(Skulls of the monks on Mt. Athos, Greece)
From the time we’re created, each
individual has a particular mode of existence, which is not extinguished
when we die. Saint John the Damascan says that the union of soul and
body occurs at the beginning of our formation. ‘Body and soul are formed
at the same time’. This specific persona of each individual is not
dismantled even on our death. The soul may indeed be separated from the
body at death, but the personhood remains the same.
Each person is a unique and inimitable
personality. This special individuality, this specific persona, never
ceases to exist. This is why, in the parable of Dives and Lazarus, the
Lord says that the rich man saw Lazarus in the bosom of Abraham, not merely Lazarus’ soul.
The aim of the divine incarnation was to
bring fallen humankind into their inheritance in the Kingdom of Heaven.
This is why all the Fathers declare that the Word of God became human
in order to deify human nature.
When we talk about the deification
(glorification) of human nature, we agree that the righteous become
sharers in divine nature, although always with the proviso that their
human nature isn’t obliterated, but participates in the divine glory of
our inapproachable God to the extent that we’re able to do so.
In other words, the individuality of
each person is retained, elevated through the resurrection, approaches
divine glory, but still remains finite.
And all of this depends on the
incarnation of the Divine Word. Jesus Christ, the second person of the
Holy Trinity, took human nature upon Himself and united with it as a
Person and a Persona. Both natures remained unconfused. When the flesh
was deified, it didn’t lose its own nature. This is Jesus, perfect God
and perfect human. It was over the dogma of the two natures and one
hypostasis of Christ that all the battles with the Monophysites were
fought.
By grace, not by essence, the righteous
take part in divine glory and communion, but each person continues to
retain his or her personality. But this is where God’s magnificent and
infinite wisdom and loving-kindness come in.
The Word as infinite God ‘dwells in inaccessible light’ (I Tim.
6, 16) and no-one can approach His divine brilliance, but all of us
saved Christians are united to His divine human nature, and, all
together constitute His body, ‘the fullness of Him who fills all in all’
(Eph. 1, 23). Since Christ is the Head of the Church and we are
the members, then the body becomes perfect when we’re all united in
Christ. The Church is His body, the fulfilment of Christ as a person.
What has been said so far is enough to
prove that the incarnate Word of God is the root cause of the fact that
people retain their personalities even after death. This becomes even
clearer from the teachings of the holy Fathers.
This indissoluble persona, consisting of
the soul and the body, is described for us by Gregory the Theologian in
his funeral oration for his brother Kaisarios: ‘I await the voice of
the Archangel, the last trump, the transformation of the heavens, the
alteration of the earth, the liberation of the elements, the renewal of
the world. Then I’ll see Kaisarios himself, without having died, without
us accompanying him to the tomb, without lamentation, without us
feeling sorry for him. He’ll be bright, glorious, elevated…’
The notion that the separation of the
soul from the body doesn’t eradicate a person’s individual identity is
also accepted by Saint Gregory of Nyssa. In his dialogue with his
sister, Saint Makrina, he uses two wonderful examples and with stunning
precision demonstrates that the soul always recognizes its own body,
both as it was when they were united and after their separation.
He uses an example from painting. In
order to paint a subject, the artist mixes a variety of colours, but can
still discern the individual colours he’s applied in making the
mixture.
A second example he uses is from pottery
and again demonstrates that the soul has no difficulty in identifying
its own body, even when it’s mixed with other, foreign elements. Ceramic
objects are made from the same clay. The potter creates a variety of
objects which don’t have the same form or the same use. A pitcher is one
thing, a wine-jar another and a plate something else. All of these
objects have their own shapes and particular features, by which they’re
recognized by their owners.
And then again, if they’re broken, they
can be mended and become recognizable: which bits belongs to the
wine-jar, to the pitcher, to the cup. And if the broken pieces get mixed
up with unworked clay, then it’s even easier for the owner to recognize
the baked pieces.
From the above we can understand very
clearly that death, that is the separation of the soul from the body,
doesn’t eradicate a person’s individual identity. People stay the same.
The separation of the soul from the body
is temporary and lasts as long as they’re in what we call the middle
situation of the departed. At Christ’s second coming, the soul and body
will be united. We shall rise, with new bodies, not subject to decay, as
Saint Paul teaches us: the Lord ‘will transform the body of our
humiliation so that it may be conformed to the body of His glory’, (Phil. 3, 21).
And Saint Makarios the Egyptian affirms
the permanent integrity of human nature with great clarity: ‘At the
Resurrection, all the members rise and not a single hair is lost, as has
been written, “Not a hair of your head shall be lost” (Luke 21,
18). And everything will be lambent, bathed in light and fire and
transformed, not, as some say, broken up and consumed by the fire so
that their nature no longer exists. Because Peter’s still Peter, Paul
Paul and Philip Philip. People remain in their own nature and specific
identity, filled with the Holy Spirit’.
(†Markellos Karakallinos, Η φύση του σώματος μετά την Ανάστασιν, Holy Monastery of Karakallou, pp. 20-24).
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