What Is “Soul Sleep,” and Is It Biblical?

“Soul sleep” is not the most common of theological phrases, but it does appear in enough places to bring about questions.

So what does it mean? Where did the phrase come from, and when? And is it based on a specific belief, school of thought, or passage of Scripture?

Overall, “soul sleep” is one way to describe humanity’s paused, unconscious status after we die, or when a person’s conscious existence ceases until the Second Coming of Christ.

The belief of death being like “sleep” until Jesus returns does have biblical roots, but the phrase “soul sleep” itself wasn’t used until relatively recent history.

So let’s take a closer look at:

• The origins of the phrase “soul sleep”
• Biblical roots of the concept of “soul sleep”
• The significance of the ideas behind “soul sleep” and what they mean for us today

Let’s start with where the term even came from.

The origins of the phrase “soul sleep”

“Soul sleep” as a phrase doesn’t appear in the Bible. It’s believed that it’s actually another term for the thnetopsychist tradition of Christian mortalism, or the belief that after someone dies, they’re in a state of unconscious “sleep” until the resurrection of the dead at the Second Coming of Jesus.¹

This tradition did not believe in an immortal soul, but instead “at death the whole person died, to await the resurrection at the last day.”²

16th-century theologian John Calvin first popularized the term “soul sleep” in his work Psychopannychia,³ “derived from Greek words which signify ‘the sleep of the soul.’”⁴ The concept behind soul sleep had already been debated for years at this point in history during the Protestant Reformation.⁵

In Psychopannychia, John Calvin was actually arguing against the idea of soul sleep. He believed that the soul is conscious after death, and he wanted to argue in favor of the mainstream belief at the time: that the soul lives on after death, that there is a purgatory, that some people become saints after death, etc.⁶

In other words, he believed in immortality of the soul, or the idea that the soul cannot be killed, and that there is some kind of life after death with no waiting period. Essentially, this is another way of saying that everlasting life is a condition of being born, since after death, there is some other form of living.

However, “soul sleep” has been used by theologians since the 2nd century to describe a form of slumber that occurs after death. So while the term “soul sleep” isn’t in the Bible, the concept behind soul sleep does have biblical roots. We’ll talk about this next.

Biblical roots of “soul sleep”

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The concept behind the thnetopsychist tradition of “soul sleep” is supported throughout Scripture. For example, Ecclesiastes 9:5 says that “the dead know nothing,” and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 describes death as having “fallen asleep.” Human beings who have “fallen asleep” in Christ will rise again when He returns.

Soul sleep, then, is like the waiting period between death and being resurrected by God. And during this period, it’s as if our existence is on pause.

We are not alive or conscious, because God’s breath of life that unifies and sustains us has gone back to Him. So after we die, we aren’t aware of what our loved ones are doing, or of the passing of time, or anything else. To our awareness, we will be on the brink of death one minute and the very next we will be risen in Christ at His Second Coming, no matter how much time has passed for the rest of the world.

We “go to sleep” in our mortal, physical bodies, but we wake up with restored, perfected, sinless bodies through the life-giving power of God (1 Corinthians 15:42-25). These “resurrection bodies” will be immortal, and our change from mortal to immortal will happen “in the twinkling of an eye” (1 Corinthians 15:52).

This metaphor gives us another glimpse into what happens after death. Take a moment and see if you can consciously tell what happens between your blinks.

…Anything?

It happens too quickly, right? Similarly, when you’re asleep, you aren’t aware of how much time is actually passing or what’s going on around you until you wake up and look at the clock and realize you were asleep for 2 hours, or 6, or 8.

Daniel calls death being “asleep in the dust” (Daniel 12:2, ESV). This phrasing points back to creation, when “the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” (Genesis 2:7, ESV). The King James Version says, “man became a living soul.”

(Body + Breath of Life = Living Soul)

Without the breath of God, we are dust. In other words, we are living beings with His life-giving breath, and we are not living beings without that breath.⁷ After death, then, we are also not living in any form. We return to the dust, awaiting resurrection.

King Solomon echoed this idea of returning to the dust when the Bible says, “All are from the dust, and to dust all return” (Ecclesiastes 3:20, ESV).

Job compares a tree and death, saying that “If [a tree] is cut down, it will sprout again, and its shoots will not die” (Job 14:7, CSB). But people don’t rise from death “until the heavens are no more; they will not stir from their sleep” (Job 14:12, CSB).

Jesus explains death to the disciples as having “fallen asleep” when He talks about Lazarus’ death (John 11:11-14).

So the concept behind “soul sleep” is nuanced. But with all of these biblical examples using sleep to describe death, we can see more clearly the biblical roots of the phrase. It’s called “sleep” because it’s figurative—the first death is something you wake from. It’s not permanent. It’s only the “second death,” as described in Revelation, that is permanent nonexistence (Revelation 2:11; 20:6, 14; 21:8).

But how does this whole concept of “soul sleep” affect us today? How can we use this information in our own lives?

The significance of “soul sleep” to us today

Photo by Pavel Danilyuk

Death is a natural part of life on this sin-sick earth, and it brings with it many questions and terms: soul sleep, final resurrection, first death, second death, etc. But the concept behind the phrase “soul sleep” also brings with it much hope.

We don’t have to be afraid of death when we consider that, ultimately, it’s just a time of unconscious waiting for Jesus Christ to return and give eternal life to all those who accept Him.

It’s a reminder that God’s ultimate goal is to dwell with us, without the barriers of sin and death between us. But after Jesus’ return, and He defeats sin and Satan once and for all, this will be a reality.

Want to keep learning about life, death, resurrection, and salvation?

1. Ball, Bryan W., PhD, “The Immortality of the Soul: Could Christianity Survive Without It?” Ministry Magazine, 2011.[↵]
2. Ibid. [↵]
3. Greef, W de. The Writing of John Calvin: An Introductory Guide, Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008, pg. 152.[↵]
4. https://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/sdg/calvin_psychopannychia.html [↵]
5. Ball, Bryan W. “The Immortality of the Soul: Could Christianity Survive Without It?” Ministry Magazine, 2011. [↵]
6. Greef, W de. The Writing of John Calvin: An Introductory Guide, Louisville : Westminster John Knox Press, 2008, pg. 152.[↵]
7. “Death, the State of the Dead, and Resurrection,” https://www.adventist.org/death-and-resurrection/ [↵]

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