ABSTRACT
In the previous chapter, I argued that the Scriptural portrayal of humans requires an interpretation of an intermediate state between somatic death and somatic resurrection. It should be apparent that a soul doctrine provides a more plausible grounding for both the intermediate state and the success of persistence of a person from somatic death to a state of existence in the afterlife. Cartesianism is one option to account for the interim state, but, as I suggested, the doctrine of beatific vision seems to require Cartesianism or some similar ontology. I argued that, in keeping with much of the Christian tradition, we have plausible reasons from one paradigmatic passage (e.g. 2 Corinthians 5) for believing that the Scriptures advance a view of humans persisting as full persons not simply impersonal souls, which would seem to exclude certain philosophical anthropologies as plausible groundings or as providing the appropriate metaphysical pre-conditions for understanding the Scriptural teaching. I advanced Cartesianism, or PBSD, as a plausible grounding for the Scriptural teaching. But what remains is providing a conceivable story for persisting persons as substances. To this end, I intend to provide some coherent and plausible Cartesian stories for thinking this might actually occur. Additionally, I take up the discussion on the models of the soul’s origin and reflect on some of their challenges.
