HUMAN SOUL, IMMORTALITY OF THE. - It is the property of the human soul to survive the death of the body.
OUTLINE:
I. Immortality in the history of religions
II. Immortality in the history of philosophy
III. Immortality in the Old Testament
IV. Immortality according to Christian philosophy
V. Immortality according to Catholic doctrine.I. IMMORTALITY IN THE HISTORY OF RELIGIONS.
In the philosophical-theological sense discussed below, there is no trace of immortality in non-Christian religions, whether primitive, national, or ethnic, ancient or modern.
In all these religions, however, there exists a deeply rooted belief in the survival of the soul, a belief that manifests as a natural instinct for the permanence of the individual and its continuation beyond life. This idea of permanence beyond the grave is also a consequence of the social structure tied to the person of the group’s leader, considered as always present and active for the benefit of the group. This concept of the leader’s perpetuity is found, in the domestic cult of the Romans, in the figure of the genius of the paterfamilias, and, during the Hellenistic era, in the concept of the « great souls » destined for an immortal life.
Regarding the survival of the soul and the manner in which it is depicted in its condition of separation from the body (bird, butterfly, scarab, winged being), V. ANIMA. Metempsychosis or reincarnation cannot be considered equivalent to immortality because it excludes the persistence of the consciousness of the individual self.
Among the Semites, the abyss separating the world of men from that of the gods is insurmountable. Even when benevolent deities wish to grant men the gift of immortality, it does not come to pass due to human fault; thus, in Babylon, the wise Adapa, to whom Anū wishes to offer the « food and water of life, » refuses them on the advice of Ea; and Gilgameš, who, like his ancestor Utnapištini, wishes to be admitted among the ranks of the gods, lets the herb of youth slip from his hands, which would have granted him immortality.
In Egypt, the popular belief concerning the survival of the soul was sublimated into the vision of immortality through the myth of Osiris, the primordial king of Egypt who, killed by his brother Sēt, rises again to reign immortal over the kingdom of the dead and thus becomes the prototype for his faithful, who, through the Osirian funeral rite performed on their corpse, can attain immortality (v. OSIRIDE).
Among the Aryo-Europeans (India, pre-Zoroastrian Persia, Greece, Rome, Celts, Germans, Slavs), immortality is the exclusive privilege of the gods. In Vedic India, only the gods are immortal (a-martja), not men, who nevertheless knew that not everything ends with death and therefore scrupulously practiced the due funeral rites toward their ancestors (pīdrāb).
Brahmanism, given its pantheistic vision of the cosmos, designates with the same term ātman (= breath, wind) both the personal self and the universal self, that is, the animating principle of the universe: it is therefore a question of an impersonal immortality or perpetuity that has nothing to do with the genuine concept of immortality.
Buddhism denied the identification of the personal self with the universal self, maintaining that the soul is not a permanent spiritual substance but the result of a series of states of consciousness detached from one another, though associated in sequence.
The goal to be achieved is to annul individual existence in nirvāṇa (= extinguished, quenched), already in life through the elimination of every passion (nirvāṇa), which prepares the way for complete extinction (second nirvāṇa, parinirvāṇa), that is, the impossibility of a new birth.
However, the doctrinal development of Buddhism led to overcoming this overly agnostic vision of original Buddhism (called the Lesser Vehicle), incapable of giving outlet to individual mysticism, and introduced (Greater Vehicle) the transcendent and permanent concept of divinity in the figure of the cosmic Buddha, revealed one day in the person of the historical Buddha. Every individual can become a Buddha, provided that the merit of their personal sacrifice—consisting in renouncing, for the benefit of others, the liberation that would lead them to enjoy bliss in Buddha’s paradise—redounds to the advantage of others; this amounts to an implicit but real affirmation of immortality. Mazdaism, preached by Zarathustra, places among the immortal saints surrounding the throne of Ahura Mazda, the « Wise Lord » Ahura Mazda, Ameretat, immortality, the reward for a life lived according to justice. The Fravashi (who in the pre-Zoroastrian era were the souls of the deceased) are assigned, like guardian angels, to the protection of individuals and, with their assistance, guarantee their immortality.
In Greece, the survival of the soul is documented, from the Minoan era onward, by funerary furnishings (especially the sarcophagus of Haghia Triada), but even in Homer there is no affirmation of immortality, which remains the exclusive privilege of the gods, thanks to the ambrosia and nectar they consume.
The evolution of the concept of survival into that of immortality occurred in Greece thanks to the mysteries (v.), particularly those of Dionysus (v.), with their orgiastic rites that gave initiates the sense of having attained a supernatural state; those of Orpheus, which represent their theological sublimation; Eleusis (v.).
For the philosophical-religious development of the concept of immortality in Greece during the Hellenistic era, V. below.
Islam, which drew its doctrinal elements from Jewish and Christian sources, affirms the immortality of the soul where it speaks both of the particular judgment (Quran, 7:35; 50:16) and of the universal judgment that Allāh will make of the good and the wicked (Quran, 21:48). The further theological development of Islam maintained this faith firmly,
orienting it with Avicenna in an Aristotelian sense and with al-Ghazālī in a mystical sense.
II. IMMORTALITY IN THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY.
I. GREEK PHILOSOPHY
The belief in the survival of the soul after death appears to belong to the original heritage of human consciousness and, together with the existence of the divinity, constitutes the other pole of religious consciousness. This conviction manifests itself in popular consciousness especially through the cult of the dead, divinatory practices (μαντική), and cathartic rites, above all through practices of religious exaltation (ἐνθουσιασμός, μανία).According to Rohde, it is especially the cult of Dionysus, arriving from Thrace, that nourished in popular consciousness the hope of immortality, so that after the trials of life, man might, through death, lead a happy life similar to that of the divinity.
