Layman

Perhaps he did not. But even if he did not, that is only because he believed that their "mortal bodies" had been transformed into something else. Something that could inherit the kingdom of God.

Your point is lost. You've staked most of your opposition on the claim that there could be no continuity between the old and the new body because "flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Now, you've ADMITTED that, in Paul's thought, the bodies of Christians living at the time of the paraousia WILL be transformed and DO have continuity with their new bodies.

Not in their old earthly bodies no. They had to be transformed--as you have now admitted.

Paul uses the same language regarding their being transformed. The dead as well as the living will be transformed.

1 Cor. 15:50-54: Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.

Paul is explicit--the living and the dead (the asleep)--will "be changed" in "the twinkling of an eye."

So, as you have admitted that there is continuity between the living at the time of the paraousia, you have by logical extension conceded that the dead will be transformed. For Paul, they are both transformed.

We are not talking about "Christianity" in general here, but of Paul. Nice try, but you can't rely on a purported inconsistency in modern Christian attitudes to avoid creating an obvious inconsistency in your reconstruction of Paul's beliefs. If all Paul meant by "resurrection" was the release of the human spirit and existence in heaven, then that's accomplished at the death of every believer. If so, what is asleep? Why a future resurrection? These are huge problems for you unless you can explain, rather than wish them, away.

Some Jews did believe in an intermediate state, just as Christians do now. But, as many Christians do now, they believed that such a state is not the ultimate goal and is missing a large part of humanity--the material body. Greeks viewed the release of the spirit from the body a victory, many Jews and Christians viewed the resurrection of the body with the living spirit as the ultimate victory.

Layman

First, Paul is not specifically talking about Jesus, he is addressing the general resurrection of believers.

Second, your logic does not follow. There is nothing inconsistent with noting that a seed must fall into the ground and die so that it can be transformed into a plant. Indeed, that is precisely the point. The body dies. Then it is radically transformed. But there is continuity between the two.

Who mentioned a birth here?

Yes, just as the plant is not the seed. It spran from the seed, but it is something radically new.

That is not what I am saying at all. I'm saying that the old body is the seed that is radically transformed into the new body.


Oh my gosh. Could you be any more anachronostic? Did Paul have access to this website? Egads.

Where does the plant come from? The seed. Right? Right.

Yes, I agree there is a radical difference. But Jesus knew that the mustard tree came forth from that mustard seed. He was remarking on the incredible power of that one seed to become that big plant.

Indeed, Jesus speaks of the seed becoming fully grown: It is like a mustard seed, which, when upon the soil, though it is smaller than all the other seeds that are upon the soil, yet when it is sown, it grows up and becomes larger than all garden plants and forms large branches.

Jesus is clear that the mustard seed "grows up" to be the mustard plant. Definite continuity but with remarkable transformation.

Your commentary is rubbish. Paul nowhere says that one cannot be transformed into the other. Far from it. Through God, all things are possible.

Again your commentary has nothing to do with the text. Yes, there are different kinds of flesh and different kinds of bodies. Paul is admitting that what our present bodies are unfit for the Kingdom, which is why he is clear that those bodies must be transformed. All Paul is saying here applies just as equally to the living as to the dead. Yet you have no problem (now) that Paul is talking about the transformation of the living at the Parousia. Even though their "flesh" and "body" are earthly. THis destroyes your point and shows you are scrambling. If God is able to transform the bodies of the living unfit, he's just as able to transform the bodies of the dead unfit. Both are unsuitable for the Kingdom, so both are transformed by God.

He says nothing of discontinuity. He's just pointing out that there are differenc kinds of bodies and different kinds of flesh.

As I pointed out above, none of this limits God's ability to transformed, because--as you have already admitted--God is quite able and will transform the bodies of the living at the Paraousia into spiritual bodies fit for the Kingdom.

The difference is no barrier to continuity.

Ah, you admit it. The old body is TRANSFORMED into the new body. That's the only point being made here. There is continuity.

Yes, there is discontinuity, but there is also continuity. That's the whole point of the seed analogy. Continuity with radical transformation.


Actually, Paul is talking about how the bodies came to be here, not really their substance. The human body we have comes from other humans. The body we will have will be made by God, thus it is "from heaven."

And again you are shadow boxing. The point of this whole thread is that there is continuity between the old and the new. You want to argue some other point and seem obsessed with Luke. That's far beyond anything I've argued here.

See above.

It's not a metaphor, it's an idiom. And it's actually irrelevant to the point--as you have conceded. If God can transform the bodies of the living so they can inherit the Kingdom there is no reason he cannot do so for the dead--who afterall are not noted for having much flesh or blood.

