I really don’t believe you’ll ever understand the full scope and true-root of my undying and passionate hatred for sousleep this side of the river Jordan…And there is nothing I could say to express my hatred, and I mean hatred, of it that would be appropriate for this site.
Inexpressibly put; I’d talk more, but the rage I feel at the doctrine of soulsleep is simply not something I could contain in the conversation that would follow. For your sake therefore, and the for sake of our mutual dignity and respect; I leave it. If the doctrine of soulsleep was the only viable truth of God’s ideal for man and his purposes for them, the only viable truth of scripture - I would hate him and his book as much or more as I hate the view of God and interpretations of his book that the Eternal Damnationalists swear to be infallibly true, self-evident, and biblical.
That this doctrine causes distance between me and God, a distance made of hate, rather than the immediate embracing and rejoicing that Universal Salvation brought; is enough to say to me - “Believe it not, believe it never”. I’ll follow that voice, whether or not I can “back it up” with a number of scripture, satisfying to your standard. I already presented scripture, you refused them as being of poor quality, or illusory. Your interpretations I reject as MacDonald would reject them.
Again, for sake of dignity, and my own sanity, I must refuse further discussion on my part.
I regret that this topic has stirred up in you such negative and volatile emotions, although I am still perplexed as to why your reaction to this doctrine is as negative as it is. You’re the first person with whom I’ve interacted on this topic who has expressed such a visceral hatred and loathing for the idea that God might have ordered our existence in such a way that we are unconscious between our death and resurrection. Whereas this does not at all seem to me to be inconsistent with God’s love for us, your view seems to be that it is just as inconsistent with God’s love as the doctrine of eternal torment. And as long as you feel the way you do, I do think any further discussion of this topic would be largely unfruitful. I’ll leave the ball in your court.
It is really simple. Soul sleep says that upon death we are separated from God, waiting for something which should have already happened 2000 years ago to reconcile man to God. To say that the soul sleeps, or continues to be dead despite Life already been made known, makes God weak, and any universalist view of Soteriology flawed as well as Jesus’s words become muddled when he speaks of those would not die.
The only “elements” to which a living soul returns after death are those from which the physical body was made. The “spirit” that is represented as returning to God who gave it is the “breath of life” that makes a “soul” a “living soul” (rather than a dead soul) whether it be a human or animal. Unless that which God breathed into man to make him a “living soul” was a pre-existent conscious being, there is nothing conscious that leaves man at death. The “breath of life” (i.e., the “spirit” that returns to God who gave it) is not something that is conscious or which has any actual, literal existence apart from a living body; it’s simply a figurative way of speaking of our life or vitality (or vital power), which is manifested through breathing. It’s the attribute that is commong to all “living souls,” and without which they couldn’t be described as “living.” And I don’t read anything in Scripture that remotely suggests that any part of us transcends time and is not “bound by nature of physics.” While certainly interesting, it is, I believe, a purely speculative theory.
While the belief in an immediate resurrection following death was a fairly common view among 19th century American universalists, I don’t think it is very consistent with what Paul reveals:
“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ” (1 Cor 15:20-23).
It is at Christ’s “coming” that the dead are raised (“then at his coming”). But what “coming of Christ” is Paul talking about here? Answer: It is evidently the same “coming” referred to in the following places:
“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go and prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John 14:2-3).
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11; cf. 3:21).
“But our citizenship is in heaven, *and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform *(or “fashion anew”) our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself” (Phil 3:20-21).
This “coming of Christ” is a future event that is to take place in time, not “outside of time.”
Speaking of this same future event, Paul goes on to say (1 Cor 15:50-52):
“I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall 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 shall be changed.”
Here the resurrection of all who die in Adam is spoken of as being simultaneous with the “change” which those who will still be alive at the time are to undergo. And both the resurrection of the dead and the change of the living will take place “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.” That the sounding of the “last trumpet” and the raising of the dead/changing of the living takes place in time is even more evident from 1 Thess 4:13-18, where Paul writes:
“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
Here we find that those who will still be alive at this “coming” of Christ (i.e., those who will be “changed”) will, at some point after the sounding of the “last trumpet,” be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. But before this happens, the dead will be raised imperishable (which, as revealed in 1 Cor 15:50-52, will take place at the same time that the living are “changed” or “put on immortality”). Then, with death, the “last enemy,” destroyed, both those died prior to Christ’s coming and those who will still be alive will be “caught up together” to meet the Lord in the air.
Jesus refers to this future time when the dead are raised by him as the “last day” (John 6:39-40; cf. 11:24).
So according to your view, when does a resurrected person become conscious of his having been raised from the dead? Immediately after dying, or after the “last trumpet” has sounded at Christ’s coming to destroy death? And when do you think Christ became conscious of his having been raised from the dead? Was it immediately after he breathed his last on the cross, or was it on the third day?
You seem to have conveniently left out Jesus’ next words in v. 3: “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” As is evident from the above passages quoted which speak of the resurrection of the dead and the change of the living, Christ’s “coming again” to take his disciples to himself is a future event that will take place in time. The idea of an “immediate resurrection” is, I believe, completely foreign to the Scriptures. All such talk about the “spirit” that returns to God at death being outside of time and “not bound by nature or physics” is, I believe, an attempt to reconcile that which simply cannot be reconciled (i.e., your belief in an “immediate resurrection” after death with what Scripture actually reveals about the subject).
Perhaps I’m misunderstanding you here, but is it your view that all people past, present and future were reconciled to God 2,000 years ago?