In Homeric poems, man appears as purely mortal, and only heroes are granted immortality, but their life in the afterworld, rather than enjoying the happiness of the gods, still feels the necessities and sorrows of earthly life to which they remain bound. Even in Orphic poems, immortality is considered an attribute of the divinity, while men are called mortal: ἀθάνατοι τε θεοί, θνητοί τε ἀνθρώποι (Orphicorum fragmenta, ed. O. Kern, Berlin 1922, frg. 169, 8). After death, souls are led by Hermes to an "underground place," as Proclus declares (εἰς τὸν ὑποχθύνων τόπων: In Rempuhl. Plat., ed. W. Kroll, Leipzig 1901, p. 340, 2; cf. p. 339, 20 sgg. and Orphic frg. 244) to be purified or punished. A lengthy fragment presents a doctrine that assumes an advanced philosophical elaboration of popular belief, as it outrightly affirms the immortality of the human soul because it is made by Jupiter and derives from the incorruptible element of the ether, and thus has a divine nature: ψυχή δ'ἀνθρωποίον ἀπ'ἀθέρος ἐρρίζωται, καὶ ἄλλως — ἀέρα δ'ἐλκόντες ψυχὴν θείαν ὄρεπόμεσθα — ψυχή δ'ἀθάνατος καὶ ἀγέρας ἐκ Διός ἄστιν (Orphicorum frāgm., ed. cit., frg. 228). Here, the so-to-speak cosmo-ontological character of immortality, which is characteristic of all Greek thought, is clearly outlined: the soul is immortal because it results from or belongs to the indestructible substance of the gods or is more akin to their nature. Immortality, therefore, does not yet arise from a metaphysics of spirit in the modern sense but is tied to attributes of perpetuity, indestructibility, subtlety, simplicity, etc., which are proper to the most perfect body, the ether, which is also the substance of celestial bodies: hence called the "fifth body," "celestial body" (πέμπτου σῶμα, θεῖον σῶμα). Cumont has sought to show the Eastern, and more particularly Persian, origin of the Greek belief in immortality: certainly, up to Plato and Aristotle, the superiority of the nature of the human soul is referred not to spirituality but to its incorruptibility (ἀφθαρσία), deriving from the ethereal nature of the soul, which grants it "affinity with the gods" (συγγένεια πρὸς θεοὺς). Thus, it is not surprising that already in Thales the soul is said to be ἀκτικίνητος and αὐτοκίνητος (H. Diels, Dox. gr., 2nd ed., Berlin 1929, p. 386 a 10) and even "immortal" (H. Diels, Die Fragm. der Vorsokratiker, I, 5th ed., ibid. 1937, fr. A. 1, p. 68, 4); Alcmaeon would have expressly called it endowed with eternal motion and therefore immortal like the gods (H. Diels, Dox. gr., p. 386 b, 12). Explicit affirmations of immortality are found in Anaximander and Anaximenes, as an attribute of the First Principle: uncreated, incorruptible... immortal, imperishable ('Ἐτι δὲ καὶ ἀγένητον καὶ ἀφθάρτον ὡς ἀρχὴ τις οὖσα... καὶ τοὺς εἶναι τὸ θεῖον ἀθάνατον γὰρ καὶ ἀνώλεθρον, ὡς φησὶν ὁ Ἀναξιμάνδρος καὶ οἱ πλείστοι τῶν φωσιόλογων (H. Diels, Die Fragm. d. Vorsokratiker, I, frg. A 15, p. 85, 16 sgg.). It is therefore important to note that the corporeality of the soul did not at all constitute an obstacle to affirming its immortality, but this was safeguarded and affirmed with particular energy by attributing to the soul an incorruptible corporeality.
More easily was the defense of immortality achieved when, with Pythagoreanism, the "incorporeal" (ἀσώματος) nature of the soul began to be affirmed. From the Pythagorean position derived Platonic doctrine, whose definitive cornerstones are: 1) "that which moves itself" (αὐτοκίνητος) is in act by itself and cannot perish; 2) that which moves itself is not moved by another, but it is the principle of motion for other movables, and such is the soul; 3) now, every such principle is by its nature "ungenerated" (ἀγένετος) and eternal (cf. Phaed., 245 c e); 4) the perhaps most substantial argument is that taken from ἀνάμνησις in the Phaedo, insofar as it appeals to pure intellectual knowledge, which requires an ontological order superior to that of sensations (Phaed., 73 c-77 d). In Plato, immortality is expressly conceived with an individual character, but it remains hindered, among other things, by the theory of preexistence and metempsychosis, which divert it into myth, in a contrast between making it "ungenerated and eternal" like that of the divinity and abandoning it to the continuous passage from body to body for purification. Aristotle deepens the argument of knowledge but seems to affirm immortality as a property of the νοῦς ποιητικός alone, which (unlike the νοῦς παθητικός φθαρτός) is said to be τοῦτο μόνον ἀθάνατον καὶ ἀξίδιον (De an., III, 5, 430 a 24 sgg.) precisely because by its nature it is impassible and simple (ἀπαθὲς καὶ ἀμυγὲς καὶ τῇ οὐσίᾳ ὢν ἐνεργεῖς ibid., 16). Probably Aristotle did not reach a clear consciousness of personal immortality, as seems indicated by the affirmation that the desire for immortality remains within the realm of the impossible: βούλησις ἀθανάτων οὖον ἀθανασίας (Eth. Nic., III, 4, 1111 b 23). Thus, even when in De gen. anim., II, 3, 736 a 15 Aristotle speaks of the νοῦς that comes "from without" (θῆραθεν), he seems to mean the activity of the generator that transmits life with the seed and not a creative act of God that infuses the spirit.
