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The Death of Death: Resurrection and Immortality in Jewish Thought

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Neil Gillman offers his view of life after death in this National Jewish Book Award winning second printing of his book. He recognizes that the Hebrew Bible has no clear statement about life after death and that the concept was not introduced into Judaism until after the second century BCE. He cites the Jewish historian Josephus who writes that the more conservative Sadducees of the second century BCE rejected the notion of life after death, while the Pharisees, who stressed the existence of the Oral Torah, accepted the notion. He notes that the idea of a soul is not found in Pharisaic writings until a century later. Since Rabbinical Judaism developed from the Pharisaic teachings, the ideas of life after death and the soul achieved a kind of canonical status.

He points out that Jews and the rest of the western world took the notion of a soul and its survival after death from the Greek pagan philosopher Plato (429-347 BCE). The idea is discussed in detail in Plato's description of the death of his teacher Socrates in Phaedo. (He does not mention that Plato's student Aristotle, like the Jewish philosopher Maimonides [1138-1204] rejected the notion and used the term "soul" to denote all bodily functions that keep people alive, such as the nutritive and respiratory systems. All parts of the "soul" die when the body dies, they said, except for one system, intelligence, which joins, according to their science, "the active intellect.")

He sees three biblical passages, none earlier than 200 BCE, that "unambiguously affirm that at least some individuals will live again after their death." He notes that the Bible's nefesh does not mean "soul," but "life" or "person." He dismisses Genesis 5:24 that "God took" Enoch and II Kings 2:11 that "Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind" as metaphors, which as other biblical metaphors, is not meant to be taken literally.

One passage is Daniel 12:2 and 9. The first verse reads: "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to eternal life, others to reproaches, to everlasting abhorrence." Daniel 12:9 is: "But you, go on to your end; you shall rest, and arise to your destiny at the end of the days." These may be the first mentions of life after death, but they do not speak of a soul. However, they may be metaphors: although the current generation may not see success against their Greek persecutors, later generations will triumph and the dead will be vindicated. In any event, the notion of life after death is in no Jewish writing before this time.

The other passages are Isaiah 25:7-8 and 26:18-19, which scholars date after 200 BCE. The first says that God "will destroy death forever" and the second says: "let Your dead revive." These passages may express the belief in everlasting life, but many scholars read them as hopes against "the kind of mass dying caused by warfare."

The idea of resurrection - the reemergence of body and soul on earth after death - is totally distinct from the notion of a continued life after death in an undisclosed place. Gillman suggests that Jews took the idea from Christians who took it from Egypt and Persia, most likely from Zoroastrianism. It is not even hinted in the Hebrew Bible.

Gillman offers many other ideas. He discusses the views of mystics concerning what transpires between death and resurrection. He examines some modern views on the subjects. He admits that he does not know if there is life after death. He speaks of "My hope for the hereafter." He writes: "That kind of hope takes me beyond the conclusion of my rational self." Noting that Judaism offers no clear answer, he asks: why be Jewish? And he answers: "Not because it is `the' Truth, not because it originated in the explicit word and will of God, but rather because of its intrinsic richness, its ability to help us cope with life, to make sense of our world."

As another reviewer pointed out, this book's great strength is its tracing of the evolution of Jewish thought relating to the afterlife. Not only does Gillman discuss the differences between Biblical, Talmudic, and post-Talmudic Jewish thought, but he also offers plausible explanations as to WHY Jewish thought evolved as it did.

Some quibbles: based on Gillman's discussion, I didn't really understand why the concept of "soul immortality" made so much more sense to modern commentators than (a) bodily resurrection (the Talmudic view) or (b) total repudiation of the idea of an individual afterlife. And Gillman's arguments for bodily resurrection aren't that persuasive -- but only, I suspect, because no argument as to an issue so far beyond our experience can possibly be entirely persuasive.

I enjoyed this book and recommend it to anyone seeking a survey of Judaism's thoughts on the afterlife. Much more satisfying than "What Happens After I Die?"