Sherah, scriptural quotations would be great. I don't think there will be any for why animals and plants die. I will write a bit about the wage of sin, and then you'll see what I meant.
Maybe I'm missing something on what I'm being given as answers. In any case, and not trying to be disrespectful, I don't think speculations would answer any of these questions. Speculations about the Bible is exactly what I don't expect a Jehovah's witness, of all Bible people, to give me. I would really love them to give me an unequivocal verse about those questions. Also, I don't want an answer like "I find it hard to separate this from that", because that's an evasive. In all the answers I just saw a few Bible quotes, not the usual rapid fire of them.
Yes, nowhere in the Bible it says that life is not finite. But "the wage of sin is death" is found in Romans somewhere. I suppose this isn't a lie. Therefore it follows that he who doesn't sin, doesn't die. We have established a cause-and-effect relationship here. And we're not talking about "spiritual death", because for a Jehovah's witness there's no such thing as physical death AND spiritual death: there's death only. They make it their point to say so, and, if you're a Catholic, the first thing they ridicule is the Catholic concept of an immortal soul. There's death, and that's it, they say. And then, if I were to accept the distinction between "spiritual death" and "physical death", then I want to make clear that, quite obviously, I meant "physical death". Holding otherwise would suggest that apple trees die a physical death but not a spiritual one, and then there are I don't know how many apple tree souls out there.
So, dogs and cats and goldfish, apple trees and grass can't sin, ERGO they should not die. Their life shouldn't be finite. And why did Jesus himself die, in that case, if he didn't sin? And then, why didn't Elijah die? What kind of death did Jesus die? Show me the verse where it says he died a physical one, not a spiritual one (as if there were two "deaths").
I didn't make my question about the ranson, atonement, grace or whatever clear. I'm not asking a question about who is supposed to have benefitted from it, that is to say, us. My question is who got the payment. As in "here, the nasty creatures I myself created, in full knowledge that they would sin, did indeed sin by eating from a tree I myself created and made it a point to have grow near where my creatures would live, in full knowledge that they would eat from it, so here's the atonement/grace/ransom/whatever so they will be free". Who is at the receiving end?
I realize that some of my questions have more to do with my understanding of Christian beliefs, and the nonsense I see, than with a mere "Give me that verse". For example, if I ask "Where is Elijah?", the answer is "In the Heavens". If I then ask "And where in the heavens is he?", that's a different matter. It has to do with believing the man is in the heavens (which I don't) or not (which other people do). But, still, I find that some of my questions haven't got a clear answer. Saying that life is not finite is not an answer to the question of why trees and birds die if they never sinned.
Sometimes this Bible gymnastics is seen as useless. Not in this case. Now I know what Bible ping pong is like.
