16 What is the ‘spiritual body’?
On what may be regarded as ‘ultimate’ in the interrelation between God, matter, and information
Michael Welker
This chapter operates from a theological perspective – broadened, however, by information on the development of classical
philosophy and metaphysics and some experience in the global science-and-theology discourse of the last 20 years. I ask the
question: Can we imagine and penetrate the reality classical theology had in mind when it spoke of the ‘spiritual body’? And
beyond that, can we convince non-theological mindsets that this concept not only makes sense in the orbit of religion, but
that it has illuminating power beyond this realm because it is firmly rooted in a reality, and not just confined to one complex
mode of discourse?
The preparation for this task requires a few sophisticated preliminary steps.
First we have to differentiate ‘old-style’ and ‘new-style’ metaphysics as two possible frameworks for the approach.
Second, we have to discern an understanding of creation in the light of Biblical creation accounts and in the light of ‘old-style’
metaphysics.
Third, on the basis of the Biblical creation accounts, we see that the notion of a creator as a mere sustainer of the universe
is spiritually not satisfying and salvific.
Fourth, this will prepare us for an understanding of the role of the resurrection in divine creativity in general, and provide an
understanding of the nature and the
importance of the ‘spiritual body’ of Jesus Christ in particular.
Fifth, we will try to comprehend the transformative power of this spiritual body and the involvement of human beings and other
creatures in it. On this basis we want to engage non-theological academic thinkers by asking them whether the sustaining,
rescuing, and ennobling interaction between God, creation, and spiritual information can find analogies in their realms of
experience, and whether it can challenge reductionistic concepts of matter. This question will be guided by a metaphysical
approach in the ‘new style’.
16.1 Differentiating ‘old-style’ and ‘new-style’ metaphysics
My proposal to differentiate between ‘old-style’ and ‘new-style’ metaphysics does not imply that ‘old-style’ metaphysics is
outdated and should be simply replaced by ‘new-style’ metaphysics. ‘New-style’ metaphysics is a constructive reaction to the
lament that after Kant, metaphysics as the production of ultimate and closing thoughts about total reality is no longer possible.
To be sure, philosophy has to face the dilemma that in late modern societies, in their academic as well as in their religious
settings, a plurality of forms of life and rationalities has established itself, and can no longer be convincingly ordered
in ‘a hierarchy of the more or less valuable.’
1 In this situation, ‘old-style’ metaphysics can be engaged in order to relativize the current epistemic setting at least in
the academy in the West – to relativize it with world views and cognitive claims from past epochs. In a more modest and empirically
argumentative way, ‘new-style’ metaphysics responds to this challenge by reducing the metaphysical claim to an exploration
of two areas of discovery and research.
It was Alfred North Whitehead who in a most helpful way differentiated between old- and new-style metaphysics (without using
these terms). On the one hand, he states in terms of ‘old-style’ metaphysics: ‘By “metaphysics” I mean the science which seeks
to
discover the general ideas which are indispensably relevant to the analysis of everything that happens’ (Whitehead,
1960, p. 82). On the other hand, in the mode of ‘new-style’ metaphysics, he speaks not of ‘the,’ but of ‘a’ metaphysics and of
a ‘metaphysical description’ that ‘takes its origin from one select field of interest. It receives its confirmation by establishing
itself as adequate and as exemplified in other fields of interest’ (Whitehead,
1960, p. 86f). Whitehead makes it clear that ‘a metaphysics’ can emerge from different homelands: mathematics, a science, religion,
common sense. As soon as a solid bridge theory can be established between at least two areas of interest by indicating that
basic ideas, concepts, and intellectual operations can work in both areas, we are in the process of a ‘metaphysical description’
and on the way to ‘a metaphysics’ – which I call ‘new-style’ metaphysics.
It is the ‘bottom-up’ approach against the ‘top-down’ thinking that is characteristic of a ‘new-style’ metaphysics. Such a
metaphysics tries to cultivate common sense, to challenge it, and move it to higher levels of insight by confronting it with
specific ‘fields of interest’ that require specific modes of thinking in order to be adequately explored. The differences
between common-sense thought and the thinking required to access at least one of these fields of interest, but also the differences
between the cognitive explorations of at least two of these fields of interest (for example in science and theology), provide
the impulses to develop a ‘new-style’ metaphysics.
