Are Christians going to Heaven?

The questions of Heaven and Hell; whether bodies ascend to Heaven or whether the souls detach from the physical body, all became major doctrinal issues for Christians to deal with. The concept of what happens after death has evolved and changed in Christian theology over the centuries based on one main issue: the gap between the life and possible death of a Christian and the return of Christ.

The Initial period between death and resurrection was very short. In fact, Christianity began with no gap. Paul's initial message was that believers would be alive when Christ returned. This is why the early Christian communities were primitive in their formation and lacked formal structures. They did not need any. The anticipation of Christ's immediate return was Paul's early message on his first round of trips to set up his churches in cities such as Thessalonica, Corinth and Galatia. It was this message that sold the earliest audiences that they should believe in Christ.

The first step away from this belief is the reason Paul writes his first letter to the church in Thessalonica. He has to address their immediate concern that believers were dying. Paul's message drew upon some Jewish apocalyptic beliefs in bodily resurrection. Thus Paul's response to the Thessalonican's concern was to explain that the bodies of the dead would be raised up and carried to Heaven, followed shortly by the bodies of the living. This is the first indication that Paul was expanding the gap, but not by a lot.

For the Apostle Paul death was akin to sleep. Christ was the first to be bodily raised to heaven. When he returned he would bodily raise anyone who lived and "slept" within Christ. The image here is of Elijah bodily begin taken directly to Heaven.

There are a number of analogies within the New Testament but all seem to indicate that the "sleeping" will be protected by Christ until he returns. One of the more perplexing is the parable told by Jesus of the rich man and Lazarus. Both die. Lazarus, a beggar, is carried to Abraham's side. The rich man dies, is buried, and taken to Hell (or Hades in the Greek, Sheol in Hebrew). The two locations seem to be close to each other because the rich man can talk to Abraham and beg to have Lazarus relieve the rich man's suffering. "Abraham's side" seems to imply this is not Heaven, but some intermediary state.

This concept gets reiterated in the book of Revelation as the "souls" of the martyrs are "under the altar" but not yet in Heaven, or at least not in paradise. They are calling out to the Lord, asking when then the Lord will judge the people on Earth and avenge their deaths. They were told they needed to wait a little longer. Like the previous parable, this account indicates that these souls are not yet in Heaven itself but in some pre-staging area.

As it gradually becomes apparent that the resurrection and the day of Judgement may not be as close in time as the Apostle Paul claimed, a different doctrine gradually develops. It is actually based on the Roman philosophy of the separation of the body and soul and the Romans took this from the Greek philosopher Plato. It was Plato who first wrote that at death the body and soul are separated.

When the great Catholic thinker Augustine ponders this concept he encounters a problem. If the souls of the dead immediately go to Heaven the concept of the resurrection loses its importance. If the souls of believers are already in Heaven, there is no reason for them to be waiting for the day of judgement. This; though, is not the image described in the Book of Revelation. The souls of the martyrs are waiting for the day of judgement. Therefore; they must not be in Heaven but in some area right below Heaven.

It is also not the message that Paul originally preached. If it had been, Paul would have been forced to deal with another issue, suicide. The earliest Christians were essentially waiting around for Christ's return and their redemption. Had they believed the trip to Heaven would occur immediately upon their death many would have argued that suicide was the best method for quickly getting to Heaven. Of course, Paul never has to worry about this problem because he never mentioned or even considered what later Christianity came to believe.

Augustine elaborates on this further when he asks for Christians to pray for his dead mother Monica. The only reason for any living Christian to pray for the dead is if the dead are not already in Heaven. If the dead (soul or body) is already in Heaven there is really no purpose in praying for them. If they are in Hell they have already been damned by the Lord so praying will not help them either.

This problem would gradually be worked out by the Catholic Church in the concept of Purgatory. Even Purgatory; though, underwent numerous changes through the centuries. It was first just a waiting area (under the altar). Gradually Purgatory became associated more closely with Hell with punishment and torture. The only difference was Purgatory had the feature of being temporary. Souls could be prayed out of Purgatory. If in Hell, they were stuck for eternity.

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries Hell/Purgatory came under fire because the Catholic Church was using the concept for profit. Believers could actually pay a priest to perform a mass that prayed for a particular dead soul. One could also simply pay and indulgence to speed up the process of getting the dead soul into Heaven. In objecting to these corrupt practices many Protestant theologians concluded that Purgatory was simply a "Catholic" addition with no basis in scripture. Most Protestants abandoned the concept.

This left Protestants with the same problem that Augustine originally pondered. However; they concluded that Augustine had to be wrong. When on the cross Jesus promised one of the thieves hanging next to him that he would join Jesus in paradise that same day. This implies that right after a Christian dies some part of him (body, soul, or both) ascends directly to Heaven.

A few hundred years earlier in 1336 Pope Benedict XII had proclaimed that souls, upon death, are truly blessed and have eternal life and rest. This seemed to put Protestants in agreement with the Catholic Church post 1336.

The division of body and soul, first detailed by Plato, gets a further definition in the Apostle's Creed, a document supposedly dictated by each of the twelve apostles while inspired by the Holy Spirit. In the Creed Jesus descends into Hell following his death, where he spends his time between death and Easter resurrection. Some believe it was his soul that descended in the Hell; some believe it was his body. In either case, the soul and body have to be separated because Jesus' promised the thief they would be in Heaven on the day of their death. For both of these to be true the soul and body have to be separated at death so there can be two components traveling in opposite directions.

In abandoning Augustine, both the Protestants and post 1336 Catholics were left with the same problem that bothered Augustine in the first place. If souls immediately ascend to Heaven what is the point of the resurrection? Is it merely to join the physical body with the soul? If so, the resurrection appears to be a minor technical procedure. The issue was further complicated because the souls of the martyrs described in the Book of Revelation did not appear to be at rest. They were described as being "under the altar" complaining to the Lord and asking for the day of judgement. This view also seems to go against the Apostle Paul, who placed the utmost importance on the day of Resurrection.

These unresolvable questions are the result of the Apostle Paul simply being wrong. Had there been no or little gap between living Christians and the resurrection none of these issues would be relevant. For Paul the resurrection of Christ was the absolute key. Only after the resurrection could Christians join Jesus in heaven.

As the gap began to expand Christians had little choice but to de-emphasize the resurrection. Christianity would have been a much more difficult sell if they had to explain that faithful believers had to wait with their decaying body until the Day of Judgement. By employing Plato's division of body and soul Christians could assert that some part of the Christian ascended to Heaven at death, just as Jesus promised while on the cross. This reduces the significance of resurrection but seems to be the most acceptable solution. Of course, it also ignores the martyr souls described in the Book of Revelation. Again, this seems to be an acceptable compromise because the immediate ascension into Heaven is much easier to sell as a concept when preaching to the world of non-believers.

The bottom line; though, is that the contradictions still exist and no solution accounts for the various accounts of death within the New Testament. The modern view being sold to prospective Christian converts is merely the most convenient and palatable view point. This is hardly the absolute "truth" that Christian evangelists proclaim when they tell someone to believe in the truth of Christianity.