Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org>]

On 18/03/2006 11:19, Herman Meester wrote:
> ...
>
> -The resurrection of the body, needless to say, is impossible ...

Is anything impossible for God? Jeremiah 32:27. This is not something 
logically impossible, just something requiring a miracle. Of course 
there is some need to establish continuity between a dead body and a 
resurrected one, which could perhaps be thought of as the disembodied 
and perhaps "sleeping" soul. Yes, there is an issue here of exactly how 
this happens, but this does not make anything impossible.

> ... - unless
> this earthly body becomes a heavenly body: such as the soul. The
> immortality of the soul, then, is applied to the body too, but this
> body is of course not earthly - it must be turned into something
> higher by God. After all, even in Antiquity they knew that the earthly
> body is a source of uncleanness, unthinkable that that body would end
> up in the heavens: it would fall down.
>   

This is a very Greek notion, not a Hebrew Bible one.
> -Exactly this is what the apostle Paul says.
> Paul doesn't believe, of course, in the literal resurrection of dead
> bodies - dead is dead. ...

Paul most certainly did believe in the literal resurrection of dead 
bodies, as witnessed for him by the literally dead and resurrected body 
of Jesus which he saw. Read 1 Corinthians 15, especially vv.3-8.

> ... However, God can turn a dead body into a
> heavenly body.
> Only in second century Christianity did the Church fathers, in the
> Docetic controversy, stress their view that there really is a literal
> resurrection of the dead body from the grave. Only the Western
> churches accepted this doctrine (and disagree with Paul), which to
> this day plays no role in the Eastern churches.
>
>   
It is abundantly clear from the New Testament that from the very start 
the Christian message was that Jesus had been literally resurrected. In 
many places it is also clearly taught that believers can expect a 
similar literal resurrection. The western churches do not in the 
slightest disagree with Paul and the other NT authors on this.

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/