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Does Christianity Believe in a Soul or Ghosts
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amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
I think it's written somewhere in there that they are resurrected and put into exotic new bodies in heaven, and our present bodies are just the seeds waiting to grow that body. The whole terrestrial demon / ghost idea in the NT seemed like an import, it didn't seem really present in the old testament. There was one apocryphal book from the old testament times that dealt with haunted houses or something though, I can't remember the name of it.
InChrist
Free4ever
According to the scriptures, believers are waiting and will be resurrected and will not face eternal darkness. In the resurrection one is made alive in a glorified eternal body as Jesus was., not merely a ghost or spirit.
Not waiting.
Ecclesiastes 12:6-7
6 Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.
7 Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.
2 Corinthians 5:6-8
6 Therefore we are always confident, knowing that, whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
7 For we walk by faith, not by sight
8 We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
The second we die we go back to Heaven and await judgment.
No waiting around buried in the ground.
A soul yes.
Not according to the Bible, which is what I base my faith upon.
At death, the Bible says we all go to the same place (the grave, sheol, hades) the only way to live again is by resurrection...literally a "standing up again".....like "hades", the meaning of the word "resurrection" has been obscured and distorted by belief in an immortal soul, which basically makes the resurrection redundant because nobody really dies.
If we recall Jesus raising his friend Lazarus, who had been dead for 4 days, Jesus did not pluck this man's spirit from 'the other side' and put it back in his body.....he actually repaired his decaying body and returned the breath (spirit) into his lungs. He had no recollection of where he had been, and if it was heaven, then how was it doing him a favor by bringing him back to this life only to die again later?
According to scripture, all the dead "sleep" (in an unconscious state) until the day Christ calls them from their graves (John 5:28-29)....some to life in heaven and some to a restoration of life on earth. Those chosen for life in heaven will have specific roles as 'kings and priests' and these will be resurrected first.... (Revelation 20:6) and they will rule over subjects on earth, where God put humans in the first place. (Revelation 21:2-4)
There are no such things as 'ghosts'....the Bible says that there are rebel spirits who like to impersonate dead people, but those who know what the Bible teaches about death, know that the dead don't talk to anyone.
The devil told the first humans that they would not die, and he has been lying about that ever since.
The only choices people have concerning life is to continue living by remaining obedient to God and his teachings, or to ignore them and face having no future at all. If that is "eternal darkness", then "gehenna" is that place. No one is conscious there however. (Ecclesiastes 9:5; 10)
cataway
Well-Known Member
death is the judgment
According to the Bible, all people have a body, a spirit and a soul.
The Bible also distinguishes between all three.(1 Thessalonians 5:23)
When a man's body dies, his soul goes to the realm of the dead, where paradise and hell are. (Luke 16:19-31)
There were also exceptions, the Nephilim who were begotten by the angels and human women, (Genesis 6:1-4) did not come after their death into the realm of the dead, but their souls remained on earth. They are the ones we call "demons" today.
The fallen angels who mixed with human women were sent to hell where they had to stay until the day of judgment.(2 Peter 2:4)
cataway
Well-Known Member
when a man dies .he is dead .its the same for every living thing ….we all have the same spirit . from the largest whale to the smallest thing that pro-creates.
Darkforbid
Well-Known Member
Not according to the Bible, which is what I base my faith upon.
At death, the Bible says we all go to the same place (the grave, sheol, hades) the only way to live again is by resurrection...literally a "standing up again".....like "hades", the meaning of the word "resurrection" has been obscured and distorted by belief in an immortal soul, which basically makes the resurrection redundant because nobody really dies.
If we recall Jesus raising his friend Lazarus, who had been dead for 4 days, Jesus did not pluck this man's spirit from 'the other side' and put it back in his body.....he actually repaired his decaying body and returned the breath (spirit) into his lungs. He had no recollection of where he had been, and if it was heaven, then how was it doing him a favor by bringing him back to this life only to die again later?