The explicit negation of immortality appears with Democritus, who considers the soul a "composite" substance of atoms and therefore dissolves at death like other bodies, and is followed in this by Epicurus (H. Diels, Dox. gr., p. 393 a 8). The Stoics, while considering the soul an ἀποσπάσμα τοῦ θεοῦ, remained hesitant between the moral exigency of a perfect justice and happiness for the best spirits, which demands individual immortality, and the logic of their own materialist metaphysics that excluded it; they affirm immortality, for example, Chrysippus and even Seneca, who make souls migrate to the stars; they deny it Panaetius, Posidonius, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, etc., for whom the sage, free from the disturbances of passions, can enjoy on this earth the perfect happiness of his virtue (ἀταραξία, ἀπάθεια). Plotinus, in the special treatise dedicated to immortality (Enn., IV, 7), after a close critique of Stoic and Aristotelian doctrines, accused of materialism but from which he utilizes positive elements, returns to Platonic doctrine, reserving however absolute immortality for the principal soul or anima mundi, into which individual souls are reabsorbed. The cosmic character of immortality is amply developed in the system of Proclus in the various grades of θεία σώματα (the sky and the stars: cf. Arist., De coelo, II, 1, 284 a 1): μερικαὶ ψυχαί, δαίμονες, θεῖαι ψυχαί, firmly holding the equivalence of immortality and eternity (τῶν τὸ ἀθάνατον ἀξίδιον) and essentially accepting also for the human soul a vehicle (ἔχημα) that is material, incorruptible, and of celestial origin (Proclus, Elementa theologiae, ed. E. R. Dodds, Oxford 1932, propp. 105-107; cf. especially Exorens, p. 315 sgg.).
It can therefore be concluded that, while the absolute negation of the immortality of the soul in Greek philosophy is rare and sporadic, its demonstration in the sense of a rigorous spiritualism and personalism has not been clearly achieved: immortality is affirmed by some in relation to an incorruptible corporeality (the celestial ether), simple, etc., from which the stars and even divinity itself arise; by others, the soul is called "incorporeal" (ἀσώματος) as number, harmony, first act, etc.: it is thus destined to vanish with the disintegration of the body at death. In both tendencies, the soul has a cosmic nature and becomes a cosmic function, failing to fulfill the desire that animates every human being for survival. The final Greek conception of the Neoplatonists seeks to fuse the principles of the various schools into a more cumbersome synthesis. Traces of this metaphysical conception of immortality, based on bodily incorruptibility, reappear in Macrobius (In somn. Scipionis, I, 12, 13) and even in Boethius (Cons. philos., III, 9); in the 17th century, it makes its appearance among the Cambridge Neoplatonists (cf. R. Cudworth, Systema intellectuale, II, Jena 1733, p. 1903 ff.).
II. PATRISTICS, SCHOLASTICISM, RENAISSANCE
The tangle of philosophical doctrines on immortality (i.) was bound to make Christians wary of resorting to philosophy. In the earliest writers, who display this distrust of reason, there is a concurrent conviction that the soul at birth and by its nature is mortal, but later becomes immortal through grace and good works. Tatian (Oratio adversus Graecos, 13) expressly declares: οὐκ ἔστιν ἀθάνατος καθ' αὐτὴν ἡ ψυχή... ὄνῃτ' δὲ (PG 6, 833; cf. 15, 837). Latin writers are no less resolute. Lactantius clarifies the difficulty philosophers have encountered in the problem of i.: the Pythagoreans and Stoics, in order to affirm it, must deny creation and invent metempsychosis (Div. inst., III, 13). When explicitly addressing i. (ibid., VII, 5-8), Lactantius admits that man at birth enjoys only animal life, while i. is an ethical task: «Homo rectus in coelum spectat, quia proposita est illi immortalitas, nec tamen venit nisi tribuatur homini a Deo. Nam nihil interest iustum et iniustum, siquidem omnis homo natus immortalis fieret. Ergo immortalitas non est sequela naturae sed merces praemiumque virtutis est... Quae ratio docet mortalem nasci hominem, postea vero immortalem fieri, cum coeperit ex Deo vivere, id est iustitiam sequi» (ibid., VII, 5, 753-54). Earlier, he distinguishes two lives in man, earthly and heavenly: «Illam nascendo accipimus, hanc assequimur laborando ne immortalitas homini sine ulla difficultate constaret. Illam primam nescientes accipimus, hanc secundam scientes, virtuti enim non datur» (ibid., 752 sg.). This agnosticism is perhaps more apparent than real: these writers aim to highlight the so-to-speak existential aspect of blessed i., which is a personal goal to be achieved, not a destiny concerning the soul as a cosmic principle. Among the Greeks, St. Justin, more deeply versed in classical philosophy, knows how to separate the positive from the negative. In the Cohortatio ad Graecos, he affirms that Plato read Moses and defended i., though he obscured it by asserting in the Phaedrus (245 C) that every soul is immortal: πᾶσα ψυχή ἀθάνατος. But Aristotle, by making the soul an "act" of the body (ἐντελέχεια), rendered it mortal (PG 6, 253). What strikes one in these writers is the serenity and certainty of possessing revealed truth, which enables them to immediately assess the value of classical culture and uncover its gaps. Characteristic is the position of Tertullian, who, despite attributing materiality to the soul, resolutely defends its i. and expressly appeals to Scripture to reject the Platonic theory of preexistence. His definition of the soul reflects this strange syncretism: «Definimus animam, Dei flatu natam, immortalem, corporalem, effigiatam, substantia simplicem, de suo patientem, varie procedentem, liberam arbitrii, accidentis obnoxiam, per ingenia mutabilem, rationalem, dominatricem, ex una redundantem» (De anima, 22). The great Alexandrian school and the Fathers of the 4th-5th centuries, deeply acquainted with Greek philosophy, could incorporate it into the elaboration of revealed truth, and it is to Plato and the Neoplatonists that they turn by preference; while Aristotle, probably