It is out of the dust of the ground that the Bible describes Yahweh as creating Adam, the first named human in the Bible (Genesis 2:7). After sin brings human death into the world, more than one verse says that humans will return to dust, which Yahweh animated with the breath of life, and they say nothing about an afterlife strictly for the consciousness of a person after their body has died. Before someone has even read through the first first three chapters of Genesis in their entirety, they would come across the first of these statements.
Genesis 3:19—"'By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.'"
Ecclesiastes 3:19-20—"'Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so does the other. All have the same breath; humans have no advantage over animals . . . All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return.'"
There are, in fact, hints here of the real Biblical doctrine of the intermediate state (the state between death and resurrection), as the wording says that "you" will return to dust rather than specifically saying "your body" will become dust again, although the body is plainly in view. It is other passages which ultimately say very simply and directly that the Bible teaches there is no immediate afterlife. For those who die, there is only the unconsciousness of Sheol; the body dies and decays, and the immaterial consciousness of a person fades to oblivion (see also Psalm 6:5, 88:10-12, John 14:2-3 [1], and more):
Ecclesiastes 9:5-6, 10—"For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even their name is forgotten. Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished . . . Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom."
Job 3:11-14, 16-19—"'Why did I not perish at birth, and die as I came from the womb? Why were there knees to receive me and breasts that I might be nursed? For now I would be lying down in peace; I would be asleep and at rest with kings and rulers of the earth, who built for themselves places now lying in ruins . . . Or why was I not hidden away 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 the great are there, and the slaves are freed from their owners.'"
That is, there is no Biblical afterlife until the resurrection:
Job 14:10-12—"'But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last and is no more. As the water of a lake dries up or a riverbed becomes parched and dry, so he lies down and does not rise; till the heavens are no more, people will not awake or be roused from their sleep.'"
Daniel 12:2, 13—"'Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt' . . . 'As for you, go your way till the end. You will rest, and then at the end of the days you will rise to receive your allotted inheritance.'"
Even then, only the righteous or repentant receive eternal life. No other human lives forever as the righteous do after their resurrection (for more on this, see 1 Corinthians 15, 1 Thessalonians 4, and Revelation 20:4-6). The rest of humanity literally dies, or perishes, in the flames of hell after their resurrection (Revelation 20:11-15), destroyed for its sins (Matthew 10:28, John 3:16, 36, Romans 6:23, and many more). Eternal torture as "justice" is not only a very obvious misrepresentation of real Biblical doctrines, but it is also the second greatest possible heresy after theistic irrationalism, the idea that God created or is otherwise above/beyond or able to change the intrinsic necessary truths of reason that start with logical axioms. Endless torture could never be deserved by any amount of sin, for it is always inescapably disproportionate to whatever evil a person could maximally commit in even billions of years. It is the worst possible category of injustice and thus of evil.
Going back to the fading of human corpses to dust, in tangent with other verses relevant to death, soul sleep, and resurrection, the verses about returning to dust are clear: there is no human experience outside of bodily life because the human mind dies with its corporeal shell, though consciousness is indeed immaterial by logical necessity [2] and the Bible affirms its distinction from the body (Matthew 10:28, James 2:26). Human consciousness itself is, whether or not the Bible is true, not a physical thing, but an immaterial thing that animates the body. Regardless, at biological death, the body starts decomposing into "dust", as one can see from empirical observation and as the Bible repeatedly calls attention to. The Old and New Testament agree that there is no immediate afterlife for anyone, for those who die enter the unconsciousness of Sheol as their bodies begin disintegrating.
[2]. For just one of many posts where I detail such things, see below:
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