“The Dead Know Nothing”

Read Job 3:11–13; Psalm 115:17; Psalm 146:4; and Ecclesiastes 9:5,

10. What can we learn from these passages about the condition of

human beings at death?

Some Bible commentators argue that these passages (Job 3:11–13; Ps.

115:17; Ps. 146:4; Eccles. 9:5, 10), written in poetic language, cannot be

used to define the condition of human beings at death. It is true that sometimes

poetry can be ambiguous and easily misunderstood, but this is not

the case with these verses. Their language is clear, and their concepts are

in full harmony with the overall Old Testament teachings on the subject.

First, in Job 3, the patriarch deplores his own birth because of all the

suffering. (In our more dire moments, who hasn’t wished that he or she

had never been born?) He recognizes that if he had died at his birth, he

would have remained asleep and at rest (Job 3:11, 13).

Psalm 115 defines the location where the dead are kept as a place of

silence, because “the dead do not praise the Lord” (Ps. 115:17, NKJV).

This hardly sounds as if the dead, the faithful (and thankful) dead, are

in heaven worshiping God.

According to Psalm 146, the mental activities of the individual cease

with death: “His spirit departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day

his plans perish” (Ps. 146:4, NASB). This is a perfect biblical depiction

of what happens at death.

Ecclesiastes 9 adds that “the dead know nothing” and in the grave “there is

no work or device or knowledge or wisdom” (Eccles. 9:5, 10, NKJV). These

statements confirm the biblical teaching that the dead are unconscious.

The biblical teaching of unconsciousness in death should not generate

any panic in Christians. First of all, there is no everlasting burning

hell or temporary purgatory waiting for those who die unsaved. Second,

there is an amazing reward waiting for those who die in Christ. No

wonder that “to the believer, death is but a small matter. . . . To the

Christian, death is but a sleep, a moment of silence and darkness. The

life is hid with Christ in God, and ‘when Christ, who is our life, shall

appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory.’ John 8:51, 52; Col.

3:4.”—Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 787.

Think about the dead in Christ. They close their eyes in death

and, whether in the grave 1,500 years or five months, it’s all the

same to them. The next thing they know is the return of Christ.

How, then, might one argue that, in one sense, the dead have it

better than we, the living, do?