In other words, God solves the problem by transforming the bodies of the believers into something acceptable in the new Kingdom.

Both events are the same occurrence--the return of Christ.

Umm, you left out the first part. Or rather, you put it in an above quote so you could ignore it here. Paul actually is quite explicit that the dead and the living will be changed. Go back to verse 51, which you neatly chopped off:

Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed,

So Paul means the exact opposite of what you were trying to pass off through creative editing here. Some Christians will die (sleep). Some will be alive at the Parousia. But ALL Christains--the living and the dead--will be changed.

"Sleep is an event that will not happen to all; change, however, will. Sleep is Paul's synonym for death, and he means that not all Christians will die, since some will still be alive at the coming of Christ. These, as the following verses will show in more detail, will experience direct change, whereas the dead will rise with a different kind of body, and thus will also undergo a comparable change." C.K. Barrett, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, at 380.

There you have it. Both the living and the dead are changed.

Geoff Hudson

In spirit language:

(20)For the [kingdom (rubbish!)] {Spirit} of God is not a matter of talk but of power.

(21)What do you prefer? Shall I come to you with a whip, or IN [love and with a gentle] {THE} Spirit?

Chapter 5

(1)It is actually reported that there [is sexual immorality] {are spirits of lust} AMONG you, and of a [kind] {lust} that does not occur even AMONG pagans: A man has his father's wife.

(2)And you are proud! Shouldn't you rather have been FILLED with [grief] {the Spirit} and have [put] {CAST} out of [your fellowship] the man {the impure spirit} who did this?

(3)Even though I am not physically present, I am with you IN {THE} Spirit.

And I have already passed judgment on the one who did this, just as if I were present.

(4)When you are assembled IN THE…

[name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you]

…{Spirit}, …

[and the power of the Lord Jesus is present]

…hand this man over to [Satan] {the Spirit}, so that the [sinful nature] {impure spirit} may be [destroyed] {CAST OUT}, and his spirit [saved] {purified.}

[on the day of the Lord.]

Geoff

Geoff Hudson

FLEE FROM THE SPIRIT OF LUST

(9)Do you not know that the [wicked] {impure} will NOT [inherit] {receive} the [kingdom] {Spirit} of God?

Do not be deceived:

[Neither the sexually immoral]
{Those with a spirit of lust}…

[nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers]

…will {NOT} [inherit] {receive} the [kingdom] {Spirit} of God.

(11)And that {spirit} is what some of you [were] {HAD}.

But you were…

[washed, you were sanctified, you were justified]

…{purified} BY THE SPIRIT OF OUR GOD.

(12)["Everything is permissible for me" -- but not everything is beneficial.

"Everything is permissible for me" -- but I will not be mastered by anything.

(13)"Food for the stomach and the stomach for food" -- but God will destroy them both.]

The body is not meant for [sexual immorality] {the spirit of lust}, but for the [Lord] {Spirit of God.}

[, and the Lord for the body. ]

(14)By his [power] {Spirit} God

[raised the Lord from the dead, and he]

will raise [us] {our spirits} [also].

(15)Do you not know that your [bodies] {spirits} are members of [Christ] {the Spirit} himself?

Shall I then take the members of [Christ] {the Spirit} and unite them with {the spirit of} a prostitute? Never!

(16)Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her IN [body] {SPIRIT}?

[For it is said, “The two shall become one flesh.”]

(17)[But] {And} he who unites himself with the [Lord] {Spirit} is one with him IN SPIRIT.

(18)Flee from [sexual immorality] {the spirit of lust}.

[All other sins a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.]

(19)Do you not know that your [body] {spirit} is a temple of the [Holy] Spirit

[, who is in you,]

whom you have received from God?

[You] {Your spirit} [are] {is} not your own, (20)[you] {your spirit} [were] {was} [bought] {purified} [at a price] {by the Spirit}.

Therefore honour {the Spirit of} God with your [body] {spirit}.

Notes:
v.(16)The original writer had no need to point out the obvious that one who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body, if only for a short time. The more important idea was that the spirit of one who goes with a prostitute becomes one with the prostitute’s spirit, and is therefore permanently polluted.

Geoff

Richard Carrier

I don't have time to participate in this but I will make a brief interjection of interest to those here:

I am researching and writing a chapter on this very subject for a forthcoming book. I don't have time to get involved in this thread, but rest assured everything here will be addressed in my chapter.

