Theo Todman's Web Page - Notes Pages

Personal Identity

Resurrection

(Text as at 26/11/2007 23:25:26)

*** THIS IS NOT THE LATEST VERSION OF THIS NOTE ***

This is a place-holder¹. Currently, just see the categorised reading-list.

This will add interest, though hopefully some of the Islamist topicality will have gone by the time my Thesis is presented. As the motivation for this discussion is partly the occasionally pernicious effects of a belief in a resurrection to paradise, the metaphysical possibility of the resurrection of beings like us is very important. It is also important to millions of non-explosive Americans. The Thesis will aim to prove that resurrection requires substance dualism. I will need to ensure I understand just what is believed by intellectually-respectable Christians and Muslims (though the topical believers are not amongst the ranks of the intellectually respectable). Some discussion was had about the orthodox Christian view being that there is no continuity of matter (the conundrum about the person consumed by cannibals was early recognised), and that the resurrection body is said to be in some sense a “spiritual” body.

A good place to start for an understanding of what resurrection meant to Christians prior to the modern era is "Bynum (Caroline) - Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity, 200 - 1336".