Official Bible Interpretation Thread

The four errors. Man has been reared by his errors: first he never saw himself other than imperfectly, second he attributed to himself imaginary qualities, third he felt himself in a false order of rank with animal and nature, fourth he continually invented new tables of values and for a time took each of them to be eternal and unconditional, so that now this, now that human drive and state took first place and was, as a consequence of this evaluation ennobled. If one deducts the effect of these four errors, one has also deducted away humanity, humaneness and 'human dignity'.

 

No, only evaluated, not valued.

 

As I said it is a description of death, not a description of their hope for the future. When a person is dead they are dead and when a person is dead they are conscious of nothing. So when a person is dead they do not know if they have a hope of a resurrection or not. Anyone dead is in a condition of non-existence and will not have any knowledge of whether their death is the first or second death or whether they will be resurrected or not.

(Psalm 146:4) His spirit goes out, he goes back to his ground; In that day his thoughts do perish.

(Ecclesiastes 9:5-6) as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all

 

This is an oxymoron. There are no, nor can there be, "conditions" of non existence. Nonexistence means "not in existence"

 

What don't you understand about; mankind chose to sin and thus God is not responsible for sin?

It was you that said; why did god create something that could kill us? So once again you are being contradictory.

People at this time do not have to choose sin to die. They are born in sin because of Adam's choice to eat of the tree.

Someone can be responsible for one without being responsible for the the other. One can be responsible for bringing death to someone without being responsible for bringing life to that one.

Yes, god is love.

As for God not creating anything that is perishable, depending on what you mean by perishable, God has created a lot of things that are perishable.

Why? There was nothing wrong with the tree or it's fruit. If a bicycle is stolen does that make the bicycle bad? No, it was the stealing of the Bicycle that was bad, not the bicycle.

Thanks but I haven't forgotten.

 

There must be something to choose from.

You are correct, I should have said why did god create something through which we would die. To kill and to die are not the same thing.

We cannot be other than the way god created us.

God is not someone but the creator of all things.

Everything is energy that cannot be destroyed.

If we die from eating the fruit then how can the fruit be good?

 

Having experienced both, I can tell you that the only difference is not whether you are awake or not.

True but the person who is "apparently stone cold asleep" will not even remember the dream unless he is woken up during the dream.

Yes but there is no relationship between dreaming and hypnosis.

Imagination, perhaps; dreaming, not necessarily.

No, they are often contradictory in of themselves.

I have already pointed out several times that your statements contradictory in of themselves and I haven't even pointed out all the cases.

You're welcome.

 

There are huge differences in states of consciousness even among those considered normal everyday consciousness. We can be in an excited state or a relaxed state. We can be alert or distracted. We can be in a state of suffering and we can be in a state of peace. A day dream has differing qualities than a night dream. When dreaming at night our bodies enter a state of rigidity
and we cannot move. When we dream in the daytime, our attention to this moment enters a state of rigidity as we are able to move around, bumping into things because of inattention to our surroundings. Whereas there are circumstantial differences between day dreaming and night dreaming, it is still, dreaming during the day.

We may slip into a day dream and not notice that it had happened until we are startled to attention.

The origin and essence of the hypnotic condition, is the induction of a habit of abstraction or mental concentration, in which, as in reverie or spontaneous abstraction, the powers of the mind are so much engrossed with a single idea or train of thought, as, for the nonce, to render the individual unconscious of, or indifferently conscious to, all other ideas, impressions, or trains of thought. The hypnotic sleep, therefore, is the very antithesis or opposite mental and physical condition to that which precedes and accompanies common sleep.

Imagery, imagination, is part of the ten commandments in that we shall not fashion a graven image, as in, imagining a form for god, or imagining a character for god.

Empty statement without the demonstration of frequency. You make all manner of baseless claims about me.

 

Forms can be said to perish. The earth. Stars. Bodies. But the fundamental force (or spiritual substance?) that bases all forms never perishes. It is always present, no matter the form or the change of form (perishment).

 

Why then does Jesus teach a lesson where the two main figures are definitly concious after death?

Why would Jesus use an image so unfamiliar to the Jewish people to teach them something so ordinary. This is unlike any other parable where the situations are completely relateable.


what exactly then as well in Luke 16 is the bosom ( or NWT "position") of Abraham, and how does it differ from the torrment the rich man was in?

 

Which parable is this? Which two figures?

 

I don't know about these verses, which are really obscure to me about the dead knowing nothing, etc; but I do know about the witch of Endore who was approached by a disguised King Saul to have a little session with a dead Samuel. After she 1st denied the ability to do this; and was told by the King who he was - and she best do what he said...she "found" Samuel. (I think it was Samuel) Sam gave the answers sought but Started Out with Why are you bothering me....you know better than to bother me with this!...tho' I've greatly paraphrased.
And how about what Jesus told the one man on the cross beside him - about seeing him in paradise that day?