due to the materialist degenerations of his school, remains a suspect source. However, this hindered the progress of doctrine, both because of the intrinsic dangers of Platonism—from whose abuse nearly all Trinitarian and Christological heresies sprang—and because Aristotle, who had even more forcefully than Plato affirmed the i. of the human νοῦς, had also developed, through his doctrine of the emergence of act and his theory of knowledge—based on absolute immateriality—the most proper concept of spirit as an absolutely original sphere of being. Nevertheless, when the Fathers borrow terms from Plato, they develop concepts within the spiritual climate of Christianity; just as some of them (e.g., the Alexandrian school) also extensively utilized doctrinal elements of the then-dominant Stoic philosophy. The most eminent example of this superior syncretism is the work of St. Augustine (cf. Soliloquia, I, II, and De immortalitate animae).Christian medieval thought up to the 13th century lives on the patristic legacy (especially Augustine and Pseudo-Dionysius) and thus inclines toward Platonism with strong Neoplatonic accents (School of Chartres, Scotus Eriugena). In the second half of the 13th century, the unusual aporia of classical philosophy Averroism (v.), which, by proclaiming the unity of the intellect for the entire human species, annihilated personal i. and the entire Christian moral edifice, as St. Thomas forcefully accuses: «Subtracta enim ab hominibus diversitate intellectus, qui solus inter animae partes incorruptibilis et immortalis apparet, sequitur post mortem nihil de animabus hominum remanere nisi unicam intellectus substantiam; et sic tollitur retributio praemiorum et poenarum et diversitas eorumdem» (De unitate intellectus contra averroistas, ed. J. L. Perrier, in Opuscula omnia, I, Paris 1949, p. 72). As for the demonstrability of i., while St. Thomas finds rational arguments sufficient, most scholastics, especially those of Augustinian orientation (and later Scotus and the Scotists), deny the probative value of such arguments and cling to faith as the sole support against the corrosive action of philosophical reason (cf. R. Messner, Schaenedes und begriffliches Erkennen nach Duns Scotus, Freiburg im Breisgau 1944, p. 334). This dualism erupted in the Renaissance, giving rise to bitter struggles between Averroists and Alexandrists and to endless discussions, as attested by the immense literature that largely remains unpublished in libraries: an eloquent document of profound spiritual interest, but also a sign of methodological ineptitude. It suffices to mention the most sensational episode, that of Pomponazzi: his aim in the De immortalitate animae (1516), as in the Apologia (1517) and the Defensorium (1519), is to «in-
The Aristotelian tradition and the effort to demonstrate that it is faith, not reason, that teaches the truth of the immortality of the soul (i.). Thus, in the conclusion of the Defensorium, Pomponazzi protests: «Primo quia vere mentem Aristotelis exposuimus ut credimus. Secundo, quoniam in omnibus postris tractatibus damnamus blasphemiam et detestamur animae mortalitatem: non quidem ex aliqua ratione naturali movemur ad hoc, sed tantum quoniam sacri canones sic determinant. Evangelio namque credo quoniam Ecclesia credit...: ideo solum ex simplici sincera fide credendum est animam esse immortalem» (Opera, Venice 1525, fol. 108 r). Porzio was no less explicit: «Animam igitur principium ortus habuisse et non deficere non est physicum decretum nec a philosopho peripathetico probatum» (Simone Porzio, Disp. de mente humana, Florence 1551, p. 90; cf. p. 94 ff.). The Latin Averroists (Siger of Brabant, G. of Jandun, etc.) likewise hold that individual i. is a doctrine of faith and not of reason: both positions are regressive, whether Alexandrism or Averroism, because they have immobilized the life of thought in one of its historical moments, even if among the most significant, such as that attributed to Aristotle. Even Cardinal Cajetan stumbled on this obstacle, who, in his old age, wrote: «Sicut nescio misterium Trinitatis, sicut nescio animam immortalem, sicut nescio Verbum caro factum est, et similia quae tamen credo... sicut et reliqua fidei mysteria. Haec ignorantia quietat intellectum meum» (Comm. in ep. 1. Pauli, Paris 1542, pp. 66-67). It is known that at the Fifth Lateran Council (1513), Cajetan had opposed the condemnation of Averroism and Alexandrism on this point. The Dominican B. Spina did not hesitate, therefore, in his Propugnaculum Aristotelis de immortalitate animae contra Thomam Caietanum (Venice 1519), to accuse his illustrious confrere of having paved the way for Pomponazzi (cf. E. Cassirer-P. O. Kristeller-J. H. Randall, The Renaissance philosophy of man, Chicago 1948, p. 271). The most distinguished monument to the defense of i. is Ficino’s Theologia platonica, de immortalitate animarum, composed just half a century before these heated controversies; in it, Christian philosophy, by the light of faith, knows how to draw the partial sparks of truth from all the knowledge of classical and Christian antiquity. Among the rationes demonstrative adduced by Ficino, those certainly inspired by Thomism are the 7th («quia esse suum habet a sua essentia»), the 8th («quia esse proprium habet et numquam a sua forma discedit»), the 9th («quia sibi per se convenit esse»), and also the 13th («quia esse a Deo accipit sine medio»), where Ficino departs from Plotinus, Proclus, and other Neoplatonists who supported «mediated creation» to defend, with Pseudo-Dionysius, Origen, and St. Augustine, immediate creation (Theol. plat., V, 7 ff.; in Opera, I, Basel 1561, fol. 140 ff.). In the more mature Quaestiones de mente (Epistolae, I, II; loc. cit., fol. 675 ff.), Ficino grounds the i. of the soul solely on the appetitus naturalis for happiness, which can be satisfied only in the afterlife, and explicitly appeals to Aristotelian metaphysics (cf. fol. 677) in expounding the argument that is perhaps the first and last in this controversy over human destiny (St. Thomas expressly touches on the argument in: C. Gent., II, 84).