My understanding is that our being reconciled to God denotes a change in the status of our relationship. Those who have, by faith, been reconciled to God do not cease to be reconciled to God or cease to be “in Christ” after they die any more than God ceases to love them. Being dead (and thus unconscious), they’re simply no longer aware of their reconciled status. But they’re still “in Christ,” and he is still their Savior and Lord. When they’re restored to a living, conscious existence at Christ’s coming to destroy death (when the “last trumpet” sounds), their awareness and enjoyment of their reconciled status will be restored as well.
What do you mean by “life” in the above quote, and what is your understanding of the “death” that Jesus said believers wouldn’t die?
Part of my major problem is the existential degradation that inevitably occurs with taking soulsleep to its ultimate conclusions about the human being. Namely, my issues entirely with the nature of the human being, being little deeper than his skin.
I embrace the ideal and view that man is “an immortal soul” - that is to say that the breath of God is not just force-energy for animating a knit together material construct; a mere machine. Even a complex, or even a “pretty” piece of machine, is still merely a machine. I embrace the idea that Man is more than the sum of his parts, but that existentially he is a far more beautiful, brighter, higher, superior sentient essence, and being; beyond the material (brightless dust) that envessels him, pretty or complex though that dust may be. He’s not just a collection of strung together complexities of elements driven by chemical fired instincts ruled by circumstance, imputed to be in the image of God - yet so thoroughly alien in that he has no individuality that is immortal as God after whom he is modeled is ultimately immortal.
He, the human, bears in the fundamental way no true resemblance to God if there is no essential-being that is primarily transcendent of the sum of his parts, or the rudiments of his functions; as God is by his nature and essential being transcendent over, for example, circumstance. “He has the power to lay down his life, and take it up again”.
In other words, I believe that the breath of God is the empowering, but also and especially is the very Individuality, the individual living expression of a life-being that being empowered by God’s very self as an artistic, creative, existence is that reflective image of The Life, Creator, Sentient Being (I AM) - in the fullest sense of the word, not merely imputed or “resembling” that image, and not in an abstract moral sense or evolutionary sense of metaphorically “walking upright”. There is this resemblance by default in the material body, but I must believe that there is surely something far more beautiful, and far more tangible to the human being than the seat of his brain, or the depth of his skin; and more in a true-sense, not the abstract sense. I hold that if the image of God is little deeper than the “visible material” of his body, God must be just as shallow; because by fundamental essence the image of God must reflect the God who modeled it. If the image, by fundamental essence is no deeper than his skin (his visible matter), then God is by fundamental essence no deeper than matter itself. We venture into the realm of Pantheism, forgoing the transcendent and infinite nature of God who is, even Panentheistically (which I hold true of God, doctrinally I am also a Panentheist, which is not a Pantheist; there is a difference) above his creation.
If being in the image of God is not so full and expressive as I’ve mentioned, in that God is somehow a being of depth beyond the pantheist concept that I believe soulsleep presents; then I believe that there is an untruth in the very idea that mankind is made in the image of God at all, if that image is so very shallow from the onset of that image’s existence. It makes God utterly alien to the human being, if nothing more than a mutual metaphorical “walking upright” is what constitutes the bulk of that reflector/reflection relationship.
I believe that the human being, being the image of God, must reflect certain unalienable truths about the essential and fundamental nature of the God who made him. There is an equivalent exchange between God and God’s image in the nature of who God is - and through that exchange a further understanding of who God’s image is. Though God’s image is “fallen” and the image of God is marred or muddled, there is yet undeniable truth that cannot wholly be usurped or destroyed for the obvious reasons. It is in these truths of the human being that we see ultimately a picture of our Maker. We are God’s children, we bear resemblance to our Father, and so our Father also bears resemblance to us. Hence if we are fundamentally, by nature of our very Imageness, no deeper than our visible matter with no transcendent, existential, sentient quality; so too we might very well conclude the same of God in the scope of who he is in his own fundamental nature. A being little more than the sum of His parts and functions. The pantheist mechanical god over machines as mechanical as itself.
I believe that the Individuality, the breath of God as being an empowered “Sentient-Breath”, a “piece” or reflection and emanation of the pure essence of God expressed as an individual being in his image and likeness, bright and beautiful as God is bright and beautiful also empowers the dust or shape it wears for some function in the lower (visible) material world. Basically, God empowers the Individuality (The Breath) which is by default an empowered noun, and by being empowered, empowers the thing it dwells in. What could be considered a basic principle of “God-breathed scriptures”, the “spirit” behind the “letter”. Man is a God-breathed and inspired being. Comparatively, if it is just ‘letter’ (visible material) with no ‘living spirit’ (living, sentient essence) - beautiful though it may be, it is little more than fluff.
I put the universe in this order; “Spirit downward” not “Material upward” in its dependency trend. God is Spirit and God does not depend on matter to exist - he is not the Pantheos; matter depends on God.
I want to be clear that I do not neglect that the body has importance in the identity of the human being, but I do not dare to base the existential essence of the human being on the parts that the breath of God by default empowers to be animate. This breath of God, is God’s very own essence; hence carrying with it at least some expression of his essential attributes which are in one accord. The Human being can love, and the human being can live, and the human being is especially sentient; it is through these attributes expressed in the breath of God that I believe this sentience, will, and other attributive essentials that are integral to an Individuality’s existence - are presented and empowering to the body it animates. This in the same way that God, who is the Prime Individual, empowers matter and creation to exist - sustaining it and maintaining it by means of his empowering Spirit, that is by means of his transcendent self.
