The Bible Says Death Is Like Sleep — Here's Why

August 8, 2023

Funerals are sobering because each one is a “wake-up” call to remind us we will all “fall asleep.” And that sleep will fall upon us sooner than we tend to think.

Most people understand perfectly well what we mean by “falling asleep in death.” And when the Bible describes death in terms of “sleep,” most people don't read too much into it.

But some do.

“Soul sleep”

For close to 30 years in Armstongism, I was taught that the reason the Bible frequently describes death as “sleep” is to indicate that our souls will be utterly out of commission, turned off and tuned out, devoid of all awareness. Death was compared to being in a deep, dark sleep, unconscious and unaware of the passage of time — the kind of sleep where, upon waking, a long night feels like a mere moment or a hard blink.

But is it true?

I didn't question this in my youth, but now I see the fallacy of that conclusion.

Sleep is a useful metaphor. But it can be taken way too far, stretched to mean something the biblical writers never intended it to mean. COGs and Jehovah's Witnesses and some others insist death is like shutting down, going all-out dark, like undergoing general anesthesia for a surgery.

Sleep is not always like that, however. There are many light sleepers. There are tossers-and-turners. Everyone who sleeps also dreams. Some people sleep walk and sleep talk. Some of us suffer a sore neck or back in our sleep. Unfortunately for married couples, snoring or gasping are not uncommon. Our bodies are actually repairing themselves during sleep.

So does the Bible's use of “sleep” mean that the dead are easily and frequently awakened? That they tend to roll around, have lots of dreams, and wake up with sore joints? Does the Bible teach a “snoring of the dead” doctrine?

In what sense is death most like sleep?

The meaning behind the metaphor

The plain answer is that death is likened to sleep because the dead are lying down and not doing anything. They're not getting up to make a living, to play, to prepare food, or to make business deals — all the normal things people do under the sun. They're in their resting place, where their bodies have ceased from their labors. Lying down, eyes closed, not talking, perhaps with their hands folded, it's as if they're sleeping. “Taking a dirt nap” is not a bad euphemism.

So why is death called “sleep”? A picture is worth a thousand words: Look again at the top of this post to see a picture from Pope John Paul II's funeral. Just look. That is why death is described as sleep. No further explanation is required to explain the metaphor.

Even when the most experienced doctor examines a body to declare whether someone is dead, all he can inspect is the body. He has no access or insight into the person's non-material soul. He doesn't have the means to scientifically discover whether it somehow survives the body. Science can only deal with the physical.

Just as we can't see another person's soul or spirit while they are alive (only its effects and interactions with the body), neither can we see it when they're dead.

Conclusion

The existence of an immortal soul is neither proved nor disproved by a metaphor — and not even science. For real proof, we must use the right tools: sound philosophy, good biblical theology, true reason. And of course it helps to have recourse to the deposit of Faith once-for-all delivered to the saints (Jude 3).

Perhaps in some later post, we can review COGs' favorite go-to verses in Ecclesiastes and the Psalms, which they claim are clear proofs that the dead have no conscious awareness, have no memory, and are unable to praise God.

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Does God Alone Have Immortality? (A Failed Prooftext)

August 4, 2023

Does the Bible explicitly deny that human beings were created with immortal souls?

The COGs teach what some call “soul sleep,” an accurate label but one generally not embraced by COGs themselves. They teach that when we sleep in death, the soul dies along with the body so that we have no conscious interaction with reality. The “spirit in man” experiences absolutely nothing, utter darkness, until the resurrection. They believe both body and soul are mortal.

They commonly cite the following prooftext — with enthusiasm — to support their view that the Christian doctrine about the immortal soul contradicts Sacred Scripture.

(A classic presentation of this prooftext is found in CGI minister Mike James' sermon: Resurrection From What? The video is cued at the start of his explication, which lasts just over a minute.)

The great apostle, St. Paul, writes of God,

who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen (1 Timothy 6:16).

In its very first clause, this passage allegedly proves very succinctly that as creatures we cannot have any immortal component in us, that only God has never-ending life.