### III. MODERN PHILOSOPHY.
In modern philosophy, the problem of the immortality of the soul (i.) appears to regain its proper proportions, as it is posed and resolved within the broader question of truth and being. While in pre-Kantian rationalism immortality is still defended, in Spinoza’s pantheism it dissolves into the eternity of the single substance; Hume’s empiricism nullifies it within absolute phenomenalism, and Kant reduces it to a mere “postulate” of practical reason (cf. Kritik d. prakt. Vernunft, II, 2, § 4). In the great idealist systems, which renew the Averroist position within the Bewusstsein überhaupt elevated to absolute reality, personal immortality disappears, as the individual is reduced to a transitory phenomenon. Fichte does not conceive the possibility of personal immortality as moral redemption except with the survival of the body as well (cf. Über unsern Glauben an die ewige Lordauer, ed. F. Medicus, III, Leipzig 1908, p. 186; ed. F. Büchsel, Leipzig 1914, p. 55 ff.). For Hegel, immortality corresponds to the imagination of a life of consciousness freed from time and movement, thus representing the inferior moment of abstract individual subjectivity (cf. Philosophie der Religion, ed. Lasson, I, Leipzig 1925, p. 234; II, ibid. 1924, p. 162).
Strauss precisely identifies the essence of modern thought on immortality, especially in the direction given by Spinoza, in the conception that makes immortality not “something future but something grasped as the present quality of the spirit, as its inner universality, its power to rise above all finite reality toward the idea.” This applies not only to the position of philosophical pantheism of, for example, Hegelian type, but also to the theological subjectivism of Schleiermacher, who assigns to man the task of “identifying himself in finitude with the infinite and of being eternal in the moment” (D. F. Strauss, Die christliche Glaubenslehre, II, Tübingen-Stuttgart 1841, p. 737 ff.). The Hegelian conception provoked, among other reactions, that of Goethe himself: the poet affirms the independence and superiority of religion over philosophy and holds as decisive proof of immortality that taken from “activity” (Tätigkeit), that is, from the incompleteness man experiences in this life, the restlessness that must be satisfied in another form of existence (J. P. Eckermann, Gespräche mit Goethe, ed. L. Geiger, Leipzig 1902, p. 245). The implicit negation of immortality in Hegel became the starting point of Feuerbach’s (v.) critique of religion. In contemporary philosophies that affirm the identity of being and time, such as left-wing existentialism and Marxism, any personal immortality is devoid of meaning and considered mere mythology or the fantastical projection of a vain subjective desire.
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### III. IMMORTALITY IN THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Though shrouded in mystery, belief in life beyond the grave is affirmed from the earliest texts of the Old Testament.
This is what the scholar expects, considering the universality of such a belief, especially among all ancient Semitic peoples (E. Dhorme, in Revue biblique, 16 [1907], p. 59). In Babylon, this afterlife is pale and diminished, yet no less real and enduring. In the “great land” (higallu), where all descend at death, there exists a true kingdom, with laws, governing bodies, and so forth. Nergal and Ereškigal, king and queen, have their palace; a secretary, Namtaru; a scribe, a governor, etc. Justice is in the hands of the Anunnaki, infernal deities who possess golden thrones (E. Dhorme, ibid., p. 71 ff.).
The Old Testament presents the same ideas and expressions regarding the great abode where all descend (v. šē'ōl), naturally excluding myths and deities, for the one Yahweh is present even there (Ps. 139, 7 ff.; Job 26, 6). The Bible, moreover, formally affirms such survival in the well-known, ancient phrases used to denote death: “to descend into šē'ōl”; “to be gathered to one’s people”; “to return to one’s fathers” (Gen. 15, 15; 25, 8, 17; 35, 29; 49, 29, 32; Num. 20, 24, 26; 27, 13; 31, 2; Deut. 31, 16; 32, 50; etc.); these clearly presuppose that something remains and survives the dissolution of the body (v. ANIMA).
“The souls, considered the most vital part of man, something that survived the body’s decay, a kind of reduction of the human being but retaining its full personality (cf. I Sam. 28, 8-20), all these souls descended into šē'ōl, where their fate was not determined by any judgment” (M.-J. Lagrange, Le judaïsme [V. BIBLICA.], p. 345). It is impossible, in fact, to interpret the ancient biblical phrases about descent into the family tomb; both because of the analogy and identity with Babylonian expressions, and because such a meaning is often formally excluded by the text itself. Gen. 37, 35: “I shall go down mourning to my son in šē'ōl,” says Jacob, certain that Joseph has been devoured by a beast! Num. 16, 30: the earth opens and swallows the guilty, who “descend alive into šē'ōl”; cf. Judg. 2, 10. David, Omri, and Manasseh “were gathered to their fathers,” yet were not buried in the family tomb (I Kings 2, 10; 16, 28; II Kings 21, 18); the same applies to Abraham, Ishmael, Aaron, and Moses.
