Absent from the body, present with the… Dirt?
January 25, 2007
Traditionally, Christians believe that once a person dies they are immediately in the presence of Jesus. I have heard some apply the same conclusion to a person in a coma. To a large extent, I think it’s tied to an association between mind and soul. Therefore, if a person is not functional mentally speaking then they must be with Jesus. I mean, “where” else would they be?
While there may be a number of obvious problems with this line of thinking, I find its presuppositions of mind and soul to be somewhat common on a popular level. This brings up a curious scenario. If a person is in a coma and has some brain activity which is slow but not enough for consciousness, to what degree are they “absent from the body and present with the Lord?” Are there gradations of Lord presence? Is a person with the Lord to a degree commensurate with the amount of brain activity they have? Maybe there’s a limbo place or state that a person is in during which time their body and mind/soul are in the physical balances. I know none of this is technical or even vey carefully presented, but I find it interesting. It raises some serious concerns for me about the christian view of life, after-life and mind/soul connections. The implications that might follow from this line of thought would impact our views about mentally handicapped persons as well. If someone comes out of coma and doesn’t remember as far back as the hours, days, weeks or even months prior to the coma, what difference does it make if they were with the Lord? Would this lack of memory be indicative of how things will be for us when we die? Maybe this is one reason why St Paul referred to death as sleep? Or maybe we do just return to the dirt. Maybe our lack of consciousness in a coma simply means that there’s little to no brain activity. Maybe there’s no “place” we go to in the meantime. Maybe absent from the body is just present with the dirt?
You ought to read the accounts of the people who have had near death experiences, which might shed some light on the potential of consciousness to continue in coma/near death/lack of brain activity. The main site is http://www.nderf.org . If you do a search, there are even a few reported by agnostics/atheists.
I’ve personally known 2 people who have told me their near death experiences. One was my wife’s uncle, who had one during a resusitation using CPR from a heart attack. His is similar to those on the website, with the experience of peace and total knowledge. He also saw his deceased grandson, his deceased sister-in-law, and some other deceased friends. This man was a Lutheran pastor, but after this experience he was clearly at great peace for the remainder of his life: he was sure he’d enter heaven, not just hopeful.
The other person was a woman who was the mother of one of my kid’s friends. She developed multiorgan failure as the result of an autoimmune disease which resulted in a long period in the ICU of several weeks. During that time, she had to be resusitated several times. When she finally recovered, she related her near death experience when she felt better. Again, the peace and desire to stay with reluctance to come back. She also met several deceased relatives and friends. However, as she related the experience, she expressed surprise that she had also seen her father there. Her husband was crestfallen. While she was in the ICU, her father had died, and the family had decided to wait until she was stronger to tell her. They had not told her yet when she related the experience.
There are several things to note about the near death experiences: they seem somewhat random, not everyone has one in similar situations, and people seem to remember them better than other life experiences, a strange finding considering that these folks were nearly dead, and the brain activity in them was likely little or none. In terms of memory, even people who get knocked out or drunk lose the ability to remember details. The transfer of immediate experience from the working memory center of the hypocampus to the long term memory circuits of the remainder of the brain usually require very good overall brain function.
Ed,
Sorry for the delay in response. Thank you for the website and comment. I will definitely look into the claims of NDE’s. On the face of it, there seems to be tremendous difficulty in ascertaining any universal principles from such random experiences. The case seems to get even more sketchy when any inferences about the divine or afterlife are attempted. Granted I’m speaking extemporaneously, but I’m not sure how much value such experiences have for philosophy until more verifiable data can be collated and hypotheses stated and defended. Again, off the cuff and pending more in-depth research.
Actually, from my prespective, I think that the NDE reports are not going to define much detail in universal principles, other than that there seems to be an existence apart from/after our bodies die. And that existence seems mostly wonderful, though a few people have had terrifying NDE’s that often lead them to make change (repent?). The lack of clearly defined universal principles from NDE’s is because, in my Christian view, the discovery of universal principles is via relationship with God as revealed through scripture, fellowship, and personal spiritual growth. And that discovery will always remain rudimentary and incomplete in this life.
Ed,
Let me see if I understand you correctly. NDE’s are indeterminate themselves in providing sufficient grounds for specific hypothesizing regarding the after-life. They do however provide some support (by virtue of their very occurences) for a theistic, or at least non-naturalistic/materialistic, metaphysic. And the specifics of the theistic metaphysic are given by virtue of the particular religion to which someone might subscribe. This kind of reminds me of the General vs. Specific Revelation (or Natural Theology) doctrine of Christianity. I’m sorry if this is mistaken, I want to make sure I understand your position correctly. It seems to me though that while NDE’s might provide some support for a non-naturalistic worldview, the support they do provide is so general that they serves almost no constructive purpose once we try to reason from them. If their usefulness is more negative or critical in the philosophical realm, then I can understand how they might be referred to. Other than that, they are just another pebble thrown into the pond of amiguity.
One of the interesting commonalities in the reports of NDE’s as you read many, is the tendency for people to describe the experience as “more real than anything else I’ve experienced, despite the passage of decades”. The second commonality is the idea that “when I returned back to Earth, I was not allowed (or enabled) to take back the perfect knowledge I experienced while there”. So, yes, the NDE’s do provide some evidence of a non-naturalistic worldview, but also some evidence that any worldview we experience or try to attain in this world will be incomplete, but that there is a futute afterlife in which we will find ourselves completed. This is a common theme in several religions, but especially in Christianity, which teaches that Jesus’ finished work leads to the reconciliation of mankind with God and an afterlife which cannot be fully understood as we live our lives on earth. So, for a theistic agnostic like yourself, it could be a useful line of human experience to examine in order to help you decide whether absent from the body means dirt or glory. And if glory, as they claim, that can help narrow the possibilities in terms of worldview(s). That leads to the final commonality of NDE’s: the people who’ve had them seem not to fear death, and that frees them in this life to see things from a less provincial or self-centered view.
Ed,
Thank you for the intersting and useful comments. I do wonder sometimes if epistemological vagueness is the the “intended” extent of our interaction with trancendense. Reminds me of Paul’s (borrowed) analogy of seeing dimly in a mirror. For whatever they may or may not be worth, I’ll look into NDE’s and add them to my list of things to consider.
Hi, I know it has been awhile on this thread, but I found a reference to NDE’s in this article about Antony Flew’s switch from atheism to theism: http://theroadtoemmaus.org/RdLb/21PbAr/Apl/FlewTheist.htm . I think it is interesting how he finds them to be the best evidence in support of an afterlife, though he obviously remains the skeptic. I have a “Doubting Thomas” personality, but, come on, some people take that to the extreme….
Thank you for the link. I’ve read some stuff about Flew’s “conversion” before, but I hadn’t read this interview yet. I think it demonstrates two things very well. First, most of the philosophical and even psychological argumentation available comes nowhere near approaching the specificity of special revelation from any religion. Flew accepted the God of the philosophers and scientists, but this is not the same God of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. I’m not even sure if there are any arguments from philosophical theism to religious monotheism? It seems to me that the concept of God is established by these arguments, but whether that God is male, female, neuter, singular, triadic, plural, etc. is yet to be proven. The second thing that the interview demonstrates is the justified nature of agnosticism. Paul Draper’s presentation of religious agnosticism in “Divine Hiddenness” sounds similar to some of the sentiments presented by Flew.
Thanks again for the good read.