 

I was refering to Luke in which he relates Jesus speaking a parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. In this, the Rich man and Lazarus die but Lazarus is carried by angels to the bosom of Abraham while the Rich Man is taken to a place of torment. Abraham and the Rich Man then carry on a conversation.

My point is that why would Jesus use an unfamiliar image (conciousness after death) for his audience?

Even if or bodies have no conciousness ofter death, our soul still lives. At the Final Ressurrection the glorified bodies (like Christ's own) of the dead will be reunited with our souls to spend eternity in either heaven or hell. If we do not have an everlasting spirit, why did Stephen ask Christ to receive his in Acts 7?

 

Thank you. I experienced a complete blank for some reason.

--


His audience were familiar with a conscious after death. They did not see sheol as we may see it today. They thought sheol was a place where the persons existence was barely an existence; kind of the fumes of their existence would rest in a place of solitude if they were good and a place unlike that one for the bad. It was conscious, but just barely (kinda like a dream). Using a parable was the perfect way for Jesus to say that a conscious after death is not true.

Jesus had the perfectly opportunity to say: "I tell you the truth. If you do not do the will of the father and do the will of the serpent, you will burn forever or at least live in an existence that you really hate for all eternity".

I think Jesus is very clear on matters as important as this, and understandings of the things he says are not fully realized unless the whole is looked at. It is the perfect oppurtunity to warn people of a concious everlasting torment. Using that parable is the perfect way for Jesus to discredit the idea of an afterlife. The Jews were often wrong and Jesus told them what they were wrong on. A parable is not a description of reality, but a way to illustrate a comparison of situations. If there is a conversation within a parable, and a parable is merely comparison, then that conversation itself is not a description of what does take place or can take place. The conversation is used to describe the relationship between the Pharisees and God. Their relationship to God was harmed due to their treatment of God's son; Jesus. Jesus is the poor man and the richman are the Pharisees.

The Bosom of Abraham must be something else: Daniel 12:2: Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt.

Stephen is describing how he would give up his life (his soul) to Jesus if need be. As a Christian, there may be times when we are offered the choice between choosing God or choosing worldly matters. Choosing God may end up taking the life of a Christian.

Part of the reason why we find the Gospel of Judas as heretical is because it creates a suicide cop scenario of Jesus' mission. Jesus knew he would die due to his true worship of God, but he didn't do anything to force or coerce anyone to do so. Actually, he made efforts to get people to change their mind, but they refused; he probably expected as much. But overall, he knew that his worship would lead to what it lead to but he choose God over everything else. This is partly what it means when Stephen said "receive my spirit".

At Acts 7:59-60 we read:

59While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." 60Then he fell on his knees and cried out, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." When he had said this, he fell asleep.

At the very next sentence we read, "When he had said this, he fell asleep". It doesn't say that Stephen ascended into heaven with a conscious existence, but that he had fallen asleep. Throughout scripture, sleep is also recognized as death. The spirit is also the breathe that God gave to Adam. It is just an animating force, just like fuel to an engine, and not the person himself. If a person dies, they are no longer animated and thus the breathe is no longer a part of them.

In the end, It seems that there is no consciousness at death, otherwise why say he had fallen asleep? Why use a parable when Jesus can speak plainly?

New International Version
Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.

Can't get anymore clear than that verse, broseph.

 

How could his audience be familiar with consciousness after death? Are you familiar with consciousness after death?

How do "we see" sheol today?

I don't see in the passage in question how Jesus denied consciousness in any form. There are two states and they do not overlap. Lazarus who found no joy in his physical life was carried to abrahams bosom. The rich man was buried, he remained with his physical state because of his attachment to it, being pleasurable and rich to him.

In regard the dead not being able to reach the living, or convince the living, This life is the opportunity to escape from the tentacles of death by divesting ourselves of our investment in the material. In other words you can not attend to this life's details, if you are not alive. Physical death is no resolution. That we die to the flesh while we are alive is when we are reborn in spirit.

Perhaps, but I don't see where he took it.

This matter is only important if it is meaningful for this life. I think that Jesus can easily be misunderstood on important matters and often was, even by his disciples. Even today we can have differing perspectives.

 

Wouldn't this seem to indicate that the non-existence after the Final Judgement that I assume you believe in is a falsehood. There is an everlasting contempt for those who reject God's love and grace. This doesn't say that they simply cease being, but that they are held in everlasting shame and contempt. Doesn't something have to exist to be shamed and to have contempt for it?

