The Intermediary Period

A Scriptural Case for Dualism

Below is a research paper that I wrote for my Metaphysics class at Dallas Baptist University over the intermediary period and dualism. I hope you’re able to learn something too!

---

Introduction

Christian philosopher and metaphysician J. P. Moreland says that “Christianity is a dualist, interactionist religion in this sense: God, angels/demons, and the souls of men and beasts are immaterial substances that can causally interact with the world.”¹

Moreland, along with many other Christian philosophers, hold that dualism, the metaphysical view that humans are both material and immaterial, is inherent to Christianity. However, others such as Nancey Murphy hold to physicalism, the metaphysical view that humans are solely material beings, argue that physicalism and Christianity are compatible. Murphy points out the trend away from dualism and toward physicalism in contemporary Christian thought, claiming that “the direction of change is very much toward physicalism.”²

The question plaguing Christian metaphysicians today, with brilliant thinkers on both sides of the argument, is whether dualism or physicalism is more congruent with Christian doctrine. This paper argues that the Christian doctrine of the afterlife, and particularly that of the intermediary period, necessitates dualism.

Dualism verses Christian Physicalism

Moreland further defines dualism as the metaphysical belief that “human persons are (or have) souls that are spiritual substances that retain personal identity in a disembodied intermediate state between death and final resurrection.”³ He goes on to say that a form of dualism was held by intertestamental and 1^st century Jews, particularly the Pharisees, as well as Jesus and the authors of the New Testament,⁴ although dualism was not necessarily taught in the Hebrew scriptures. Dualism would continue to be the prominent view of humanity among Christians for centuries, developed and cemented into Christian thought by thinkers such as Augustine and Aquinas.⁵

Physicalism (or materialism),⁶ on the other hand, “views… human persons as wholly physical beings.”⁷ “We are our bodies,” Murphy argues, “There is no additional . . . mind or soul.”⁸ To physicalists, “embodiment is metaphysically essential and disembodied existence is impossible.”⁹ While dualism reigned for almost two millennia, physicalism found its rise to popularity in the twentieth century through both theological and philosophical advancements primarily due to the progress of physical science, one of its first proponents being Thomas Hobbes, author of Leviathan.¹⁰

Today, the debate over dualism and physicalism rages on amongst Christian philosophers, although the argument is heavily skewed to the side of physicalism.

The Intermediary Period

Both the New Testament and the Old Testament (though not as clearly) affirm what is referred to as the intermediary period.¹¹ The intermediary period, or the intermediary state, is “a temporary state of disembodied human existence which occurs after death and prior to the final resurrection of the body.”¹²

The doctrine of the intermediary period has been held by the majority of Christians throughout church history. The Westminster Confession, and later the 1689 Baptist Confession of faith, say of the intermediary period, “The bodies of men after death return to dust, and see corruption; but their souls, which neither die nor sleep, having an immortal subsistence, immediately return to God who gave them.”¹³ Even the Catholic church affirms the persisting existence of the soul after bodily death through doctrines such as that of the doctrine of purgatory.¹⁴

The intermediary period, then, is a commonly-held yet speculated doctrine among Christians today.

Does the Intermediary Period entail Dualism?

The issue of the intermediary period is directly tied to the issue of dualism and. physicalism. John W. Cooper, in his chapter in The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism, “Biblical Anthropology is Holistic and Dualistic,” says, “Although God created and redeems humans as embodied persons, he sustains us disembodied between death and bodily resurrection.”¹⁵

Additionally, in his two-part paper, “Biblical Anthropology and the Intermediary State,” Brian Edgar writes, “Traditionally, biblical anthropology has been controlled by eschatology. That is, the requirements of eschatology in general and of the intermediate state in particular have led directly to an anthropologically dualist view of the person.”¹⁶

In other words, if the intermediary period exists, then dualism must be true. In order for a person to persist after bodily death and before bodily resurrection, there must be an immaterial part of a person. A logical argument for this may go as follows:

I. If the intermediary period exists, then dualism is true

II. The intermediary period exists

III. Therefore, dualism is true

Or, as represented in truth-functional logic:

1) I ⊃ D

2) I

3) ∴ D (MP 1, 2)

This argument, in the form of modus ponens, is valid. This means if the premises are true, then the conclusion follows from the premises. The question now is if the argument is sound, meaning the premises are true and the conclusion follows from the premises. To do so, both premises must be proven true. Premise one has already been shown to be necessarily true, which leaves premise two’s truth value to be determined. So, does the intermediary period exist?