I believe that the Person is the Breath. It was not until the breath was breathed that the Adam was deemed alive, or a living soul. Before that it was a shell of dust for all intents and purposes; as far as I am able to interpret it wholesale. The life of a human is Breath dependent, and the Breath is not dust dependent in the same way that God who is the source of that Breath is not Matter dependent. I believe our being an image is weaved integrally with this essential idea. We are God dependent, solely, for our existential individuality. We are not dust dependent any more than God is matter dependent. We are made after the image, the reflection, and likeness of this God to depend on, and be sustained by Him. I see little reason, even Biblical reason, to avoid believing the highest possible good (one reason I embrace Universalism) when it comes to God and the Truth. That we are God dependent solely, higher beings transcendent of visible matter, dust, or the sum of our parts; is to me a superior and higher expression of the Spirit behind the Biblical truth.
So there are two major reasons I want to express that show why I have such a volatile opinion of soulsleep. I feel, expressively so, that it is negative trend and trends towards a derogatory view of what is true; about God, and about Man, and about the mutual dealings between.
First is that it conclusively speaks to a pantheistic god, who is mechanical, shallow in his scope, and utilitarian. Every bit of that is anathema to me.
Second is that it conclusively speaks to a human being who is little more than an humanly intelligent beast with no higher transcendent value other than “I say it has value” - it is a spiritually expressed system of fiat. Imputed worth is merely imputed to be valuable, adding the word “God” in the sentence doesn’t make it any less true.
What it personally says to me, and my existential state; is that I am not the beautiful true-self transcendent image of God who shall have a beautiful body to match the intended creation that I am; that is a “bright breath of God” a divinely inspired Individuality. It reduces me to a beast, humanly intelligent…but a beast. No deeper than the sum of my parts, no deeper than the depth of my skin whose worth and value is based on an economy of divine fiat, or imputed worth and imputed resemblance of image-reflectiveness. But little true transcendent substance, if any at all. I become degraded, and adding “God made your body” into the sentence doesn’t negate that degradation. It actually enhances it and irritates it exponentially - putting the focus of my view directly on God as being an irrespective utilitarian pantheist deity, mechanical and cold in the truth of the matter. My embrace of the brighter ideal is replaced by an alien god and a very dismal view of self.
“I’m just skin and bones, there is no bright light that I am. I am not the free spirit of breath and light, no ministering flame, no high noble transcendent expression of the deity’s being. I am but a pretending beast, I am but an organic machine.”
Poetically speaking I go from being an angel made by YHWH, to being a glorified rat made by the hands of a divine NIMH.
(though I myself believe animals have a “soul” also)
And since I already foresee the inevitable response; “back it up with scripture?” In due time I’m sure I will. But for now, I see it in the white beneath the letters of black, as for proofs consider it following a command of Christ; “Consider ye the lilies”. I’ve considered them spiritual in the true sense of the word.
As for the Biblical view, I can only express the same sentiments as Studentoftheword. It makes God feeble too, and thoroughly ensures the existential death of the individuality of whom Christ promised would never die. I myself have taken him at the truest good height of his word. I, that which is me, will never die if I live and believe in him. I do live and believe in him, therefore I (the individuality that is me) shall never die.
If I am my body, and my body dies, and thus I die, then Christ has sinned in lying or misleading even in the Greek. What does it mean to not die unto the age? If I understand “The Age” to be that time when Christ fulfills his promises as Messiah, that is “the reign to come”, then I should understand that I won’t see existential death even up to that point. At which case that begs the question; what about after that point? What about after “The Age”? If the Age is the reign of Christ then I believe any concept of the saints experiencing existential death is moot and irrelevant by default - it won’t happen. There is little reason I see that it should, especially when is reign is to defeat Death. Cases could be made for it, but so too can cases be made for ETC and the devil being in the Tsunami that hit Japan…but cases made are not automatically right, let alone smart.
Another problem I have is what I’ve expressed before, it does imply that the Living slip from the fingers of Life. Otherwise, we’d never have died the existential death in the first place having always that connection unsevered to our sustaining Life. We’d always hold on, even if by a thread’s breadth - but that would be enough for us to be alive. I see no reason why God should hold his people at such a distance, such a precarious edge as to possibly lose them. It is poor stewardship that I will not blaspheme the Lord to attribute to him.
If you are existentially dead, you are not existentially alive. If you are existentially alive, you are not existentially dead.
To be existentially dead as soulsleep implies, it simply veers back to that fundamental point; Life did not keep you Alive as Life promised Life would. And if Life promised to keep me alive, I must understand that it does not, cannot mean less than what I can imagine. It must mean something good, in a way that I can recognise it as good, and better than I imagined it in its being good.
If none of this seems Biblical to you, more or less; then unfortunately I can’t oblige you any more than I already have. In which case I’d have to simply be honest, if soulsleep were the only viable biblical view I’d be more inclined to put my Bibles down and frolic in the woods. There would be better things for me to do with my time as I would not believe it given my experience, if only hopeful experience, that God is better than that. Thankfully I don’t believe it is the only viable Biblical view (in fact I don’t think it is Biblical at all if the verses are looked at in proper context beyond the cutting board science that people have made of it in theology…but that’s a different story altogether), but I believe rather that the higher ideal is most assuredly more true, and beyond that there are things not even the Bible, at least our Bibles contain that speak to the truth - consider ye the lilies of the field. The books required to record the deeds of Jesus would fill the kosmos. In essence Truth is not imprisoned between the covers of a book, even a God-breathed one. I sincerely believe there is a lot more to it than soulsleep premises from its interpretations, “Biblical” or not.
