Survival or immortality of the soul?

Modern man, who explores the bottom of the oceans and increasingly dominates the infinite cosmos, does not yet know his own nature. In general, he knows the outside world, but he is not aware of himself; he knows who he is, but he does not know what he is.

We are not referring to materialists. They think they already know what they are: just a thinking matter. I refer to Spiritualists, that is, to those who believe that, after death, something continues, something survives... This "something" is usually called soul or Spirit. And when one speaks of this matter, so abstract for many, it always reminds us of death. The issue "death" is not sufficiently analyzed by people. On the contrary, one generally avoids discussing the subject, acting like the ostrich that is said to put its head under the sand when it presents a danger. In relation to death, most people act childishly, if not irrationally.

When one asks someone if he believes in the immortality of the soul, the answer is usually positive. But when that same person speaks of his friend, who died, he says that heloved him, always using the verbs related to the deceased in the past, in the same way that he expresses himself about his car destroyed by fire when he says he liked it. This person, indeed, is right when using the verb in the past when talking about the car, because it no longer exists. But if he believes that his friend survives death, why does he use then the same tense? This clearly demonstrates the fragility of his conviction regarding immortality...

Another curious position about death: no one fears a living friend, but after his death they fear his body, which has become a corpse, and also fear his soul, which has become a ghost ... This is so disturbing, that we have already heard something like this: "I loved my mother very much, but she did not appear to me!" The dearest mother turned into a ghost! Unfortunately, such events are not as rare as one might think.

When we ask someone, who says he has a soul or Spirit, where he wants to be buried, the person usually answers: "I want to be buried in my city, near my parents, relatives and friends". If we ask that same person where his soul will go, the answer will undoubtedly be: "It will go to Heaven"; or to another good place, according to his religious conviction, even because no one plays with such a serious subject. However, we could object: "What does it matter if it goes to Hell or to any other place, since it is your soul who will go and not you? You said that you will be buried in your city".

This subject was once presented to a select non-Spiritist audience, interested in research on extra-physical phenomena. When they heard this question, the crowd stirred and began to murmur until one of them said, "I will not be buried there. It will be my body". Faced with this, the audience calmed down, until the speaker said: "You did not solve the problem. On the contrary, you made it even more difficult, to the point of making it contrary to reason”. The audience became uneasy again.

To understand well why the problem became complicated, let us leave the field of the Spiritual things for a moment and move on to the field of grammar and logic. The grammars of all languages ​​teach that the possessive is the word that indicates someone who can claim the possession of something, that is, of the possessed object. Therefore, if it is said, "My watch" - it means that the watch belongs to me, that I am its owner. In case someone tries to touch it, I'll say, "Do not touch that watch because it's mine”!

So far, the referral of the subject is logical, of course. But when we look at the use of the possessive case in the above phrases, the question becomes more complicated. Let's see: a creature died. Body and soul parted. The body was buried and the soul "went to Heaven". If someone threatens to touch that body, who will say, "Do not touch that body because it is mine"? Or if someone tries to touch the soul: "Do not touch that soul because it is mine"? Who is this being that has this body and soul?

Is this a philosophical problem with no solution? No, absolutely not! Second position - not only Spiritist in particular, but Spiritualist in general - perfectly logical, one should write off the sentence "my soul", replacing it with "I". I am the possessor of the body or rather I was the owner of the body that died. I was its temporary user. I, soul or Spirit, before the dead body can say, "This body was mine. I used it during the time in which it lived". The body can never say: "This soul was mine".

Thus we arrive to the conclusion that I, Spirit, am immortal, not capable of being destroyed. I use a material body these days. This body will die one day. Not me! The body is not an essential part of the human being. It is only a temporary clothing of the immortal Spirit, and it may last from a few seconds to a little more than a century. As much as we respect it, as an imperative instrument for the evolution of the Spirit, the body must be regarded as an instrument, as an object and not as a subject. And for those who have not yet divested themselves of the habit of visiting cemeteries, it should be remembered that the components of the body, within a short time after burial, will become part of other organisms, animals or vegetables... And an even blunter conclusion: The body is disposable...

It is me, soul or Spirit, who thinks, learns, feels, hates, and loves... Not the body. The body is only an instrument of temporary use of the immortal Spirit. When my body dies, I will leave it as clothes I wore and enter into another dimension of the infinite Universe, using a more subtle body. However, I cannot see this dimension today, because I am limited by the material body. But when I leave, I will take everything I have learned, all the progress I have made in the field of intelligence and feeling, that is, everything I have incorporated into this evolutionary period that I have lived in the material world.