According to scripture, all the dead "sleep" (in an unconscious state) until the day Christ calls them from their graves (John 5:28-29)....some to life in heaven and some to a restoration of life on earth. Those chosen for life in heaven will have specific roles as 'kings and priests' and these will be resurrected first.... (Revelation 20:6) and they will rule over subjects on earth, where God put humans in the first place. (Revelation 21:2-4)
There are no such things as 'ghosts'....the Bible says that there are rebel spirits who like to impersonate dead people, but those who know what the Bible teaches about death, know that the dead don't talk to anyone.
The devil told the first humans that they would not die, and he has been lying about that ever since.
The only choices people have concerning life is to continue living by remaining obedient to God and his teachings, or to ignore them and face having no future at all. If that is "eternal darkness", then "gehenna" is that place. No one is conscious there however. (Ecclesiastes 9:5; 10)
metim, ittim, don’t you mean you base your faith ignoring the bible
No. The Bible backs up everything I said.....Do you know the Bible?.....Can you show me where I am in error?
Samantha Rinne
Resident Genderfluid Writer/Artist
Typically, Christian ppl would be yes to soul, no to ghosts. This implies that souls don't have somewhere to go.
cataway
Well-Known Member
You are a soul .living or dead you are a soul
No it doesn't. You are reading this verse out of context.
1 Thessalonians 5:23 in isolation seems to read that way, but that is not what it is saying.
From verse 12 you can see whom Paul is addressing....
"12 Now we request you, brothers, to show respect for those who are working hard among you and presiding over you in the Lord and admonishing you; 13 and to give them extraordinary consideration in love because of their work. Be peaceable with one another. 14 On the other hand, we urge you, brothers, to warn the disorderly, speak consolingly to those who are depressed, support the weak, be patient toward all. 15 See that no one repays injury for injury to anyone, but always pursue what is good toward one another and to all others. . . . .
23 May the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. And may the spirit and soul and body of you brothers, sound in every respect, be preserved blameless at the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24 The one who is calling you is faithful, and he will surely do so.
25 Brothers, keep praying for us.
26 Greet all the brothers with a holy kiss.
27 I am putting you under the solemn obligation by the Lord to have this letter read to all the brothers.
28 The undeserved kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you."
You see, he is addressing the Thessalonians congregation concerning the role of brothers who are taking the lead there and their response to their direction. He is addressing the congregation as a whole. So when he speaks of "the body" (those who make up the body of Christ) he is not speaking of the human body.
The "soul" in the scriptures represents life itself, so the life of this body of Christians had to reflect the teachings of the Master.
The "spirit" in this context means the healthily spirit of the whole congregation to which each individual is a contributor.
Never take a verse out of context. What the whole Bible teaches has to agree with every verse in it. If you find contradictions, then it is proof that misinterpretation is at work. Unfortunately, Christendom is the master of misinterpretation......and the confusion that results is the reason for its disunity.
Not true. The realm of the dead is nothing more sinister than mankind's common grave. We all go there to "sleep". (Ecclesiastes 9:5; 10; 1 Thessalonians 4:13) The rich man and Lazarus is a parable. it is not to be taken literally.
Not quite correct. The Nephilim were the offspring of angelic fathers and human mothers, but because they were hybrid humans (there is no record of them fathering children) they perished in the flood along with Noah's contemporaries...and rightly so since they were not sons of Adam and had no right to live. Their angelic fathers dematerialized and returned to the spirit realm where God stripped them of the ability to materialize again. These became the demons who make trouble for mankind even today.
2 Peter 2:4...
"Certainly God did not refrain from punishing the angels who sinned, but threw them into Tarʹta·rus, putting them in chains of dense darkness to be reserved for judgment."
So, not quite correct again. There are no demons in hell. These were sent to "Tartarus", (not hell) which is a condition where the aforementioned restraints were placed on those rebel angels. Not literal chains or literal darkness because they were to be active in the earth until it was time for Jesus to throw them into prison with their leader. There is no further mention of them materializing again, even though faithful angels did so in bringing messages to God's servants on earth.
