NetDoc said:
So "technically" only her bones will inherit the kingdom then? Obviously, "Flesh" is out!
It wasn't until the fourth century that Christians started teaching and believing that "flesh" was intrinsically evil, and could not inherit the kingdom of God. This was the result of the neo-Platonic influence on Christianity brought on primarily by Augustine, but pushed along by others before and well after him.
The Bible uses two different terms. When referring to mortal people the Bible says "flesh and
blood", but when referring to immortal humans (i.e. Pre-Fall Adam and Eve, post-Resurrection Jesus) it always says "flesh and
bone". Before the Fall all living things were quickened by spirit instead of blood. After being resurrected, all living things return to a spiritual state of being. This is not to say that there is no tangible body, or "flesh", but only that life is contained in spirit, not in blood, therefore the life is a "spiritual" one. Gen. 9:4 - "But flesh with the life thereof,
which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." Notice the flesh does not contain life, but the blood does. Nowhere in the bible do we find anything saying that spiritual things cannot have flesh, in fact we find the opposite. Jesus teaches Nicodemus that people who are born of the Spirit (through baptism and the Holy Ghost)
are spirit. I am spirit (just as God is spirit) because I was born of the Spirit when I was baptized. "Spirit" as you can plainly see, can have flesh.
Many people foam at the mouth about the idea that God has a body. The only thing they can quote from (besides pagan philosophy) is John 4:24, which says "God is
a spirit." The article "a" is italicized because it is not in the Greek. The article "a" doesn't exist in Greek or Hebrew. The Greek reads (literally) "spirit is God". Many will argue that spirit cannot have flesh, but "incorporeal" or any derivitive is nowhere in the bible. Origen argued against a corporeal God, but admits that the idea is not Biblical. The Clementine Homilies admit that Christianity originally believed in a corporeal God. Felix says that Plato is dead on in teaching that God is immaterial. The Jews were Hellenized way before Christ and they started changing their scriptures around to attack theomorphic ideas about God. All the places where their scriptures spoke of God's body parts they replaced with the word
memra, which is similar to the Greek
logos. Christianity followed suit shortly thereafter, and your ideas are pure Plato.
Now, moving on to your idea about flesh inheriting the kingdom of heaven - the early Church fathers ALL taught that the resurrection was a physical one, and that flesh would inherit the kingdom of heaven. They did so because that is what the original Apostles taught and because there is no place in the Bible that says otherwise. Galileo says that the "unadorned grammatical meaning" of the Bible renders God corporeal. Tertullian condemns the heretical teaching that we are not resurrected to the flesh forever, as do Ignatius and Iranaeus.
Here are Justin Martyr's words: "They who maintain the wrong opinion say that there is no resurrection of the flesh." He continues: "And there are some who maintain that even Jesus Himself appeared only as spiritual, and not in flesh, but presented merely the appearance of flesh: these persons seek to rob the flesh of the promise. First, then, let us solve those things which seem to them to be insoluble; then we will introduce in an orderly manner the demonstration concerning the flesh, proving that it partakes of salvation." He continues: "But following our order, we must now speak with respect to those who think meanly of the flesh, and say that it is not worthy of the resurrection nor of the heavenly economy, because, first, its substance is earth; and besides, because it is full of all wickedness, so that it forces the soul to sin along with it. But these persons seem to be ignorant of the whole work of God, both of the genesis and formation of man at the first, and why the things in the world were made. For does not the word say, "Let Us make man in our image, and after our likeness?" What kind of man? Manifestly He means fleshly man, For the word says, "And God took dust of the earth, and made man." It is evident, therefore, that man made in the image of God was of flesh. Is it not, then, absurd to say, that the flesh made by God in His own image is contemptible, and worth nothing? But that the flesh is with God a precious possession is manifest, first from its being formed by Him, if at least the image is valuable to the former and artist; and besides, its value can be gathered from the creation of the rest of the world. For that on account of which the rest is made, is the most precious of all to the maker."
Both Clement of Rome and Alexandria agree with the Martyr. The Apostle's Creed states that the Resurrection of the flesh is doctrine. Theophilus of Antioch says this: "God will raise up your flesh immortal with your soul."
You will be hard pressed (it's impossible) to find a Christian from the first 300 years after Christ who didn't beleive the flesh inherited the kigdom of God. It was not a dabate until philosophy completely took over the church. It is not a difficult doctrine, it is not a mystery and it is not the pagan philosophy that has completely assimilated your doctrine. Our bodies of flesh and bone will rise again and we will have spirit coursing through our veins and we will live forever.
I finish with the words of Cyril of Jerusalem. Keep in mind that "spiritual body" does NOT mean no flesh. "This body shall be raised, not remaining weak as it is now, but this same body shall be raised. By putting on incorruption, it shall be altered, as iron blending with fire becomes fireor rather, in a manner the Lord who raises us knows. However it will be, this body shall be raised, but it shall not remain such as it is. Rather, it shall abide as an eternal body. It shall no longer require for its life such nourishment as now, nor shall it require a ladder for its ascent; for it shall be made a spiritual body, a marvelous thing, such as we have not the ability to describe".
