But where does the Bible speak of the soul leaving the body. The usual answer is the passage where Paul says "absent from the body...and present with the Lord".
I don't know where it might say that because I am not that familiar with the Bible, but obviously the soul has to leave the body once the body is dead, because there would be no reason for the soul to remain with a dead body
1 Corinthians 15:44 They are buried as natural human bodies, but they will be raised as spiritual bodies. For just as there are natural bodies, there are also spiritual bodies.
Paul says they are raised as spiritual bodies so that indicates that the soul (which is the person who is raised) will be raised as a spiritual body. Then it has to go somewhere and I believe the soul (the person) goes to the spiritual world (in the heavens), based upon the following verse:
1 Corinthians 15:40 There are also bodies in the heavens and bodies on the earth. The glory of the heavenly bodies is different from the glory of the earthly bodies.
On the other hand, he says that unless the dead are raised the Christian has no hope and his faith is worthless.
There seems to be a contradiction there. If the soul is the real person and the soul leaves the body to be with the Lord, then how could no resurrection from the dead mean faith is worthless?
I think I know the verse you are talking about where Paul says says that unless the dead are raised the Christian has no hope and his faith is worthless and I think Paul is referring to the spiritually dead being raised to spiritual life (eternal life). I just remembered that I explained this to a Christian on another forum some time ago, and I saved it as I saved all my longer posts, in a Word document, so here it is below. Sorry it is kind of long:
In
1 Corinthians 15:12-22, Paul was referring to a spiritual resurrection. That Jesus was raised up means His spirit was resurrected; brought back to life. If Christ’s spirit was not brought back to life, then your faith would be in vain and you would still be in your sins.
22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive means that all shall be made spiritually alive, not physically rise and be alive in bodies. That does not mean Jesus’ soul (spirit) was brought back to life (because the soul cannot die, so it does not need to be brought back to life); it means that the Cause of Christ (what He taught and represented) were brought back to life after three days... Had it NOT been brought back to life you would still be in your sins because it was the Cause of Christ that needed to be brought back to life in order to save people from their sins. People needed to get the Gospel message that Jesus taught and the disciples needed to carry that far and wide. Their faith in Jesus needed to be renewed (resurrected) after Jesus had died and the disciples lost all hope.
13 But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: and 16 For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: refers to rising from spiritual death, rising from the graves of ignorance of Christ, not to anyone rising from physical graves. Had the Cause of Christ not been brought back to life after three days, everyone would have remained in their sins and in spiritual death.
26 The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death refers to spiritual death, not physical death. The physical body was never designed to live forever, but the soul is immortal so it can never die. Those souls who believe in Jesus will have eternal life (everlasting life) because they are near to God; other souls who are veiled from God continue to exist in the spiritual world after their physical body dies, but they will not have eternal life because in comparison with the holy existence of the children of the Kingdom of God, they are nonexistent because they are separated from God.
Eternal life refers to
a quality of life, gaining the rewards of the heaven, which are peace, the spiritual graces, the various spiritual gifts in the Kingdom of God, the gaining of the desires of the heart and the soul, and the meeting of God. Eternal life does not refer to continuance or duration of physical life, since the physical body cannot live forever. Eternal life refers to continuance or duration of the life of the soul, since souls live forever.
Thus all the following Bible verses refer to the eternal life if the soul, not the eternal life of the physical body.
John 3:16: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.
John 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
1 John 5:13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life.
John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life,and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.
John 11:25-26 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?”
John 4:13-14 Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
We can eliminate the contradiction by saying that the body Paul desired to be absent from was "the body of death", as he calls it. In other words, Paul desired to be clothed with the body he will receive (spiritual body) at the resurrection of the dead and therefore be absent from the natural body of death. Paul understood that when he died he would have a new body when raised from the dead.
Yes, that is according to my understanding and one way to explain it. There are many ways of explaining the same process that will take place.
