320. Hair and nails in Heaven
320. HAIR AND NAILS IN HEAVEN
Will the resurrected body have everything the present body has, e.g., hair and nails?
Whether the hair and nails will rise again in the human body?
It is written (Lk 21:18): A hair of your head shall not perish.
Further, hair and nails were given to man as an ornament. Now the bodies of men, especially the elect, ought to rise again with all their adornment. Therefore they ought to rise again with the hair.
The soul is to the animated body as (the personal virtue or habit of) art is to the work of art . . . Now art employs certain instruments for the accomplishment of the work intended . . . and it also uses other instruments for the safe-keeping of the principal instruments; thus the art of warfare employs a sword for fighting and a sheath for the safe-keeping of the sword. And so among the parts of an animated body, some are directed to the accomplishment of the soul’s operations, for instance the heart, liver, hand, foot; while others are directed to the safe-keeping of the other parts as leaves to cover fruit; and thus hair and nails are in man for the protection of other parts . . . and since man will rise again with all the perfections of his nature, it follows that hair and nails will rise again in him (S80,2).
Whatever belongs to the integrity of human nature in those who take part in the resurrection will rise again. . . .
Further, our resurrection will be conformed to the resurrection of Christ. Now in Christ’s resurrection His blood rose again, else the wine would not now be changed into His blood in the Sacrament of the altar. Therefore the blood will rise again in us also. . . (S80,3).
Christ’s resurrection body was recognizable: by Mary Magdalene at the empty tomb, by the two disciples on the road to Emmaeus, by the Eleven in the upper room, by “Doubting Thomas,” and by Peter at the Sea of Galilee. If He had been hairless and nailless, He would not have been recognizable as Himself. The reaction would have been “What weird thing is that?” instead of “It is the Lord!”
Just as with the sexual organs, the practical earthly works of the other bodily organs disappear in Heaven but their beauty remains. (St. Thomas calls this “ornament” and “adornment”.) For utilitarian work is earthly and temporal, but beauty is Heavenly and eternal.
The same will probably be true of clothes. On earth they have four purposes: beauty (“adornment”) and three utilitarian purposes: to protect the potential victims of sexual lust, to protect against cold weather, and to show the wearer’s social status or vocation. In Heaven there will be no lust, no cold, and no earthly social status, so the utilitarian purposes for clothes will disappear. Yet clothes will remain for “adornment”. “That’s me!” a woman says about a dress. Clothing in Heaven will be as natural to the person as hair and nails.
Notice how wonderfully concrete and specific St. Thomas is about our blood and Christ’s blood (in his last paragraph). Most modern theologians do not dare ask such questions, the questions children ask. But Christians have concrete data (in divine revelation) as well as abstract speculation (in philosophizing and theologizing), and the speculation must conform to the data. If it does, it can really prove such things, just as the sciences do with their data. St. Thomas also is careful to humbly distinguish such only—probable arguments, which are only from “fittingness”, from certain demonstrations.
Our revealed data tell us that Christ’s body, which is our only concrete example of a resurrected body and our model for our own resurrection bodies, (1) has blood, and (2) is immortal. In our present life these two things are contradictory, and we cannot know or imagine how they can be reconciled. But we know that they can be reconciled, somehow, by God, for our data source (Christ) tells us that they are. If it is, it can be.