering the work of Rudolf Steiner, Owen Barfield and William Arkle over the past couple of years.

(I encountered the idea over thirty years ago summarized in the work of Colin Wilson, but did not then pay much attention.)

The idea of an historical evolution of consciousness seems to go-with a belief in reincarnation, because reincarnation allows each person to participate in the different stages of evolution that are aiming-at a fully divine form of consciousness.

Steiner and Barfield describe this aimed-at state in some detail - in essence it combines on the one hand a direct involvement with, and participation in, reality such as was characteristic of early man and remains characteristic of early childhood; with, on the other hand, a fully alert, self-aware, purposive and analytic consciousness which is characteristic of the adult consciousness and the modern phase of Western history. 

So, the idea is that I am personally experiencing the distinctive modern, alienated consciousness now - including the knowledge and aspiration towards a future state; however, in earlier lives I have also personally experienced, and benefited from, earlier phases of human consciousness. At some point later this life, and perhaps further lives, I may incrementally, a step at a time, learn how to combine the positive qualities of all phases. This aimed-at fully divine conscious state is what Barfield calls Final Participation.

According to Steiner and Barfield, these earlier life phases include non-incarnated lives - lives when we were conscious but had no body. So the theory is really one of multiple lives, rather than re incarnation.

Therefore the human spirit or soul (i.e. that entity which is reincarnated) is here conceptualized as undergoing an educational process toward which each life is contributing.

Repeated lives, many lives, seem to be necessary in order to allow for the very large amount of experience and learning required to bridge the gap between being a man and becoming a god. Certainly, one mortal life seems grossly inadequate for this, especially given that most human lives in history were terminated either in the womb or in early infancy - a small minority of humans have reached adulthood, and even fewer of these have had a full experience of marriage, family, maturity and growing old etc.

So, evolution of consciousness and reincarnation seem to make a neat package. However, this package is, if not incompatible with Christianity, at least somewhat alien to the structure of Christianity; which places a great deal of emphasis on the individual life which we are experiencing now, and sees 'this life' as having potentially decisive consequences for eternity.

And certainly, while reincarnation seems to described in the Bible - most notably in the case of John the Baptist apparently being a reincarnated Prophet Elijah - there isn't any scriptural description of a scheme of reincarnation as the norm. And especially not of multiple lives.

My interpretation is that ancient Christianity saw reincarnation as true, but as an exceptional possibility, done in exceptional cases and for specific purposes - rather than as the standard procedure for the majority of people.

Does an exclusion of reincarnation then rule-out the evolution of consciousness throughout human history? No, but denial of reincarnation with multiple lives does limit the role of evolution of consciousness in the lives of individual spirits or souls - it breaks the link between the evolution of consciousness in history and the evolution of my consciousness and the specific consciousnesses of every other individual.

Put differently, the arguments which (in particular) Owen Barfield makes for different types of consciousness in human history, such as his insights into the changing scope and meaning of words, may well be true; but they lose their relevance to the evolution of my consciousness and your consciousness if we were not present (in earlier lives) actually to experience the several stages of this historical evolution.

In sum, the historical evolution of consciousness is a matter of historical but not personal interest, if we ourselves were not present during that history.

My own belief is therefore that I accept Barfield's description of human consciousness having changed throughout history and in broadly the way he describes; and I also accept that we are meant (or destined) to achieve that mode of consciousness Barfield terms 'Final Participation'. But I do not accept that the two are causally linked - for instance I do not believe that I have, myself, personally participated in the historical phases of the evolution of consciousness during previous lives.   

Rather, I see the evolution of consciousness as a sequence which is recapitulated in different scales in different situations: e.g. through human history, in each person's individual development from childhood to maturity, and also in the largest cosmic scale of our salvation and divination across eternity.

(To clarify this last point: the Barfieldian sequence of Original Participation, the Consciousness Soul and Final Participation can be mapped onto the Mormon theological sequence of pre-mortal spirit life, mortal incarnate life, and post-mortal eternal incarnate life.)

I therefore would modify the Steiner/ Barfield model, since I regard this evolutionary sequence of consciousness as a basic and necessary process in terms of Man as a whole and also individual men working towards fuller divinity. And I think it is because the process is basic and necessary that we see it appearing and re-appearing here and there throughout reality; operating at many scales and across many time-frames.

Note: Previous posts on reincarnation
http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=reincarnation

Almost everybody who believes-in the evolution of human consciousness, also believes-in reincarnation - but not me.

While I think it probable that reincarnation was usual before the advent of Jesus Christ; I don't believe that reincarnation has been normal since then, at least among Christians - and has indeed been very exceptional (or absent). This for the simple reason that Jesus came to bring resurrected and eternal life in Heaven to his followers, and my assumption is that resurrection happens soon after biological death - which combination (as I understand it) rules-out reincarnation. (although perhaps not something like projected avatars...).

However I also believe that through history (and pre-history) the consciousness of men has developed according to a divine plan or destiny (consciousness has 'evolved' in an old sense of the word). In other words, Men at different points in history have thought and experienced differently - and this is evolutionary-development of mind is (of course) reflected in language (as documented by the work of Owen Barfield), religion, society, science, art and everything else.

But the key point is that socio-cultural change is driven by the inner change in human consciouness - and that inner change has inner causes - and not (or not primarily) the other way around (as most people suppose).

However, if for the past c. 2000 years at least, human souls have one mortal life, and if therefore we can experience only one mode of consciousness and one era of evolutionary history - then what is the value of an evolution in consciousness? Why have consciousness changing through human generations - if, for each individual person - consciousness is Not changing?

My answer is that each of us is unique, therefore each of us needs different experiences in our (one) mortal life; and the evolution of consciousness is a way that God uses to give individual human spirits the many types of experience that each needs.

Other ways of providing different experiences come from different families, different social circumstances, nations, levels and types of civilisation etc. But one of the important ways in which mortal life is tailored to the needs of individual incarnating spirits is through the phases and stages of the development of consciousness.

So that the simple hunter gatherer societies had (in important respects) a very young-child-like consciousness even among adults. Medieval Europe was essentially rooted in the developmental stage of an older child (with its fixed symbolism, hierarchies and rituals). Modern society is essentially the adolescent stage.

And there has never yet been (except among individuals and small temporary groups, perhaps) any time and place where the adult form of consciousness has prevailed - although that is the task of our stage of evolution: i.e. to become properly adult in our consciousness.

Our task (here and now, in The West) is to grow-up spiritually; to attain (and this must be an active and conscious choice, which is a reason why it has not yet happened) what Owen Barfield called Final Participation.

The idea of saving the appearances, or saving the phenomena, is that deep explanations should explain superficial explanations. For instance, scientific models of the movements of planets should be able to model and predict the movements of the real planets. 

The same idea ought to apply to religious 'models' includings all the various explanations in scripture, doctrine, and formal theology - yet it is surprising how often they don't.

Consider reincarnation. Reincarnation - of widely varying detailed explanations - seems to be a spontaneous, natural and universal human belief except where is is contradicted by culture - in other words, all tribal religions (animistic, totemistic), plus many Eastern religions in the spectrum of Hinduism and Buddhism include reincarnation.

I infer that reincarnation (in its various guises) is an attempt to save these appearances - to explain, model, systematize some basic human experience or intuition. In some way people experience and feel something (this is 'the appearance') that leads them to create various models of reincarnation that 'save' (explain) these experiences and feelings.

It is interesting that mainstream Christianity did not, and did not attempt to, save the appearances when it came to reincarnation - it simply stated that reincarnation was not true, did not happen - and implied that any of the feelings or experiences that led to so many millions of people positing reincarnation as an explanation for them, were merely some kind of delusion.

What were these 'appearnaces'? I think the basic one is the feeling that 'my life did not begin at my birth (or ceonception)'.

