Lazar Puhalo

His Eminence +Lazar {Puhalo] begins the Prologue to this book as follows: "The fathers have enjoined us repeatedly that we not be curious concerning the soul after death, its condition or its state" [1]. Reference to the "fathers" pertains to all righteous fathers of the Orthodox faith, and it refers to a select group of 21 fathers that the author identifies in Appendix I [130-186]. Having devoted 56 of 195 manuscript pages just to present translated texts from these fathers without editorial comment, the author builds confidence that the fathers have shared harmonious beliefs about what will become of the soul and body after death. I recommend that readers keep Appendix I marked for ready reference while evaluating the foundation that Archbishop Lazar lays for his thesis.

What is the thesis for this book? His thesis can be divided into two segments: right dogma and false teaching or heresy. Right dogma means that there exists correct information for Orthodox believers to learn and share concerning the soul and body, dying and death, and what will happen to soul and body after death. Those who have been initiated in holy dogma become empowered to discern and resist encroachments by heresies that pervade literature written by many confused or ignorant Orthodox authorities on the same subjects. By winnowing the wheat of holy dogma from the chaff of false teaching, His Eminence sets a course that holds firm to the Apostolic witness of Christ. Therefore, each topic that he broaches re-confirms the Orthodox hope that we are empowered inside the Church to participate in ridding ourselves of any fear about death and the particular or universal judgments.

Two general themes emerge from the book. First, Orthodox Christians must participate in prayer, self-control and active engagement in the Church to be saved from the perils of disobedience to God. Second, the Persons of the Holy Trinity are rich in co-suffering love for all human beings.

Both thesis and dual themes create a lens with adequate refraction to correct spiritual myopia caused by sin. In other words, the author's thesis and his themes work like a new pair of reading glasses. After a while reading the book, I wondered why anyone would trade the right eyeglasses for cheap knock-offs. Sin is the origin for death--and lack of visual focus!--among human beings, which is the topic for Chapter 1: "The source and nature of death" [6-10]. In four manuscript pages, the author amasses 29 reference, which appear as end-notes to Chapter 1. What I noted about the references is that the author employs primary sources, which means that he does not rely on second-hand reports for help. Instead, he goes to authoritative editions of various fathers quoted in Chapter 1 such as St. Gregory Palamas, St. Ambrose of Milan and St. John Damascene.

Chapters 2 - 8 entertain equally cogent topics related to the book's title. These include how the soul and body are related [Chapter 2], what becomes of the soul after death {Chapter 3], the controversies caused by "out-of-body experiences' [Chapter 4], dogma of the Church concerning the particular and universal judgments [Chapter 5], the nature of heaven and hell--along with "Hades" [Chapter 6], things that ought to be done for those who have fallen asleep [Chapter 7], and a concluding discussion of the so-called Macarian Homily" and its Gnostic sources [Chapter 8].

The book's tone and style of exposition and argument are seldom terse, because academic discourse is avoided. Instead, the book conveys an approach to readers that invites participation. The fact that footnotes have been printed at the end of each chapter means that references are easy to locate, while also not impeding a reader's progress. Nevertheless, footnotes in this book are important to read. For example, consider footnote 17 to Chapter 2 [16]. This footnote answers a textual question about why most Hellenists, such as Paul's audience of philosophers in the Athenian Areopagus [Acts 17: 16-34} rejected the re-union of the soul and body. Advancing from Origen's troubles after having accepted soul-body dualism, the author introduces material that will be considered in Chapter 4 and Appendix 1. Again, I recommend that a reader mark Appendix 1 for ready access [cf. above].

I have read reviews of the book that fail to represent the opinions of the author in plain view. For example, some reviewers have wrongly characterized the author as holding a belief in "soul sleep." Yes, I know that there were members of the Holy Synod of bishops in a canonical Orthodox Church who printed their collective rationale for a negative appraisal of the author's prior publications on related topics. That matter I plan to address elsewhere. However, here I speak to reviewers of just this book. Trying to account for glaring mistakes in reviews, I concluded that either reviewers have read and not understood what the author writes concerning the state and functions of the soul between falling asleep and re-union with the body later, or else they are simply dishonest, preferring to say or write false opinions for selfish gain.

I wish to state the author's position that anyone can evaluate, by quoting the text. Concerning "two extremes of opinion" having arisen about the soul after death, the author writes: "The first error is that common to many sectarians, who teach a heresy called "soul sleep," or "soul slumber" [17-8]. "The other extreme...teaches that the soul is imprisoned in the body, and that it has a pseudo-physical 'subtle body' of its own, so does not need the physical body" [18]. Moreover, the text continues in Chapter 3 by providing a theology of grace inherent in the Resurrection of Christ, which explains how the instrumental faculties of the soul's nous after death remain active. Just as well, the book dismisses chicanery that portrays the soul as an organ of sensation such as the physical eye senses light and receives impressions that relay signals to a physical brain with a locus inside a physical cranium.

Rightly so, the book distinguishes, on the one hand, mechanical and biochemical processes of sensory data that require a physical body for data collection, and "perception" by the soul, on the other hand. I have employed the verb "distinguish" in the previous sentence as a deliberate cognitive strategy to identify another mistake in some reviews, which ascribes to Orthodox teaching functions by the soul after death that are literal and not metaphorical. The book states that ascriptions as these represent failure to differentiate layers of discourse such as meaning embedded in perceived metaphors as distinct from meaning derived from data input by the senses. The results of errors as these are shown to create suspicion, scandal, and disharmony in the Church.

The book contains material that many audiences will appreciate. It is geared to the adult reader with a high school-level vocabulary, dictionary skills, and diligence to read carefully. I recommend the book without reservation to anyone who needs the healing of the Orthodox Church in this modern or post-modern age.… (meer)