16.2 Creation according to ‘old-style’ metaphysics and according to classical Biblical accounts
Most theological and philosophical thinking about ‘creation’ has been dominated by the concepts of ‘bringing forth’ and ‘dependence’.
Creation as
creatura was nature, the cosmos, or vaguely conceived totality as brought forth and dependent on one or several transcendent power(s)
or will(s) or personal entity(ies), mostly named God or gods. Creation as
creatio was the activity or energy of bringing
forth, keeping in dependence or even in ‘ultimate’ dependence and at the same time sustaining nature, the cosmos, the totality
(sometimes explicitly also referring to culture and history). Connected with this type of thinking, ideas and concepts of
God such as ‘the all-determining reality’ (Bultmann, Pannenberg), the ‘ground of being’ (Tillich), the ‘ultimate point of
reference’ (G. Kaufman), the ‘whither of absolute dependence’ (Schleiermacher) were highly en vogue.
2In striking contrast, the classical Biblical Priestly creation account in Genesis 1 offers a much more subtle picture. Through
the word of God, chaotic matter becomes enabled not only to win forms and shapes, energy, and life. The heavens, the stars,
the earth, the waters, and the humans are to actively participate in God’s creative energy and power. The same verbs used
for the divine process of creating are also used for the co-creativity of what and who are created. Against a widespread fear
of a ‘synergistic’ confusion of God and creature in the case of co-creativity, it has to be recognized that the Biblical creation
account does not think in one-to-one structures (God and creation, God and world, God and the human being). The account thinks
in one-to-many structures in which selected creatures gain a graded share in the creative divine activity. In various ways
selected creatures participate in the formation of creation. The heavens part, the stars govern the times and festive days,
the earth brings forth creatures, and the humans are assigned the task to rule over creation and thereby reflect the image
of God.
In this one-to-many relationship, no creature has the power to act in God’s stead, yet the power of the co-creative creatures
is sizable. This power not only enables humans as well as other creatures to exercise their creaturely freedom and act independently;
it also makes creaturely self-endangerment and self-destruction possible. There are several indications in the creation account
that support this realistic reading against all metaphysical ‘perfect-watchmaker’ illusions (which, as a rule, come with the
theodicy question in the backpack). The co-creative creatures remain creatures. Despite their
powers, they are no gods (as other ancient creation accounts would have it). Neither the heavens nor the sun, moon, and stars,
nor the earth are divine powers. And the ‘slave-holder and conqueror’ language in the infamous ‘call to dominion’ indicates
that a constant conflict between the humans and the animals in a common area of nourishment has to be regulated. The humans
clearly become privileged, yet in all their self-interest and privileging of their own self-reproduction and spreading over
the earth they have to mirror the image of God to the other creatures, and that means in ancient royal imagery: the exercise
of justice and mercy towards the weak.
Whoever does not like this sober picture of creation that takes seriously the fact that life is finite, that it lives at the
expense of other life, and that the co-creative power of the creatures brings the risks of self-endangerment, seems to find
an argument against this understanding in the Priestly account itself, an argument impossible to beat. Doesn’t, after all,
the Biblical creation account press us to embrace the speculative metaphysical view by the repeated assertion of the ‘goodness’
of creation? Repeatedly, the co-creative creaturely entities and the areas of creation are seen by God as ‘good’ (Genesis
1:4, 10, 12, 18). The works of creation viewed all together are even judged to be ‘very good’ (Genesis 1:31): ‘God saw everything
that He had made and lo, it was very good.’ ‘Good’ (tob in Hebrew) means ‘conducive to life.’ But a creaturely and even co-creative existence, even if it is highly conducive to
life, has not yet reached the level of divine glory. The difference between God’s glory and the creation judged by God to
be ‘good’ and ‘very good’ is still maintained. Creation is not paradise.
16.3 ‘Creation’ itself points beyond God as a mere sustainer of the universe
It belongs to the rituals in the science-and-theology or science-and-religion discourses and their public radiations that
some of the scientists connect their summarizing perspectives with religious awe and theological respect for the power and
wisdom of a divine creator. The power of mathematics and rational thinking in illuminating hidden secrets of nature, observations
of unquestionable beauty and
astounding rhythmic orders, the fecundity of life and its potential to generate ‘higher forms’ are named in order to support
such views.
