Christendom inconsistent beliefs #4: Christ, flesh and bones in heaven?

[Eloi]

[onewithhim]

[Replying to 2ndpillar2 in post #80]

Whew! I don't know how you came to those conclusions, but they conflict with everything in the Bible. Let's just agree to disagree, and I pray that you can come to the point where 2 Corinthians 4:4 no longer applies to you.

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[historia]

The Scriptures are clear: Jesus was "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit." (I Peter 3:18)

Sure, but notice that this passage does not say Jesus was made alive 'as a spirit', but rather 'in the spirit' -- or, perhaps better, 'in the Spirit.'

Historically, Christians have interpreted this verse in different ways. But we might turn to Paul, in Romans 8:9, to gain some perspective here:

You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you.

Obviously, Paul is not saying here that the Christians to whom he is writing have lost their flesh and been turned into spirits. Rather, to be "in the Spirit" means to have the Spirit of God dwelling within you.

He continues:

Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

For Paul, to be made alive in the Spirit, then, means to have your deceased mortal body resurrected to new life by the Spirit of God. It is not the assertion that at the resurrection you become (or Christ became) a spirit.

In fact, by inference, Paul is clearly saying here that, in the Resurrection, the Spirit gave Jesus' mortal body new life, rather than it being dissolved or discarded.

Paul said as much in his letter to the Corinthians: "So it is written: 'The first man Adam became a living person.' The last Adam became a life-giving spirit." (I Corinthians 15:45.)

Okay, but we have to read this statement in context, giving attention to the original language, which takes us back to my earlier post:

It is sown a psychikos body; it is raised a pneumatikos body. If there is a psychikos body, there is also a pneumatikos body. Thus it is written, "The first man Adam became a living psyche"; the last Adam became a life-giving pneuma.

When we look at the text this way, it is clear that what Paul is contrasting here is 'soul' (psyche) and 'spirit' (pneuma). In this passage, he uses both of those nouns as well as adjectives derived from those nouns, literally 'soul-ish' (psychikos) and 'spirit-ish' (pneumatikos).

We can restate the passage as:

It is sown a soul-ish body; it is raised a spirit-ish body. If there is a soul-ish body, there is also a spirit-ish body. Thus it is written, "The first man Adam became a living soul"; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.

What Paul is saying here is that all of us currently possess a 'soul-ish' body -- that is, a body animated by or given life by the soul, the natural 'breath of life' or 'life-force' that animates all living animals.

A person whose body is animated by the soul can himself be called a living soul, as Adam was in Genesis 2:7, which Paul quotes here.

But the body the Christian will have at the resurrection will be a 'spirit-ish' body -- that is, a body animated by or given life by the Spirit of God (as we just saw in Romans 8).

Since Christ's resurrected body is now animated by the Spirit -- and it is through Christ that the Spirit of God will, in turn, animate the Christian's resurrected body -- Paul can refer to Christ himself as a life-giving Spirit.

But, in calling Adam a "soul" and Christ a "Spirit," Paul is not suggesting here that they don't have bodies. He is, by inference, simply noting that they have different types of bodies. And like all of the other types of bodies Paul gives examples of in 1 Cor. 15 -- plants, animals, the sun, moon, and stars -- we should understand that a body -- even a resurrected one -- is physical.

[historia]

So Peter and Paul say Jesus was raised in the spirit, yet John seems to say he wasn't a spirit. How about 2 against 1? Majority wins? Just a little humor.

I'm actually willing to take seriously the idea that there are divergent views of Christ's resurrected body among the various authors of the New Testament.

But, if we want to harmonize these passages, then we need merely note, as I did above (see post #82), that to be 'raised in the Spirit' does not mean you are a spirit, and so Peter, Paul, John (and Luke!) are not at odds on that point.

And he didn't say he "still" had the nail marks. It was my addition.

I appreciate that. But in that unguarded comment I think you have actually understood what is evident in the text itself: the risen Christ is showing the marks of his crucifixion precisely to convey that this is his crucified body brought back to life.

The interpretation you and Eloi have offered instead gives the impression that Christ is being deceptive. He's a spirit but tells the disciples he's not a spirit. He shows them the wounds of his crucifixion, but that's not actually the body that was crucified.

Jesus just wanted Thomas to believe that he was risen.