Thinking in this way, one can develop a new state of consciousness, which can be called "Spiritual citizenship". It is a citizenship that is not national, not even planetary, but cosmic. This Spiritual citizenship is a condition before life, very different from that:

"I am a man and I have a soul". On the contrary, the creature says, "I am an immortal Spirit. I have a body, in which I am temporarily incarnate".

The idea of ​​being mortal and having an immortal soul imposes suffering. Note that, according to this misplaced position, it is not I who am immortal, but she, my soul. The idea of ​​being mortal and having an immortal soul contains a sense of destruction, for at least half of the being would be destroyed by the phenomenon of death.

Why can we say that it is an idea of ​​destruction, of loss? Because the creature becomes accustomed to concentrating all its life potential in the body and not in the Spirit, to the point of saying: "When I die, I want to be buried here or there". Man feels more like a mortal body than like an immortal Spirit. So, he suffers! He suffers because his reason tells him that at death his body will soon be consumed, rotting rapidly, and that the constituent elements of his body will take part in the formation of new plants and animal organisms. According to this mistaken point of view, the soul is only part of the being. That is why he says, "When I die, my soul goes to Heaven".

According to this position, death destroys the self, for it says: "I want to be buried" here or there. Well, only what is dead is buried! It may be argued, however, that the soul is indestructible. This is true, but it is treated as a third person: it, whose nature and destiny are not clearly defined by theologians. Not well defined by the theologians, but clearly defined by Paul the Apostle in his First Letter to the Corinthians in chapter 15: "But one shall say: How shall the dead rise? And with which body will they come?"

The Apostle teaches that the soul has another body beyond material, that is, a Spiritual body, indestructible, subtle: "And there are heavenly bodies and terrestrial bodies, but one is the glory of the heavenly and the other of the earthly”.

And, pedagogically, it demonstrates the complete destructiveness of the physical body, when comparing it to the seed, which really disappears to give rise to the plant: "So is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in decomposition; it will rise up a body in incorruption". "It is sown an animal body, it will rise up a Spiritual body. If there is an animal body, there is also a Spiritual body".

And in anticipation of those who would create the evil theory of the resurrection of the flesh, he warns: "And now I say this, brethren: that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, nor corruption inherit incorruption".

As can be concluded, the Apostle Paul taught that the material body will be buried and simultaneously the Spiritual body will be released.

The Christians perfectly understood the Apostle's statements, because Jesus demonstrated the independence of the Spirit in relation to matter, when, for forty days, He appeared and disappeared in the period of the so-called resurrection until the ascension. It should be noted that Jesus, as the Evangelist relates (John 20: 11-16) was completely clothed, according to the Jewish custom, to the point that, in his first appearance to Mary Magdalene, she thought that the man she saw behind her, was a gardener.

But the question arises: where did Jesus get those clothes? He had been crucified naked, or almost naked, because the soldiers, before crucifying Him, took off His clothes: "And when they had crucified Him, they divided His garments, casting lots (...)" (Mt, 27:35)

Moreover, He did not wear the shroud, nor the handkerchief that had been over His head, with which he could cover His body, for these pieces were in the tomb, according to the Apostle Peter, when he entered the place:“(…) and went into the sepulcher, and saw the sheets on the ground, and that the handkerchief which was upon His head was not with the sheets, but wrapped in a different place" (Jo 20: 6, 7)

From where had Jesus taken those robes he wore? It is clear that neither His body nor His garments were material, since they were in another vibratory range, in another dimension, still unknown by Science.

It should also be noted that Jesus, from His resurrection, no longer acted as usual, that is, as an incarnate Spirit, limited by matter. He went through a closed door, according to the Evangelist's account: "And when the evening of that day arrived, the first day of the week, and the doors were shut where the disciples had gathered, afraid of the Jews, Jesus arrived and stood in the midst of them and said: “Peace be with you” (Jo 20:19).

Jesus joined two disciples, who were going to Emmaus, and talked with them, not being recognized. At nightfall, the two of them stopped in front of an inn and invited the stranger to dinner with them. Sitting at the table, the three men, at the moment when He prayed and shared the bread, Jesus revealed himself, as the Evangelist reports: "Then their eyes were opened and they recognized Him, and He disappeared from them". (Lc 24:31).