The idea of man being an “Immortal Soul” speaks to me as being the higher, and brighter, superior trend of interpretation over soulsleep in the same way that Universal Reconciliation speaks to me as being the higher, and brighter, superior trend of interpretation over ETC.
If (as you say) “man is an ‘immortal soul,’” then Adam was an “immortal soul” when God declared to him, “By the sweat of your face you shall eat your bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
So let’s consider the following argument:
Every man is an “immortal soul.”
“Adam” is a man.
Adam died and returned to the dust.
Therefore, an “immortal soul” died and returned to the dust.
We could also say:
Every man is an “immortal soul.”
“Stephen” is a man.
Stephen died and was buried by devout men.
Therefore, an “immortal soul” died and was buried by devout men.
As we both agree that “Adam” and “Stephen” were both men, the only way to avoid the above conclusions would be to either deny premise 1 or 3. Either “Adam” and “Stephen” are not “immortal souls,” or “Adam” did not die and return to the dust and “Stephen” did not die and was not buried.
Man’s being constituted by the physical body created for him by God does not entail that he is “merely a machine” or “just a collection of strung together complexities of elements driven by chemical fired instincts ruled by circumstance, imputed to be in the image of God.” Man is a person just like God is a person (i.e., a rational, self-aware being). And being a person, man has the capacity to make decisions governed by love rather than instinct, and to exercise dominion over lower forms of life in a way that is pleasing to God. But unlike God, man was created in such a way that he is constituted by a physical body that is made from the elements of this earth. And at the time of the resurrection, I believe the elements which constitute our mortal body will undergo a supernatural change, making us “heavenly” rather than “from the earth.”
So do you believe it is impossible for God to modify and organize matter in such a way as to give it the capacity to live and feel and think? That is, do you think it is impossible for God to bring persons into existence by modifying and organizing matter in a certain way?
“Circumstance” can be defined as “a condition that accompanies or influences some event or activity” or “a state of affairs.” So picking either definition, is God transcendent over the circumstances that define his own existence? That is, is God free to act contrary to the own self-existent nature? If not, then we have no reason to believe that man is free to act contrary to the circumstances that define his existence. It’s true that Jesus had the power to lay down his life and take it up again. His having the power to do this was part of the divinely-ordained circumstances in which he found himself.
I believe man is a personal (i.e., rational, self-aware) being who, by virtue of his creation by God, is constituted by a physical body, but man is not identical to his body. Even for those who believe in the “immortality of the soul,” man is often not spoken of as being identical to his “immortal soul,” for it is often said by the advocates of this system (and I would be surprised if you haven’t said or thought something similar yourself), “I believe I have an immortal soul,” or “When I die my immortal soul will depart from my body.” When spoken of in this way, the “immortal soul” is just one more “part” of man that makes him what he is.
Consider the following verse (which is often employed as a proof-text for immortal soul-ism): “And as [Rachel’s] soul was departing (for she was dying), she called his name Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin” (Gen 35:18). Notice that we are not told that “Rachel” was departing. Rather, we are told that something (i.e., her “soul” or nephesh) was departing from her. And after it departed, we then read (vv. 19-20), “So Rachel died, and she was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem), and Jacob set up a pillar over her tomb.” It is evident from these verses that “Rachel” was thought to be wherever her body was, not where her “soul” went. While we need not understand Rachel to have been strictly identical to her body, she was, at the very least, constituted by her body. When Rachel’s body died, Rachel died, and where Rachel’s body was buried, Rachel was buried. Same goes for every other human being.
So what was the “soul” (nephesh) that was said to depart from Rachel as she was dying? Answer: it was simply Rachel’s vitality or life, and means the same thing as the word ruach does in (for example) Ps. 146:4 and Eccl. 3:19. For a few examples where nephesh means “vitality” or “life” see Gen 1:20, 30; 19:17; Ex 4:19; 21:23; 1Sam 22:23; Job 12:10; Esther 7:7; Prov 12:10; Jonah 4:3).
Yes, I’m aware of the difference between pantheism and panenthesism, and I think we are, for the most part, in agreement on this point.
Now, according to your view, the “breath of God” (i.e., that which God breathed into Adam to make him a “living soul”) = “an immortal soul” and is “the very Individuality.” But if the person, Adam, was actually the “breath” that God breathed into what you have called an “overglorified organic machine,” then wouldn’t it have been more accurate and appropriate for God to have said to Adam, “By the sweat of your face you shall eat your bread [but can a “breath of life” sweat, and does it have a face? Can it eat bread?], till you return to me, for out of me you were taken; for you are a breath of life, and to me you shall return.” Wouldn’t this have been more consistent with what you say above? But of course, that’s not what God says. Adam was not constituted by the “breath of life” that God breathed into him; Adam was constituted by his physical body. Thus, when Adam’s physical body died and returned to the dust, Adam died and returned to the dust. But the person “Adam” did not return to God when he died, because the person “Adam” was not the “breath of life” that came from God. The “breath of life” was simply what made Adam a “living soul” (as opposed to an inanimate, dead soul). It’s what enabled Adam’s brain to function, and thus made it possible for Adam’s rational self-awareness to emerge.
