The Immortality of the Soul—History of the Doctrine

WE have now seen that of the different sects of philosophers, the Aristotelians, the Epicureans, the Stoics, the Academics, and the Pyrrhonists, deified the immortality of the soul; and that the great mass of the people agreed with them on this subject. This leaves only the Platonics and Pythagoreans, and these sects, it is claimed, did believe the soul immortal. We know that they talked about the immortality of the soul, and argued about it, and professed to believe in it; but the doctrine they discussed was only that of emanation and immanation, or absorption. That is, they thought the soul a part of God, an emanation from him, separated from him for a short time, but destined finally, either at the death of the body or at some future time, to return to him, be re-absorbed into his being, and thus lose all personality and conscious existence. This view, it will be seen, virtually amounts to annihilation of the soul. It is not at all like the present doctrine of the immortality of the soul.

On this point Bishop Warburton remarks: "But when the ancients are said to hold the pre and post existence of the soul, and therefore to attribute a proper eternity to it, we must not suppose that they understood it to be eternal in its distinct and peculiar existence; but that it was discerped from the substance of God, in time, and would, in time, be rejoined and resolved into it again. This they explained by a closed vessel filled with seawater, which, swimming awhile upon the ocean, does, on the vessel's breaking, flow in again, and mingle with the common mass. They only differed about the time of this reunion and resolution: the greater part holding it to be at death; but Pythagoreans, not till after many transmigrations. The Platonists went between these two opinions, and rejoined pure and unpolluted souls immediately to the Universal Spirit; but those which had contracted much defilement were sent into a succession of other bodies, to purge and purify them, before they returned to their parent substance." (Divine Legation of Moses, vol. xi., book iii, sec. 4, pp. 214, 215.) Then he justly adds: "Thus we see this very opinion of the soul's eternity, which hath made modern writers conclude that the ancient sages believed in a future state of rewards and punishments, was, in truth, the very reason why they believed it not." (Ibid., p. 216.)

This was the doctrine of the Platonists and Pythagoreans.

Speaking of this subject, Mr. Watson remarks:— "Thus philosophy refined upon the doctrine of immortality until it converted it into annihilation itself for so it is, in the most absolute sense, as to distinct consciousness and personality. The prevalence of this notion under different modifications is indeed very remarkable." (Theol. Inst., vol. i., p. 50.)

He thus indorses Warburton's position:— "Some learned men have denied the consequence which Warburton wished to establish from these premises, and consider the re-absorption of these sages as figurative, and consequently compatible with distinct consciousness and individuality. The researches, however, since that time made into the corresponding philosophy of the Hindoos, bear this acute and learned man out to the full length of his conclusions." (Ibid., pp. 50, 51.)

Of the belief of the philosophers in the immortality of the soul, the Encyclopedia Britannica says:— "This, however, appears by no means to have been the case with the systems of any, as far as we can learn, of those ancient philosophers who contended the most strenuously for the immortality of the soul. For not only do they seem to have agreed that no suffering could be expected by the wicked in another life, on the grounds that the gods were incapable of anger and therefore could not punish, but the very notion of the soul's immortality, as taught by them, involved the complete destruction of distinct, personal existence.

"Their notion was, that is, when they spoke their real sentiments (for in their exoteric or popular works they often inculcate, for the benefit of the vulgar, the doctrine of the future retribution, which they elsewhere laugh at), that the soul of each man is a portion of that spirit which pervades the universe, to which it is reunited at death, and becomes again an undistinguishable part of the great Whole, just as the body is resolved into the general mass of matter. So that their immortality, or rather eternity, of the soul, was anterior as well as posterior; as it was to have no end, so it had no beginning; and the boasted continuance of existence, which, according to this system, we are to expect after death, consists in returning to the state in which we were before birth; which every one must perceive is the same thing virtually as annihilation. Such, then, were the views which prevailed among the most highly enlightened nations of antiquity on this subject." (Encyc. Brit., eighth edition, vol. i. pp. 459-463.)

What will our friends say to these facts? Not one of the ancients believed in the eternal, personal existence of the soul. All souls were finally to lose their separate existence, and be re-absorbed into God. Certainly these will not be claimed as orthodox believers in the immortality of the soul! With these views they could not possibly believe in the eternal misery of the wicked.

PERIODICAL DESTRUCTION.

There was another point universally held by the ancients which utterly forbade their believing in the soul's immortality. They held to a periodical destruction of all things, not excepting the soul.

