Elijah

Not if you believe in mind-over-matter/faith and see the material world as an illusion/inferior to the spiritual world that can be minipulated with thought. The resurrection is really a counter to an astral realm afterlife of the supernaturalistic pagans... which they knew was impossible.

They believed eternal life was the natural state of man and that we were in a fallen state due to how we were living. Once we get back to our intended/ideal state then anything was possible; where there is a will there is a way, given enough time.

Paul had the gnostic/platonic concept of flesh/matter being corrupt/evil so it would be impossible for us to live eternally with fleshy bodies so he proposed a new type of body on resurrection.

Amaleq13

Yep. Different bodies that were, according to 1 Thess 4:16-18, going to be taken up into the clouds to be in heaven with God.

IOW, exactly what you claim Paul didn't believe.

Elijah

Heaven in the air?

Amaleq13

That's what Paul says.

Heaven is up.

Elijah

Where does he say heaven is in the air? (IMO) He is speaking of a resurrection on earth with a different type of non corruptible bodies.

Amaleq13

I quoted 1 Thess 4 so that you would read it.

Yes, we've seen that your opinion and the texts do not necessarily agree. Paul quite explicitly describes the faithful leaving the earth to go up into the clouds and air to be in heaven with the Lord forever.

Elijah

Ugh... they aren't in heaven nor does it say they go there.

Edit: That ugh wasn't directed at you, but me screwing up this post so many times.

Amaleq13

Still haven't read it? Cognitive dissonance in action, folks. :banghead:

The Lord descends from heaven and the faithful are taken up into the clouds and air to be with the Lord forever.

Jeffrey Gibson

I wonder if you'd be kind enough to lay out the nature and extent of your grounding in Ancient philosophy, neo-Platonism and popular Hellenistic religion.


Specifically, what authoritative studies on these topics not to mention primary literature from Platonists and neo Platonists and Stoics and Epicureans and Peripatetics, etc. or writers on Greek and Roman religion like Plutarch and Lucian, informs your claims? Do you have formal training in the field of Ancient Philosophy and Greco Roman religion?

And what informs your claims about Paul and his purported acquaintance with neo-platonism and ancient "rationalist"? Have you had formal training in Pauline studies? If so, when and where?

Are you at all acquainted with the literature on Paul and Greco Roman philosophy such as Abraham J. Malherbe's Paul and the Popular Philosophers (or via: amazon.co.uk) or Troels Engberg-Pedersen's Paul and the Stoics (or via: amazon.co.uk) or Stan Stowers' "Does Pauline Christianity Resemble a Hellenistic Philosophy?," in Paul Beyond the Judaism/Hellenistm Divide (or via: amazon.co.uk) ed. Troels Engberg-Pedersen (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001) 81-10 or the entries on Paul and Philosophy in The Dictionary of Paul and his Letters (or via: amazon.co.uk), or the studies in Paul in the Greco Roman Word: A Handbook (or via: amazon.co.uk), edited by J. Paul Sampley? Are you even aware of these works?

In other words, why should anyone accept you as an authority on these matters?

Jeffrey

bacht

It would be better if you just said "this is my interpretation, not based on any scholarly research", rather than implying that yours is the obvious reading. There is no conspiracy here against your position, but you have to be able to defend it somehow. There are several posters here with unorthodox theories, but they at least acknowledge the work of others in the field.