Still looking for endings

My thoughts about endings, the human need to have endings to stories that is, has continued this week. I received an email from my Dad with one question. What did the ancients think about a good death? I assumed (correctly because I called Dad) that he wanted to know what people thought when good people died. I told him that people believed that that they died. They had been fulfilled by living a good life that would be perpetuated in the community's story, either as "story" or though offspring. He thought they missed out, because they did not have the end of the story; that there is hope of ever-lasting life though the resurrection of God's son. I did not see it that way, I felt they believed their story continued. Isn't that eternity? Their story did not end and went on. All right, I know we believe more than that specifically, the resurrection of the body but they still had eternity in mind. I find advantage to their beliefs. Consider this, 'Because they took death seriously, they took life seriously.'(Bernhard W. Anderson, The Living World of the Old Testment 4th Ed, 1988 pg 587). Do I take life seriously? Most of the time, probably...