Thus writes Mr. Leland: "It was a notion which generally obtained among them [the philosophers], that at certain periods which the Stoics termed conflagrations, and which were to happen at the end of what they as well as the Pythagoreans and Platonists called the great year, there should be an utter end put to the present state of things; and the souls of all men, and even of those of them which had become gods, demons, or heroes, were to be resumed into the universal soul, and thereby lose their individual existence." (Leland's Revelation, vol. i. part iii. chap. v. p. 341.)

Watson confirms this testimony thus: "Another notion equally extensive and equally destructive of the original doctrine of the immortality of the human soul, and a state of future rewards and punishments, which sprung up in the Egyptian schools, and was from thence transmitted into Greece, India, and throughout all Asia, was that of a periodical destruction and renovation of all things." (Theol. Inst., vol. i. part i. p. 52.)

"When the universal inundation takes place," says Enfield, "the whole surface of the earth is covered with water and all animal life is destroyed; after which nature is renewed, and subsists as before till the element of fire, becoming prevalent in its turn, dries up all the moisture, converts every substance into its own nature, and at last, by universal conflagration, reduces the world to its pristine state. At this period, all material forms are lost in one chaotic mass; all animated nature is reunited to the Deity, and nature again exists in its original form, as one whole, consisting of God and matter. From this chaotic state, however, it again emerges, by the energy of the Efficient Principle, and gods, and men, and all the forms of regulated nature, are renewed, to be dissolved and re-newed in endless successions." (Hist. of Phil., book ii. chap. ii. sec. 1, p. 195.)

Then none among them could possibly believe in the immortality of the soul as a separate personality.

EMINENT MEN WHO REJECTED THE SOUL'S IMMORTALITY.

On examination we find that most of the eminent orators and authors of antiquity have recorded themselves as unbelievers in the soul's immortality. Among these, Cicero stands prominent as a great orator and states-man. Though in some of his writings he argues for the immortality of the soul, yet after all he confesses that he did not really believe it. Of him Warburton says, "He professes his disbelief of a future state of rewards and punishments in the frankest and freest manner." (Divine Lega., vol. ii. book iii. sec. 3, p. 182.)

Virgil, Horace, and Seneca were all "disbelievers in the immortality of man." (See Enfield, Hist. Phil., pp. 310-313.)

After showing that Cicero was full of doubts on the subject, Dr. Home says: "All which gave Seneca just occasion to say that 'immortality, however desirable, was rather promised than proved by these great men.' While the followers of these great philosophers were thus perplexed with doubts, others of the heathen entertained the most gloomy notions,—either imagining that they should be removed from one body to another, and be perpetual wanderers, or contemplating the grave as their eternal habitation, and sadly complaining that the sun and stars could rise again, but that man, when his day was set, must lie down in darkness, and sleep a perpetual sleep." (Horne's Intro., vol. 1. p. 18.)

No wonder that Paul said that the heathen had no hope; for it was really true.

Gibbon, the celebrated historian, says: "The writings of Cicero represent in the most lively colors the ignorance, the errors, and the uncertainty, of the ancient philosophers with regard to the immortality of the soul. When they are desirous of arming their disciples against the fear of death, they inculcate, as an obvious though melancholy position, that the fatal stroke of our dissolution releases us from the calamities of life, and that those can no longer suffer who no longer exist." (Dec. and Fall, vol. i. p. 527.)

So, then, the belief of the ancients was against the immortality of the soul.

BELIEF OF THE HINDOOS.

To-day the doctrine of the soul's immortality is not universally nor even generally believed, though it has been industriously propagated for over two thousand years, from the time of the school of Plato down to that of the modern theological seminaries. Nearly the whole of the Asiatic nations reject it, and hold to the total annihilation of all souls! That this is not merely my assertion will be seen from the following testimonies, all from men who hold to the immortality of the soul. Mr. Watson's testimony will not be questioned. Hear him:—

"With us, this [the doctrine of the soul's immortality] is a matter of general belief; but not so with the generality of either ancient or modern pagans. The same darkness which obscured the glory of God, proportionately diminished the glory of man,—his true and proper immortality. The very ancient notion of an absorption of souls back again into the divine Essence was with the ancients what we know it to be now in the metaphysical system of the Hindoos, a denial of individual immortality; nor have the demonstrations of reason done anything to convince the other grand division of metaphysical pagans into which modern heathenism is divided, the followers of Buddha who believe in the total annihilation of both men and gods after a series of ages,—a point of faith held probably by the majority of the present race of mankind." (Theol. Inst., vol. i. part i. chap. iv. p. 22.)

