Resurrection Annulled

8. With what enigma has man struggled, and how have most religions tried to resolve it?

⁸ As we have seen throughout this book, man has constantly struggled with the enigma of his short and finite existence that ends in death. As German author Gerhard Herm stated in his book The Celts​—The People Who Came Out of the Darkness: “Religion is among other things a way of reconciling people to the fact that some day they must die, whether by the promise of a better life beyond the grave, rebirth, or both.” Virtually every religion depends on the belief that the human soul is immortal and that after death it journeys to an afterlife or that it transmigrates to another creature.

9. What did Spanish scholar Miguel de Unamuno conclude regarding Jesus’ belief on the resurrection?

⁹ Nearly all the religions of Christendom today also follow that belief. Miguel de Unamuno, a prominent 20th-century Spanish scholar, wrote about Jesus: “He believed rather in the resurrection of the flesh [such as Lazarus’ case (see pages 249-52)], according to the Jewish manner, not in the immortality of the soul, according to the [Greek] Platonic manner. . . . The proofs of this can be seen in any honest book of interpretation.” He concluded: “The immortality of the soul . . . is a pagan philosophical dogma.” (La Agonía Del Cristianismo [The Agony of Christianity]) That “pagan philosophical dogma” infiltrated into Christendom’s teaching, even though Christ plainly had no such thought.​—Matthew 10:28; John 5:28, 29; 11:23, 24.

10. What were some consequences of belief in an immortal soul?

¹⁰ The subtle influence of Greek philosophy was a key factor in the apostasy that followed the death of the apostles. The Greek immortal soul teaching implied a need for various destinations for the soul​—heaven, hellfire, purgatory, paradise, Limbo.a By manipulating such teachings, it became easy for a priestly class to keep their flocks submissive and in fear of the Hereafter and to extract gifts and donations from them.