Why did Jesus appear in clothes that He did not have; why did He suddenly appear to the two disciples and vanished from their sight? Why did not Jesus stay in someone else's house, as He usually did? For forty days He appeared and disappeared suddenly, having no record of staying in someone's house or having eaten regularly, as He did before the resurrection.

Why did Jesus do this? He wanted to draw a very clear line, separating the two periods of His life among men: during the first He had been incarnate, when He had acted as an ordinary man, bounded by matter; during the second, (the forty days until the Ascension), He wanted to show that He was still alive, but He no longer had a material body, He was no longer incarnate.

The Apostle Paul, to whom Jesus appeared on the road to Damascus, was judiciously convinced that Jesus no longer had a terrestrial body but a celestial or Spiritual one, as He wrote in his letter to the Corinthians.

Jesus gave His last lesson, leaving the most beautiful lesson about immortality. A lesson without words that, according to Him, would be decoded later, eighteen centuries later: "I still have much to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. (Jo 16:12). But when that Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth (...)". (Jo 16: 12-13). "But the Comforter, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and remind you of all things whatsoever I have said unto you" (Jo 14:26).

Based on the teachings and examples of Jesus, one can arrive to the conclusion that we are essentially Spirits, now incarnated. One day we will leave our earthly body, as Jesus left His, keeping only the celestial, immortal body, according to the Master, in a genial way taught and exemplified!

It remains, however, for many people, a question that invariably appears when these comments are made: If the tomb was empty and the body with which Jesus appeared was Spiritual, where was His physical body? The Master, of course, could not explain the matter to those with whom He had lived, as is evident from His words already quoted: "I have much more to say to you, but you cannot bear it now" (Jo 16:12).

Fulfilling the promise of Jesus, the Comforter comes to recall His lessons and explain many facts that were recorded by the Evangelists, but which were not understood at the time, such as the sudden apparitions of Jesus in the upper room and in the fishing, and His disturbing disappearance before the companions to Emmaus, as already mentioned. These facts, taken by miracles by many theologians, find in Spiritism clear and logical explanations, not in the field of theological speculations, but within the objectivity of Science, in the researches of the phenomenon of materialization - now called ectoplasm by parapsychologists - carried out by several scientists, including the figure of Sir William Crookes, the celebrated English physicist, who could prove that the Spirit Katie King, with her materialized Spiritual body, was limited within the material plane as if incarnate, becoming visible, audible and tangible. (Spiritist Facts, William Crookes, History of Spiritism, Arthur Conan Doyle)

As to the disappearance of the physical body of Jesus, one can read a clarification on the dissipation of the remaining fluids in corpses, in Andre Luiz's book Obreiros da Vida Eterna(Workers of Eternal Life) (Chapters 15 and 16). It is a pious operation carried out by Spiritual benefactors, who dissipate in the atmosphere the fluids remaining in the body, before burial, in order to protect it from profanation that could be carried out by inferior Spirits.

In parallel, one can conclude that the Master himself has been charged with dissipating the remaining energies in His body, and in so doing, He completely dematerialized. It is easy to understand this, remembering that if the empty tomb of Jesus has already caused so many wars, imagine what would cause the desire to possess some bones of His body.

In this context, it is easy to imagine that the body of Jesus should really disappear, for the priests, as soon as resurrection was announced, would rescue it, in order to show it in public, denying the victory of life over death.

Moreover, if the shroud that is in Turin is authentic, it attests that there was a phenomenon on it capable of leaving the figure of a human body imprinted which, according to scholars, coincides with what is known about the body of Jesus, both as regards the physical characteristics and the sufferings that were imposed upon Him. However, this impression on the fabric was not caused by radiation, heat, dyeing, or painting. To this day, it is not known what caused those impressions that allow a computer to restore the figure of a corpse that had been scourged and crucified before being deposed on one end of the cloth and covered with the other.

In conclusion, it can be said that Spiritism, in decoding the message of Jesus, clarifies to us what we truly are: Immortal Spirits, temporarily incarnated in mortal bodies!

Therefore, when the phenomenon of death occurs, it is improper to say survival of the soul. Only those who are in danger of dying survive. The soul, which is immortal, only frees itself from the physical body.

Translation:
Eleni Frangatos - eleni.moreira@uol.com.br