the mystical temple of god 664 “Then those whom the earth received in her bosom,” (the words are those of St. Peter Damian) “those whom the waters swallowed and those whom destructive fire consumed, all give back just as a deposit entrusted to them, and restore life without any diminution of it.”222 Let Tertullian, that most ancient writer,223 end this section for me: “The body rises from the dead,” (he says) “and indeed intact. It is everywhere in deposit with God, through Jesus Christ, that most faithful depository of God, and you should know that what you think of as the destruction of the body is its withdrawal. It is not only the soul that is set apart; also the body has for the time being its own places of withdrawal, in waters, in flames, in birds, in beasts. When it seems to be dissolved into these, it is transferred, as it were, into receptacles, so that it may once more be reproduced from them.”224 “Death and Hell gave up their dead who were in them” (said the Prophet of the Apocalypse). “And the sea gave up the dead who were in it” (Rev 20:13). But the immortality of the body having been asserted, what shall we say about the soul? Shall we believe with atheists that having left the body it disappears into the air? Far from it. For by its nature it is immortal. For when “God formed man of the slime of the earth, He breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul” (Gen 2:7) [LV], not a dying soul. For although what is taken from the earth will one day return to the earth, this [breath], however, which the Divine mouth (if I may use a human way of speaking) has breathed onto the face of man, is immortal as God Himself from whom it began. This fact is so conformed and fitting to our capacity of comprehension, and not only to Holy Scripture or dogmas of the faith, that even infidels, who think correctly about the souls of men, have taught that they are not only immortal but moreover that after death are punished for their crimes or made blessed for their virtues. We indeed, who are recipients of the light from above, have established that the 222 St. Peter Damian, Some Little Works, I (Bk. VIII, ep. 8): PL 144, 477 (n. 284). 223 Tertullian (d. 220), eminent ecclesiastical writer. 224 Tertullian, Book on the Resurrection of the Body, Ch. 63, at the beginning: PKL 2, 933 (nn. 885-886). This quotation is neither complete nor entirely accurate.
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