Also, you speak of “resembling” the image of God (which is what you seem to think my view entails). But I don’t think we “resemble” God’s “image.” I think we resemble God, which is why we are said to bear his “image” and to have been created after his “likeness” (Gen 1:26-27; cf. 5:1). We are “like” God and resemble him in a certain way. But in what sense are we like God, and in what sense do we resemble him? Are we infinite, all-powerful, all-knowing, self-existent beings who rule as sovereign over all creation? Are we the creators of heaven and earth? Do we dwell in “unapproachable light” and alone have immortality (1 Tim 6:16)? No, none of these things are true of us. So what is the “likeness” that we share? Is it because we are immortal? No, because we aren’t immortal (yet; but we will be when we are raised from the dead and “death is swallowed up in victory” - 1 Cor 15:53-54; cf. 2 Cor 5:4). Is it the fact that we were created from the “dust of the earth” and will return to the dust after we die? No, because that’s what happens to every other creature on earth (and of course, God is not made of “dust”). Is it the fact that we are “living souls?” No, because other creatures who weren’t created in the image and after the likeness of God are called “living souls” as well. Is it the “breath of life” that we have as “living souls?” No, because this “breath of life” is shared by all “living souls,” whether human or not, and is represented as departing from both man and beast at death. Thus, in your attempt to “rescue” man from being what you call an “overglorified organic machine” you actually completely undermine his uniqueness and nobility by asserting that the divine image and likeness in which he was created consists in the “breath of life” or “spirit” which God breathed into Adam, and which is said to leave man at death.
No; as said before, both God and man are persons (i.e., rational, self-aware beings) who, as such, have a capacity for love. But unlike God, man is a finite, created and spatially extended being. And also unlike God, man’s personhood (although just as real and genuine as God’s) emerges as a result of the way in which God has modified and organized the matter that constitutes man’s physical body.
I agree!
We don’t have to not be spatially extended beings constituted by physical bodies in order to bear resemblance to our Father any more than we must be infinite, self-existent, omnipotent and omniscient beings to do so. Our “imageness” (as you say) is not found in these particular attributes. To say we must be immortal in order to bear God’s image is like saying we must be omnipotent or infinite. It’s true that one day we will be immortal (and thus like God in that sense), but this has nothing to do with our presently bearing God’s image. If it did, then even according to your view we would not be fully bearing God’s image at present, because there would still be a part of us that is mortal, whereas with God he is entirely immortal (i.e., there is no part of him that is mortal), and cannot die in any sense whatsoever.
I actually like your analogy, but I see it as supporting my view more so than your own. There is a sense in which we are like “letters” (“visible material”) that are “God-breathed.” But just as the letters of Scripture don’t have some kind of non-physical thing or substance “in” them from which they can be separated (for the ink that forms the inspired words found on the pages of Scriptures is entirely physical and material in essence), so we can be considered as “God-breathed” (i.e., as bearing God’s image and as revealing something about the mind of God) while still being entirely physical and material in our constitution.
When Jesus said, “God is spirit” (John 4:24), do you understand the word “spirit” to describe the kind of “stuff” or “substance” (for lack of a better word) that God is made of (i.e., as something distinct from matter?). Just wondering.
Even if I were to grant that the “breath of life” within us is not just the attribute that is common to all “living souls” and is what makes them “living souls” (i.e., life or vitality) but rather God’s “very own essence” (and a number of proponents of “soul-sleep” have believed just this) it wouldn’t mean this divine “essence” is what we are constituted by as human beings. Nor need one understand it to be the “stuff” in which our consciousness and personhood is found, or by which it is “carried.” One could understand our capacity for conscious personhood as being dependent on this “essence of God” being in our body without also believing that our consciousness continues after the “essence” leaves us at death and returns to God who gave it. That is, one could view it as necessary to our conscious existence without understanding it to “carry” our conscious existence after we die.
If the “person is the breath” (i.e., the “breath of life”) then what God should have told Adam is what I wrote earlier: “By the sweat of your face you shall eat your bread [but again, can a “breath of life” sweat, and does it have a face? Can it eat bread?], till you return to me, for out of me you were taken; for you are a breath of life, and to me you shall return.” Moreover, non-human animals have this same “spirit” or “breath” as humans do, and they’re not made in the image or likeness of God. And are they “God-dependent” in the same sense as you believe we are?
As far as man being “body (or matter)-dependent” vs. “God-dependent,” I believe (as stated earlier) that we are dependent on our body (in a relative sense) and on God (in an absolute sense), who both created our body and gives us life. As the Giver of life, he sustains us every moment. Every day that was formed for us is written in his book (Ps. 139:16), and God alone has ultimate control over when we die:
“If he should set his heart to it and gather to himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh would perish together, and man would return to dust” (Job 34:14-15). (Notice that it says “all flesh would perish together.” Every “living soul” - whether man or beast - is alive because of the same “spirit” or “breath” from God, and if God were to “gather to himself his spirit and his breath” both man and beast would perish)
“You return man to dust and say, ‘Return, O children of man!’” (Ps. 90:3). (Btw, how can “man” be returned to dust if “man” is an “immortal soul?”)
Moreover, couldn’t I respond to all of your comments about man being “God-dependent” vs. “matter-dependent” by saying that, according to your view, man is not “God-dependent” but rather “immortal soul-dependent?” That is, according to your view, God simply brings each individual “immortal soul” into existence and then, like the deistic god, can step away from his creation and no longer need involve himself with keeping it in existence. Once created, the “immortal soul” is no longer dependent on its Creator but on its own inherent immortal nature. Once God brings an “immortal soul” into existence it will never cease to exist, but will go on functioning just as it was meant to function.
