Is the Ascension Story an Embellishment?

[Gary]

I think this is why general evangelism is so ineffective. I'd wager this board is full of former Christians who got the standard sales pitch. It's easy for some Christians to think themselves true evangelists by giving the boring boilerplate rather than getting their hands dirty and presenting viable belief options. Few of them would know how to effectively convey the Primacy of Christ view (or even know what it is) for example. There's a lack of sophistication in the mission field, and I think that explains the rise in skepticism. This is my humble opinion based on lots of observation and reading.

Viable (rational? logical?) belief options regarding a belief system whose core principle is the reanimation of the dead body of its leader two millennia ago?

Could you give some examples?

[robrecht]

I think your answer is a clue to the problem of proving the existence of Yahweh: one must already believe in the supernatural; in gods of some sort. Then you can try to convince the person that your god is the only true god. And the typical manner to do that is to prove the resurrection of the dead body of a man who lived twenty centuries ago. I think it is going to be much harder today to convince educated people of rising dead bodies than it has been in the past.

That may be typical for some, but it is not at all the approach that I would follow. To me it seems much more common in the philosophical tradition to develop the 'idea' of God as undefinable and therefore absolutely unique in ways that are best affirmed by universal negations. It just so happens that Yahweh's refusal to be named corresponds to this 'understanding' of God. My understanding of the Christians faith is to view Jesus' faithfulness and witness to the truth of God even unto death and beyond is a witness to this type of undefinable God of love. My Christian faith would be the same regardless of whether Jesus' resurrected body was a spiritual or material body. I actually believe it was both spiritual and material but not in a way that we can describe very well.

[Adrift]

My Christian faith would be the same regardless of whether Jesus' resurrected body was a spiritual or material body.

Wow.

[robrecht]

Wow.

Please be careful not to take one sentence out of context.

[Adrift]

Please be careful not to take one sentence out of context.

Oh, I read the sentence that followed it. I still find the sentence I quoted astonishing especially in light of 1 Corinthians 15:17, and the fact that Paul is referring to physical resurrection. That and the heavy condemnation of Docetism in the Gospel and epistles of John should highlight how off the idea of a spiritual rather than physical body is. Certainly later Gnostics proved that their faith in a spiritual resurrection body was not at all the same as the faith of those within orthodoxy.

[robrecht]

Oh, I read the sentence that followed it. I still find the sentence I quoted astonishing especially in light of 1 Corinthians 15:17, and the fact that Paul is referring to physical resurrection. That and the heavy condemnation of Docetism in the Gospel and epistles of John should highlight how off the idea of a spiritual rather than physical body is. Certainly later Gnostics proved that their faith in a spiritual resurrection body was not at all the same as the faith of those within orthodoxy.

I in no way disputed 1 Cor 15,17. Read 1 Corinthians in its entirety. Paul is very clearly speaking of a spiritual body. There's no way around that. How does Paul describe our new bodies that will be changed? Imperishable, glorious, powerful, spiritual, spirit as opposed to 'soul', heavenly, bearing the image of the last Adam, the second man, the man from heaven, immortal. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; the perishable cannot inherit the imperishable. The only material bodies that we have experience of on this side of death are not at all like this. The only matter that we have experience of is subject to entropy and decay. Whatever Paul has in mind in terms of our spiritual bodies, whatever kind of combination of spirit and matter that we can try to imagine, Paul is clearly not thinking of what we have experienced prior to our death; our heavenly bodies will not be like the dust of the earth. Personally, I like the image CS Lewis uses in the The Great Divorce of a greater more substantial kind of reality, but I do not think we can try and describe this reality very well.

[Adrift]

I in no way disputed 1 Cor 15,17. Read 1 Corinthians in its entirety. Paul is very clearly speaking of a spiritual body. There's no way around that. How does Paul describe our new bodies that will be changed? Imperishable, glorious, powerful, spiritual, spirit as opposed to 'soul', heavenly, bearing the image of the last Adam, the second man, the man from heaven, immortal. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; the perishable cannot inherit the imperishable. The only material bodies that we have experience of on this side of death are not at all like this. The only matter that we have experience of is subject to entropy and decay. Whatever Paul has in mind in terms of our spiritual bodies, whatever kind of combination of spirit and matter that we can try to imagine, Paul is clearly not thinking of what we have experienced prior to our death; our heavenly bodies will not be like the dust of the earth. Personally, I like the image CS Lewis uses in the The Great Divorce of a greater more substantial kind of reality, but I do not think we can try and describe this reality very well.

