[Vision2020] Clearing out more problems for Phil

[Ralph Nielsen]

[Vision2020] And clearing out just one more problem for Ralph

Phil Nisbet pcnisbet1 at hotmail.com
Tue Aug 30 03:29:05 PDT 2005


Ralph quoting: "There is not a hint of [life after death] in the  
Torah, or in most
of the [Hebrew] Bible. There, human death is final. ... With the
possible exceptions of Elijah and Enoch, all biblical personalities
die and their death is final." (Etz Hayim; Torah and Commentary.
Jewish Publication Society, 2000. p. 1436).


Ralph: “I also challenged Mr. Nisbet (or anyone else) to show us one  
single
person in the Tanakh who died and went to heaven. We are still waiting.”

Phil: You actually provided your own answer Ralph.  Enoch.  Nice  
going.  It’s
actually verse in B’Rashit that sends him directly to G-d without dying.
What’s fairly interesting about that of course is that actually,  
considering
when the final version was redacted, it may have been more influenced  
than
the stronger statements in Samuel, which was redacted to its current  
form
much before it.

Phil: Your reference from the Conservative volume is also interesting  
in what if
fails to insert.  It mentions that Elijah is taken whole to G-d, but  
fails
to mention that during his life Elijah resurrected a person already  
dead.
If there is no after life, no Olam HaBa, then where was the dead person
prior to returning from something deemed to be final?  How can death be
final if Elijah can bring you back from it or if like Samuel you can  
speak
as a spirit to those who are in the land of the living?

Ralph: You are confusing what Etz Hayim says about the Torah with my  
question. Obviously, Elijah's raising a dead person is an exception  
to the general rule, so you can write to the editors of Etz Hayim and  
tell them so. And don't forget that the widow's son, whom Elijah  
raised from the dead, had just died and was not yet buried. Nor was  
he taken up to heaven. So it would seem that all Elijah had to do was  
administer CPR.

Ralph: As for the "spirit" of Samuel, who/which was raised by the  
witch of Endor, doesn't the text make it plain that we are dealing  
with necromancy, which was forbidden (Deut. 18:11-12)? There are many  
mediums about today who will also "communicate" with the dead,  
usually for a fee.

Phil: Your challenge is also interesting in another respect.  What is  
it that you
assume to be ‘heaven’?  Of course it is difficult to suggest that  
anybody
has ever gone to ‘heaven’, since we have no idea what that place is.   
There
are lots of speculations as to what happens, yet all we are actually  
told is
that we can be gathered unto our people, taken to G-d as spirit or be
punished in the pit.  The reference to what sort of existence the  
after life
is, is left vague and there are as many opinions as there are  
individuals.

Ralph: You admit that Enoch was taken up to heaven alive. It is also  
obvious that God didn't kill Elijah before carrying him up to heaven.  
That makes a grand total of two persons in the entire Tanakh = Hebrew  
Bible = Old Testament who went to heaven alive.

Ralph: My challenge was to show us (the readers of Vision 2020, in  
case you haven't  guessed) how many people in the Tanakh died and  
then went to heaven. As for what and where heaven is, both the Tanakh  
and the New Testament tell us that it is above the clouds. Don't  
forget that in those days the earth was considered to be flat, with  
heaven above and Sheol below.

Phil: That is plainly different than insisting that there is no life  
after we die,
just not telling us what that life will be.  Just as Stephen Hawking
suggests, we can not hope to see beyond the singularity and even if  
we were
told what the great beyond was, what relative referent would we have to
comprehend it.

Ralph: Stephen Hawking was not discussing the Tanakh, was he?