Most people do not have any specific (certainly not any detailed) memories of a previous life or lives; but many people do have a sense that their 'current' mortal life was not the beginning of life for them - there was 'something' of themselves, some kind of essence (spirit, soul or incarnate body or whatever) existing before their conception or birth. Some already existing entity which took-on a body and became an incarnate mortal.

In sum, I think this feeling of some past existence is the basis of theories of reincarnation. 

I suspect that this rather vague, but pretty solid, feeling is the basis of the theoretical elaborations of reincarnation.

However, I do not think there is any similar intuition about future reincarnations and their nature and purpose - and indeed these explanations are widely variable between religions; nor do I believe that the sense of having been specifically 'incarnated' i.e. having had a different body - is a part of spontaneous experience.

One strength of Mormonism is that it does explain the most basic intuitions, feelings, experiences concerning a previous life - although the link between the intuitions of Mankind and the doctrinces of Mormonism is seldom made. But Mormonism can say - yes, your feelings are valid; and we can explain them; but not by reincarnation, instead by pre-mortal spirit existence.

This is saving the appearances.

It seems that reincarnation goes-with a belief in the superiority of spirit - the superiority of existence as a spirit over incarnated existence...

I say 'goes-with' because I don't think reincarnation logically-implies the superiority of spirit, but goes with it in a natural kind of fashion - apparently; if such Eastern versions of reincarnation are considered as Hinduism, Buddhism - or more recent doctrines such as Anthroposophy and some New Age ideas.

By the 'superiority' of spirit, I mean that with reincarnation it is usual to see life as a pure spirit as superior to life 'in' a body: the body is seen as a restriction.


For reincarnation, repeated incarnations serve the life as a spirit - and usually the ultimate goal is to stop reincarnating, discard bodies, and live permanently (finally, eternally) as a spirit.

The incarnations can serve spirit in various ways - each reincarnation might provide an experience to allow spiritual progress, or be a kind of opposite of this - the incarnation being a punishment or adverse consequence of earlier lives... but in the end the idea is that these incarnations, these repeated embodied lives, are merely a means-to-an-end; they have the purpose of ultimately allowing the body to be discarded.


In Christianity the picture is different - but there is here a difference between 'Mainstream' Christianity and Mormon Christianity.

In most kinds of Catholic and Protestant Mainstream Christianity, the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost include two spirits (Father and Ghost) and one resurrected incarnate (Son). The overall sense seems to be that whether God is a spirit or incarnated makes no difference - since there is (by the mystery of the Trinity) a unity of all three.

But there is a implicit sense in Mainstream Christianity that being incarnated is a problem. Man is regarded as primarily incarnated, as beginning as an incarnate - and the problem of incarnation is solved by means of Jesus descending into the incarnated state, dying and being resurrected... The feeling is that incarnation is a problem that needed solving, and was solved by such means.


For Mormon Christianity, incarnation is superior to spirit life. The Father is incarnate - God is not 'a spirit' but has a body.

Men have their (pre-mortal) origins as spirits, and incarnation is seen as a necessary step in progression to full divinity, to become like the Father.

(Not all pre-mortal spirit Men have incarnated, and presumably not all will necessarily incarnate - if they chose not to. They would remain as spirits - as angels; or as demons, none of whom are - according to doctrine - permitted to incarnate. Therefore, for Mormonism, incarnation is a privilege.) 

And Christ too (although highly-divine as a pre-mortal spirit) necessarily went-through this stepwise process in order to become fully divine, like his Father. But instead of dying and becoming a spirit (as happened to all men before Christ) - by dying and resurrecting; Christ began the new era in which all mortal incarnated Men died and were resurrected.


For Mormonism, incarnation is superior to being a spirit (all else being equal); in the sense of incarnation being a more divine form of being (and, as I said above, necessary for Man, including Christ, to become fully divine).

Therefore; for Christians in general, and Mormons in particular, there is no point in reincarnation - unless something has, in some way, 'gone wrong' with the primary incarnation (maybe that it was ineffective at achieving its purpose for some reason - perhaps extremely premature death?).


My conclusion is that - for Christians - reincarnation isn't a thing that is necessarily ruled-out nor false... As I have previously noted, the discussion in the New Testament of whether John the Baptist was a reincarnated prophet - and if so which one - suggests that the possibility of reincarnation was acknowledged by Jesus and his followers.

It is more a matter that reincarnation is superfluous for Christians, but esepcially for Mormons - at least under 'normal circumstances. Only if something has gone wrong with the primary incarnation would there seem to be any compelling reason to have further incarnations.

This leaves-open the question of how often things go wrong in human mortal lives, such that further incarnations are required (or desirable). Is it common or rare? To that I have no answer.

It is not that I regard reincarnation as impossible, rather that I believe it is probably very rare - and the reason I believe this is related to incarnation being irreversible.

We start-out as pre-mortal spirits - and we incarnate in order to make progress towards full divinity.

All Christians at least implicitly believe that to be resurrected - that is, to be incarnate, to die and then to be incarnated again with a perfected body - is 'better' in some vital way than simply to be 'a spirit'. That to be resurrected is a higher state than to be a spirit - otherwise why go to the bother of incarnation and death.

It also seems that there is a very general folk wisdom, spread across many religions and spiritual practises - that to die is to separate spirit from body, but that to be a spirit whose body has died is to be in some way maimed, incomplete, miserable, and indeed to be unselfed. This leads to the 'underworld' of post-mortem spirits - Hades, Sheol and the like - a world of partial and demented spirits, living in an eternal and unpleasant present.

What I take from this is that incarnation is progression, and it is also irreversible - once a spirit has had a body, the body cannot afterwards be detached from that spirit without some maiming, some irreparable damage.

Now - what this seems to mean for reincarnation is that it has to involve 'the same' person coming back. I think this is entailed, because the body would (I think) have to be remade from the surviving spirit - in something I imagine to resemble a complementary process.

In other words after death there is a maimed and incomplete spirit, and resurrection entails re-completing it with 'the same' body it had during life, but this time an immortal, perfect and pure body.

If this person was reincarnated then either they would have to return to earth with this immortal body - in which case they would be an incarnate angel rather than a resurrected human. An example would be the Moroni; who is an important human character featured in The Book of Mormon, and who then becomes the angelic agent for the rediscovery and traslation of the book by Joseph Smith.

(Note: There are also thought to be angels who are pre-incarnate or never-incarnated spirits.) 

A reincarnated human would, I take it, have to be re-born to human parents - and if a post-mortem spirit was indeed reborn in this way he would need to be provided with a new body that was nonetheless in some essential way the same body he had before - not necessarily the same in appearance, but the same in some essential fashion; because otherwise he would remain maimed; and also otherwise because if he had a different body when reincarnated, then he would not be the same person somehow reborn, but someone fundamentally different.

So I can imagine that a reincarnate might arise when (for whatever reason, perhaps a premature death such as being murdered - premature in terms of what they had been incarnated to accomplish, in a spiritual sense) - would instead of being resurrected, have their spirit 're-cycled' t be born again - but this recycling would be the same person, with a body that was the same in its ultimate essential quality (even if it did not look identical).

I expect that this thing has happened, and continues to happen - but such an idea of reincarnation apparently rules out some of the attributes and things it is supposed to achieve in Eastern religions.  It seems to rule out incarnation as other (non human) beings, and also the idea of reincarnation as a way of gathering very different experiences of being different kinds of person.

I think reincarnation is more of a second chance (or maybe third, fourth etc chance) to do what needs to be done - rather than a mechanism for incremental, stepwise spiritual progress. And this conviction of mine comes from my understanding of what happens to the spirit at death and resurrection.

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A belief in reincarnation is probably spontaneous for human beings. It is a feature of most hunter-gatherer animistic religions, and also of 'Eastern' forms of paganism such as mainstream Hinduism and Buddhism.

The basic idea is that after death of each currently-alive human, each human soul returns to earth in another body - and that each currently-alive human being has a soul which previously inhabited other bodies.