3 Others, however, leave such discourses with the summary: ‘The more I looked at the universe, the more I found it pointless.’
Or they think along Whitehead’s words: ‘Life is robbery and requires justification.’
At this point, we become aware of the fact that any ‘natural awareness of the divine’ is connected with pressing problems
– as Calvin showed so powerfully at the beginning of his
Institutes of the Christian Religion in 1559. Any perspective on God as creator and sustainer of the world will never overcome the ambivalence and ultimate inconsolability
of a ‘natural’ theology of creation. Calvin calls this ‘sense of Deity’ – which he sees beyond dispute – ‘fleeting and vain’
(Calvin,
1559, I, 3, 3).
If we do not overrule the realistic experience of creation with ‘old-style’ metaphysics, we have to acknowledge that a power
merely sustaining the universe – impressive as it is – is ultimately not worth being called ‘divine’. And the instantiation,
the ‘whither’ of this power, is not worth being called ‘God’. Confronted not only with the finitude of life, but also with
the fact that life can live only at the expense of other life, and that the co-creative power of the creatures is full of
self-endangerment and destructive potentials, we have to ask for the saving and ennobling workings of the creative God in
order to overcome the deep ambivalence just depicted.
‘Saving and rescuing’ can in this case, as we easily see, not just mean repairs in the course of natural processes. To be
sure, our life and world experiences of birth and healing, of forgiveness, reconciliation, and peace mirror the depth of God’s
creative care and guidance. And these experiences can cause gratitude and joy, praise and glorification. But the haunting
question remains of whether God’s creativity can ultimately overcome the finitude and deep ambivalence of creaturely life
itself. This question cannot be raised and
answered without addressing the difficult topics of eschatology: new creation and the resurrection.
16.4 Divine creativity in the resurrection and spiritual body of Christ
The resurrected Jesus Christ is not the resuscitated pre-Easter Jesus of Nazareth. Although a few witnesses of the resurrection
in Luke – and certainly all sorts of Christian fundamentalists and their critics – seem to confuse resurrection with resuscitation,
the Biblical insights on this topic are clear. The Biblical texts report experiences of homage (
proskynesis) in which witnesses fall down in worship in the face of a theophany, although this revelation of God is mixed with doubt
at the same time.
4 Jesus’ resurrection is a reality that, on the one hand, exhibits characteristics of something sensory, while on the other
hand retaining the character of an appearance, even an apparition. The Emmaus story is especially revealing: the eyes of the
disciples are kept from recognizing the resurrected one. By the ritual of the breaking of the bread, their eyes are opened.
Then in the next verse it says: ‘And he vanished out of their sight.’ Instead of complaining about a spooky event, about just
having seen a ghost, the disciples remember a second experience that had not seemed to be a revelation at first: ‘Did not
our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the scriptures?’ (Luke 24:30ff).
The witnesses recognize the resurrected one not only by his salutation, the breaking of the bread, the greeting of peace,
the way he opens up the meaning of Scripture, and other signs, but also through his appearances in light. These clearly speak
against any confusion of resurrection with physical resuscitation. A multitude of diverse experiences of encounter with Christ
brings about certainty that Christ is, remains, and will be ‘bodily’ present among
us. By contrast, the stories of the empty tomb show that a single moment of revelation alone, even if it is a spectacular
one from heavenly messengers, is not in itself enough to cause belief. Instead, what remains after the empty grave are fear,
amazement, and silence (Mark). Meanwhile, the belief that the corpse has been stolen is disseminated, used for propaganda
purposes, and becomes widespread (John and Matthew). According to Luke, the visions at the empty tomb are dismissed as ‘women’s
chatter’.
The certainty that Christ is risen does not signify, however, that he is present in the way that the pre-Easter Jesus was.
