John Hick on resurrection

1. John Hick on resurrection • Thesis: Resurrection & what modern science tells us about human nature are compatible (cf. Linda Badham - modern science and all theories of ongoing life are incompatible) • Modern science • Tells us that humans are a “psycho-physical unity” (452) • There is no distinction between soul & body Hick on resurrection ~ slide 1

2. John Hick on resurrection • Hick: Now the notion of resurrection is “consonant with” the conception of the human person as an “indissoluble psycho-physical unity, and yet it also offers the possibility of an empirical meaning for the idea of life after death” (453). Hick on resurrection ~ slide 2

3. John Hick on resurrection • The notion of resurrection • Paul (in I Cor. 15:36-44) offers the classic statement • At death the whole person dies • But God, by an act of sovereign power, recreates the person, not as an identical physical organism, but as a soma pneumatikon (“spiritual body”) Hick on resurrection ~ slide 3

4. John Hick on resurrection • Hick: This “spiritual body” embodies the dispositional characteristics & memory traces of the deceased organism & • Inhabits an environment continuous with this “spiritual body” Hick on resurrection ~ slide 4

5. John Hick on resurrection • The problem of identity: Can this “spiritual body” be the same person as the deceased person? (Recall that one of Badham’s criticisms of the idea of resurrection is that persons cannot retain identity without continuity.) Hick on resurrection ~ slide 5

6. John Hick on resurrection • Hick’s defense of the intelligibility of identity of the person without continuity: three imaginary case histories • 1. Person in London disappears & suddenly reappears in New York--same personality, continuity of memory, same beliefs, same habits. Only thing possible is continuity occupancy of space. Hick on resurrection ~ slide 6

7. John Hick on resurrection • This is intelligible, makes sense. • 2. Person dies suddenly in London, reappears in New York with same character, memories, etc. We would be forced to say that this is the same person. Hick on resurrection ~ slide 7

8. John Hick on resurrection • 3. Person dies and person with same character traits, memories, etc. appears in a resurrected world. Should we say this is the same person? Hick: Yes (458). Hick on resurrection ~ slide 8

9. John Hick on resurrection • Hick states that what he has tried to show is the “conceivability of resurrection as the divine re-creation of the individual after his earthly death as a total psycho-physical ‘replica’ in another space” (461). • Thus note that he is not offering an argument for the existence of resurrection, but for its intelligibility. Hick on resurrection ~ slide 9