Thus, in the normal situation, souls circulate through incarnations; and life is a matter of cycling and transformations.

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(In different traditions, this cycle of souls or a particular soul may be constant; or may have a meaning or tendency - towards upward progression or downward degeneration.)

*

Since I do not believe that reincarnation really happens (or, at least, that reincarnation would be a rare and singular occurrence, not the norm) - then there is a need to explain why so many people feel that reincarnation accounts for basic perceptions concerning the nature of life.

I just have a couple of observations or suggestions based on the idea that the reality of reincarnation may be a consequence of 'misinterpreting' the meaning of true intuitive knowledge.

*

For example, the feeling of a particular affinity between individuals born in different generations may be due to a pre-mortal, pre-incarnate, spiritual relationship - and that incarnation of pre-mortal spirits may be purposive: that the earthly reality of human relations is in some way a microcosm of the pre-existent spirit reality of divine relationships.

(The reality of a pre-mortal spirit existence has been a minority, although sometimes prestigious - e.g. St Augustine of Hippo, view within Christianity throughout its history - and is currently mainly represented among Mormons.) 

This would mean that we are non-randomly incarnated to be born by particular parents in particular situations and with a particular 'network' of potential-deep relationships (not all of which may be apparent). But this is not (as for reincarnation) based on what we did in past lives, but what we are 'destined' to do in this mortal life.

(Bearing in mind that we may choose to defy our destiny, or it may be thwarted by the choice of others or by accident.)

*

Also, the survival of the soul after death seems to be a near universal intuition (which can, of course, be over-learned and suppressed as is usual among modern Western adults); and this intuition may be interpreted not as a step towards some period of life in a post-mortal spirit realms and then resurrection, but as implying that the surviving soul returns to earth in some other form.

(If there is no concept of a heavenly realm, or a spirit underworld, then the only thing a surviving soul could do is to return to earth: either as a discarnate ghost, or by taking another body.)  

*

Also, our intuitive sense of a need for a great deal of spiritual progression, that we are actually grossly imperfect but are supposed to be perfect (or much better than we are) - suggests more learning and development is necessary than can be accomplished in one mortal life.

The interpretation of this intuition may suggest that soul would need to return for multiple lifetimes or attempts. Christian theology regards this perfecting and progress as the work of Christ; and some also allow for further spiritual progression in the state that comes after death.

*

On the one hand reincarnation is optimistic, in the sense that this mortal life we currently experience is not our one and only chance; in another sense and at a deeper level, reincarnation is pessimistic because it devalues this particular mortal life as non-essential, optional, just one among many.

*

Both reincarnation and my own theology demand some kind of rationale and metaphor to explain why the reality is non-obvious: why do we not know spontaneously and exactly where our souls come from and go to?

If the feelings are built-in, which they are; then why not also the understanding of what these feelings mean?

Why must this be puzzled out, guessed or made the subject of divine revelation?

The various answers are the basis of the various theologies.

*

Owen Barfield's central idea, and the one for which he is best known, is the evolution of consciousness - meaning that the nature of human consciousness has changed throughout history such that people in different eras and places had very different relationships with the world: these changes fall into three general categories of Original Participation, the Observing Consciousness and Final Participation.

He traces the evolution of consciousness mainly by observing the characteristic changes in the meaning and usage of words, which seem to display a cohesive development - and also looks at other cultural evidence. Barfield's idea of evolution in this regard is not natural selection, but a developmental process (akin to the growth and differentiation of a living entity): the emergence and unfolding of human destiny, interacting with the agency and free will of individual humans.

What is seldom appreciated or emphasized is that for Barfield the evolution of consciousness is divinely designed, and bound-up with reincarnation. To put it concisely, the reason for the evolution of consciousness through history is that this provides the necessary conditions by which successive reincarnations of  human spirits may learn what they require to develop towards divinity.

So, for Barfield (although this is hinted at much more often than made explicit) it is God who 'provides' the evolution of consciousness in order that reincarnating human spirits may have the necessary experiences they need to growth towards the ultimate goal of Final Participation - whereby firstly, and stepwise, the Ego or Self has become separated from its original 'unconscious' immersion in the environment and strong in its purpose and will - awake, alert and in-control; then secondly the now strong and purposive Self/ Ego comes back into a participatory relationship with The World.

To underlying rationale (the 'point') of the evolution of consciousness is, for Barfield, bound-up with the reality of reincarnation; and therefore those (such as myself) who disbelieve in reincarnation as the normal human destiny, yet who believe in the evolution of consciousness, need to be clear that we differ from Barfield; and are, indeed, denying the main reason for evolution of consciousness as Barfield understood it.

To put it bluntly: those individuals who are sympathetic towards Barfield's core idea of the evolution of consciousness yet who do not believe in reincarnation, need to explain what the evolution of consciousness is for - if not to provide the conditions necessary for educating the reincarnating human spirit.  

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Note: My personal 'take' on reincarnation is that it is not the normal human destiny - but that reincarnation happens to some individuals for particular purposes - for instance, a sage, prophet or saint may be a reincarnate who has returned to assist in the divine work - indeed I suspect that many of the wise intuitive individuals such as Rudolf Steiner and perhaps Owen Barfield himself, who claim direct personal knowledge of the reality of incarnation, are themselves actually some of these rare and atypical persons. As a believer in Mormon theology, my explanation for the evolution of consciousness is that humans have a pre-mortal spiritual existence before being voluntarily incarnated into life on earth - and the evolution of consciousness allows pre-mortal spirits to be 'placed' - by God - into the historical era which best addresses their personal spiritual needs: i.e. their specific needs for mortal experience of a particular kind.

http://charltonteaching.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=reincarnation 

A favourite theme of the late, great Geoffrey Ashe was that the transition between paganism and Christianity went smoothly and peacefully in Britain. 

Unlike on the European continent; the British pagans (whether Druidic or Roman in their religion) did not seem to persecute the new Christian religion; and later-on the Christians did not persecute the pagans when they got the upper hand. 

What seems to have happened is that the Christians took-over the sacred pagan sites, and 'repurposed' or rebuilt them as churches; while the pagan Gods were replaced with Jesus, Mary, and the Saints on the basis of analogous religious functions.

(Most famously; the pagan British goddess Brigid, was replaced by the Irish Saint Brigid.) 

As well as its socio-political significance; this is theologically interesting; because it suggests that there is no fundamental conflict between paganism and Christianity; that - somehow or another - people could move from pagan to Christian without major spiritual or societal upheaval. 

I think this gives us a clue to the essence of Christianity; or, more exactly, what distinguishes it from paganism. 

What the smooth-transition tells us on the one side, is that (despite what so many people have said, and what is still asserted) there was not much to distinguish paganism and Christianity in terms of morality and lifestyle. 

The everyday and societal practice of paganism and Christianity don't seem to have been very different. 

What is very different between paganism and Christianity, is what happens after death! 

It seems to me that the Big Message of Christian missionaries; the "unique selling point' that Christians had to offer over and above anything the pagans said; was the prospect of resurrected eternal life in Heaven. 

Whereas the pagan religions could point at either some kind of afterlife life as depersonalized spirits - in an underworld or maybe as ghosts lurking in this world; or else some kind of reincarnation into the same kind of life all-over-again but as a different person...

Christians came along with their account of Jesus Christ who died and rose again and ascended to Heaven; and who offered the same possibility to those who would follow him. 

And this prospect apparently appealed greatly as a possibility superior to anything in paganism. 

I think it would have been obvious to ancient Britons, as it was later to the Anglo-Saxons and Norsemen; that what Christians offered was superior if it was true. 

But how could people know it was true - above and beyond trusting the historical stories of the missionaries?

One form of validation was miracles: when the missionaries were Saints who could perform miracles, then this validated their claims, because it proved they had a link to the divine.

But a second, and probably more widespread, form of experiential proof was by participation in the Mass, the Eucharist, Holy Communion.  