To concede, this argument is based on the assumption that Scripture is true, as both dualists and Christian physicalists, if they are in fact orthodox believers, ought to hold to the authority of Scripture. This paper’s aim is to show that the Christian doctrine of the intermediary period entails dualism; its aim is not to prove the intermediary period exists independent of Scripture.

That being said, the two proof texts most commonly used are Matthew 10:28, which is not Pauline, and 2 Corinthians 5:8, which is Pauline.¹⁷ First off, Matthew 10:28 reads, “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”¹⁸ In this verse, Jesus seemingly separates the soul from the body. For one to be able to kill the body but not the soul, the body and the soul must be two different things, or at least two different parts of the same thing. If they were one and the same, then it would be impossible to kill one and not the other. Further, the claim that one can kill the body but not the soul implies that the soul lives on past the death of the body, providing evidence for the existence of the intermediary period. “Matthew 10:28,” Cooper commentates, “almost certainly expresses dualist Jewish eschatology… If the text represented bodily monism, killing the body would ipso facto kill the soul.”¹⁹ In Matthew 10:28, Jesus implies the existence of the intermediary period, therefore necessitating dualism.

Next, in 2 Corinthians 5:8, Paul writes, “Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.”²⁰ Paul affirms, like Jesus, the existence of both body and soul. He also affirms, through his acceptance of a dualistic view of humanity, that the soul goes to an intermediary period, here which means to be in the presence of the Lord. Cooper commentates, “The only option here is being with or without his body, which entails dualism.”²¹ Just like Jesus in Mathew 10:28, Paul, in 2 Corinthians 5:8, implies the existence of the intermediary period, therefore necessitating dualism.

Does the Intermediary Period contradict Christian Physicalism?

Some Christian physicalists argue that even if the intermediary period exists, it does not contradict physicalism. “It is compatible with physicalism,” they assert, “that human persons are only contingently constituted by their current bodies, and that they, or their ‘souls’, continue to exist in the intermediate state by being constituted by a replacement body.”²² This brings into question whether the dualism represented in the Bible contradicts physicalism.

However, it must be the case that the dualism in Scripture contradicts physicalism. As the old idiom says, you cannot have your cake and eat it too. Dualism and physicalism are inherently contradictory and can therefore not both be true at the same time. Scripture seemingly asserts that the souls in the intermediary period are not embodied, and they will only be embodied at the final resurrection. 2 Corinthians 5:8 seems to imply that to be with the Lord in the intermediary period is to be absent from one’s body; in other words, to be with the Lord in the intermediary period is to be disembodied. Furthermore, even if one immediately receives a new, glorified body upon death, there still must be an entity receiving said new body.

This goes to show that a person is not just their body, but also their soul, as the same soul experiences a change in bodies. Therefore, the intermediary period necessarily contradicts physicalism.

Near-Death Experiences (NDEs)

A new area of study that supports the existence of the intermediary period and the truthfulness of dualism is that of near-death experiences, or NDEs. On NDEs, Gary Habermas says, “The popular subject of near-death experiences (NDEs) occupies a potentially crucial place in scholarly discussions of topics such as human nature and the possibility of an afterlife.”²³

Near-death experiences are the stories of individuals, after being pronounced clinically dead, who are revived and then “describe being conscious nonetheless, sometimes seeing or hearing things that would have been impossible if they hadn’t had an out-of-body experience.”²⁴ NDEs offer proof of an intermediary period, or at the very least an afterlife, by showing that consciousness may continue after the death of the body. In turn, they also offer proof for dualism. If the soul (i.e. consciousness) can persist after bodily death in an intermediary period, then dualism, the existence of both body and soul, must be true.

In Lee Strobel’s book, Seeing the Supernatural, he shares an interview with John Burke, a pastor and author who has done extensive research on NDEs. In the interview, John shares several NDE stories, each of which had been investigated, studied, verified, and corroborated. For example, he shares a famous example of a woman who claimed to have drifted, while unconscious, out of the hospital and saw a shoe on a third-story window ledge. When she gained consciousness, the shoe was found and appeared exactly as she had described it.

One study revealed that out of ninety-three NDE patients who claimed to have had verifiable observations, 92% of those observations were completely accurate.²⁵ At the end of the interview, Burke claims, “At a minimum, these cases demonstrate convincingly that consciousness really does continue after clinical death.”²⁶ If consciousness persists after bodily death, then it follows that the intermediary period must exist, and therefore that dualism is true.

A Christian Physicalist Counterargument

Nancy Murphy pushes back against the intermediary period, arguing “Proper Christian hope for the future is based not on “soul-ectomy,” the surgical removal of the immortal soul, but rather on resurrection. We say “resurrection of the body” but we should say resurrection of the person, the whole person.”²⁷ To Murphy, the final resurrection is much more significant to a Christian than a supposed intermediary period, and it is in the final resurrection that they should put their hope in. The person is their body, and nothing else, so all that matters is the resurrection of their body.