In fact, the complete fullness of his person and his life is now present ‘in Spirit and in faith’. This presence ‘in Spirit
and faith’ is hard to comprehend, not only to naturalistic and scientistic thought, which tends to fixate instead continually
on the pros and cons of physical resuscitation. By contrast, the fullness of the person and life of Christ accentuates the
community of witnesses in Spirit, faith, and canonical memory. In this way, the entirety of Jesus’ life, his charisma and
his power, is present and efficacious in the resurrected and exulted one.
The presence of the resurrected one conveys the powers of love, forgiveness, healing, and his passion for children, the weak,
the rejected, the sick, and those in misery. Further, the power to confront the so-called ‘powers and principalities’ begins
to take shape in his presence: for example in conflict with political and religious institutions in the search for truth and
demands for real justice. The person and life of Jesus Christ unleashes normative and cultural renewals and other creative
impulses. The presence of the resurrected Christ is realized among the witnesses through many signs – including small ones
– of love, healing, forgiveness, devotion, acceptance, and the passionate search for justice and truth. In this often inconspicuous
way, Christ and the kingdom of God are ‘coming’.
Besides this emergent coming for which Christians pray in the Lord’s Prayer, the Biblical traditions also offer visions of
the final coming of the Son of Man. They deal with eschatological visions, and these are necessarily visions because the resurrected
and exulted
one will not come only in a specific year or to a specific area of the world. The resurrected and exulted one comes in all
times and to all areas of the world. He judges, as the Apostle’s Creed says, ‘the living and the dead’. This is a vision that
necessarily transcends all merely natural and empirical conceptions. But it is this important and healing vision that opposes
all explicit and implicit egoisms of particular cultures and eras.
If we only have a vision of the Son of Man coming from the heavens with his angels, ‘we are of all people most to be pitied’,
to echo Paul in 1 Corinthians 15. The talk about the ‘coming’ Christ becomes comforting because the one who is ‘coming’ will
not be revealed for the first time only at the end of all times and eras, but rather, he is already among us now as the crucified
and resurrected one; and because the crucified and resurrected one is the one who, in the historical pre-Easter Jesus, has
been revealed in his incarnational nearness of his human life and work. For this reason, we cannot separate the memory of
the historical Jesus from the realization that the crucified and resurrected one is present and will ‘come again’ for his
full parousia. The creating and saving God is present here, surrounding and carrying his creatures in his ‘Yes’ to life against
the powers of sin and death. These powers are dramatically depicted at the cross of Christ.
At the cross of Christ, Jesus is condemned in the name of politics and in the name of religion. He is executed in the name
of both Jewish and Roman law. Even public opinion is against him: ‘Then they cried out again, “Crucify him!”’ (Mark 15:13f.
par.). Jews and Gentiles, Jews and Romans, natives and foreigners all agree. All principalities and powers work together,
and the worldly ‘immune-systems’ collapse. The reciprocal checks and balances between religion, politics, law, and morality
fail in the event of the cross. Conflicts between the occupiers and the occupied, the world superpower and an oppressed people,
are simply glossed over. Even the disciples betray Jesus, abandoning him and fleeing, as the tradition
of the Last Supper, the Gethsemane story, and the ‘night of betrayal’ make all too clear.
The cross reveals, as the Biblical texts say, ‘the world under the power of sin’. It reveals ‘the night of godforsakenness’,
not only of Jesus himself – but of the whole world. The cross reveals the presence of this dire need and misery, not only
in Jesus’ hour of death, but as a real and present danger in all times. The resurrection liberates from this night of godforsakenness.
God’s activity alone, and not human initiative, brings salvation. The true saving power and vital necessity of the resurrection
only become manifest against the background of the cross. That God, and God alone, brings salvation to humanity becomes recognizable
in view of the harrowing possibility and reality that, despite the best intentions and the best systems, humanity alone is
doomed. Even the ‘good law’ of God can become fully corrupt and be abused by humanity under the power of sin. Perversions
of religion, law, politics, and public opinion then triumph. Therefore it is crucial to recognize that God has saved and saves
humanity, which is completely lost without God. How God saves is also crucial: in a powerful yet emergent way without loud
fanfare or drumbeats. As impressive as the Isenheim Altarpiece’s portrayal of the resurrection may be, the witnesses of the
resurrection in the Biblical traditions describe the reality of God’s salvific work in quite a different way.