Following-up an insight from Philip K Dick; I think we can imagine that Men, at that earlier stage in the development of consciousness, would spontaneously, passively, overwhelmingly experience participation in the Mass as a literal re-living of Jesus's death and resurrection. 

In the Mass; Jesus died and came to life, and was actually-present here-and-now to those participating. 

This (or something spiritually analogous) would surely have been a compelling validation of the actuality of what Jesus offered. 

In sum; I think the conversion from Paganism to Christianity as it was actually experienced by people in the early centuries AD (people, it should be noted, whose consciousness was significantly different from you and me) was essentially very simple, which was why it could be very quick - and why mass-conversions, and even mandatory conversion, made sense at the time. 

It was an expression of the desire for resurrection after death, as preferable-to/ better-than anything paganism could offer. 

And the method of achieving this desired goal, was to be admitted to the community who ritually re-enacted Jesus's death and resurrection, such that he became actually present to the believer.

 

Note added: This post comes after a whole bunch of earlier posts in which - as a result of reading the Fourth Gospel as the primary and most authoritative source about Jesus's teaching - I became increasingly convinced that the core message of Christianity (i.e. the offer of resurrected eternal life in Heaven) had become de-emphasized and somewhat buried throughout the history of the Christian churches. In my opinion; the advent of Mormonism from 1830 was, to a significant extent, made possible by Joseph Smith's "re-discovery" of resurrection as the core promise of Christianity. Mormonism also brought a completely new and fundamentally different set of fundamental metaphysical theological assumptions concerning reality as pluralistic, developmental etc. But I believe that the main appeal of the new type of Christianity in its early decades was its clarity-about, and focus-upon, post-mortal life - treated very 'realistically' and as something that could (with certain conditions) confidently be anticipated - and with potential for continuation of loving mortal relationships.  

It has been noticed for more than a century that there is a broad correlation between ontogeny and phylogeny. Ontogeny is the development of an organism through its lifespan, while phylogeny refers to the sequence of forms leading from earlier to later members of the same presumed evolutionary lineage. 

In terms of the evolutionary-development of conscience something analogous (and perhaps homologous - i.e. from the same causes) is seen in the change of consciousness during a human lifespan, and throughout human history. 

In other words, the sequential development of consciousness from early through late childhood, into adolescence and adulthood; is similar to the sequence of human cultural conscience from the hunter-gatherer nomadic (analogous to early childhood); agrarian/ classical-medieval (older childhood); modern (adolescence) -- and the human society of 'adulthood' lies in the future (if enough people choose that path) and corresponds to whatever emerges from the first glimpses of what I have termed Primary Thinking, heart-thinking, or the state of Final Participation.   

Why should this be? Why should our lifespan development correspond to the characteristic evolution of consciousness throughout history? 

The explanation given by Rudolf Steiner and Owen Barfield is a version of reincarnation: that each modern individual has been incarnated multiple times in historical societies through history; so that the eternal 'self' (which persist between incarnations) undergoes cumulative linear transformation as a result of experience and learning. 

In other words, modern people are more mature and developed than in the past, as a consequence of having incarnated many times before, in many types of society.  

But I regard reincarnation as having been (whether wholly or mostly) ended by the work of Jesus Christ; such that since the time of Christ's death, Men have (pretty much) ceased to reincarnate; but instead make a choice between accepting or rejecting resurrected eternal life in Heaven. 

(I think that there may be exceptions when some of those who reject Heaven may be allowed further reincarnation; when the souls desire and may benefit from this in terms of coming later to embrace resurrection due to further experience.) 

Therefore I find myself advocating much the same scheme of evolutionary-development of consciousness - but without reincarnation as the explanation. What then is my explanation for (on average) 'more mature' souls being reincarnated in modern than in hunter-gatherer times? 

(Note: 'More mature' does not correspond to 'better' in terms of more-Good or more likely to attain salvation. It just means more-mature. Plenty of adults are worse people than most children; many people get worse as they grow-up; and probably more modern children would choose salvation than modern adults. Nonetheless adults are indeed, on-average, more mature in consciousness than children.) 

My answer to this relationship between ontogeny and phylogeny is to focus on the experiences we accumulate in pre-mortal life. 

Following Mormon theology, I believe that we all had an (eternal) pre-mortal existence as immaterial spirits. In other words; before we incarnated into mortal bodies we were immortal spirits; and resurrected-incarnated immortality must be preceded by phases of spirit immortality and incarnated mortality. 

The immortal pre-mortal spirits are each unique in terms of their original disposition and the differences due to different experience as spirits. 

I don't think all pre-mortal spirits do the same thing (i.e. they have different 'jobs' or functions); but some at least are 'angels' - messengers and workers for the will of God. 

(Other 'angels' are resurrected Men - so there are two types of angel: pre-mortal spirit, and post-mortal incarnate.) 

Some of these spirit angels are apparently closely concerned with life on earth: some are what is termed 'guardian angels', that work very closely with incarnated mortal humans. 

As the name implies, pre-mortal spirit angels do not have as much agency (or free will) as us mortal incarnates - they function more as intermediaries between God and mortal Men, conduits of God's will - they are, nonetheless, individuals, each an early step in Man's potential development. 

(Potential development, because some pre-mortal spirits may choose to remain at that stage indefinitely. Mortal incarnation is optional, chosen.)

For instance, pre-mortal angels may be a link Men to God's presence, God's will, and a spiritual between Men. They may also perform miracles, under direction of God. They are agents in making early Man more naturally and spontaneously spiritual than modern Man. 

In other words, an abundance of pre-mortal angels working closely with incarnate mortal Men may help account for the characteristics of Original Participation. Furthermore, these angels are building-up experience through living (spiritually) in close association with many of the various earlier forms of human society. 

Later in history, after the time of Jesus Christ; at various points some of these angels are incarnated as mortal Men; and bring into mortal life the same maturity they have developed as pre-mortal angels. 

Therefore, the evolution of consciousness through history is due to the greater maturity of more experienced incarnated souls; due to their having themselves lived-through much of previous human history - not incarnated, but in the form of spirits. 

Part of this maturity is the 'spiritual adolescence' that rejects the spiritual influence of pre-mortal angels; rather as teenagers reject influence-by and association-with children. 

One consequence of this scheme is that many of the pre-mortal spirit-angels live more like learners than helpers. 

Thus 'guardian angels' may actually be more concerned with their own learning than with providing irreplaceable 'services'. 

(Interestingly, this corresponds with the view of 'learner angels in some popular depictions - for what that is worth).

The above implies that some of us who are currently incarnated have probably been around and closely involved with human society and individuals at several or many times and places in human history - perhaps as pre-Christ reincarnates, and/or as post-Christ spirit-angels. 

Why, then, do most people not remember something of this? 

Well, some people do! And others have an implicit memory - like the memory of a dream (because spirit life has dream like qualities); but a dream than affects waking life.   

Or even more like the implicit memories of very early childhood - mostly unrecalled, but affecting us in many ways. 

If that is something like the way that these things work; then maybe many of us do have some kind of memories of this sort - perhaps evident in some of our innate aptitudes and preferences - as well as our varying degrees of innate, accumulated spiritual maturity 

 

My understanding is that an eternal and indestructible resurrected body has no physical relation to the mortal body; but is 'regenerated' from the soul: regenerated from that which survives death.

This is confirmed for me by the possibility of reincarnation, which seems to have been the 'normal' thing for souls in many parts of the world throughout history - including the ancient Hebrews and first Christians - since the possibility or prophecy of prophets being reborn is mentioned several times in the Old and New Testaments (including the Fourth Gospel Chapter 1, when discussing the identity of John the Baptist).

If a person is to be reincarnated, especially when widely separated by time, then this must presumably be with different bodies - showing that the principle is established whereby a soul may be housed in different bodies - including, potentially, the resurrection body.