The Old Testament is very restrained on this matter, primarily due to the danger of polytheism. Traces of this appear in the prohibition of certain funeral rites (Lev. 30, 27 ff.; Deut. 14, 1), in the prohibition of necromancy (Deut. 18, 11; 26, 14); cf. especially I Sam. 28, 8-20 on the evocation of Samuel, where, beyond the spread of necromancy in popular religion, the explicit belief in life beyond the grave emerges, with the preservation of one’s personality. The afterlife is sketched fleetingly, also due to the real conditions then existing: heaven was closed, for no beatitude is possible outside of Christ (Hebr. 6, 20); only at the dawn of the Resurrection did the just, with the glorification of Christ, receive the awaited reward, and the wicked the punishment they deserved (Dan. 12, 1 ff., 13; Hebr. 11, 39 f.; cf. A. Feuillet [V. BIBLICA.]; F. Spadafora [V. BIBLICA.]).
Thus is explained the inert life (Eccl. 9, 5 f. 10), likened to sleep (Job 10, 20 ff.; 17, 16; 20, 11 etc.), in darkness (Ps. 49, 20; 88, 7, 13; etc.), of souls in šē'ōl; where they cannot praise Yahweh (Ps. 6, 6; 115, 17; Is. 38, 18); and their name of rēphā'im (“languid,” “weak”).
Hope for the future is clearly expressed in Ps. 16, 11; 49, 16; 73, 23 f. and frequently in the book of Wisdom, which speaks of immortality (athanasia: Wis. 3, 4; 4, 1; 8, 17; 15, 3), of incorruptibility (aphtharsia: ibid. 2, 23; 6, 18 f.) and of the different fate awaiting the just (ibid. 3, 1 ff.; 7, 9; 4, 4-17; 5, 15) and the wicked (ibid. 1, 16; 2, 21-25; 5, 6-13), always in messianic or eschatological contexts. For the realization of such hope was indeed imminent.
The doctrine of the immortality of the soul is common in the apocrypha and rabbinic books, with parallels to the sapiential books regarding the different fate of the just and the wicked, though much confused and indistinct (J. Bonsirven [V. BIBLICA.], I, pp. 322-49; M.-J. Lagrange, Le judaïsme [V. BIBLICA.], pp. 353-63).
Only in the New Testament does the doctrine of the immortality of the soul receive its full formulation: Mt. (and parallel passages) 5, 12, 29; 10, 28; 16, 26; 18, 9; 22, 32 f.; I Cor. 3, 15; Hebr. 13, 14; II Cor. 5, 1-10; Phil. 1, 18-26 and passim.
#### IV. L'L SECONDO LA FILOSOFIA CRISTIANA.
Di fronte allo spettacolo continuo della inevitabilità della morte del corpo, l'uomo ha sempre cercato di assicurarsi una possibilità di salvezza contro la perdita dell'essere: agitato dal desiderio di una felicità perfetta e senza fine, che sa di non poter ottenere nella vita mortale, l'uomo ha cercato nella religione, nella filosofia, nella poesia, nell'arte e nella stessa prassi come nelle conquiste della scienza e della tecnica di dominare la corrosione del tempo e della morte. La difficoltà fondamentale del problema dell'i. proviene dalla mancanza di qualsiasi evidenza sensibile dell'i. stessa. D'altronde, per soddisfare l'esigenza fondamentale di una i. in senso proprio, corrispondente all'aspirazione della coscienza umana, bisogna che la sopravvivenza dell'essere abbia il doppio carattere, di essere cioè di natura principalmente spirituale e di avere una struttura personale: una i. di ordine cosmico in cui svanisca la peculiarità della natura e della vita umana, come attuazione della conoscenza e dell'amore, od una i. riservata a pochi privilegiati (eroi, filosofi, sapienti, ecc.) o, infine, una i. di carattere universale, che riguardi cioè l'umanità come tale o la ragione in generale, ecc., tutte queste concezioni non soddisfano al problema.
L'aspirazione universale alla i. ha la sua radice, da una parte nella brama di una felicità infinita che l'uomo sente e che invano cerca di soddisfare sia nei beni del corpo come in quelli dello spirito quali sono raggiungibili in questa vita; dall'altra l'i. scaturisce dall'esigenza profonda di un ordine di perfetta giustizia in cui vengano riparate le ingiustizie, che sembrano evidenti e inevitabili nella vita terrena, con la premiazione dei buoni e la punizione dei malvagi in una vita futura. Questo carattere escatologico sta alla radice della persuasione pressoché universale della i. e contiene e compie i precedenti circa il carattere personale e spirituale della sopravvivenza.
Poiché l'essere dell'uomo dice un doppio rapporto, uno intrinseco costitutivo fra l'anima e il corpo e uno estrinseco conclusivo fra l'uomo e Dio, così doppio diventa anche l'orientamento sul problema della i. Nel primo rapporto, se l'anima non mantiene un'unione veramente sostanziale, ma soltanto dinamica con il corpo, come semplice principio di moto, allora si potrà salvare l'i. dell'a., ma sembra venga pregiudicata l'unità ontologica dell'uomo; se invece l'anima è detta veramente forma sostanziale del corpo, è difficile allora comprendere come possa sopravvivere da sola, una volta separata dal corpo. Nel secondo rapporto si può pensare che l'anima umana è un principio appartenente a un ordine ontologico affine alla Divinità e partecipante quindi dell'eternità e necessità della Divinità stessa; ma allora non si spiega la nascita e la morte; oppure essa è posta come realtà contingente e creata nel tempo da Dio, e allora non si vede come qualcosa che incomincia non debba anche finire. Sono questi gli scogli principali della i. dell'a. sul piano teorico, che hanno impedito nel pensiero classico il formarsi di una posizione consistente su questo punto ch'è il più decisivo dell'essere dell'uomo e che si chiarirà soltanto con l'avvento del cristianesimo.