Agreed! In the first century, the idea of resurrection entailed your mortal body coming back to life in some fashion, so it makes sense that Thomas would want to confirm that Jesus' body was really raised from the dead.

The idea that Jesus' body was dissolved and he was recreated as a spirit is, in that way, rather odd. Even if, for the sake of argument, we accept that's what the early Christians believed, no one in the first century (Jew, Christian, or pagan) would have called that 'resurrection'.

Your idea of a "glorified" physical body that can go through doors is a bit much. That's the first time I've heard that.

This is not my idea, this is what orthodox Christians have taught for nearly two thousand years (see post #27).

You might stop and ask yourself why it is that the sources you've read on this topic have failed to properly represent the orthodox view.

[2ndpillar2]

[Replying to 2ndpillar2 in post #80]

Whew! I don't know how you came to those conclusions, but they conflict with everything in the Bible. Let's just agree to disagree, and I pray that you can come to the point where 2 Corinthians 4:4 no longer applies to you.
.

It is the "many" on the wide path to "destruction" (Matthew 7:13). On the other hand, your false prophet's false gospel of grace, is antithetical to the message of Yeshua, and the whole of the Law and the prophets. The ones escaping drinking from the cup of God's anger, are those who "keep the commandments", not those who nail them to the cross (Revelation 14:10-12). Paul has his "many" followers, but like lemmings, they seem to miss the turn in the road. As you are adding leaven (hypocrisy) to the bread of life, your message provides neither nourishment nor healing to the sheep, which leads to eating judgment (Ezekiel 34:16). Apart from 2 Corinthians 4:2, it is Paul who uses fraud in his preaching, and portrays himself a Gentile to the Gentiles, and a Pharisee of Pharisee to the Jews. Paul's message is conflich with the Law and the prophets, and the message of Yeshua. To build your house, you quote Paul, and his worthless shepherd Peter, and now that we are at the "end of the age", Paul's lawlessness and Peter's Stumbling Blocks will be removed (Matthew 13:41) along with their agents.

[onewithhim]

The Scriptures are clear: Jesus was "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit." (I Peter 3:18)

Sure, but notice that this passage does not say Jesus was made alive 'as a spirit', but rather 'in the spirit' -- or, perhaps better, 'in the Spirit.'

But Jesus was put to death IN the flesh......how do you understand that? Perhaps the same way we should understand IN the spirit. He had a body of flesh when he was killed, and then he had a body of spirit when he was resurrected. It stands up to scrutiny, unless you want to play around with smoke and mirrors.

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[historia]

The Scriptures are clear: Jesus was "put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit." (I Peter 3:18)

Sure, but notice that this passage does not say Jesus was made alive 'as a spirit', but rather 'in the spirit' -- or, perhaps better, 'in the Spirit.'

But Jesus was put to death IN the flesh......how do you understand that?

It just means his mortal, earthly life came to an end.

As I said, Christians have historically interpreted this passage in different ways, and it can even be translated differently.

But the interpretation I find the most compelling is the one that takes seriously the fact that the expression "in the flesh" -- and related expressions like "according to the flesh" and "flesh and blood" -- are idioms.

Their usage elsewhere in the New Testament (as we saw above with Romans 8:9 and Matthew 16:17) shows they don't refer literally to one's muscles and tissue, as such.

Perhaps the same way we should understand IN the spirit.

Indeed, they are both idioms.

[Eloi]

[Eloi]

There are several reasons why many religionists cannot grasp the idea of the spiritual resurrection of Jesus. Some are:

1) they believe that death is leaving a body and staying alive in some kind of invisible figure

2) they believe that the resurrection is to give a material body to that invisible figure that was still alive in another "dimension"

3) They don't realize that although authentic spirits, like angels, are invisible, they also have a spirit body.

Some interesting questions for analysis:

if a dead person is still alive in spirit without needing to be resurrected:

a) can he have contact with angels and other non-human spirit beings and move around in that "dimension"?

b) then why do they need to be resurrected? What is the meaning of the resurrection in this ideological-philosophical framework?

[Revelations won]

[onewithhim]

[Replying to Revelations won in post #89]

No, neither the Father nor Jesus have bodies of flesh and bones. The scripture says that two things cannot be in the spirit realm: (1) FLESH and (2) blood. Flesh cannot be there, as well as blood. So the tricky smoke and mirrors viewpoint about the bones doesn't work. Blood can't be there, bones can't be there, and neither can flesh.