And we should just accept what you say as true and “conclusive” because you feel so strongly about it? Because thus far I’ve seen hardly any reasoning or argumentation to support your assertions. I have seen a lot of passionately held opinions from you concerning things that one could have no certain knowledge of apart from a revelation from God (such as your view that the physically dead are conscious).
According to my view, man’s being in God’s image and likeness is absolutely essential to who and what he is. For man to cease to bear God’s image he would cease to be man. The divine image in which he was created is inseparable from his nature and genetic makeup; his DNA and everything about him would have to be completely altered in order for him to cease to bear God’s image. So I think you’re very much mistaken for asserting that, according to my view, it is something that is “imputed” to him or a “spiritually expressed system of fiat.”
It’s almost as if the author of Ecclesiastes wrote the following just to respond to your last statement:
“I said in my heart with regard to the children of man that God is testing them that they may see that they themselves are but beasts. For what happens to the children of man and what happens to the beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts, for all is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 3:18-19).
It’s very humbling, I know. So what makes us different than all the other creatures God has made? Well, because we were created with a superior brain we can think like God thinks and have understanding of God and his ways (significantly, those who are “without understanding” are said to be “like the beasts that perish” - Ps. 49:20). We can also exercise our will over creation in the way that God has commanded (Gen 1:26-28), and we can love as God loves. No other creature on earth can love its enemies. But why? Because it lacks an “immortal soul?” No. It’s because they were not “fearfully and wonderfully made” with the kind of brain that we were created with. Because of how God designed us, we can love our enemies - and when we do so, we resemble God (Matt 5:43-48). And what’s more, we can do all of these remarkable things (things which reveal our divine likeness to God and our superiority over every other earthly animal created by God) without having to possess an “immortal soul.”
I should also add that another important thing which separates man from the beasts is that he has been given the promise of a resurrection to immortality. While both man and beast die and return to the dust, man has been promised ultimate deliverance from death. We are told that those who have been raised from the dead “cannot die anymore, because they are equal to the angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection” (Luke 20:36). When Jesus says that those raised from the dead “cannot die anymore” it’s evident that he is talking about a different kind of death than what he was referring to in John 11:26. The former is physical death and is tied to our consciousness (for those whose brain has stopped functioning have lost consciousness), while the latter is a spiritual condition in this life and has nothing to do with whether or not we are conscious after physical death.
While beautifully expressed, the above is (like much of what you’ve said concerning what I believe) a misrepresentation and distorted caricature of my view.
I believe just what Christ promised as well, and don’t see his promise as having anything at all to do with whether or not believers consciously exist after physical death. I’m still puzzled as to why you understand Christ in this way. Again, I must ask: what do you think happens to those who don’t live and believe in Christ? Do unbelievers cease to consciously exist after they physically die, while believers don’t? And are those who are presently “dead in sin” without conscious existence or “existentially dead?” If not, then when Christ promised that those who live and believe in him will not “die for the age” (which implies that those who don’t live and believe in him will “die for the age”), he isn’t saying their conscious existence will not cease after they physically die, for that’s not the “death” Christ has in view. Unbelievers are not doomed to temporarily cease to consciously exist after they physically die because they didn’t “live and believe in Christ,” nor are believers exempted from temporarily ceasing to consciously exist after they physically die because they did “live and believe in Christ.”
You are not your body. You are a human person constituted by your body. And the fact that your conscious existence will be put on hold when you die does not mean Christ was lying or misleading you “even in the Greek,” because Christ wasn’t talking about physical death or “existential death” when he said that those who live and believe in him “will not die unto the age.”
Christ was no more promising in John 11:26 that certain people will not “existentially die” than he was promising that certain people will not physically die. Rather, I believe he was talking about the kind of “death” that Adam died on the day that he sinned, and which Paul speaks of in Eph 2:1. And it’s my understanding that Christ was talking about the age of his reign (which, as is revealed in 1 Cor 15:24-28, will one day end). All who are believing on Christ during this time will not be “dead in sin.” Rather, they will enjoy the “life of the age.” So what happens when Christ’s reign ends? All who physically die will be raised immortal and those who are still alive at the time this takes place will be “changed.” And the blessing that had been enjoyed by living believers during the duration of Christ’s reign (the “life of the age”) will be replaced by a different and greater blessing that will universally enjoyed, whether one was just or unjust: a glorious and sinless immortality. Unlike the blessing promised by Christ in John 11:26, this blessing cannot be secured by faith in Christ, nor can it be forfeited by unbelief.
Again, Christ is no more promising in John 11:26 that certain people will not “existentially die” than he is promising that certain people will not physically die. Rather, he’s promising that those who live and believe in him will not suffer that “death” which Paul calls being “dead in trespasses and sins.” And they don’t.
Don’t worry; God is not going to lose anyone. All people have been given to Christ by God (John 3:35; 13:3; Matthew 11:27; Luke 10:22; Ps. 2:8; Heb 1:2), and it is God’s will that Christ not lose any of all that God has given him, but should “raise it up on the last day” (John 6:39). Because all who die in Adam will be made alive in Christ on the “last day,” it follows that none will be lost. While physical death is an enemy, it is not inconsistent with God’s love for you. Not only will you have no awareness of being physically dead, but it is only temporary. Your next conscious experience after death will be awakening from death on the “last day.”
Agreed!
The only group of people who have been given the promise that they will not physically die (and thus “existentially die”) are those who will still be physically alive when Christ comes to raise the dead (1 Cor 15:51; 1 Thess 4:13-18). Unless you happen to be one of these people, there is not a single promise in Scripture that you will be kept existentially alive prior to becoming immortal. But again, this is nothing to be fearful of or upset about, because you will have no awareness of being dead, and death is only temporary.