The darkness is spiritual...the chains are figurative. These rebels know that they they will eventually perish, but God is not finished with them yet. They will be confined to an abyss for 1,000 years while God's kingdom under Christ restores mankind to reconciliation with God. At the end of the 1,000 years, they will be let loose again for a while, testing redeemed mankind one last time. (Revelation 20:1-3)
This is what I believe the scriptures teach.
Its something that many do not agree on, but on whole Christians in my experience believe in a ghost or a soul. The majority believe that upon death the spirit leaves the body and that part of it is your personality. Some will say that they will go to heaven and be reunited with loved ones. Some also believe that the ghost of the person pre-exists and goes down into the world when a baby is born or is being formed in the womb.
There are on the other hand many groups that do not hold these things.
shmogie
Well-Known Member
I agree with most of this. However, it needs to be made abundantly clear that DOING to please God is not the way of Salvation, it is by FAITH, and faith alone. Good deeds flow from salvation, they do not earn salvation.Not according to the Bible, which is what I base my faith upon.
At death, the Bible says we all go to the same place (the grave, sheol, hades) the only way to live again is by resurrection...literally a "standing up again".....like "hades", the meaning of the word "resurrection" has been obscured and distorted by belief in an immortal soul, which basically makes the resurrection redundant because nobody really dies.
If we recall Jesus raising his friend Lazarus, who had been dead for 4 days, Jesus did not pluck this man's spirit from 'the other side' and put it back in his body.....he actually repaired his decaying body and returned the breath (spirit) into his lungs. He had no recollection of where he had been, and if it was heaven, then how was it doing him a favor by bringing him back to this life only to die again later?
According to scripture, all the dead "sleep" (in an unconscious state) until the day Christ calls them from their graves (John 5:28-29)....some to life in heaven and some to a restoration of life on earth. Those chosen for life in heaven will have specific roles as 'kings and priests' and these will be resurrected first.... (Revelation 20:6) and they will rule over subjects on earth, where God put humans in the first place. (Revelation 21:2-4)
There are no such things as 'ghosts'....the Bible says that there are rebel spirits who like to impersonate dead people, but those who know what the Bible teaches about death, know that the dead don't talk to anyone.
The devil told the first humans that they would not die, and he has been lying about that ever since.
The only choices people have concerning life is to continue living by remaining obedient to God and his teachings, or to ignore them and face having no future at all. If that is "eternal darkness", then "gehenna" is that place. No one is conscious there however. (Ecclesiastes 9:5; 10)
shmogie
Well-Known Member
I think, and it seems ?
amorphous_constellation
Well-Known Member
But Paul said in Corinthians that you get a new body, and then it goes places. Or does the 'soul' go places in the interim the last the trumpet sounds making that body available, (obviously chronological far from the moment many people die) and then rejoin the body to create a new body, and take that body to a new place on a second trip? All of this is very confusing, it's no wonder I can never keep it all straight.
Another interesting thing is when you look at the greek words for soul and spirit in 1 Thessalonians 5:23, they were actually psyche and pneuma. Most people who speak english have a greater understanding of those two words than they would soul and spirit. They are actually applicable in different places. Psychology researches the psyche, and things that are pneumatic deal with air. Alternatively, we have no idea what could be meant by soul and spirit. So I guess a question might be, where does an equivalent word for the psyche show up in the old testament? Pneuma seems pretty compatible with the hebrew word for spirit, which was ruach, or the breath of god, but was there much discussion of the psyche before the new testament...
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We wait for the resurrection and the renewal of all things. We do have souls, and when we die, we receive a foretaste of either Heaven or Hell in accordance with the state of our soul (see the Parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man). The living can pray for the dead (see 2 Maccabees 12:38-43), and the dead can also pray for the living.
Our bodies at the Resurrection will be the same bodies that we have now, but transfigured and glorified, as Christ was transfigured on Mt. Tabor and as His body was glorified at His Resurrection.
MonkeyFire
Well-Known Member
The people who remain will be spirits, those who die become ghost.