On the other side; the indications that resurrection involves re-animating the mortal body can be taken to be implied by two episodes in the Fourth Gospel ('John'): the raising of Lazarus (assuming, like me, you regard this as a resurrection) and by the episode in the 20th chapter where the resurrected Jesus twice shows the wounds in his sides and hands to the disciples.

Some would assume that Lazarus is brought to life in the same physical body that has died, presumably after it had been miraculously repaired; and that the continued presence of wounds in Jesus's hands and side means that we all should expect to be resurrected in the same physical bodies in which we died - or at least one that looks the same.

Instead, my assumption is that these particular public demonstrations of  resurrection are not intended to be a pattern for all possible ones. In these; I assume that the resurrected body formed in more-or-less the same physical space as the dead mortal body; as a proof of continued identity for bystanders. But this is not necessary - nor indeed usual.

Unless resurrection was intended to be restricted only to those who had died without serious damage to their bodies, the process of resurrection (whatever it is) cannot depend on the survival intact of the physical body. There is no indication anywhere in the Fourth Gospel that resurrection is so restricted.


Furthermore, I personally do not hang too much on the 'showing of the wounds' episode, since it may well be a later addition to the Gospel by another hand and is unconfirmed by other parts of the Gospel. For example, when Mary Magdalene first met the risen Jesus at the tomb, she seems not to have seen any wounds - or else she would (surely?) immediately have recognised him.

(It is characteristic of the Fourth Gospel that all key points are repeated in different sections; I suppose so that they are emphasised, and also in order to better explain them using different 'metaphors' and contexts.) 

Therefore, lacking confirmation, I would not want to depend on the showing of the wounds as decisive evidence; especially as I am sure that the immediately adjacent and interpolated passage in Chapter 20 - about the coming of the Holy Ghost - is a later and false insertion.

It may be that most of Chapter 20 is not from the beloved disciple (whom I recognise as Lazarus); and instead based on later hearsay and the not-from-Jesus hence alien, 'imminent second coming' agenda.


But either way, I think that the fact of resurrection being the provision of a 'new' body (eternal and incorruptible) by a 'process' that does Not require any contribution from the mortal body, was something known and assumed at the time the Fourth Gospel was written.

If you wish to attain a higher 'consciousness' in life - by which I mean to experience, perceive and understand more than the five senses 'reality' of mainstream modern materialism; then you will already know that while higher consciousness is attainable in moments (aka 'peak experiences'), these moments tend spontaneously to be infrequent and last only seconds; and trying to make such moments longer and more frequent, and ideally continuous, is very difficult indeed.

(This goal of enhanced being was the major focus of Colin Wilson's thought; throughout dozens of books from The Outsider of 1956 to Super Consciousness in 2009, at the beginning and end of his publishing career.)

Another thing you might realise is that what works for one person seems seldom to work for another person. The history of those who have (apparently) attained higher consciousness is a history of different individuals with different experiences.

The lesson is that There Are No Shortcuts - the path is usually long, and each person seems to need a different path (presumably because each is, in fact, starting somewhere different).

To illustrate this, you may wish to give an hour and a half of intense attention to this recording of one of the most 'enlightened' men of whom I am aware - William Arkle.

http://www.wessexresearchgroup.org/digital_08.html

Near the end, he responds to some questions from the audience (from the well known investigator Nigel Blair, who was the host of these proceedings) concerning whether meditation was necessary for everyone and beneficial for everyone. Arkle is very definite, even somewhat harsh, in refusing to make universal recommendations or even 'hints' or 'tips'; or to imply that there are quicker and easier ways to get where you need to go.

Each of us has to struggle, because these things are difficult to learn, because they are meant to be difficult to learn.

Because without the struggle we will not really learn them.


Note: To clarify, for new readers: Arkle is a spiritual Christian - not a New Age writer. His understanding is based upon God as Creator and Loving Father, we being his children; creation being for the purpose of raising us - like Jesus Christ - to ultimate full divinity of the same kind as God. Unorthodox Christian elements in Arkle include that - as with Mormonism - Arkle envisages a Heavenly Mother consort with the Father, and human divinity as potentially rising to the same nature and level as that of the divine parents, But unlike Mormonism; Arkle also includes a scheme of incremental reincarnation (whereas Mormonism achieves much the same explanatory function by positing a significant and evolutionary pre-mortal spirit existence for all men and women).
http://williamarkle.blogspot.co.uk

*
Those who believe in a pre-mortal, un-incarnated, spirit existence need to have an answer to the question of why so many people apparently cannot remember anything about it.

The usual example is that there is a 'veil' placed between that phase of our lives, and now; between the eternal lives of Men and Angels dwelling in Heaven, and life on earth; and this veil is necessary to the fulfilment of our mortal tasks. We need to be on our own.

*

The difficulty is that while this veil explanation works for many phenomena, it doesn't account for the important fact that communications do apparently 'pierce' the veil, from time to time - sometimes those in Heaven seem to communicate with those on earth, and seem aware of the activities of those on earth.

Also, how to account for those of us who do feel a strong (albeit extremely imprecise and incomplete) conviction and memory of the reality of pre-mortal existence - and the numerous reports of such an experience throughout human history?

*

For example, evidence of pre-mortal life is widespread if is seen to be present in the form of belief in re-incarnation.

I interpret the intuitive belief in systematic reincarnation in such terms. I think it probable that true reincarnation is very rare indeed - done only for special divine purposes; but that the intuitive belief so many people have about their own personal reincarnation, is in reality a rational misinterpretation of what are actually true memories of their own pre-mortal life.

*

Anyway; why set up a veil that is partial and incomplete, and sometimes intended to be breached - when the veil amounts to a total obscuration for some people but not for others?

Well, such objections to 'the veil' are not critical. All mortal understanding is metaphorical (even when true), and all metaphors are incomplete and break-down when pushed. The metaphor of the veil may serve for the most important purposes.

*

However, my own understanding of the apparent-veil is different; my understanding is that there is not so much a material barrier, but a barrier of thought-forms which divides pre-mortal and mortal life. Specifically that, when looked at from a Heavenly perspective, mortal life is extremely slowed-up, as if we lived in a more viscous medium than Heaven.

The spirit existence of pre-mortal life was swift and immediate - there was no significant gap between thought and action because there was no body, and because the Heavenly environment had little resistance.

Heavenly life, and thought, was fluid and frictionless.

*

Earthly life, by contrast - and necessarily, as being vital to the purpose of it - is slowed-up and delayed.

Mortal, earthly life is experienced as having resistance; there is resistance interposing between the spirit and the body, and events (both creation and corruption) unfold in slow-motion (compared with Heaven) - sometimes with what is experienced as painful slowness.

Patience and prudence are always necessities in mortal life; and courage of course - exactly because of the potential for suffering, and the gap between the ideal and the actual.

*

From this I infer that our mortal memories of pre-mortal life are always present and for everyone - if we choose to introspect - but that these memories are of a life that was so swift and fluid and frictionless, that from our earthly perspective they are a blur.

Our memories of pre-mortal life are (by analogy) somewhat like watching a video recording sped-up a thousand-fold: we see just a blur of shapes and colours and sounds, creating a general impression that is mostly un-interpretable, but from which we may occasionally perceive the flicker of a recognisable picture or soundscape.

*

For those who are most attuned to these pre-mortal memories, most gifted and skillful at interpreting them, the experience may be perceived as an 'instantaneous' understanding of so many simultaneous things as to be indescribable.

Furthermore it is extremely difficult for our slow, viscous, meaning-oriented mortal memories to retain this kind of ultra-sped-up information - there is just far too much stuff to take-in and store, its sequence cannot be properly perceived, the elements cannot clearly be resolved.

*

I would push this metaphor even further. Quite often, reports of knowledge of other worlds, other lives, of Heaven has been experienced in an opposite way to that I have described: experienced as a static state-of-being - such as Nirvana. Experienced as if it was mortal life on earth that was 'swift and slippery', and Heaven that was unchanging: an eternal, unitary state of being.