But is this what Paul means? Are his words air-tight, slam-dunk proof that the “soul sleep” position of Armstrongism is true?

To find out, we can ask a simple question to see whether it violates the law of non-contradiction: Were angels created immortal?

To be consistent, if this verse rules out the possibility that man has an immortal soul — because God “alone has immortality” — then it must also rule out the possibility that angels will live forever, because God “alone has immortality.”

But the answer to our question is yes. Angels are creatures — they're not God — yet angels are immortal. They don't come with an expiration date. (I'm sure there are some COG teachers on the fringe who believe angels pass away, but I don't know any.) Does anyone believe the powerful angelic spirits in heaven (or hell) are subject to death or annihilation?

Even the devil won't perish from existence. The book of Revelation portrays his fate as one who “will be tormented day and night forever and ever” (Revelation 20:10).

If angels were indeed given the gift of immortality, then clearly we cannot take 1 Timothy 6:16 to mean only God lives on forever. It must mean something else.

What could that be? Obviously it is this: God alone has immortality inherently, in his nature. It's what makes God God. He alone is necessary existence; all other existing things derive their existence from him.

And since God is the Almighty, the Holy Immortal One, he is able to impart immortality to anything in his creation if he chooses to. He has already done this in the angelic realm; with that precedent, it's not out of the question that he could have done this with mankind, made in his image.

It should be clear that these two ideas are not mutually exclusive — that (1) God alone has immortality within himself, and (2) God can choose to impart unending existence to certain of his creatures.

The Christian view is that while man as an organism is indeed mortal, his spiritual component is immortal. When a man's body becomes a corpse (at death), his soul suffers the loss of its companion (the body), but the soul itself is not destroyed. It's incomplete without its “soul mate,” but it exists apart from the body nonetheless.

To see how this can be, consider the limited analogy of a water balloon. As it falls from a great height, it is a full-fledged “living” water balloon. But when it bursts upon contact with the ground, it is “dead” — that is, it is no longer a water balloon. The water balloon is no more. But that doesn't mean water doesn't continue its existence (albeit differently) apart from the destruction of the balloon. The only way to restore or “resurrect” this water balloon from the dead would be to reunite the water with the reconstituted bits of rubber material.

(This analogy is limited because we should not crudely or simplistically think of the body as just a container that holds captive a soul, like a balloon holding water. Body and soul are united much more profoundly. Catholics have always taught that our ultimate reward is not merely to escape the body — a pagan concept — but to undergo a bodily resurrection. On this matter of the soul, the biggest beef COG teachers have with our historic Christian view is that we believe the soul, or “spirit in man,” is conscious rather than unconscious during the interim between our death and resurrection. That really bothers them for some reason.)

But this post is not meant to be a full biblical or philosophical treatment of the human soul. The point is that it's an absurd imposition on the text of 1 Timothy 6:16 to say it proves we can't have an immortal soul.

We know that if saying God “alone has immortality” means our souls are mortal, then it also means the angels are mortal — which is not the case. And that means 1 Timothy 6:16 is not a slam dunk for the COG position. It's a brick.

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About Me

July 26, 2023

My name is Darren.

“COG” is short for the “Church of God” movement — a tradition not yet 100 years old. It was spawned by Herbert W. Armstrong, whose ministry began around 1934. He is the founder of the Worldwide Church of God (WCG).

I was born into the WCG, and at age 19 — during the early stages of “the changes” in WCG doctrine — I joined the Church of God International (CGI), founded by Armstrong’s son, Garner Ted Armstrong.

Now I’m a Tradition-minded Catholic. My conversion story is published here (Catholic Answers Magazine).

I don’t resent my upbringing in Armstrongism (as it is more aptly called). My background provides a unique perspective that helps me to better understand and appreciate the truths of “the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3).

Yet I wish I had known someone in my young adult years who could both (1) understand the COG doctrines and relate to its culture, and (2) offer reasonable and charitable critiques while explaining Catholicism in terms I could understand.

In this blog I offer my thoughts in a way that might have been helpful if presented to me years ago, when I was a young, devout COGer facing the world ahead of me.

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