Afterlife beliefs can powerfully influence human behavior. Actions that might seem inexplicable without knowledge of such beliefs can sometimes be easily understood, and even seem quite logical, when viewed in the appropriate context.
The major golden rule scholars essentially ignore this issue. I suspect that is because they share the principal elements of a Christian afterlife belief system.
As diverse as many Christian traditions are with respect to the details of afterlife belief, they generally share some common ideas. For example:
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human beings live one human lifetime,
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during that lifetime they require some sort of redemptive experience such as baptism,
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sometime after death each person will experience some process of selection or judgment, which is typically associated with behavior in the person’s lifetime,
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based on that selection or judgment the person will be either rewarded or punished in some fashion; although sometimes after an interim period; and
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the final reward or punishment is usually considered to be eternal.
Contrast that view with a commonly held belief in Eastern religions and cultures that a human will almost certainly have experienced prior lifetimes, possibly as a human but perhaps in a series of lower life forms. And that a human will almost certainly experience multiple, perhaps hundreds, of future lifetimes.
Consider the difference in viewpoint between a person who believes that a human requires a redemptive event in his lifetime because of some generalized fault or lack with the view that the specific actions of that human in prior lifetimes have significant influence on the current lifetime, for better or worse.
Compare the idea of a judgment being rendered after death by a divine being or force with the notion that what happens in the next life is an essentially mathematical summation of the positive and negative influences of the current life.
Ask yourself if you feel equipped to anticipate the desires of an individual who sincerely practices a form of ancestor worship.
You might believe in the idea of eternal reward and punishment. I might believe that the ultimate goal of multiple lifetimes is the achievement of freedom from rebirth.
You might believe that you are among the “select”, predestined to enjoy eternal bliss in the presence of God. How will that dispose you toward others not so fortunately selected?
You might believe that the kingdom of heaven is a literal place and that there will be a literal resurrection of physical bodies in an end-of-days event. I might believe that heaven and hell are states of consciousness attainable or experienced in this lifetime; here and now; and that there is no actual afterlife.
Any strongly held afterlife belief system will inevitably shape an individual’s behavior in this lifetime. The more the system tends toward the single-lifetime, eternal-judgment model, the higher the current-lifetime “stakes” will be seen to be.
Risking eternal damnation is no small matter. It can, and has, motivated extreme behaviors among its believers: for both good and bad. It can, and has, proved to be a powerful tool for influencing the actions of others.
Promises of eternal bliss and threats of eternal agony can be powerful tools of influence, control and coercion.
The more my actions toward you are motivated by my specific afterlife belief system the more important it is that I be sure that I am not imposing my beliefs on you without your knowledge and consent. And the less I know of you and your beliefs the greater the risk that I will act towards you in a way that you will consider harmful.
If we ignore the afterlife issue we implicitly assess all actions among individuals in a this-lifetime context, as if no afterlife is assumed. That would work for many individuals and for some groups.
But we know that the “golden rule community” is a largely Christian one and that community has strong and crucial afterlife beliefs. That fact and those beliefs must be a part of the discussion.
©Charles R. Lightner