Time&Eternity

Biblical and Theological Conceptions of Time 111
der to arrive, like Paul, at the insight that the Resurrection of Jesus as the
beginning of a new order has significance for the death of the individual
and that its goal is “that God may be all in all” (1 Cor. 15:28).
This theology makes it possible to see the biological span of individual
life embedded in a larger context. The time of earthly life stands in relation
to eternity. That this relation has been foundational for centuries and has
been expressed in various ways was shown clearly on pp. 37–41. In such a
worldview, death is not the last stop, but rather an intermediate stage and
the entrance into a new phase of being.
The connection to eternity relativizes the significance of time in at least
two ways, in both cases in two respects. First, the perspective of eternity has
the power to relativize the suffering in time. It fulfills a consoling function
that can inspire a serene calm, but also can evoke a mindless submissiveness
or carelessness. Karl Marx rightly inveighed against the latter form of consolation
when he criticized religion as the opium of the people. Second, the
perspective of eternity can relativize the merits and good things of life
through the knowledge that all things, all knowledge, and all efforts are
temporary. When nothing in this world can be the ultimate, but rather, at
the most, the penultimate, power structures are seen in a different light.
When, from the perspective of eternity, the temporary nature of all hierarchies
becomes clear, this can encourage people to be more radical in their
critique of society and more daring in trying out alternatives. However,
such a perspective of eternity can also be misused repressively in the attempt
to grant existing hierarchies eternal and divine sanction or to force human
beings, under threat of eternal punishment, to render blind obedience.
The conception of death as transition to something else thus relativizes
the importance of life by placing it in a larger context. It therefore makes
the event of transition an important happening, for which the individual
must prepare and which the community must surround with appropriate
rituals.
The notion of death as transition, however, also tends to reduce the significance
of death itself. It does this in a way that separates it from Pauline
thought. One could say that here a popularized interpretation of Pauline
theology comes to fruition that tries to circumvent death rather than suffer
it. This interpretation was supported by the Greek idea of the mortal body
and the immortal soul and by dualist thoughts in Gnosticism. The body indeed
dies, but the soul escapes death, so to speak, through the back door.
The notion of the immortality of the soul is incompatible with Pauline theology
because, in the final analysis, it does not take death seriously. 377 Whoever
does not take death seriously is also unable to take the death of death
seriously, that is, Christ’s resurrection—which, for Paul, is the center of all