Die Dood en Daarna ’n Verkenning van Enkele Standpunte binne die Teologiese en Filosofiese Reformatoriese Denke

Abstract

This article investigates the question of what happens to human beings at death and afterwards. It is focussed on a few theologians and philosophers in the Reformational tradition. The following viewpoints are discussed: (1) John Calvin’s Platonic anthropology. (2) The influence of a dichotomist anthropology on the three confessions of the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands and South Africa, as well as on their preaching of the Heidelberg Catechism. (3) Two Reformed systematic theologians, K. Dijk and G.C. van Niftrik, who adhered to a dichotomist view of being human and an “intermediate state” between death and resurrection. (4) A. Janse and J.A.L. Taljaard, two Christian philosophers, who, on the basis of the Scriptures, rejected the idea that man/woman consists of an immortal soul and a mortal body. (5) This is followed by two Reformed ministers, B. Telder and C. Vonk, who applied the insights of Janse and therefore rejected the traditional ideas about after-life and a so-called intermediate state. Of the two, Vonk most consistently applied the view of the human person as an integral unity to what happens at death and afterwards. (6) The article is concluded with a summary of the results.