16.5 The transformative power of the spiritual body: sustenance, rescue, and ennoblement into eternal life
Although the experiences of the resurrected Christ both of the first witnesses and of contemporary witnesses do have the character
of visions, memories, and anticipatory imaginations, they are not mere mental or psychic phenomena. They respond to the self-presentation
of the resurrected and elevated Christ in his post-Easter body and they participate in his real life. The structured pluralism
of the
canonic witnesses, the structured pluralism of the ecumenical witnesses, the structured pluralism
5 of a multidisciplinary theology, and the polyphony of the individual witnesses in truth-seeking communities work time and
again against illusionary productions of Jesus-images, wishful Jesus-morals, and Jesus-ideologies. It is the faithful realistic
response to his presence and his word that critiques and purifies the witness to Christ and to the workings of the Triune
God, and thus saves it from being confused with all sorts of self-made religiosity.
In order to do so, it is crucial to respect both continuity and discontinuity between the life and body of the pre-Easter
Jesus, of the resurrected and exulted Jesus Christ, and Christ as the ultimate Judge and Saviour of the world in his parousia.
The amazing continuity between the pre-Easter and the post-Easter body is described by Paul with the imagery of the seed and
the full-grown plant (1 Corinthians 15:36–38, 44). Yet this amazing continuity is correlated with almost frightening discontinuities:
‘the
dying of the seed and an act of [
new]
creation by God (15:38, my italics). Our whole perishable person will be transformed (
metaschematizo, Philippians 3:21) into a new and imperishable heavenly personality that will be qualitatively different from our first.
It will be – thank God – much better!’ (Lampe,
2002).
Both continuity and discontinuity are expressed in the term ‘spiritual body’. As Paul differentiates between ‘flesh’ (
sarx, as perishable matter) and ‘body’ (
soma, as matter shaped by mind and Spirit into a living spiritual existence bearing information and giving information), he can
perceive continuity and discontinuity in the following way: the body as flesh and as dominated by non-divine
powers will decay and die; the body as the spiritual body will be recreated by God’s grace in the resurrection.
6 Although ‘flesh’ is definitely doomed to decay and death, it is full of energies and logics of self-sustenance and self-perpetuation.
However, as these energies fall short of aiming at the existence of the ‘spiritual body’, they are bound to ‘sin and death’.
There would be no substantial hope for our lives if there was not a continuity between our bodily existence on earth – undeniably
also shaped by the flesh – and our spiritual body, shaped by the powers of faith, love, and hope. Paul challenges the Corinthians
who want to connect Christ and the soul here and in eternity, but want to leave room for any behaviour in terms of sex and
food, as the earthly body would die in any case. ‘In Paul’s holistic perspective … the reality of salvation is not
another reality apart from the outer everyday life, not just a religious reality for the
inner life of a person. It grasps and embraces the whole of human existence, the entire personality … For exactly this reason,
Paul talks about “resurrection” and not of such things as “spiritual immortality” and “ascending souls”’ (Lampe,
2002, pp. 104f).
Connected with this anthropological realism is an eschatological realism that sees any perspective on creation already in
the light of the new creation. This eschatological realism affirms that the creative God is not a mere sustainer of the world,
as this world is full of ambiguity and despair because of creaturely co-creative freedom and its potentials to misuse; it
is full of ambiguity and despair because of the inert brutality and finitude of life in the flesh. The mere affirmation that
the Triune God opens much richer perspectives for creation than its continuation until a timely or untimely death is not strong
enough to sustain a viable faith and
hope towards an eternal existence in a spiritual body. According to Paul, it is rather the presence of the resurrected Christ
– in continuity and discontinuity with his pre-Easter life and body and the rich spiritual orientation and information given
with this presence – that opens up a totally new perspective. Those who live in Christ as members of his body – consciously
or unconsciously – are transformed into his likeness and are preserved towards the eternal life of God.
But it is not only the life of the believers and followers of Christ that gains a salvific perspective through its participation
in this spiritual body. In the celebration of the Holy Communion, the Eucharist, the ‘elements’ bread and wine participate
in the edification of the spiritual body, too. The gifts of creation (not just gifts of nature, but gifts of the interaction
between nature and culture and thus already richly blessed by the working of the Holy Spirit!)