My explanation is that when something is sped-up fast-enough, it becomes perceived (by mortal minds) as static and unchanging.

Try the experiment of doing this with music - as the playback is sped-up, at first the music is experienced as faster and faster, but a line is crossed when the notes blend together, and a much slower and more gradually modulating chord-like sound emerges (representing the overall dynamics, the average pitch, the tonality etc.).

This is my explanation for how Heaven is perceived by mortal minds, and how the limitation of earthly human perception may mistake what are in reality extreme degrees of swiftness and fluidity for (what appears to be) slow, gradually modulating, even static states of being.

*

I use a family picnic as (sometimes) an example of one of the most delightful occasions of being a parent with children. 

Certainly, the picnics in the middle of a country walk (or a walk around a country house estate) are among my treasured memories. 

There was about them a spontaneous atmosphere of enchantment - but there are various ways of conceptualizing its meaning. 

In a mainstream, materialist and mundane fashion - a 'successful' family picnic could be described as a form of pleasure; some kind of combination of the biological bond between parents and offspring, and the physical pleasures of warm weather and soothing views, pleasant food and rest after exertion... something of that kind. 

By this account there is no extra or special significance to a family picnic - it was nice while it lasted; but in mortal life nothing lasts...

And when the event has faded from memory, then it will have disappeared from reality. The vast universe closes over the indescribably micro-incident, obliterates it - as if it never had been. 

Or; we might imagine something like a family picnic among animistic hunter-gatherers - with a significance that is in one sense timeless and in another sense one of an unending cycle of eternal recurrences with transformations. 

One picnic is all picnics; and all picnics are in that one picnic here and now. No individual picnic is necessary, none add to the sum of picnics - but any specific picnic is simultaneously all past and future picnics. 

Each is different, but in a way that does not affect the quality of the world - which Just Is. 

In the same way each reincarnation of each family member is different in terms of the exact manifestation of the soul - but there are just so many souls which recur over time. 

There can be permutation and recombination of the specifics of a picnic, but it is ultimately an arbitrary event artificially detached from the unending continuum of live cycling and transforming - neither adding-to nor subtracting-from the totality of creation.  

From a traditional Christian transcendent (broadly Platonic, or Eastern Orthodox Christian) perspective; the picnic might be seen as a glimpse or foretaste of Heaven. Its value lies in what it symbolizes, what it represents, what it leads-to. 

Strictly speaking, the actual earthly picnic is not significant - because it is transient and mundane. Only insofar as it induces us to think of the eternal and unchanging true-reality of Heaven, to yearn for it, to strive for salvation - does this specific family picnic have value. 

Mortal life is - at most - a preparation for eternity. 

The earthly picnic is evanescent and will disappear, because ultimately it is not needed. If the picnic had never happened, this would not affect the reality of eternal Heavenly perfection - which, because it is perfect, has no need for earthly things, and can neither be enhanced nor affected by earthly occurrences. 

But my own understanding is that this picnic is unique and unprecedented; and adds something eternal to the cumulative sum of divine creation; which had a beginning, and perhaps a different future because of this picnic. 

This earthly picnic potentially affects the eternal souls of the participants. If the family are able to learn from their experience now, then after death their resurrected souls will carry the learning from this picnic forward into Heaven. 

This picnic has something Good in it which makes a permanent difference, and things will never be the same again afterwards. 

Even if the picnic - and what it did, and what it meant - is absolutely forgotten by the mortal humans who participated in it - no matter! The immortal souls of those humans will be affected by it - and the Good consequences will survive through the transformation of resurrection to affect Heavenly life everlasting. 

My point? What happens on earth means more than our fleeting feelings in this transient mortal life; yet the Good, significant events of our lives are not merely secondary,  imperfect and disposable glimpses of the eternal perfection of Heaven. 

Our bodies and minds are temporary - but our souls are eternal.

And if our souls proceed to resurrection and Heaven; then all that is relevant which we have learned on earth will be carried forwards into life everlasting; and will change the nature of eternal creation.

  

A couple of days ago I read through the Fourth Gospel (again) - this time all-through in a couple of hours, to try and get an overview. Several things stood-out and were clarified; but probably the most important was an answer to the question of who gets resurrected.

And the clear answer is - those who believe on, who follow, Jesus.

Or, to put it another way, only those who believe on, who follow Jesus, will be resurrected to that Eternal/ Everlasting Life which Jesus brings us.

This is in contrast to mainstream Christian belief that all are resurrected (but not-all are saved); and it also contradicts a single but explicit sentence in the Fourth Gospel+; however, the overall structure of the Fourth Gospel and multiple, repeated, references support the answer that it is 'only' those who regard Jesus as the Son of God and the Messiah, that will be resurrected.

(This opens a further question of what happens to those who are choose Not to follow Jesus and who are Not therefore resurrected - but I will deal with that below.)

Assuming this interpretation is correct, how could this simple teaching have been missed? The answer is quite simple: Biblical understanding has operated on the basis that the whole Bible is equally true - therefore a specific teaching in 'just' one Gospel (especially the Fourth Gospel) is ignored/ explained-away when it contradicts other parts of the Bible - and especially when it contradicts the three Synoptic Gospels and the Pauline Epistles.

Whereas I believe that if we believe the truth of the Bible (truth in at least a general sense, recognising that this must mean interpretation of specific verses), then we believe the Fourth Gospel is true - including its claims about itself; and these Fourth Gospel claims mean that it is the single most authoritative Book in the Bible, which ought to be given the highest authority, above any other Book in the Bible.

(By contrast the other Gospels are, and claim to be no more than, secondhand and post hoc compilations of accounts about Jesus; and Paul's knowledge is from intuitive revelation that is, for Christians, intrinsically unlikely to be detailed and specific.)

Therefore, to check this claim for yourself - I would simply urge you to read the Fourth Gospel as an autonomous text in light of this interpretation, and looking for evidence of this teaching. (Assuming that you do already have a personal revelation of the truth of this Gospel; and if not then you would need to seek one.)

If we take the original Fourth Gospel to run from Chapters 1-20, with Chapter 21 added later (but presumably by the real author) - then the Gospel begins and ends with two core teachings - which are repeated throughout:

1. That Jesus is who he claimed to be - the Son of God, the Messiah sent by God; and that he died, resurrected and ascended to Heaven to become fully divine.

2. That Jesus came to bring resurrection and Life Eternal/ Life Everlasting to those who 'believed on' him (including believing his claim to be the Messiah and Son of God), who followed him as a sheep follows a shepherd, who loved him and believed in his love for each of us, who trusted and had faith in him.

In fact, we see that these two teachings are linked, and are - in a sense - a single teaching.

Most of the Fourth Gospel is taken up with providing 'proof' that Jesus was who he claimed - and this proof is of the type that would be effective for those living just after the death of Jesus and in the same region - evidence suitable for that time and place.

So, the evidence is the witness of John the Baptist (who was very well known and would have been regarded as the best possible witness); the fulfilment of Old Testament prophecies (which, again, would have been well known); and the evidence of the miracles including the resurrection of Lazarus and Jesus, at a time when many witnesses of these events were still around.

None of this evidence is very convincing to people 2000 years later and in different places and cultures; but the further teaching of the Fourth Gospel is that after his ascension Jesus sent the Holy Ghost, the 'Comforter', to provide a direct witness and knowledge to the disciples - and implicitly (although probably not explicitly) to everyone else who sought it. 

The rest of the Fourth Gospel is, via stories (parables), miracles, reported conversations and direct teachings - to explain the enhanced, divine nature of Life after resurrection - this being termed Life Eternal or Life Everlasting; and to promise this to all who would follow Jesus.

