The Dead

How often - and boringly - have you seen the Family Circus cartoon where dumb old Billy is about to bike into traffic or off a cliff but good old Grandpa, who is dead, is there, flying and invisible, taking time out from harp playing to save his grandson from danger!?

Kind of sucks for those who have lost a kid to a car accident or any other kind of tragedy, as then - to the extent they believe in Bil and Jeff Keane's theology - it means that their ancestors didn't care to watch over their kids.

And it kind of sucks for the readers, because false theology is not all that funny.  Especially as for kids growing up reading this, it gives a devastatingly false impression of how things are in the hereafter.

The logical lesson being that if you don't find enough pagan themed
candies then your dead granddad didn't love you enough.

First, let us examine a pertinent verse on this matter.  Ecclesiastes 9:5 says, "For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not anything..."  Well, that seems pretty clear.  The dead know nothing.  Which means that no, Little Billy's granddad is not flying about, playing harps, hugging his still living wife, visiting school plays, saving Billy, helping PJ find "Easter Eggs" and all the other things that he's been shown doing over the decades.

But, I hear it called out, don't lots of Christian faiths believe that when you die you go up to heaven?  Yes.  And some also believe that if you were bad, then after you die you're going straight to hell.  And still others believe you go to a Spirit Paradise if you were good, and a Spirit Prison if you were bad.  And still others believe that there's a place called Purgatory where some have to stay awhile until they can improve - or I guess fail to improve - their situation enough to go up or down.

And in all cases, this involves the dead knowing things.  Hmm.  So maybe all those churches are right and the verse is wrong?  Okay, so here's the thing.  When you get to the "maybe the Bible verse is wrong" option alarm bells should already be going off.  Especially for a very clearly stated Bible verse not subject to much misunderstanding.

Also, one must consider something obvious.  What is the one thing that all Christian faiths agree is coming?  Yes, that's right, Christ's return.  And what does that herald?  Yes, right again, Judgment Day.  And what happens on Judgment Day?

Well, quite a lot, and it starts to diverge again with different faiths and denominations having different thoughts on how all that goes down.  But one thing - oddly - agreed upon is that at that time a final decision will be made and all those who are good (repentant and believing upon the name of Jesus) will get their reward and all those who were bad (unrepentant and/or not believing upon the name of Jesus) will get their punishment.

Now.  People have been dying since Jesus ascended into the sky after His resurrection.  If they are already in Heaven or Hell then what is the point of Judgment Day?  Or perhaps they are only there until the final, final judgment, and then they'll get to learn if they get to stay in Heaven or not?  Wow, that sounds kind of nerve wracking.

Imagine playing a harp for 1,700 years or so, and still not sure if you get to stay.  Conversely, maybe you're in hell dying for a cup of water, and what, when Judgment Day comes Jesus will say, "Oh, wait, hey, sorry about this, you're supposed to be up here - My bad!"

It seems unlikely.  Far more logically, you are dead, and know nothing, and then later when Judgment Day comes it all gets sorted out.

And so none of those other faiths make much sense, as all of them negate the need for a Judgment Day. Because everyone is thus either already sorted appropriately into Paradises and Prisons and Heavens and Hells, or worse, it has God as a person who may have "wrongly sorted" people who died and then must "correct" Himself later!

Far, FAR easier to simply believe the literal words of the Bible that say, "The dead know nothing" and thus avoid those theological difficulties.  There are but two faiths I know of who do this, and they are Jehovah's Witnesses and Seventh-day Adventists.

Now there are other theological difficulties with Jehovah's Witnesses - to put it mildly - but they are outside the scope of this article.  For this article, the important thing is that they have at least that one thing - and I'm sure a few more things here and there - correct.

Of even more importance is that the Seventh-day Adventist faith, correct in so many other ways, is additionally correct on this issue.  The dead know nothing, and Judgment Day has a point to it!