Heaven and Hell, Old and New, Part II

Alex,

Thank you for a detailed response. I guess the best way I can explain my thoughts on heaven, hell, end times, etc. is to tell you what I have come to think about what the Hebrew Bible and history have to say. Then, maybe when we have talked that through I can explain where I am
personally.

The ancient Israelites, it seems to me, had no concept of an afterlife until the introduction of Greek ideas of an 'underworld,' which was less associated with reward and punishment and more just where people ended up. I would agree 100% that ancient Israel (I'm, a little unfairly, speaking in general terms here) equated "salvation" with God's favor in the here and now. Having been to Israel, I can attest to the fact that, even today, many Jews are more interested in their ability to survive as a people as a result of God's favor, than with any guarantee of reward in an afterlife.

The writing of the New Testament books within the 1st Century AD coincided with a general loss of faith amongst the Jews with respect to reward and divine favor in this life. Within this spiritual restlessness, the Pharisees, unique among Jewish sects for believing in both an afterlife and free will, became the most influential group in the rise of Rabbinic Judaism, post-Roman conquest. I have no doubt that Roman ideas of the afterlife, including giving an account of your life at the end, had some influence on Jewish and Early Christian thinkers.

So, to my mind, Israelite, Jewish, and Christian understanding of the afterlife have been at least in part shaped by cultures around them. Because of this, I am hesitant to attribute 'common ground' to the various models of the afterlife found in the Bible. I am likewise reluctant to consider the ancient Israelites ideas of "salvation" a "pre-figuring" as you state, because their ideas were well developed in their own right.

Please understand I am not trying to be patronizing in giving the details and history - just trying to explain my view.

thanks again,
Colin

Colin,

Thanks for your response to my e-mail. I've got a couple of quick thoughts in response to your concerns.

1. I think you might be a little quick to ascribe cultural influences to the after-life concept in the NT. Jesus talked more about afterlife, specifically heaven and hell, than any other person in the NT and he did so without any apparent need to explain what he was talking about. In other
words, during the Sermon on the Mount, he simply warns that certain people are in danger of hell but doesn't have to explain what hell is. So I wonder if there's more understanding of after-life "in the Jewish air" than you give credit for.

I think the real question/issue is rooted in what you mention about 1st-century Judaism. What happens in the inter-testamental period in terms of the concepts of heaven and hell that Jesus can just show up and start talking about it and people seem to really get it?

2. I completely agree with you that the concepts of law, land, torah, and temple were all very much established in their own right by the time Jesus gets on the scene. However, just because a concept of what it means to be the "people of God" has been well-established does not mean that it was not intended to be a pre-figuring of the realities to come.

When Jesus' apostles, all deeply devout Jewish men, started preaching about Jesus, crucifixion, and resurrection, they realized that absolutely everything needed to be re-understood in light of this event. If Christ was, indeed, the "telos" or the "end" or the "purpose" of the law, then perhaps everything needed to be re-evaluated in light of him. This is why Paul takes three years in the desert after his conversion--it takes a lot of work/thinking to re-evaluate one's whole worldview!

The Jewish now Christian disciples of Christ were reckless and ruthless and insistent that all of the Jewish way and laws and understandings of religion and God and law and worship and all of it now had to be radically re-understood in light of Jesus, Messiah, the one who fulfilled all of it.

If you're interested in reading something that I think would speak your language in terms of taking 1st Century Judaism tons more seriously than Christians historically have written by someone who's a deeply committed Christian thinker/theologian/cultural critic/scholar I'd strongly recommend N.T. Wright in general and "The New Testament and the People of God" specifically. If you want someone who's definitely committed to Christianity but not satisfied with how Christians today deal (or don't deal) with the OT and with the Jewish roots that Christianity comes from, you owe it to yourself to read some of his thinking. If you're interested in a taste of it, check out his web site: http://www.ntwrightpage.com/

Thanks again for this interaction, Colin!

Alex