That is, pretty much, everything that the Fourth Gospel says (aside from some specific remarks to the disciples - and a single hint that they ought to teach about Jesus following his ascension). There is little or nothing specific about how to live or about a 'church' of any kind - which is probably another reason that the Fourth Gospel has been historically down-graded from its proper supremacy over the rest of the Bible.

If it is true that only the followers of Jesus are resurrected, then this removes certain problems that arise from the alternative view. It means that resurrection is chosen, it is voluntary; and therefore resurrection is not compelled nor is it enforced. I was always troubled by the idea that Jesus brought resurrection to all, whether they wanted it or not - especially since the prospects for someone resurrected but not saved seemed so grim. It seemed that Jesus was giving with one hand, but taking with the other - which would not be very loving, and seemed sub-optimal (for a creator God) - surely something better could be managed for the children of God?

But apparently that was a misunderstanding. Those who do not believe Jesus, or who do not love him and do not wish to follow him, or who do not want Life Everlasting in a (Heavenly) world of love and creation - these are Not resurrected - but shall instead return to spirit life (as we began; before we were incarnated into earthly mortality).

This fits with the beliefs of many non-Christian religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, and some other paganisms) - who see post-mortal life in terms of a return to the spirit world.

It also opens the possibility of reincarnation, which has probably been the usual belief of most humans through most of human history. The Fourth Gospel teaches that reincarnation is a possibility, when it discusses whether John the Baptist was one of the Old Testament prophets reincarnated... the conclusion is that he was not one of a series of possible named prophets, but the possibility of reincarnation is assumed.

We could even speculate (and it would be a speculation unless confirmed by revelation) that the world contains some mixture of newly incarnated mortals, and a proportion of reincarnates who did not accept Jesus in previous lives but have returned (presumably by choice) to enable further chances.

But again, it seems intrinsic to Christianity that all higher theosis is by choice; and post-mortal spirits would not be compelled to resurrect, nor to reincarnate - but might remain in spirit form as long as they wished.

Mortal life is best seen as an opportunity. As Jesus explained in his conversation with Nicodemus, Heavenly Life Everlasting is available only via death and being resurrected or 'born again'; and this was the path that Jesus himself needed to take in order to attain to full Godhood at the ascension. Jesus brought us this possibility - but it must be chosen, and the reason for choice must be love.


+This is John 5:28-9: ...'all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and come forth; they that have done good, until the resurrection of life, and those that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.' I regard this, from its interruption of the structure and its contradiction of the rest of the gospel, as a later, non-canonical insertion. 

Note added:

I want any seriously interested reader to do what I suggest above; which is to check this claim for yourself - I would simply urge you to read the Fourth Gospel as an autonomous text in light of this interpretation, and looking for evidence of this teaching.

However, below I have made a selection of relevant passages from just the first six books of the Fourth Gospel (you will need to search the rest of the Gospel for yourself) - and the last verse of the (original final) Chaper 20. These are consistent with the understanding that resurrection is to life eternal/ life everlasting by means of 'receiving' Jesus; and that those who do not accept Jesus, shall not be resurrected to this new kind of Life as Sons of God: Life eternal/ everlasting is for the resurrected, both together - there is no sense of there being a distinction or sequence between resurrection and the New Life.


1: [11] He came unto his own, and his own received him not. [12] But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

2: [14] And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: [15] That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. [16] For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. [17] For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. [18] He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. [19] And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

[36] He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.

5: [24] Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. [25] 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.

[39] Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. [40] And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. [41] I receive not honour from men. [42] But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you. [43] I am come in my Father's name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive.

6: [26] Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. [27] Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed. [28] Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that we might work the works of God? [29] Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent. [30] They said therefore unto him, What sign shewest thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? what dost thou work? [31] Our fathers did eat manna in the desert; as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat. [32] Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. [33] For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world. [34] Then said they unto him, Lord, evermore give us this bread. [35] And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. [36] But I said unto you, That ye also have seen me, and believe not. [37] All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. [38] For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. [39] And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day. [40] And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day. [41] The Jews then murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. [42] And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven? [43] Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves. [44] No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. [45] It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me. [46] Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father. [47] Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life. [48] I am that bread of life. [49] Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. [50] This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. [51] I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. [52] The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat? [53] Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. [54] Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. [55] For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. [56] He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. [57] As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me. [58] This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever. [64] But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him. [65] And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
(…)
20: [31] But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.

My understanding is that we began (pre-mortal) life as spirits, each of whom can trace their origin eternally; at some point we became sons and daughters of God (that is, of Heavenly Parents); and at some later point we were incarnated when these spirits took-on bodies.

Thus, (with a few exceptions, probably) I believe that this is our one-and-only incarnate mortal life. 

(To complete the sketch: when we die the spirit is severed from the body; and then we are resurrected with immortal bodies.)

I explain the typical experiences and memories that are usually taken as pointing towards reincarnation with previous earthly lives; as being actual occurrences of our pre-mortal spiritual existence - when we were a type of 'angel', each of us engaged in some distinctive way with work in God's creation.

So, when we have a sense that we really were present at some time and place in earth's history (for example) it is possible that we really were there, as pre-mortal spirits. We were not a specific historical person, but may have been present and intimately-involved with the divine destiny related to some people, some era, some location...

This may well explain my own very solid and long-term fascination and empathy for a few very specific places, times and persons; for which I seem to have memories of a spiritual, aspirational 'atmospheric' nature - but no solid, specific physical details.

Three examples are the English Lake District (specifically around Keswick) at the time of the Lake Poets such as Coleridge, Southey and Wordsworth; Concord, Massachusetts at the time of Emerson, Thoreau, Alcott; and Oxford at the time of The Inklings (especially Tolkien and the Lewis brothers).

Just to clarify, I do not feel any special identification with any of these individuals; but I do feel a strong identification with their core spiritual-intellectual aspirations and efforts.

Taken together, all of these make an obvious theme of romanticism, of escaping 'modern' alienation and breaking from materialism into a (mythic) spiritual awareness.

Despite the fact that this theme goes back to my middle teenage years, long before I was a Christian, and long before I could articulate this theme (which has, indeed, happened only with the past few years) - this is, and always has been, my most deeply-cherished theme and hope. And becoming aware of it - explicitly, and in a coherent fashion - is extremely encouraging, energising and orientating.

Of course, it is possible to write-off this notion as a wish-fulfilment fantasy, because it is based upon subjective conviction. About this I have nothing to say: I merely state my own understanding. The value is personal - my understanding of my situation is not necessarily or any interest or relevance to other people, especially strangers.

But you may yourself have a different set of fascinations, which may yield a different impression of pre-mortal concerns; and this may lead-onto a clarity about your business here-and-now, in this mortal life - the essence of what you, personally, are 'here-for'.

*

For most of my life I had a false understanding of the Christian belief in everlasting life: I thought it was about living an eternal life as a spirit. I assumed that the stuff about resurrection in a new body was a primitive superstition, which no sophisticated Christian believed.

But my understanding is very different now. I now assume that the intuition of every childhood, all historical cultures and most of the modern world is correct: that the soul survives death. The question is what happens next, or what state is that surviving soul.

*

The human soul is meant to be united with the body, therefore after death of the body there is a degree of maiming.

So death of the body is indeed 'a bad thing', as we naturally suppose, and survival in a spiritual realm does not make up for this.

(Indeed, the 'natural' post-death survival of the soul may itself be most of what people describe as hell - I am impressed by the ancient Jewish idea of Sheol as a realm of witless gibbering ghosts, human souls minus the body may be like that - each ghostly spirit in its own horrible unending isolation.)

*

Immortality, popularly conceptualized, is continued life - life as it is now but continued indefinitely.

But this has nothing to do with Christianity, rather it was what Christianity was intended to cure; and indeed continued spirit life solves none of the deep problems of life; neither does reincarnation (leaving-aside the question of whether reincarnation is true in this world).

