Between Death And The Resurrection

There are only two logically possible fates after death other than some sort of immediate continuation of conscious experience: a dreamless sleep or the oblivion (nonexistence) of the mind.  The experience of either of these things would be the same for people either way.  If the former was true, people would exist as a mind and yet not perceive anything.  If the latter is true, there is no longer a consciousness to do the experiencing.  The Bible very much seems to affirm that, at least before Christ, one of these or the other was the default fate of humans.  Between the death--the earthly death--of a person and their bodily resurrection, the Bible is actually quite meager in its details on one level.  It is far more clear in its statements about the ultimate fate of people: the righteous will be resurrected to eternal life (Daniel 12:2) and the wicked will be resurrected to be killed in hell (Matthew 10:28, Revelation 20:11-15).

Some Biblical and broader philosophical ideas are unaffected by what happens between now and some future eschatological time.  Whether or not the Bible taught an intermediate state of consciousness, the doctrine of resurrection to eternal life or permanent death of the soul (Ezekiel 18:4) would still apply to the bodies of the dead.  Consciousness is immaterial and distinct from the body it inhabits whether or not it dies as the body does; it also would not follow from a period of soul sleep or oblivion that there is not an afterlife to come.  There could still be a resurrection to new life after a brief or even extremely prolonged time of dreamless sleep or nonexistence of the soul, which is what the Bible says awaits both the righteous and the wicked (a resurrection, that is).  However, as will be tackled later, there are very significant nuances in the Biblical position on an afterlife as it relates to the so-called intermediate state.

As for a passage that directly mentions some kind of state after death that is quite different from what evangelical theology entails, there is Job 3:11, 13-14, and 16-19:

"Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? . . . For now I would be lying down in peace; I would be asleep and at rest with kings and counselors of the earth . . . Or why was I not hidden in the ground like a stillborn child, like an infant who never saw the light of day?  There the wicked cease from turmoil, and there the weary are at rest.  Captives also enjoy their ease; they no longer hear the slave driver's shout.  The small and great are there, and the slave is freed from his master."

This describes an apparently common destiny for humans after the first death, even as Job later says (19:26) that after his body has been destroyed, he will see God in his flesh, hinting at an eventual resurrection of the body as is taught in various other Biblical passages.  Job specifically says that death is a release from worry for everyone, the wicked included, and he longs for death himself (3:1-8) after suffering the loss of family members, bodily health, and animals.  Certainly, even if the Bible is true, this could be what Job mistakenly assumed about what awaits people between death and resurrection, but it is neither the only part where the Bible says such things nor is it obvious from the context that Job is only speculating or articulating his preferences.  Like how Jesus later describes Lazarus as sleeping while dead in John 11, Job seems to genuinely expect for there to not be torment before the resurrection for any soul and for there to be relief from painful experience.

In Ecclesiastes 9:4-6, the writer makes similar statements, actually going further to clarify that no one is aware of anything in Sheol, the grave:

"Anyone who is among the living has hope--even a live dog is better off than a dead lion!  For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even the memory of them is forgotten.  Their love, their hate, and their jealousy have long since vanished; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun."

The author of Ecclesiastes once again emphasizes that there is a common fate for the righteous and wicked on one level, with all of them dying and their emotions, desires, and experiences ceasing to be.  Verse 10 of the same chapter adds that people might as well pursue (morally permissible) passions in this life, because in Sheol, where the collective dead are said to go, "there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom."  Again, the author is plainly saying that people do not experience anything after death--at least until the resurrection of the dead that other Biblical figures mention.  Daniel 12:2, for example, which speaks of a general resurrection of the righteous/saved to eternal life and a resurrection of the wicked to eternal shame (which, as I have addressed elsewhere, does not contradict the Bible's blatant doctrine that the wicked will cease to exist in the lake of fire), says the dead sleep in the dust of the world until the day God restores them to life.

The New Testament also clearly indicates that those who die belonging to Yahweh/Christ will see him in paradise right after their biological death in Philippians 1:23 and Luke 23:43.  Does this contradict what the Old Testament so clearly teaches about the "intermediate period" between death and the resurrection?  Not necessarily, though few seem to ever wade into the details of something as far from predominantly popular theology and as philosophically complex as the true Biblical position on what, if any, afterlife people immediately face after they die before their resurrection and final state.  How the very legitimate affirmation of soul sleep/oblivion in the Bible relates to the resurrection to eternal life or the second death is not ambiguous; the details of how it relates to the present time are more complex.  There is much more that will be addressed about this soon.