Division between soul and spirit

by M.J. 82 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  Leolaia

  Interestingly, the Society quotes from the Letter to Diognetus to support their belief that Christians are to be "no part of the world," yet carefully excise any hint that the illustration used in the letter assumes a notion of an immortal soul.

  *** w51 3/1 pp. 139-140 Early Christians Under Roman Rule ***

  Some historians have debated over why God’s people were singled out and persecuted beyond measure, but when one sees the issue it is quite simple to understand. A letter addressed to Diognetus, who lived in the early part of the second century, says: "The Christians are not separated from other men, either in their earthly abode, nor by language, nor customs; they never inhabit separate towns, they use no peculiar speech, no singular mode of life.—They dwell in the towns of Greeks, or of Barbarians, just as chance has assigned their abode and inasmuch as they follow the customs of the country with regard to raiment, food, and other such matters, they show a temper and conduct which is wonderful and remarkable to all men. They obey the existing laws, nay, they triumph over the laws by their own conduct."

  *** w93 7/1 p. 14 Christians and Human Society Today ***

  Most of the Roman emperors misunderstood the early Christians and persecuted them. Showing why, The Epistle to Diognetus, thought by some to date from the second century C.E., declares: "Christians dwell in the world, but are not part and parcel of the world."

  Here is the full quote:

  "The Christians are not separated from other men, either in their earthly abode, nor by language, nor customs; they never inhabit separate towns, they use no peculiar speech, no singular mode of life. They dwell in the towns of Greeks, or of Barbarians, just as chance has assigned their abode and inasmuch as they follow the customs of the country with regard to raiment, food, and other such matters, they show a temper and conduct which is wonderful and remarkable to all men. They obey the existing laws, nay, they triumph over the laws by their own conduct....In a word, what the soul is in a body, this the Christians are in the world. The soul is spread through all the members of the body, and Christians through the divers cities of the world. The soul has its abode in the body, and yet it is not of the body. So Christians dwell in the world, and yet they are not part of the world. The soul which is invisible is contained in the body which is visible, so Christians are recognised as being in the world, and yet their religion remains invisible. The flesh hates the soul and wages war with it, though it receives no wrong, because it is forbidden to indulge in pleasures; so the world hates Christians, though it receives no wrong from them, because they set themselves against its pleasures. The soul loves the flesh which hates it, and its body parts, so Christians love those that hate them. The soul is enclosed in the body, and yet itself holds the body together; so Christians are kept in the world as in a prison-house, and yet they themselves hold the world together. The soul though itself immortal dwelleth in a mortal tabernacle; so Christians sojourn amidst perishable things, while they look for the imperishability which is in the heavens. The soul when hardly treated in the matter of meats and drinks is improved; and so Christians when punished increase more and more daily" (Epistle to Diognetus 5:1-5, 6:1-9).
• 

  Narkissos

  HR,

  First I goofed with the references in Hebrews: psukhè is the object of salvation in 6:19: 10:38f; less clearly 12:3; 13:17. Interestingly the concept of "resurrection" plays no significant role in Hebrews -- which is the most clearly Hellenistic (probably Alexandrine) book of the NT.

  Basically the Pharisaic notion of "resurrection" (also probably from Persian origin) implies the body, although Paul turns around that with his idea of "spiritual body". And the response to the Sadducees in the Synoptics, likening the ressurrected to "angels in heaven," also tones down the corporeal dimension. Seems like some early Christians used the Pharisaic concept in a somewhat loose way, because they were influenced by other notions as well (such as the elevation of the righteous, in the Hellenistic Wisdom of Solomon for example).
• 

  M.J.

  And having a belief in an afterlife is NOT THE SAME THING as the "pagan philosophy" of Platonism. The Society treats the two as if they were the same thing, when they're not. The belief in an afterlife goes back to the OT....to the notion of the Rephaim shades residing a ghostlike existence in Sheol in the afterlife (the Society obscures this by mistranslating the word for "Rephaim", and not once discusses the Rephaim in their discussions of the afterlife).

