When a character gets turned into an undead, the Raise Dead and Reincarnate spells do not work on that character, and Resurrection is needed.
As an example: a PC becomes a vampire, then is destroyed, then is brought back from the dead as a nonvampire PC by resurrection. If the PC then dies again, does the PC need a resurrection spell to be brought back from the dead, or is raise dead enough?
The English present perfect tense/aspect can be used to describe either 1) a present state arising from a past event or 2) merely something having occurred some time in the past. Of course, often those are effectively the same thing. When they're not, the ambiguity is usually resolved based on context.
For example, if you're waiting for a train and hear an announcement that "the train has been delayed", your natural interpretation would be that the train is currently running late (i.e. #1) and not that the train has certainly been delayed at least once in the past (i.e. #2), as the latter would be a useless and absurd thing to announce.
On the other hand, if you're applying for a visa to visit a foreign country, and the form asks you "have you been deported from or denied entry to any country?", you'd better believe that it doesn't mean "last week" or "last year", but rather "ever in your life". If you answer "no" and it turns out that you were in fact denied entry 20 years ago, the consulate will assume that you deliberately lied to them and no amount of grammar quibbling is going to get you that visa.
So, how does that relate to Pathfinder? As That_Knight_Guy notes, the descriptions of Raise Dead and Reincarnate both contain the following text (emphasis mine):
A creature that has been turned into an undead creature or killed by a death effect can't be returned to life by this spell.
So, does this mean that:
Technically, the rules don't say. Had the writers wanted, they could've amended the quoted sentence to explicitly resolve this ambiguity, but they didn't. There are valid arguments in favor of either interpretation, and a GM could choose to rule either way.
It simply makes no sense to me that, after a creature has been turned into an undead, destroyed and returned to normal life by Resurrection or True Resurrection, the "stain" of having once been undead would still linger upon them and prevent Raise Dead and Reincarnate from ever again working on them.
Also, one grammatical argument in favor of this interpretation is that, if the authors of the rules had intended Raise Dead to never again work on such creatures, they could've easily made that explicit by inserting the word "ever" into the sentence I quoted. Since they didn't, that was presumably not their intent.
(It's not an airtight argument, however, since the omission of the word "ever" could've also simply resulted from insufficient care and attention to possible alternative interpretations.)
Most important statement relevant to your case comes from this article and it is:
The choice between "fun to read" and "precise" needs to be handled on a case-by-case basis. Certain rules can be simple and straightforward, while other matters can be handled more conversationally or filled with inspirational descriptions of people, places, or events.
The rule in the spells you are referring falls into "fun to read" category, not into "precise"category.
The way my table was playing, this rule was only applied to the most recent death. If your table prefers "once and for all" interpretation, it is your right. I don't believe it is what authors meant, but frankly my belief has nothing to do with how you play your game.
Both Raise Dead and Reincarnate contain the following text:
A creature that has been turned into an undead creature or killed by a death effect can’t be returned to life by this spell.
This quite clearly states that if the creature has been turned into an undead creature, they cannot be returned to life with these spells. No caveat is included in the text of the spell that specifies the undead magic has to be 'recent'.
Resurrection And True Resurrection state:
You can (resurrect/revive) someone killed by a death effect or someone who has been turned into an undead creature and then destroyed.
The use of Resurrect and Revive is the only difference between the wording of the spells. This quite clearly states that as long as the undead has been destroyed, you may return the creature to life. Given that in this situation, the undead has been destroyed and revived, the spell would generally work as intended.
Both Resurrection and True Resurrection also state that they cannot revive someone who has died of old age. If the creature in question died of old age, they cannot be returned to life by any means.
Yes. The reason for this is because they have a shiny new dead body in which the spells are able to target. In the original situation, the dead body has been turned into an undead and is no longer a suitable target for the spell. Whereas having just died from fall damage and not become undead it can be done. Basically you need the dead body, so situations like disintegration would also have the same effect.
