Hello Dr. Sungenis, I recently engaged in a dialogue with a protestant on the issue of prayers for the dead and he posed a question to me that I did not know how to answer. So I was wondering if you could help me out here. He said that Catholics usually point to 2 Maccabees 12:40-46 in order to prove that prayers for the dead is acceptable. The verse says "for if he were not expecting the fallen to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death." However, he pointed out that in verse 40 the dead men had under their tunics "amulets sacred to the idols of Jamnia, which the law forbids the Jews to wear." He said that since people who die in a state of mortal sin go to hell, and since these dead men committed the mortal sin of idolatry, then we cannot use this passage to support the view of prayers for the dead, since our prayers would be useless. He also pointed out that it was common knowledge among the Jews that idolatry is a sin, since the Torah prohibits it, so Catholics can't say "the dead people didn't know idolatry was a mortal sin." I did not have an answer for him and I said that I would get back to him. So I was wondering if you knew how to respond to his question. I look forward to your answer. In Christ, Frank
R. Sungenis: Frank, we can answer this in two ways. First, regardless of whether mortal sin was committed, the passage establishes that praying and sacrificing for the dead was a common and historical practice in Israel based upon the idea that the dead would be raised and go into eternity. Otherwise, Judas would not have offered sacrifices and prayers for the soldiers after they had already died if he had not been taught to do so by the Hebrew religion. Hence, we establish prayers for the dead more on why Judas felt compelled to do so, not that he actually did so. He felt compelled to do so because of what he was taught previously about the future of the dead and what effect prayers had on them. Hence, we can be certain that there were times in the past in which someone who died had committed only a venial sin, and thus prayers and sacrifices for them would have been appropriate and applicable.
Second, Judas is not the one who determines whether the soldiers committed a mortal sin, since he is not a priest or a prophet. This is important since the Old Covenant made a distinction between sinning without full knowledge and sinning with full knowledge (Numbers 15:27-31). In order to know whether the taking of the amulets was a mortal sin such that full knowledge of the gravity of the sin was in the consciousness of the soldiers, one would need an infallible means of determining it. In the case of the man who picked up sticks on the Sabbath, even Moses himself could not determine whether the man had done so with full knowledge, hence, they took the matter to God, and He alone made the judgment (Number 15:32-36). We can surmise the same in the case of the soldiers in 2 Maccabees. Only God could determine for certain whether a mortal sin had been committed. As such, Judas was well within his prerogatives to pray and sacrifice for them, hoping that no mortal sin was committed.
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