The Strand Study Bible

I SAMUEL I SAMUEL 28:7 This word ( enquire ) denotes a more intensive “seeking after” than does the word “enquired” used in verse 6. Because the Lord now refused to answer, King Saul, due to his habitual and chronic stubbornness and disobedience to the Word of God (I Sam 15:22-23), consulted a medium out of desperation. This incident would become the final nail in Saul’s coffin (I Chro 10:13-14). 28:8 Jewish traditions suggests that these two men who accompanied King Saul were Abner (Saul’s cousin and commander of Israel’s army - I Sam 14:50-51 & 17:55) and Amasa, and further mentions that the medium at Endor was the mother of Abner. If this is true, it would account for her having escaped Saul’s initial elimination of witches and wizards in his earlier years (vs. 9). 28:11 Some have questioned whether Samuel really appeared to Saul, arguing that an evil spirit impersonated Samuel. However, all indications within the text point to the fact that the spirit was indeed Samuel. There are reasons for this surmise: (1) The witch’s surprise (vs. 12) - The medium’s apparent fright upon seeing Samuel suggests that even she recognized it was God’s doing, not her own; (2) King Saul’s recognition of Samuel (vs. 14); (3) An evil spirit impersonating Samuel would not have spoken in this way (vs. 17) - The evil spirit would not have wished to help David; nor would he have spoken in such solemn terms of the punishment due to rebellion against God; (4) The accurate prediction of Saul’s demise (vs. 19); and (5) The testimony of the text (vs. 12, 15-16). 28:15 This portion of Scripture is just one of many scriptures throughout the Bible that affirms a conscious personal after life ( Isa 14:9b & 26:19 and Ezk 32:21 and Rev 12:7-10 & 14:1-3 & 15:1-3). Matthew 17:1-3 states: 525

And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart, And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light. And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.

If Moses and Elijah were dead and asleep in the grave, awaiting the resurrection, what are they doing here “awake” and talking with Jesus? The doctrine of “soul sleeping,” which is taught by various religions, is a false doctrine. Karl G. Sabiers in Where Are The Dead? notes:

The original decree of death, Gen. 3:19, implies only the death of the body. “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread, till thou shalt return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken; of dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” Here it is plain, that only so much of man as was “dust,” and “taken out of the ground,” was doomed to return to dust again. But the “breath of life” or spirit , breathed into Adam by his Creator, was not “dust” nor “taken out of the ground.” It therefore was not doomed to return to dust with the body at death. 1

Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 8:8 & 12:7:

There is no man that hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit ; neither hath he power in the day of death. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and t he spirit shall return to God who gave it.

In harmony with the above, we find that wherever the fulfillment of this original decree is spoken of in the Bible, it is described as taking effect upon the “dust” of the body only, while the spirit is released from the body and survives its dissolution. Randy Alcorn in Heaven notes:

At death, the human spirit goes either to Heaven or Hell. Christ depicted Lazarus and the rich man as conscious in Heaven and Hell immediately after they died (Luke 16:22-31). Jesus told the dying thief on the cross, “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). The apostle Paul said that to die was to be with Christ (Philippians 1:23), and to CF absent from the body was to be present with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). After their deaths, martyrs are pictured in Heaven, crying out to God to bring justice on Earth (Revelation 6:9-11). These passages make it clear that there is no such thing as “soul sleep,” or a long period of unconsciousness between life on Earth and life in Heaven… Every reference in Revelation to human beings talking and worshiping in Heaven prior to the resurrection of the dead demonstrates that our spiritual beings are conscious, not sleeping, after death. (Nearly everyone who believes in soul sleep believes that souls are disembodied at death; it’s not clear how disembodied beings could sleep, because sleeping involves a physical body.) 2

According to the Scriptures, death is a separation of the spirit from the body (Gen 25:8, Job 14:10, I Ki 17:20-22 and Lk 23:46). Remember the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31? Jesus stated emphatically that they were both alive and conscious after dying. When the Apostle Paul was stoned and died, he too said he was conscious after dying (II Cor 12:1-3). Paul reminds us JO II Corinthians 5:8: We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord . Jesus reminded his listeners in Mark 12:27, concerning the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that: He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living : ye therefore do greatly err. NOTE – The Apostolic Church ( Jn 4:24b ), which started in 1832 and was led by John Bate Cardale, is one of the religions that teach their 10 million followers that the dead are not waiting around as disembodied consciousnesses in Heaven, but are asleep and unconscious in the grave. They quote Ecclesiastes 9:5 as proof. According to the Apostolic Church , only Jesus Christ has ascended to Heaven. The dead are comatose, and will remain so until God raises them. 3 28:16 Those who have gone on before us are aware of us ( seeing the LORD is departed from thee ). 28:19 Meaning, Saul and his sons would no longer be among the living. 1 Sabiers, Karl G. Where Are The Dead? , Los Angeles, CA, Robertson Publishing Co., 1938. Print. 2 Alcorn, Randy. Heaven , Carol Stream, Ill., Tyndale, 2004. Print. 3 Tomorrow’s World (Apostolic Church Magazine – May-June 2008). Print.