  Are there any old threads on this? Or perhaps someone that knows a lot about this can start a new one? I've been searching for a discussion on this topic.
• 

  Narkissos

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/68224/1.ashx
• 

  LittleToe

  On a different topic, but related to the scripture and thread title:

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/81048/1.ashx
• 

  Hellrider

  Leolaia:

  Some writers, especially the author of 2 Baruch and Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, conceived of a spiritual body with heavenly glory, i.e. like the bodies of angels. Although the Society treats angels as bodiless, indeed Jews and Christians regarded them as embodied...

  Ok, yes, that makes more sense now, of 2 Corinthians 5:1-5 too. To my question above, this question could now be answered in the affirmative (lol)... So although the ressurection is for the most part thruout the NT perceived as a future event, what happens in 2 Corinthians 5 is also a sort of "ressurection", the "anchor" we have been given - awaiting the physical ressurection (I know all the scholars don`t like overall theology but want to understand each text on its own, but still, in an "overall-theology-kind-of-view", this would have to be it). So, now I`m just curious if Paul also saw it this way, that the "spiritual ressurection" he talks about, was just a preliminary "ressurection", awaiting the whole deal. Maybe he didn`t. He doesn`t talk so much about that future ressurection, I think. So the "spiritual body" could be it for Paul, as in 1 Corinthians 15:50. But on the other hand, he talks about the soul as a "down payment"!? I thought these passages about the soul as our "down payment"was intended to mean that the soul lives on after death, awaiting the (physical) ressurection, sometime in the future, and that this soul is the "heavenly body". But when you read thru 2 Cor 5:1-5, it looks a lot like it is not a matter of "undressing" (which it would be, if one is stripped of the body), but we "want to be clothed" and "put on" our heavenly body!?

  I`m more confused than ever. Maybe Paul just didn`t have a clue (2 Corinthians 12:2-4)
• 

  Narkissos

  HR,

  The resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15 is the final one, since it is supposed to occur at or after the parousia (v. 23). Whence, probably, the introduction of the notion of "body" (albeit "spiritual"). Here (as well as in 1 Thessalonians 4) Paul still expects to be among the living who will be "changed" instead of dying and be resurrected (v. 51f). This is the same "event" which he describes in 2 Corinthians 5:4: "we wish not to be unclothed but to be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life." Although this doesn't seem so sure (v. 3).

  This chronological scenario seems to fade in Philippians: dying is not "sleeping" anymore, it is "being with Christ" (1:23). The transformation of the body still lies on the horizon (3:21), but in a much more general (perhaps collective) way.
• 

  Leolaia

  Hellrider....Yeah, you're confused. It is confusing because Paul is talking about both the intermediate state between death and resurrection (in v. 3-4a, 6-9), and resurrection itself (in v. 4b-5, 10) in 2 Corinthians. The key is v. 3-4, where Paul refers to the common fear of dying and being found "naked" and bodiless (the term gumnos "naked" is a technical term from Platonism describing the released soul, just as skénos "tent" in v. 1, 4 is also a metaphor for the body as the temporary dwelling-place of the soul; Plato referred to the body as a géinon skénos "earth tent", compare Paul's epigeios oikia tou skénous "earthly house of our tent"). This is a clear reference to the postmortem state; a person leaving his body would be "naked", and this experience of nakedness is something that Paul ("we") dislikes because "we do not wish to be unclothed but to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life" (v. 4). For Paul, "life" was fully realized in the "immortality" of the resurrection (cf. Romans 2:7, 6:23, 8:34, etc.) and this was something that Paul had in earlier epistles expected to happen in his lifetime, as 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17 and 1 Corinthians 15:51-54 make clear. Paul expected not to experience death but to be "changed" and pass into immortality in the general resurrection, yet by this time Paul is contemplating the possibility that he may die and thus experience the "nakedness" of death. What he reassures his followers is that even if this does occur, there will still be the "eternal house of heaven" that will clothe those in Christ, and that those who die before the resurrection will be "at home in the Lord". Note again that Paul is talking about the afterlife immediately after death, because in v. 8-9 "being at home with Christ" is axiomatically the same as "being away from the body", just as "being away from Christ" is what happens when one is "at home in the body".
  