La soluzione più completa resta quella di s. Tommaso, secondo la quale l'anima umana ha una natura del tutto speciale, intermedia fra le forme puramente corporali e le nature angeliche; essa infatti è forma sostanziale del corpo, ma insieme emerge sull'essere del corpo per le sue funzioni spirituali ed è quindi uno spirito. L'anima è creata da Dio nel tempo, ma pur avendo avuto inizio non conosce una fine perché dotata (a parte post) di una intrinseca necessità di esistere; è forma spirituale e tuttavia ogni individuo umano nasce con la propria anima che lo rende una « persona » dotata di dignità razionale, di elezione libera e capax Dei, perché è per via dell'anima spirituale e immortale che l'uomo è detto « a immagine di Dio » (Sum. Theol., 1ª, q. 93, a. 6). La dimostrazione tomista ha carattere apodittico, in quanto procede dalla conoscenza delle proprietà reali alla determinazione dell'essenza e si svolge in due tappe: 1) l'anima umana è una forma per sé sussistente, cioè spirituale, in quanto è dotata di operazioni a cui il corpo propriamente non partecipa (le funzioni spirituali); 2) una forma sussistente, cioè spirituale, che opera « per sé », ha anche l'essere per sé e non in dipendenza dal corpo, che anzi è il corpo a ricevere da essa l'essere. L'esistere perciò appartiene all'anima umana in modo inseparabile e così dopo la morte essa conserva il suo essere e permane incorruttibile. Ed « un segno » della sua natura indistruttibile l'anima lo ha nell'orrore che prova l'uomo della morte e nella brama di vivere sempre (Sum. Theol., 1ª, q. 75, aa. 2 e 6).
Questa riflessione porta l'Angelico a delineare
a second metaphysical argument for the immortality of the soul, inspired by the Augustinian conception of "eternal truths," which can well satisfy the legitimate demands of the so-called "philosophy of life" or of action and of the new Christian spiritualism. The fact that knowledge attains eternal and immutable truths does not prove the eternity of the knowing subject, but of the known object and of the ultimate foundation of such truths, which is the "First Truth," God Himself, who draws the soul to Himself as to its ultimate end: «Ex fine autem argumentum accipere possumus de rei duratione, sicut et de initio rei argumentari possumus per causam agentem: quod enim est ordinatum ad finem sempiternum, oportet esse capax perpetuae durationis. Unde potest probari ex aeternitate veritatis intelligibilis immortalitas animae» (C. Gent., II, 84).
V. IMMORTALITY ACCORDING TO CATHOLIC DOCTRINE.
In the most complete description of the afterlife in the classical world, left by Virgil (Aen., VI, 739-55), one finds a synthesis of the Platonic myth with the more mature Stoic conception: it is affirmed that the fate of souls after death differs according to the life led on earth. Those who have died, stained by guilt, must be purified through proportionate punishments before passing to the Elysian Fields for the final purification (the bath in the river Lethe) and from there, after a period of a thousand years, resume life in bodies. In this Virgilian description, which seems to derive especially from the Stoic Posidonius, early Latin Christian literature saw an anticipation of Christian doctrine: even if the eternity of punishments and of blessed life is still lacking, there is a clear sense of personality, expiation, and purification even for souls that have not sinned (an anticipation of the Christian "Limbo"; cf. L. Radermacher, Das Jenseits im Mythos der Hellenen, Bonn 1903, p. 13 ff.).
The doctrine of personal immortality is contained in the Apostles' Creed itself with the articles on the "resurrection of the flesh" and "eternal life," since the body is raised to be united with the soul, which maintains its being, and to participate in its life. Moreover, the fact that in Sacred Scripture the bodily immortality of Adam is presented as a gratuitous gift from God, which the first man lost through sin, presupposes that after death the life of man is limited to the activities possible for the soul when separated from the body. The condemnation by the Fifth Lateran Council (December 19, 1513) directly targets the denial of personal immortality by Alexandrinism and Averroism: «Damnamus et reprobamus omnes asserentes animam intellectivam mortalem esse aut unicam in cunctis hominibus et haec in dubium vertentes». The conciliar decree directly appeals to Mt. 10:28 («Et nolite timere eos qui occident corpus, animam autem non possunt occidere») and Jn. 12:25 («Qui odit animam suam in hoc mundo, in vitam aeternam custodit eam»). Regarding the meaning and theological scope of the decree, even Luther agrees, as is recognized by Protestant scholars (P. Althaus, Luthers Stellung zur Unsterblichkeit, in Die letzten Dinge, 3rd ed., Gütersloh 1926, p. 280). The conciliar text continues by showing that the truth of immortality is the foundation of Christianity and that reason cannot demonstrate the contrary: «Alias Incarnatio et alia Christi mysteria nobis minime profuissent, nec resurrectio exspectanda foret, ac sancti ac iusti miserabiliores essent iuxta Apostolum, cunctis hominibus» (omitted by Denz-U). For Calvin, it is moral conscience that provides the decisive testimony of immortality: «Certe conscientia, quae inter bonum et malum discernens Dei iudicio respondet, indubium est immortalis spiritus signum» (Inst., I, 15, 2). The Council, though it does not directly pronounce on the rational demonstrability of immortality, nevertheless condemns the theory of the "double truth": «Cumque verum vero minime contra dicat, omnem assertionem veritati illuminatae fidei contrariam omnino falsam esse definimus; et ut aliter dogmatizare liceat, districtius inhibemus» (Denz-U, 738). The conciliar condemnation has a negative-positive meaning: reason cannot demonstrate the mortality of the soul or its uniqueness for the entire human species, and faith cannot teach the absurd (in philosophy). That personal immortality, however, belongs to the preambula fidei and is therefore accessible to reason alone is the doctrine of St. Thomas and is commonly accepted by theologians. On the other hand, the immortality of the body, which man lost through original sin, will only be restored with the final resurrection of the flesh, but this is a miracle of God's power and surpasses all capacity of the human intellect (Sum. Theol., 3ª, Suppl., q. 75, a. 3). Nevertheless, the resurrection of bodies, though not natural, satisfies the natural desire of man for the integrity of his person, especially when one accepts, with St. Thomas, the Aristotelian notion that the soul is the substantial form of the body, so that the integral man consists in the operative harmony of his principles. The same Angelic Doctor admits that the philosophers of antiquity did not attain the perfect clarity that can be obtained after Christian Revelation: «In quo satis apparet quantam angustiam patiebantur hinc inde eorum praeclara ingenia; a quibus angustias liberabimur si ponamus hominem ad veram felicitatem post hanc vitam pervenire posse, anima hominis immortali exsistente» (C. Gent., III, 48, toward the end). To this unshakable certainty, faith gives the definitive confirmation.
