On the Resurrection of the Dead and On the Last Judgment by Johann Gerhard

Abstract

Reviewed by: On the Resurrection of the Dead and On the Last Judgment by Johann Gerhard Mark Mattes On the Resurrection of the Dead and On the Last Judgment. By Johann Gerhard. Translated by Richard J. Dinda. Theological Commonplaces XXX–XXXI. Saint Louis: Concordia, 2020. xiii + 578 pp. This volume of Gerhard's Theological Commonplaces, written 1621–22 and from the perspective of orthodox scholasticism, offers two treatises. They cover every imaginable question that could be raised about the resurrection and the last judgment. As he did throughout his Commonplaces, Gerhard arrived at his conclusions only after traversing the scriptures and their interpretation by numerous church fathers and medieval scholastics. The resurrection of the dead, which will happen at the last judgment, will include both believers and unbelievers. It stretches the imagination how God will revive human bodies, but Gerhard affirms that since God has infinite power, it is sure to happen (114). After all, Christ saves sinners, but conversely, he is "poison" to death (61). Humanity's telos or goal presupposes a resurrection since God has not made humans in a disembodied state: in eternal life, souls must be united with raised bodies since embodied existence is the nature of humans (115). The resurrection of bodies at the end of time is foreshadowed in Christ's own resurrection, a bodily event (127). The damned, too, will be raised, since the resurrection applies to all humans, and their bodies will be incorruptible and immortal, but not impassible (176). Both sexes will be raised as their proper sex since, contrary to some opinions, the female is as perfect as the male (188). With respect to the last judgment, Gerhard builds on the Lutheran claim of Christ's bodily presence in the Lord's Supper, in multiple places simultaneously, in order to explain how Christ can be present to millions awaiting the final judgment (311). The godly, who are saved through Christ alone, will be rewarded not only with appropriate compensation but also because they will share in "the boundless treasure of eternal glory and happiness" which is Christ himself (376). Even those theologians not attracted to Lutheran orthodoxy should find Gerhard a treasure in terms of reflection on both the scriptures and the wider Christian tradition. [End Page 212] Mark Mattes Grand View University Des Moines, Iowa Copyright © 2023 Johns Hopkins University Press and Lutheran Quarterly, Inc.