This is a valuable testimony, especially coming from one who is such good authority. This alone gives a majority at the present day against the doctrine of the soul's immortality.

Mr. Davy says: "The religion of Buddha is more widely extended than any other religion. It appears to be the religion of the whole of Tartary, China, Japan, and their dependencies, and of all the countries between China and the Brahmapootra. . . . They appear to be materialists in the strictest sense of the term, and to have no notion of pure spirit or mind. . . . Ordinary death is merely a change of form, and this change is almost infinite, and bounded only by annihilation, which they esteem the acme of happiness." (Ibid).

Then a majority of the race are materialists, instead of immortal-soulists!

Our next witness is that candid author, Henry Howe. He writes: "Boodhism, the religion of Burmah, has the greatest number of disciples of any on the globe, among whom is half of the people of China, Laos, Cochin China, and Ceylon; all of Cambodia, Siam, Burmah, Thibet, Tartary, and Loo-Choo; and a great part of Japan; and most of the islands of the Southern seas." (Travels of Celebrated Travelers, p. 596).

"Existence and sorrow are declared to be necessary concomitants; and therefore the chief end of man is to finish this eternal round of changes, and be annihilated. The great doctrines of this faith are five; viz., 1. The eternal existence of the universe and all things; 2. Metempsychosis; 3. Nicban, or annihilation," etc. (Travels of Celebrated Travelers, pp. 597, 598).

Of this religion, Alger says, "It is the basis and motive of the most extensive disbelief of individual immortality the world has known." (Future Life, part v. chap. viii. p. 615). Kaepen, in his work on the "Religion of Buddha," says, "Buddhism is the gospel of annihilation." (Ibid., part ii. chap. vi. pp. 111-127).

In the Methodist of April 16, 1870, Bishop Thomson publishes a sermon in which he says: "As to the existing systems of India, China, and Japan, Hindooism, Confucianism, and Buddhism are all, as every intelligent man knows, decaying and ready to perish, without satisfying the wants of mankind. They hinder human development, and must be swept from the earth by human progress. Nor need we lament; nay, we should rejoice in the prospect, for they offer no salvation to man in this life, but by the extinction of all interests in this life,—its duties, responsibilities, and possibilities,—and no salvation beyond the grave but annihilation, the blowing out of the soul as the blowing out of a candle."

Then the bishop understood them to teach the annihilation of the soul after death, and they do not believe in the immortality of the soul.

In the same paper I find still further unquestionable proof of the belief of the Hindoos on this point. A new sect has lately originated in India called the "Church of the One God." Says the Methodist: "Representatives of the 'Church,' learned in the Sanscrit, were sent to the sacred city of Benares to study more fully the Vedas—the supreme scriptures of Brahmanism—in order to ascertain if the new movement could not be reconciled to the primitive and purest faith of the country; but they reported that these ancient documents taught Pantheism, Metempsychosis, and the annihilation of the soul.

"The Hindoo books describe several different degrees or states of happiness for mankind after death. Of these the highest state is called Mooktee, and consists of union with the Deity, or absorption into the infinite Spirit. This state is the result or reward of attaining divine knowledge. As soon as any man acquires a knowledge of Brahma, it overcomes or extinguishes all sin within him, and its influence upon him; he disregards all work, however meritorious in general opinion, and, emancipated from all worldly desires and bodily passions, his spirit becomes united with Brahma, or is absorbed into him, as a 'drop of water when it falls into the ocean.' He loses all personal identity. He is no longer, and will never again be, a conscious and separate being, and so is not subject to any further transmigrations or changes."

"The third and fourth states of happiness are in the heaven, or abode of the gods, called the Swurg. Some few persons who in this life have performed works of extraordinary merit, after death proceed to Swurg, and reside there till the close of the present Kapla, when Swurg and all its residents, whether gods or saints, will be annihilated." (India, Ancient and Modern, pp. 408, 409).

This is the faith held by the majority of the human race to-day. Is this the doctrine of the immortality of the soul? It is just the opposite. Do not our orthodox friends know these facts? How, then, can they have the face to claim a universal belief in their notion of the soul's immortality—when all the facts are the other way?