Okay, but it is not about ‘our qualifying’, like the ball was in our court.
I guess you did. 
Once again: Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
Meaning that it can happen you meet a stranger with a need who in reality is an angel while you are not aware of it. You are not aware because the angel looks exactly like a human.
2 Likes
Paul seems to have a different way of describing souls and their mortality - -
or should I say, their IMMORTALITY?
1Co 15:41-42
There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars:
for one star differeth from another star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead.
It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
1Co 15:44-47
It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body,
and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, The first man Adam was made
a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. Howbeit that was not
first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is
spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the
Lord from heaven.
1Co 15:50-53
Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God;
neither doth corruption inherit incorruption. Behold, I shew 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 trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be
raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put
on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
Paul is quite clear that what he talking about in 1 Cor 15 is resurrection not souls.
35 But some one will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?”
He goes to great pains in explaining that we are raised not in a physical/natural body but a spiritual body, imperishable, powerful, and made of the stuff of heaven and not of dust or the Earth. And he stresses quite a few times that the physical comes first and is like a seed from which the spiritual body grows.
But it is not just Paul who thinks this way about the resurrection. Peter says much the same thing about Jesus’ resurrection.
For Christ died for sins once and for all, a good man on behalf of sinners, in order to lead you to God. He was put to death physically, but made alive spiritually (1 Peter 3:18)
@mitchell,
Perhaps your opinion is evolving?
Didn’t you used to say that there can be no soul without a body?
Or are you saying that because Paul used the phrase “spiritual body”, you somehow
think your conditions have been met … that there is a BODY? I would have to object
for the obvious reason that a “spiritual body” is not the same as “a body”.
Well of course, I continue to learn. And that quote from Peter is an example of something I came across just recently.
But mostly this is your understanding of my belief which is evolving.
I don’t believe that “the soul” is really a Biblical concept, especially not as this thing which is inserted into bodies or moving from one to another. I have always believed in the spirit which is created by the choices of our physical life, which continue to exist eternally afterwards.
Nope. Even when it is the spirit, we have the cases of the angels and God where there was no physical body. So it is not that the spirit cannot exist without a body but that we are different from self-existent God and created angels in that we create our own spirit by the choices we make.
Paul says that the physical/natural body is first and is like a seed from which the spiritual body grows.
1 Like
I think you would have saved lots of people a lot of time if you had STARTED with
this idea. It’s not particularly controversial, though the Roman Catholics would
probably be willing to spend a thousand postings on refuting your opinion. They
are rather keen on souls being pre-existent, and just transported to a nice meaty
chassis for the conventional 4 score and 10 years.
So: the SPIRITUAL self, once developed by a body of flesh, can be sustained
indefinitely without continuation of the body of flesh.
You concur?
I think if you go back to beginning you will find that I did. You just got something into your head and wouldn’t listen no matter how many times I told you that you had it wrong. In particular, I pointed repeatedly to 1 Cor 15 where Paul says that while the physical body is perishable the spiritual body is imperishable.
Yep.
And that goes for everything which is alive. …although… not everything which is alive is alive to the same degree. Most have very little individuality and their life is mostly that of a whole species.
It’s when you throw sentences like this around that it becomes quite a mess.
While I think you might have a good argument when it comes to the Old Testament, the New Testament is definitively a pro-soul or pro-spirit book.
Even in the Old Testament, we have this perfectly amazing discussion:
So Saul disguised himself and put on other garments, and went, he and two men with him; and they came to the woman by night. And he said, “Divine for me by a spirit, and bring up for me whomever I shall name to you.”
The woman said to him, “Surely you know what Saul has done, how he has cut off the mediums and the wizards from the land. Why then are you laying a snare for my life to bring about my death?”
But Saul swore to her by the LORD, “As the LORD lives, no punishment shall come upon you for this thing.”
Then the woman said, “Whom shall I bring up for you?” He said, “Bring up Samuel for me.”
When the woman saw Samuel, she cried out with a loud voice; and the woman said to Saul, “Why have you deceived me? You are Saul.”
The king said to her, “Have no fear; what do you see?” And the woman said to Saul, “I see a [divine being] coming up out of the earth.” [< The ANE concept of the APSU/ABZU is that the underworld was the location for most of the dead.]
He said to her, “What is his appearance?” And she said, “An old man is coming up; and he is wrapped in a robe.” And Saul knew that it was Samuel, and he bowed with his face to the ground, and did obeisance."
Here we have a spiritual body - - without equivocation.
Getting Back to the New Testament:
In the time of the Dead Sea communities, we find documents where sectarian scribes wrote about the most righteous of men having their souls rise up to become glittering stars! - - a form of angelization.
You equate soul with spirit. I do not and I do not think that most other people equate them either. I constantly hear people talking about soul and spirit as two different things. So all of your quotes and arguments about the spirit is irrelevant. My whole point from the beginning was that the “soul” adds nothing to the spirit which is in the Bible, or the mind and body which is adequately explained by science. So I simply say yes to all those things in the Bible about the spirit, but continue to say no when it comes to claims about a soul.
It was a Greek pagan concept that the soul was something that animates the body. But there is no such thing. The body and mind are processes of self organization which are entirely physical. And while I certainly believe in the imperishable spirit from 1 Cor 15, that is not something which animates the body either but gives us a continued existence after the body dies and disappears.
That is not the Bible. In the Bible angels and human beings are completely different things
I answered this question for my part in Wigner’s friend and The Migrant Mind: Quantum Soul
The soul is not subject to natural law and is what makes the quantum choices in physics. It is therefore, immaterial and I believe, contains our consciousness. The brain is an interface device, imo.
I don’t think you will ever be able to differentiate the spirit from a soul.
The narratives point to the two being the same thing.
I agree. This is not the Bible. It represents a lacuna in the Bible… which the dead sea scrolls tries to fill.
LOL I certainly do not believe in this thing which other people differentiate from the spirit. In particular I not believe in any magical thingies being inserted into bodies and such.
I am not interested in additions to the Bible.
Then be satisfied with spirit of Endor!
1 Like
My modest (simple) opinion, without claiming to be right.
Soul - personality.
Spirit - the part (as only species) that allows us to have understanding of the spiritual world.
My dog has a personality, my cat also, but I never saw them praying.