Some would say that if God existed and was truly good and all-powerful there would be no suffering or evil, because a truly good and all-powerful God would be “better than that.” But of course, the tremendous suffering that Christ endured is not at all inconsistent with God’s love or his power. Similarly, while temporarily ceasing to consciously exist may seem to you to be inconsistent with God’s love and power, perhaps it is no more inconsistent with God’s love and power than Christ’s suffering and death was. You may not understand why God would order our existence in such a way that our conscious existence is put on hold at death, and you may prefer that this not be the case (just as we would all prefer that we not have to physically die), but this doesn’t make it at all inconsistent with God’s love or power.
When you talk about looking at certain verses in their “proper context,” do you mean looking at them in the context of those texts that you seem to think are so conclusive in their support of your position that the dead are conscious (such as 1 Sam 28, Luke 23:43 and Rev 6:9-11)? If so, then couldn’t I just as easily say that it is your position which is not “Biblical at all if the verses are looked at in proper context beyond the cutting board science that people have made of it in theology”? Of course, you may argue that your own intuitions about what is “ideal” and what is most consistent with God’s love should be considered as part of the “context” in which we interpret Scripture, but why should I believe your own intuitions about what is “ideal” and what is most consistent with God’s love are correct and mine are false?
Some would say that the “higher ideal” is that we not have to suffer pain or physical death at all, and that God should’ve originally created man in such a way that he could not and would not suffer pain or die. That is, it could be argued that the “higher ideal” is that the original condition in which man was created should have been one in which we would exist in the kind of uninterrupted, deathless state that many believe we will begin to enjoy immediately after we physically die, when our “immortal soul” leaves our body. After all, death is an enemy, so existing in a condition in which we must die cannot be considered the “higher ideal,” can it? But perhaps the “higher ideal” is not that which is according to our own opinion and preference. Perhaps what you happen to believe is the “higher ideal” may not, in fact, be the highest ideal in God’s eyes. I’m more inclined to think that the “higher ideal” is that which is according to God’s sovereign will and purpose for our existence, and which he has revealed to us in Scripture.
And to this one could respond, “The idea of man being created a mortal creature who, in distinction from every other mortal creature, is destined to be raised immortal from the dead and made equal to the angels in heaven speaks to me as being the higher, and brighter, superior trend of interpretation over “immortal soul-ism” in the same way that Universal Reconciliation speaks to me as being the higher, and brighter, superior trend of interpretation over ECT.”
I’ll close with the following words from Paul and a few brief comments:
“The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are of the dust, and as is the man of heaven, so also are those who are of heaven. Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the man of heaven” (1 Cor 15:47-49).
According to Paul, no man will be “of heaven” or will “bear the image of the man of heaven” until he is raised with an imperishable, glorious, powerful, spiritual body. Until this happens, we “bear the image of the man of dust” and are “of the dust.” But “immortal souls” would not be “of the dust” but rather “of heaven.” Thus, we are not “immortal souls.”
I’ll just get to the root of it outside of the peripheral politic; here is the summary of our viewpoints in contrast.
a. You believe all is physical, and nothing exceeds that physical/visible boundary.
b. I believe all (or atleast there is a state of existence which; - ) is both physical, and transcends that physical/visible boundary.
Is this a valid representation of your view? All is physical, and nothing exceeds that physical/visible boundary? No transcendent agent beyond said existential boundary?
I’m not really sure how this gets to the root of our discussion, because (as I think I’ve noted previously) a number of proponents of the idea of soul-sleep are “dualists” in regards to human nature; they simply deny that the non-material aspect of our nature that leaves the body at death is where our “seat of consciousness” is found, or that the non-material aspect of our nature can be conscious or “carry” our consciousness apart from its being united to the material aspect of our nature. Understood in this way, the “spirit” or “breath of life” that is said to leave us at death would in fact be understood to be an “immaterial substance” of some sort (perhaps made of the same immaterial “stuff” that God is thought to be made of), but rather than being an “immortal soul” that is conscious after death, it is instead understood to be that which animates us, thus enabling our brain to function and our consciousness to emerge while we’re alive. So one does not have to deny that there is some kind of non-physical aspect of our nature in order to deny that the dead are conscious.
My own view is pretty speculative, as I don’t understand Scripture as revealing much about what you’ve asked me. I believe that everything that exists in the universe was created out of the fullness of God’s own infinite being (rather than ex nihilo), and at its most fundamental level is made of whatever it is that makes God “something” rather than “nothing.” It’s not my view that God is “material” in the sense of being made out of atoms or subatomic particles (e.g., quarks or gluons) but I am inclined to believe that atoms/subatomic particles are, in a sense, “made of God” (in the sense of being an extension or projection of whatever makes God “something” rather than “nothing”). Because I believe that all that exists was created out of God’s own infinite fullness and is, at its most fundamental level, comprised of whatever it is that makes God “something” rather than “nothing,” God is able to interpenetrate every part of his creation without, at the same time, being identical to, or synonymous with, his creation. He is both in and through his creation and he transcends his creation.
Hope that helps.
Now, if you don’t have time to respond to everything or even some of what I wrote in my previous post, I understand. But if you do have time (and there’s no hurry), I would greatly appreciate your thoughts.
I understand Jesus’ argument to be that God would not have called himself the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob if these three patriarchs were going to remain dead forever. The very fact that God called himself their God when these men were dead demands that they be, at some point, raised from the dead (i.e., restored to a living existence, for to be resurrected is to be restored to life after having died).