To imagine that immortality (continued existence) or a system of reincarnations (recycling of the soul through various bodies) solves anything fundamental seems to be simply a misunderstanding - a non sequitur.

*

So what is the Christian belief?

Christian salvation involves the soul surviving death, then the saved soul being resurrected in a perfected body to dwell in heaven.

The process of resurrection is not a restoration of the state of humans on earth; we as we are are not reborn again to a continued existence; but there is instead a re-making of an unique human into an unique Son of God - retaining each individual human nature (staying essentially the same person) but enhancing - indeed transforming - this nature.

It's simple enough isn't it? And I had heard this often enough, but somehow it didn't get through to me...

*

*

I find that the doctrine of pre-mortal existence, that we were alive and sentient before this mortal earthly life, takes a larger and larger place in my cosmology as its implications sink-in.

When I first encountered it, the doctrine of pre-mortality seemed like just 'kicking the can further back up the road' - but this is not so. It is a profoundly different perspective from (say) that we (our selves) were created from nothing at the time of conception, in embryo or at birth; and profoundly different too from the various theories of cyclical reincarnation and transformation.

*

Indeed, this doctrine of pre-mortal existence is coming to seem like a key - the necessary first piece of a jigsaw of inference that makes sense of mortal life, and gives meaning to it; and enables a positive attitude towards it.

I have found that rival doctrines cannot explain the necessity and desirability of our mortal life - this actual life we are living here-and-now; so that there is a tendency to regard mortality as a misfortune we would wish to be over as soon as possible, a trial to be endured as a punishment, or simply trivial - swallowed-up by the eternity of post-mortal life or rendered insignificant by the round of reincarnations, or a momentary spark in an infinite universe and duration of nothingness.

But to perceive mortal life as a discrete episode, sandwiched between the two open-ended and unmeasurable eternities of pre- and post-mortal existence - is to change this earthly life from being just an infinitesimally-brief mere-prelude to Heaven or Hell or extinction or a roundabout of similar incarnations - into a infinitely precious - because unique and bounded - era of our existence.

*

And pre-mortality enables us to consider mortal life as a choice; and for each person to understand himself as a volunteer rather than a conscript in this spiritual and bodily warfare amidst which we find ourselves; because at some level and in some way and with some precision (although not pre-destined) we chose this actual mortal life.

Thus pre-mortality is a way-out from what seems like the logical necessity of this whole business of mortality being an accident, an unfortunate accident - the notion that we were born here-and-now and as who-we-are for no reason at all but simply as the unrepeatable outcome of roll-upon-iterated-roll of genetic dice - and that we are (it seems, in such a mood) nothing-but this combination of randomness, genetics and contingent circumstance...

*

However, pre-mortal existence locates our essential selves outside of earthly chance and contingency - our essence is prior to randomness, genetics, and environment; our real selves are independent of contingency; and therefore there is meaning and necessity to our basic situation.

Pre-mortal existence is one key part of the doctrinal pre-requisites we require to understand that this actual earthly mortal life of ours is ultimately part of an eternal narrative and striving, with which we personally have already and previously aligned-ourselves.

*


Note: These thoughts were crystallized by watching a video of the late Elder Neal A Maxwell speaking on the subject of "A wonderful flood of light" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJwZ6zQhyZ0 - h/t 'Zen' at jrganymede.com. Correction: the poetic quotation Elder Maxwell attributes to CS Lewis was actually by JRR Tolkien (from Mythopoeia) - and was rather addressed-to CS Lewis.

The coming of Jesus Christ changed the nature of death.

More exactly, I believe that this happened at the point of his baptism by John; the time when Jesus became divine; when the divine spirit rested upon him and stayed with him.

From then; those who loved, trusted, had-faith-in, 'followed' Jesus (those who wanted to be resurrected and dwell in Heaven for eternity) would be resurrected.

So time is real, history is real; the nature of death is divided into before and after that moment. That moment introduced the new possibility after biological death; which was resurrection to eternal life.


Before Jesus, there was no resurrection. When Men died, the spirit was separated from the body. What then?

My understanding is that the body is what enables greater agency, greater freedom; our capacity to be an actor rather than acted-upon. A spirit without a body has a much lesser degree of agency; so when the body dies there is a loss of The Self.

We experience an analogous situation each time we sleep. Sleep itself represents two of the possibilities after death - when we live in the spirit.


Deep sleep is the loss of consciousness. We are alive but don't know it (or barely so); alive but unaware of anything. This is the nearest reality to the subjective perception of death as annihilation.

Genuine annihilation of an individual spirit is impossible since our primordial spirit had no beginning, is eternal, has no end - but self-awareness can be annihilated (which represents a return to our primordial state, before we became Children of God) - alive but unaware.

When this state of alive-but-unaware is pleasurable, blissful - then it is Nirvana; the state of being sought by Hindus and Buddhists. So I am suggesting that deep sleep is a temporary Nirvana.


Dreaming sleep is equivalent to Hades or Sheol; which are seen as conditions of 'delirious', or demented half-being; when men become witless ghosts or similar.

This is seen in the state of dreaming sleep insofar as we are in a passive state of being. Memory constantly slips away, our capacity for agency is feeble so that we 'go along with' whatever is happening.

Dreaming sleep is an experience of passivity, loss of reason and purpose. It is a vision of spirit life without incarnation.


I suggest that these states - Nirvana and Hades, corresponding to deep and dreaming sleep - were the possibilities of spirit life before Jesus.

A further possibility was reincarnation. The spirit could be re-housed in a new body.

Since the body, and its specific nature, affects the spirit - this meant the reincarnated spirit, reborn and leading another life, was 'a different person' - not the same person repeated.

An analogy would be a relative who shares a certain fundamental similarity, the same flavour, deep character - "He's Just Like his uncle John...".


After Jesus a further possibility was introduced, in addition to 'Christian resurrection' - and this was Paradise.

Paradise takes various forms - Valhalla, or the Muslim Paradise. Implicitly, Paradise is a state in which our-selves are retained and our agency; so paradise is a kind of resurrection.

But Paradise is not a resurrection to the presence of God and the participation in the work of creation that is Heaven. It is a place where one's favourite activities become possible, in principle eternally (and subject to the limits of that aspiration, and the constraints of mutual existence).

Paradise (in its variants) is, indeed, pretty much the lower or 'Telestial' Heaven as described in Mormon theology. It is pleasurable and enjoyable, but in Paradise men are not qualitatively different from how they are in this mortal life - there is no ascent to a higher, more conscious and creative and loving, form of life.

In sum; Paradise is essentially uncreative, passive ('contemplative', appreciating, consuming) a reversion to childhood or adolescence; to Original Participation. And I believe it is possible that some people in Heaven are actually experiencing Paradise - e.g. those who are resurrected as (in their essence) children, but who live (as children) with their families who include those who are participating with God in the work of creation.  


What about Hell? Well some will choose that, on the basis of how they choose in mortal life - maybe even a large majority of people in the modern West.

These are self-excluded from heaven, and self-excluded from resurrection; Hell is the exclusion of Love.

Such remain spirits in the condition of Sheol, but isolated by the perspective and priorities of those who choose Hell.

Their state seems terrible to me; and is based upon a primary (pride-full) dishonesty of denying that they are God's children living in God's creation... but Hell is what they get, having rejected all the above.

So, Jesus brought Hell, as well as resurrection in Heaven - because it is deliberate, conscious rejection of the world of God, Good, Creation and Love that makes Hell hellish.

Note added: Resurrection is the single most astonishing, incredible, mysterious thing about Christianity. That is my point. What that means is that resurrection is Not something that can be 'explained' in common-sensical, ordinary, easily intelligible, procedural terms as if it was a chemical manufacturing process. It is incredible. I am not At All surprised if people don't believe it. Nonetheless, resurrection is something near the core of what Jesus taught (and did). I think resurrection is probably a much more important fact of Christianity than commonly regarded. We should work from that, rather than try to make the incredibility go away.