However, as just one example of a number of problems that exist in the thread's opening argument:

Paul rejected many fundamental tenets of Phariseeism when he converted, e.g. circumcision, so physical resurrection is no more inviolate a conviction. To the contrary, that may have been the last stumbling block preventing him from accepting Christ.

Also, I do not ignore this point in my online material on the subject as the poster claims, so he must not have read all the relevant sections. He only links to one of several that discuss the issue, so evidently he hasn't familiarized himself with my entire argument. Everyone: start at http://www.infidels.org/library/mode...rection/3.html and keep going. Don't just stop on section 3b.

Full details and other points will have to wait for the book's publication, but you get the gist of what sorts of things are amiss here, I think.

Incidentally, the ultimate sourcebook that will redefine scholarship in this area is Alan Segal's new book, Life After Death: A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion due out by early next year, but already open to pre-sale on Amazon. No discussion of this issue will be up-to-date without reading it, once it is available. It covers and synthesizes material I know most scholars aren't even aware of. I'm in a privileged position of having gotten advanced looks, which is why I can say it is a must-read here. I expect it will come to press well before my chapter does.

CJD

The only valid point in this statement, Richard, is the fact that Paul's Jewish background does not mean that he necessarily believed in a physical resurrection. But at the very least, Paul's Jewish background can substantiate the plausibility that he would have no problems with a physical resurrection. One facet of the argument is NOT "Paul was a Pharisee, therefore Paul held to a physical resurrection"; rather, it is more like "Paul was a Pharisee, therefore it is more plausible that the doctrine of a physical resurrection would not have provided a stumbling block to him. This, and his use of soma give more weight to the idea that he believed in a physical resurrection as opposed to a purely wispy or vaporous resurrection."

Yeah, that's why he had Timothy circumcised. No, his problem with circumcision as promoted by the "Judaizers" was that the act itself in no way could put one in better standing with YHWH through the Christ. The "fundamental tenets" of the Phariseeism of Paul's own day that the Apostle rejected were 1) legalism (like that described above); and 2) bigoted ethnocentricism.

Regards,

CJD

Steven Carr

And how does God transform the bodies of people who have been cremated or eaten, using your criteria of 'continuity'?


Agreed. But as Paul is explicit that for the living their earthly tent will drop away and they will be clothed in a new heavenly tent, he must also mean that the dead will receive a new heavenly tent, one which was not made from human hands, one made in Heaven , and one which has not been present on earth before.


Paul is utterly clear about this difference between his present earthly body and his new heavenly body in 2 Corinthians.

The fact that Paul thinks the dead and the living will end up in the same identical transformed state, means that he thinks the living will receive new bodies, just as the dead whose ashes have been scattered to the four winds will also receive new bodies.

Steven Carr

Of course, you need at least a little evidence that Paul thought Heavenly bodies were wispy or vapourous.

Another false dichotomy from Christians. Paul thought we would get new bodies, heavenly bodies. This does not mean 'wispy' or 'vapourous'.

'Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God'

Steven Carr

From
http://www.christendom-awake.org/pag...surrection.htm

'Wright's acceptance of that point runs into objections from Alan F. Segal, a Jewish historian at Barnard College who is completing a major work titled Life After Death covering Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Segal and Wright agree on many basic issues, including that the Gospels teach a material, physical concept of resurrection. But Segal opposes Wright's contention that first-century Jews and Christians all meant the same thing when they spoke about resurrection.

According to Segal, they "all talk about a bodily resurrection but not all believe it is physical," and the Apostle Paul conceived of a "spiritual" body in the pivotal passage, 1 Corinthians 15, written about 20 years after the Easter events.

In this crucial and rather technical argument, Wright insists that what Paul meant by "spiritual" was that after Resurrection the body is "animated by the spirit," not that it is a nonmaterial body.'

I do find it surprising that Paul is supposed to have thought that Jesus was God Incarnate, and that his body was not animated by the spirit (whatever that means).

One good candidate for a person who has a body animated by the spirit is God Incarnate surely?

The page also writes :-
'Some argue modern science has taught us the Resurrection was impossible, as were other miracles. To Wright, it's silly to think first-century Christians were "ignorant of the fact that dead people stayed dead." They knew this, but were convinced Jesus was the one exception.'

The ONE exception?

Hadn't the disciples seen Jesus raise people from the dead?

Geoff Hudson

HJ raised spirits from corpses, as in the case of Lazarus. The dead stayed dead. The blind stayed blind, and the lame stayed lame. It was all about making the spirit of a person acceptable to God. Resurrection was a later development.

Geoff