So since God is not the God of the dead but of the living, and God calls himself the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob after these three men had died (and been dead for generations), then it follows by logical deduction that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob would be restored to life by a resurrection - for it is only by a resurrection that the dead can be said to “live again.” In other words, when accepted and applied to Ex 3:6, Jesus’ premise (i.e., that “God is not the God of the dead but of the living”) leads to the logical conclusion that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob will be (or perhaps had been) raised from the dead. But since Scripture elsewhere indicates that the resurrection is a future event that is to take place for all people at a single moment in time rather than a progressive event that takes place immediately after each individual dies (which seems to be StudentoftheWord’s view), I think we can be sure that Jesus understood Ex. 3:6 to reveal (i.e., in conjunction with his premise) that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob would not remain dead forever, but rather would be restored to life at some future time. Thus, the doctrine of the resurrection is found to be supported by a passage of Scripture that even the Sadducees accepted as authoritative and inspired.
But to conclude from Jesus’ words that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were “alive” at the time God spoke to Moses without their having been raised from the dead would not support Jesus’ argument for the resurrection, but would rather serve to undermine it. For if Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were “alive” after they died without their having been raised from the dead, how would their being “alive” after death lead to the conclusion that they or anyone else will be raised from the dead? For again, to be “resurrected” in the sense of which Christ is speaking in this passage is to be restored to a living existence sometime after death. To me, the only logical conclusion to which one could arrive when reading this passage is that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob either had been raised from the dead when God spoke to Moses, or that they would be raised from the dead at some future time.
I ask it so I can understand your view from a yea/nay view, and if your view is not as I’ve presented it; I want to be able to alter my understanding to meet the core issue at hand.
Obviously, we are not denying, on a mutual basis, scriptural authority (even giving margin that our understanding of ‘authority’ may be different) - nor are we denying the faith, or even the importance of the body as a fearfully made ‘thing’. But our interpretations are so vastly different, and for my end I find the interpretation you follow to be derogatory to the human being in the truest sense. I don’t think you understand “why” I find it so hideous, as you’ve expressed - and especially as you’ve stated in answer “you don’t have anything to be afraid of” - which is a sign that you’re missing my point, but I can’t express it in another way until further understanding is reached.
I am certain that we will not be able to reach any sort of discussory conclusion until I understand your core-view, that is “your simple thesis statement”.
I want you to understand “why” I find this doctrine so derogatory, derogatory in that it fundamentally lowers the Human Being.
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.I wrote this awhile back, but my view has morphed a bit, so please read beyond the quoted text:
Those thoughts I had back then have led up to my current way of thinking and seeing all of this in that I don’t believe ANYONE was “asleep” or in “soul sleep” when they died before Jesus was ressurected. I think the spirit of man has ALWAYS gone on after death. I am wondering if perhaps the “dividing point” was more “NOW we KNOW”. Just like Jesus came to correct our views on so many things… for example, “You have heard it say, an eye for an eye… but I SAY”
Perhaps the dividing point wasn’t “NOW human beings will no longer “sleep” after death”, perhaps it was “Now human beings **have the knowledge **that they do not “sleep” after death”. Are you guys following me?
I believe the “dead bodies” that walked out of the graves, was like I said before, visions that people had of their loved ones. That is just a personal opinion. I have experienced this myself, in my own life. The events were absolutely life-changing to me and have not been able to be explained away as coincidence or wishful thinking. It was too strong.
Native Americans (not sure if it is a certain tribe or what, I know Cherokee does) believe that when a loved one passes over, they come back in a dream to a family member to let them know they are ok. So many people have had this phenomenon. I myself, would probably be skeptical if I didn’t have the experiences myself.
Well, I’m just throwing this stuff out there. I’m not trying to really prove anything or get involved in a lengthy debate… just wanted to share some ideas and perspectives and thoughts with you guys. Feel free of course to pick it apart, etc. I’ll of course respond! I just kind of dig discussions, laid-back talking than debates. Been through too many debates on message boards, kinda burned out. Wow… can you tell? Looks like I’m already preparing myself to go on the defense… LOL.
I suppose what I should have said is this: there is no need to fear that our ceasing to be existentially alive for a temporary period of time “lowers” or “degrades” us as creatures made in the image and likeness of God. In fact, if anything “lowers” or “degrades” us, it is not being existentially dead for a temporary period of time (which, to me, is no more “degrading” than the fact that we haven’t always existed, or that we are finite, spatially extended beings) but rather being “dead in trespasses and sins.” That’s my view, at least.
This is where we have completely polar ideas. This is where the disagreement is. I feel it is anathema to the very concept of being an image of the Transcendent God.
Clearly, the apostle Paul didn’t believe in an immediate resurrection at death.
For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, {Or by the word of the Lord} that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. I Thessalonians 4:15-18 ESV
Paul indicates in this passage that the dead in Christ will rise from death when Christ returns.
So there is nothing I or anyone else could say to convince you that the particular understanding of man’s nature for which I’ve been arguing in this thread and elsewhere is true and Scriptural. Your presupposition/intuition that man’s being in the image of God entails that his conscious existence cannot cease - even temporarily - invalidates every possible argument from both Scripture and experience/observation that man is unconscious while dead.
just wanted to share some ideas and perspectives and thoughts with you guys. Feel free of course to pick it apart, etc. I’ll of course respond! 
LOL. 
I ponder this often!