Resurrection of the dead

This article concerns itself with the Christian tenet of belief in the final resurrection at the end of time, as featured in the last sentence of the Nicene Creed. For other meanings, see Resurrection (disambiguation)

Most denominations of Christians believe in the concept of eternal life after death, provided through the atonement of Christ. It is generally believed that when a person's body dies, the soul is separated from the body and continues to exist forever. The term resurrection of the dead is generally used to refer to the idea that the dead bodies of all or some of humanity will be reformed and rejoined with the soul at the end of the world. This phrase is included at the end of the Nicene Creed.

Those who hold it applies to all mankind also call it the General Resurrection, on the grounds that it involves mankind in general.

Various Christian sects disagree on the exact nature of the resurrection.

Different beliefs concerning the timing

• Simultaneous both of the just and the unjust
• The just are resurrected before the unjust
• Only the just are resurrected
• Timed with the Rapture

Different beliefs on the method

• the qualities of the resurrected body will be different from those of the body laid in the grave
• but its identity will nevertheless be preserved; it will still be the same body which rises again

Different beliefs on the end state of resurrected person

• only spiritual, a body adapted to the use of the soul in its glorified state, and to all the conditions of the heavenly state
• physical and spiritual resurrection
• glorious, incorruptible, and powerful
• like unto the glorified body of Jesus, based on the power and gift of His atonement

Resurrection of the Dead as the Sole Afterlife

Several churches, such as the Dawn Christadelphians, Jehovah's Witnesses, and theologians of different traditions such as N. T. Wright or L. Ray Smith, dismiss the idea of the immortality of a non-physical soul as a vestige of Neoplatonism, and other pagan traditions of spirit/body dualism. In this school of thought, the dead remain dead (and do not immediately progress to a Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory) until a spiritual or physical resurrection of the dead occurs at the end of time. Some groups, Dawn Christadelphians in particular consider that it is at this time of resurrection that the judgement will take place.

Resurrection of the Dead in Judaism

As mentioned in the Gospels, the chief distinction between the Pharisee and Sadduccee parties in the 1st century AD, was that the latter denied the doctrine of Resurrection of the Dead, while the former accepted it. A third party, the Essenes, also believed in the Resurrection and had their own doctrines concerning it. However this debate may have not only concerned the resurrection of physical bodies at the end of the world, but may have been a more encompassing debate over the existence of the afterlife at all.

See also

• Reincarnation

External links

• Resurrection of the Dead An elementary teaching about Christ.
• Catholic Encyclopedia: General Resurrection
• Jewish Encyclopedia: Resurrection