From a historical-critical perspective: A. Stöckl, Die spekulative Lehre vom Menschen und ihre Gesch., 2 vols., Würzburg 1859, especially II, p. 148 ff. (anti-Platonism of the early Fathers). Fundamental for beliefs on immortality in the classical world is: E. Rohde, Psyche, Seelenkult und Unsterblichkeitsglaube der Griechen, Tübingen 1893; 10th ed., ibid. 1925 (for a retrospective critical discussion of the work, V. W. Jaeger, The theology of early greek philosophers, Oxford 1948, p. 73 ff.). Furthermore: G. Runze, Unsterblichkeit und Auferstehung, part 1: Die Psychologie des Unsterblichkeitsglaubens und der Unsterblichkeitsleugnung, Berlin 1894; W. James, Human immortality, Boston and New York 1898; I. Royce, Conception of immortality, ibid. 1900; H. Graf Keyserling, Unsterblichkeit, Munich 1907; L. Friedländer, Darstellungen aus der Sittengeschichte Roms, VIII, iv, Leipzig 1910, pp. 359-68; C. Pascal, Le credenze d'oltretomba, 2 vols., Catania 1912; H. Scholz, Der Unsterblichkeitsgedanke als philosophisches Problem, 2nd ed., Tübingen 1922; C. Stange, Die Unsterblichkeit der Seele, Gütersloh 1925; K. Fahrion, Gott, Freiheit, Unsterblichkeit, Leipzig 1926; Th. Mainage, Immortalité, Paris 1926; H. Lungwitz, Über Unsterblichkeit, in Annales der Philosophie, 6 (1927), pp. 116-27; W. Gortmann, Die Unsterblichkeitsbeweise, Karlsruhe 1927 (historical exposition from Plato to Giles of Rome). - On the denial of immortality by the left Hegelians, v.: C. Fr. Goschel, Von den Beweisen für die Unsterblichkeit der menschlichen Seele im Lichte der spekulativen Philosophie, Berlin 1834; Chr. H. Weisse, Die philosophische Geheimlehre von der Unsterblichkeit des menschlichen Individuums, Dresden 1835; I. H. Fichte, Die Seelenfortdauer und die Weltstellung des Menschen, Leipzig 1867; Fr. Strauss, Der alte und der neue Glaube, 9th ed. by E. Zeller, Bonn 1877, p. 81 ff.; id., Die Unsterblichkeitslehre der modernen Reflexion, in Die christliche Glaubenslehre, II, Tübingen and Stuttgart 1841, p. 697 ff.; E. Hirsch, Die idealistische Philosophie und das Christentum, Gütersloh 1926 (important for the study of Fichte, p. 172).
W. Stahler, Zur Unterblüchkeitsproblematik in Hegels Nachfolge, Münster 1928; K. Leese, Philosophie und Theologie im Spätidealismus, Berlino 1929 (specialmente p. 224 sgg., dove espone la posizione di Weisse).
Dal punto di vista sistematico-critico : K. Groos, Die Unterblüchkeitsfrage, Berlino 1922; G. Heidingsfelder, Die Unterblüchkeit der Seele, Monaco di Baviera 1930; id., Zum Unterblüchkeitsfrage in der Renaissance, in Aus der Geisteswelt des Mittelalters, Mélanges Grabmann, Münster in V, 1935, pp. 1265-86; G. van der Leeuw, Phänomenologie der Religion, 45ª ed., Tubinga 1933, p. 293 sgg.; trad. franc., Parigi 1948, p. 307 sgg.; S. Vanni Rovighi, L'i. dell'a. nei maestri francescani del sec. XIII, Milano 1936; vari autori, Il problema dell'i., in Archivio di filosofia, Roma 1945; E. Franck, Philosophical understanding and religious truth, Londra 1945, pp. 98 sgg., 132 sgg.; E. S. Brightman, A philosophy of religion, Nuova York 1946, pp. 387-410; J. Endres, Die Unterblüchkeit der Menschenseele, in Divus Thomas (Friburgo), 22 (1944), pp. 75-94; A. Bremond, Le syllogisme de l'immortalité, in Rev. philos. de Louvain, 46 (1948), p. 161 sgg.; F. Heller, Unterblüchkeitsglaube u. Jenseitshoffnung, Monaco 1950 (con ampia bibl.).
Nuovi studi sull'antichità classica : M. P. Nilsson, The immortality of the soul in greek religion, in Eranos Jahrbuch, 39 (1941), p. 63 sgg.; Fr. Cumont, Lux perpetua, Parigi 1940, p. 117 sgg. Cornello Fabro