However, Ralph Stefan Weir pushes back, rebutting, “For the Bible, as for Plato or Descartes, for a person’s soul to continue to exist following death just is for that person to continue to exist… ‘Soul’ and ‘person’ [are interchangeable] for the thing that… continues to exist in the intermediate state.”²⁸ To Weir, a Christian is much more than their body—a Christian is their soul. It is this soul, Weir believes, that enables a person to persist after death in the intermediary period and, eventually, the final resurrection.

Conclusion

Returning to the argument,

I. If the intermediary period exists, then dualism is true ( I ⊃ D )

II. The intermediary period exists ( I )

III. Therefore, dualism is true ( ∴ D )

Premise one has been demonstrated to be true. As for premise two, Scriptural support, such as Mathew 10:28 and 2 Corinthians 5:8, as well as verifiable observations from stories of near-death experiences, support its validity. If both premise one and premise two are true, then the argument is valid and sound, therefore meaning that the conclusion must be true.

The intermediary period exists; therefore, dualism is true. In conclusion, the Christian doctrine of the afterlife, and particularly that of the intermediary period, necessitates dualism.

---

1. J. P. Moreland, “Christianity, Neuroscience, and Dualism,” in The Blackwell Companion to Science and Christianity, ed. J. B. Stump and Alan G. Padgett (Chichester, United Kingdom: Blackwell Publishing, 2012), 634.

2. Nancey Murphy, “Immortality versus Resurrection in the Christian Tradition,” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1234, no. 1 (October 2011): 77, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1749-6632.2011.06132.x.

3. Moreland, “Christianity, Neuroscience, and Dualism,” 634.

4. Ibid., 634.

5. Murphy, “Immortality versus Resurrection in the Christian Tradition.,” 77.

6. Lynne Rudder Baker, “Need a Christian Be a Mind/Body Dualist?,” Faith and Philosophy 12, no. 4 (1995): 490, https://doi.org/10.5840/faithphil199512446.

7. Keith Loftin, “Souls and Christian Eschatology: A Critique of Christian Physicalism,” Southwestern Journal of Theology 60, no. 2 (2018): 197.

8. Mostyn Jones and Eric LaRock, “From Murphy’s Christian Physicalism to Lowe’s Dualism,” TheoLogica: An International Journal for Philosophy of Religion and Philosophical Theology 5, no. 2 (July 21, 2021): 101, https://doi.org/10.14428/thl.v5i2.56273.

9. John Cooper, “Biblical Anthropology Is Holistic and Dualistic,” in The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism, ed. Jonathan Loose, J. L. Menugue, and J. P. Moreland (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons Inc., 2018), 416.

10. Ralph Stefan Weir, “Christian Physicalism and the Biblical Argument for Dualism,” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 91, no. 2 (September 18, 2021): 116-117, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11153-021-09811-0.

11. Cooper, “Biblical Anthropology Is Holistic and Dualistic,” 419-420.

12. Brian Edgar, “Biblical Anthropology and the Intermediate State: Part I,” Evangelical Quarterly 74, no. 1 (April 16, 2002): 27, https://doi.org/10.1163/27725472-07401002.

13. Westminster Confession 32.1, 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith 31.1

14. Catechism of the Catholic Church 1030

15. Cooper, “Biblical Anthropology Is Holistic and Dualistic,” 415.

16. Edgar, “Biblical Anthropology and the Intermediate State: Part I,” 27.

17. Weir, “Christian Physicalism and the Biblical Argument for Dualism,” 118.

18. Matthew 10:28 English Standard Version

19. Cooper, “Biblical Anthropology Is Holistic and Dualistic,” 421.

20. 2 Corinthians 5:8 English Standard Version

21. Cooper, “Biblical Anthropology Is Holistic and Dualistic,” 423.

22. Weir, “Christian Physicalism and the Biblical Argument for Dualism,” 116.

23. Gary R. Habermas, “Evidential Near-Death Experiences,” in The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism, ed. Jonathan Loose, J. L. Menugue, and J. P. Moreland (Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley and Sons Inc., 2018), 320.

24. Lee Strobel, Seeing the Supernatural (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2025), 121.

25. Ibid., 159.

26. Ibid., 165.

27. Murphy, “Immortality versus Resurrection in the Christian Tradition.,” 81.

28. Weir, “Christian Physicalism and the Biblical Argument for Dualism,” 119.