  What is especially confusing about this passage is that Paul is unclear in v. 1-2 on when a person will be "clothed with our heavenly dwelling". The comfort he gives in v. 4 may imply that one would not have to experience the nakedness of death at all, that the presence of Christ will be enough to "clothe" a person so to speak, such that heaven itself will be his home instead of his former body. Note that this is not a notion of a resurrection immediately after death; the Platonic language and the logic seems to suggest that Paul has given up the idea of a resurrection and has simply adopted a Platonic idea of an immortal soul that will be clothed in a different sense in heaven. But the reference to "what is to come" in v. 5 and the eschatological judgment in v. 10 clearly suggest that Paul did not give up this idea at all. It is equally possible that Paul means that a person will be naked temporarily after death, but that it is nothing to "groan" about because one will be "at home with Christ" and that one will still be "clothed with our heavenly dwelling" when the resurrection occurs. The text is ambiguous and this ambiguity can give rise to much confusion. I think Paul may be intentionally ambiguous because many Gentile Christians in Corinth had a hard time understanding the notion of a resurrection (which is why Paul expended so much effort explaining it in 1 Corinthians 15), and these converts were already believers of a Platonic eschatology. Thus, Paul may be ambiguous here to allow for both points of view. Note also that he is non-commital in 2 Corinthians 12:2 on whether his journey to heaven was "in the body" or "out of the body", the latter being what Platonists would expect.
• 

  Hellrider

  Narkissos:

  Ok, yes, I see that, in light of v.23. I tend to forget that Paul (and probably others) actually believed the end was "right around the corner", lol. (Note to self: Rule 1 in Bible interpreation; Remember that all the Bible people believed that everything was gonna happen while they were still alive - not unlike some cults today, that I know of ) But what about:

  5:5 Now the one who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave us the Spirit as a down payment

  What does "down payment" mean in this context? I was sure that "down payment" here mean the soul! To use one of those retarded Watchtower-inspired analogies (but use it against them), I would say it like this: I don`t know how the real estate market in Palestine worked almost 2000 years ago, but I know that where I live, when you buy a house, you don`t have to move out of it, after you`ve made that first payment, you don`t have to move out and stay out until you`ve paid for the whole house. I can`t imagine it was like that 2000 years ago either...So, if the "Spirit" is just the "life force", and it would completely die at death, along with the body, then that wouldn`t be a "down payment" at all. Or am I over-simplifying it now? Does spirit mean something completely different here? Is "spirit" here Jesus, or the holy ghost or whatever?

  Question to all: Ok, which passages in the NT are clear on the issue of a soul surviving after death, as an intermediate state between death and the (future) ressurection? I would say the parable about Lazarus and the rich man is definitely one. Also, John 8:56 indicates this. I brought up this passage in a discussion (well, both these passages actually) with a JW. On the John-passage, he tried to explain it as that Abraham was overjoyed in looking forward to/seeing that this day would come, sometime in the future, back when he was alive. I tried to explain to him that that is not what the passage says at all. The passage says, literally, that " 8:56 Your father Abraham was overjoyed 1 to see my day, and he saw it and was glad" (that is, showing emotions, like a living person). Of course, it was like talking to a brick wall.
• 

  Hellrider

  Leolaia, ok, I get it. Basically, we`re all gonna be running around butt naked in heaven until the ressurection, when we will be fully clothed...

  No, seriously, thank you very much for breaking that down for me, I have been scratching my head over those verses, but I get it now. Very well explained.