Agreed. The hardest thing for myself sometimes is to really stick behind what I profess.

No one tries to argue that Stephen's body ascended into heaven.

http://www.saintjonah.org/pics/protomartyr.jpg
This is St Stephen's right arm.

Catholics uphold the belief that the body truly dies and will be ressurected at the call of Christ in the Last Days, but we also confess that the soul given to us by God continues to exist after death. Although separated from the body, so that the body appears to be sleeping:


This saint has been with God in spirit for 400 years give or take.

At the ressurection, those faithful to God will have their sould reunite with glorified bodies (those bound for damnation through an active rejection of God will also be ressurected).

I agree that the spirit is not the person himself, bu is an integral part of who a person is. It is a part of our person, but is not corporeal.

As it is written, And fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in hell (Matthew 10:28).

Also, And may the God of peace himself sanctify you in all things; that your whole spirit, and soul, and body, may be preserved blameless in the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 Thess. 5:23)

Why Why does Christ say that the soul (or for you, the breath) can be destroyed? If our hope is to become merely glorified bodies and nothing else (and if our breath is gone regardless at this point), why should we fear something/someone who could destroy this?

Why does Paul make a tripple distinction? Even if we grant that "spirit" in this case is a "life-force", he still identifies a soul.

In closing, our bodies, prior to our ressurection will have no knowledge or conciousness (we agree on this), but our soul which is integral to our nature and our person is created by God and eternal. This is where we differ...broseph.

 

What of bodies that are dismembered or burnt to ashes. What of bodies that are so disrupted that they are never recovered? What of infants, are they resurrected as infants?

 

Do you have access to the "minutes" of the nicene convention.
There is no suicide if there is no death. The crucifixion is elemental to the passion play. Jesus could have called upon the angels to prevent his capture or crucifixion. That he be put to death is part of the plan and there were many players who participated in making things happen the way they did.

It relates to the concept of the dream of separation and death.

We find what we look for, broseph.

 

Our glorified bodies will be like the Ressurected/Glorified Body of Christ.

These three characteristics, identity (it is really our body), entirety (not only our arms or leg, but our whole body), and immortality (our soul cannot be separated from this body), will be common to the risen bodies of the just and the wicked. But the bodies of the saints shall be distinguished by four transcendent endowments, often called qualities.

* The first is "impassibility", which shall place them beyond the reach of pain and inconvenience. "It is sown", says the Apostle, "in corruption, it shall rise in incorruption" (1 Corinthians 15:42). The Schoolmen call this quality impassibility', not incorruption, so as to mark it as a peculiarity of the glorified body; the bodies of the damned will be incorruptible indeed, but not impassible; they shall be subject to heat and cold, and all manner of pain.

* The next quality is "brightness", or "glory", by which the bodies of the saints shall shine like the sun. "It is sown in dishonour," says the Apostle, "it shall rise in glory" (1 Corinthians 15:43; cf. Matthew 13:43; 17:2; Philippians 3:21). All the bodies of the saints shall be equally impassible, but they shall be endowed with different degrees of glory. According to St. Paul: "One is the glory of the sun, another the glory of the moon, another the glory of the stars. For star differeth from star in glory"'(1 Corinthians 15:41-42).

* The third quality is that of "agility", by which the body shall be freed from its slowness of motion, and endowed with the capability of moving with the utmost facility and quickness wherever the soul pleases. The Apostle says: "It is sown in weakness, it shall rise in power" (1 Corinthians 15:43).

* The fourth quality is "subtility", by which the body becomes subject to the absolute dominion of the soul. This is inferred from the words of the Apostle: "It is sown a natural body, it shall rise a spiritual body" (1 Corinthians 15:44). The body participates in the soul's more perfect and spiritual life to such an extent that it becomes itself like a spirit. We see this quality exemplified in the fact that Christ passed through material objects.

Source: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12792a.htm


Will those who are infants be ressurected as infants, it is hard to say. I do not know if there has ever been a declaration of an official teaching on that issue.

 

This is fascinating ukr cdn, I will have to consider it at length as it contains a vocabulary with which I am unfamiliar.

Off the top however I would make these points.
Due to the fact that there is no teaching regarding infants,
The "knowledge" that is portrayed is incomplete, and being incomplete, it does not guide. Since our salvation is worked out in life, our understandings of "after life" are needless speculation. We do not need theology to have spirit.

From the material from your link, "It would destroy the very idea of resurrection, if the dead were to rise in bodies not their own." When Jesus asks the disciples who do you say that I am, they respond some say this person or that person.

Jesus says elijah has already come and the disciples take that to mean John the Baptist. So is elijiah resurrected or reincarnated or neither? John the baptist was born a child that grew to a man.