The Everlasting and the Eternal

The subject of this book is the relationship and the difference between the temporal everlasting and the atemporal eternal. A main concern is to address how these different concepts are related logically and, in the light of their logical differences, how they are related religiously. A paradox confronts the very idea of a life that is timelessly eternal. The paradox of eternal life arises because a lived life must be temporal, the actions and events in that life occurring at some time or other, while the timeless eternal is atemporal. Eternal life must both be in time as a life and not be in time as eternal. If the living God of theistic traditions is said to be eternal in this sense, this paradox is encountered (or, as some say, a contradiction), as is a mirror paradox when it is said that human beings may come to eternal life. This problem is addressed and a resolution is offered.

James Kellenberger is emeritus Professor of Philosophy, at California State University, USA. His previous books include God-Relationships With and Without God, Relationship Morality, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, and, most recently, Dying to Self and Detachment.