7 become gifts of ‘new creation.’ Bread and wine not only symbolically edify the natural bodies of the community assembled.
As ‘bread and wine from Heaven’, as the body and blood of Christ, they edify the members of the body of Christ, the members
of the ‘new creation,’ the bearers of the fruits and gifts of the Holy Spirit. Here the continuity between creation and new
creation, between creation old and new becomes palpably present in the middle of the overwhelming discontinuity. It is the
spiritual information – to call it thus in search of a more appropriate term – that operates on the material fleshly bodies
and minds through the presence of Christ in word and sacrament, causing sometimes dramatic but most often only very calm emergent
transformations. It remains to be discussed whether this process can mirror analogies in non-religious and even scientific
areas of exploration and interest. With the help of ‘new-style’ metaphysics, we should try to explore such analogies in the
interactions between ‘God, matter, and information’,
or rather between ‘God, earthly and fleshly creatures, and spiritual orientation’.
16.6 Some lessons and inspirations for interdisciplinary dialogues on the topic
In this respect, the anthropology of Paul can provide some clues, when we look at his description of the activities of the
spirit. From both theological as well as anthropological perspectives, the Spirit enables co-presence, contact, and even interaction
with those who are absent, respectively a presence in absence. Through his Spirit, the invisible God communicates with the
human spirit and imparts to it creative impulses. But the communicative power of the spirit can also be vindicated in an anthropological
bottom-up approach. According to Paul, even those who are absent can have authentic contact with others ‘in the spirit’, despite
their different locations in space and time. By remembering his own visits, his teaching and preaching, and through his petitions
before God, but also through the letters and messages of others, Paul is present to the community ‘in the spirit’. This presence
is not merely a figment of his imagination.
Paul sees himself becoming ‘spiritually’ present in the community. In 1 Corinthians 5, he describes this process of spiritual
communication and co-action: ‘For though absent in body, I am present in spirit; and as if present I have already pronounced
judgement in the name of the Lord Jesus … When you are assembled … my spirit is present with the power of our Lord Jesus’
(1 Corinthians 5:3–4). ‘The name’ and ‘the power of our Lord’, and certainly the Spirit of God (though not expressly mentioned
in this passage), play an important role here in the connection of the community – even in a very general way: that is, with
and without bodily co-presence. However, one does not need to make reference to the ‘Holy Spirit’ in order to understand the
spiritual process of communication between Paul and the Corinthians. We can explain
basic functions of the human spirit without direct reference to theological realms.
Memory and imagination are not just ‘mental constructs’ in the ‘inner subjectivities’, which in a strange way happen to connect
and intersect, thus allowing common understanding, consensus, and the guided common search for truth. As instances, which
support individual certainty, communal consensus, and the oriented progress of truth-seeking communities,
8 they certainly do have ‘points of reference’ in natural space–time and the matter correlated with it. But in the mediation
from empirical experience to shared forms of memory
9 and sustainable common imagination, there is a ‘spiritual loadedness’ of the experienced material reality and a transfiguration
of it. In secular terms, this transformation and the mental participation in it has been beautifully expressed by Wordsworth
in his famous poem ‘Daffodils’:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance …
I gazed – and gazed – but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills
And dances with the daffodils.
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1 As a representative voice, see Habermas (
1987, p. 434).
3 See Polkinghorne and Welker (
2001).
4 See also Eckstein and Welker (
2006) and Peters, Russell, and Welker (
2002, especially pp. 31–85).
5 It is crucial to differentiate clearly a context-sensitive multisystemic pluralism from a mere ‘plurality’ of individuals,
groups, and their various goals and opinions. The first constellation challenges us to understand a complex structure and
circulation of power; the second presents just a soft relativism. By comparison, see Welker (
1999b, pp. 9–23;
2000a).
6 It is most important not to associate ‘flesh’ with an understanding of matter in a Newtonian sense as ‘solid, massy, hard,
impenetrable, moveable particles.’ The notion of ‘flesh’ is not to be confused with ‘material stuff’ without any information.
8 The texture of truth-seeking communities is described in the last chapter of Polkinghorne and Welker (
2001).