Source: Paul's Narrative Thought World by Ben Witherington III, Westminster John Knox Press, 1994, pp. 329-330

It is unlikely that Paul, when he talks about a "spiritual body," means an immaterial one. "Natural" body means a body animated and governed by a natural or physical life principle or force. Spiritual body does not mean a body without substance, but a body animated and vivified by God's Spirit. The eternal Spirit will be the force and life source animating this body; therefore it partakes of the eternal life the Spirit can give. Paul does not likely mean that it is similar to the Holy Spirit in its lack of material form.

© Copyright Original Source

[robrecht]

Source: Paul's Narrative Thought World by Ben Witherington III, Westminster John Knox Press, 1994, pp. 329-330

It is unlikely that Paul, when he talks about a "spiritual body," means an immaterial one. "Natural" body means a body animated and governed by a natural or physical life principle or force. Spiritual body does not mean a body without substance, but a body animated and vivified by God's Spirit. The eternal Spirit will be the force and life source animating this body; therefore it partakes of the eternal life the Spirit can give. Paul does not likely mean that it is similar to the Holy Spirit in its lack of material form.

© Copyright Original Source

I think the problem comes with what one means by 'matter, material, immaterial, physical,' which are terms that can mean very different things in different contexts and, in fact, are terms that Paul himself does not use here so I too should probably avoid the term as well. I completely agree with Witherington about the absolute reality of a spiritual body in Paul's thought. Some would say, I think rightly, that the spiritual and heavenly imperishable bodies Paul is referring to are more real than our earthly bodies. I think it would be more faithful to Paul to contrast (real) earthly, perishable bodies with (even more real) imperishable immortal spiritual bodies, like that of the Last Adam, the second man, the man from heaven.

[seanD]

I think the problem comes with what one means by 'matter, material, immaterial, physical,' which are terms that can mean very different things in different contexts and, in fact, are terms that Paul himself does not use here so I too should probably avoid the term as well. I completely agree with Witherington about the absolute reality of a spiritual body in Paul's thought. Some would say, I think rightly, that the spiritual and heavenly imperishable bodies Paul is referring to are more real than our earthly bodies. I think it would be more faithful to Paul to contrast (real) earthly, perishable bodies with (even more real) imperishable immortal spiritual bodies, like that of the Last Adam, the second man, the man from heaven.

"Fleshly" as per what Luke directly described, and what Matthew and John directly implied.

[robrecht]

"Fleshly" as per what Luke directly described, and what Matthew and John directly implied.

But clearly this is a term that is used differently by Paul so I think that would also create a potential misunderstanding of Paul.

[Gary]

That may be typical for some, but it is not at all the approach that I would follow. To me it seems much more common in the philosophical tradition to develop the 'idea' of God as undefinable and therefore absolutely unique in ways that are best affirmed by universal negations. It just so happens that Yahweh's refusal to be named corresponds to this 'understanding' of God. My understanding of the Christians faith is to view Jesus' faithfulness and witness to the truth of God even unto death and beyond is a witness to this type of undefinable God of love. My Christian faith would be the same regardless of whether Jesus' resurrected body was a spiritual or material body. I actually believe it was both spiritual and material but not in a way that we can describe very well.

Are you a universalist?

[robrecht]

Are you a universalist?

I leave God's judgment to God.

[Gary]

I in no way disputed 1 Cor 15,17. Read 1 Corinthians in its entirety. Paul is very clearly speaking of a spiritual body. There's no way around that. How does Paul describe our new bodies that will be changed? Imperishable, glorious, powerful, spiritual, spirit as opposed to 'soul', heavenly, bearing the image of the last Adam, the second man, the man from heaven, immortal. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; the perishable cannot inherit the imperishable. The only material bodies that we have experience of on this side of death are not at all like this. The only matter that we have experience of is subject to entropy and decay. Whatever Paul has in mind in terms of our spiritual bodies, whatever kind of combination of spirit and matter that we can try to imagine, Paul is clearly not thinking of what we have experienced prior to our death; our heavenly bodies will not be like the dust of the earth. Personally, I like the image CS Lewis uses in the The Great Divorce of a greater more substantial kind of reality, but I do not think we can try and describe this reality very well.

Just curious. Do you believe that Paul believed that in the final Resurrection, the bones and decomposed flesh of the righteous dead will be reconstituted and resurrected into the clouds or just that a spiritual "body", similar in form/outward appearance to their previous earthly body, will rise up out of their graves?

[seanD]

But clearly this is a term that is used differently by Paul so I think that would also create a potential misunderstanding of Paul.

Just to be clear, are you saying the gospels were at odds with Paul because they either didn't understand his teaching about resurrection or weren't aware of it, or that we don't understand Paul's resurrection teachings in relation to the gospels?

[robrecht]

Just to be clear, are you saying the gospels were at odds with Paul because they either didn't understand his teaching about resurrection or weren't aware of it, or that we don't understand Paul's resurrection teachings in relation to the gospels?

Neither. I'm merely saying that Paul and later gospel writers used some terms differently.