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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Please explain resurrection
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
I am confused by the afterlife thread and the comments on resurrection.
What is this resurrection?
Is it of the body or mind or spirit or soul or the whole person?
When?
Are folks given a new body just or does their body re-connect with itself, one day at the end of the universe as we know it?
When (if) Jesus was resurrected at least his body was there to make something of.
But countless people have been eaten by wild animals/cremated and scattered etc. There's no chance of their actual bits being re-united - someone else could well have them by now anyway, do we argue over the atoms?
Or is it a comforting myth? I'm veering towards this last one. That it's a genuinely comforting thing for us all to believe and buy into.
[ 16. May 2016, 08:14: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
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Garden. Room. Walk
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
I have absolutely no idea about the mechanisms in play by which we continue to be, eternally. You're quite right to point out that the substances which compose our bodies at the time of death get taken up in different ways by the earth and the atmosphere to which they return. But in terms of substance, I'm not sure how much of my 73 year old body contains cells which were there at earlier stages of my life. I'm the same "axe" with about 50 billion new "heads" and 50 billion new "handles". Maybe I'm being presumptive to call myself "I". But it does seems that way things are; I have this sense of continuity and these memories of "I". There may be natural explanations for that but this temporal continuity also seems to have some elements of mystery and the unknown.
I'm not sure that pointing to the re-use of atoms does much to explain, or explain away, belief or disbelief in resurrections. Some form of continuity is as good as it gets for me.
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
Lots of potential ways to start trying to answer this, but I'll try to stick to the orthodox view, following the thought of recent expositors such as Wright and Bauckham.
Resurrection is the source and hope of christian belief. It's not an add-on or a luxury, but something that makes a crucial difference.
It's slightly better to err on the apophatic side of things, so it is sometimes easier to say what it isn't rather than what it is, but that's not to say that we don't/can't know anything about it at all.
Firstly, it's not reanimation or reincarnation. But it is bodily. The most extensive text on this is 1 Corinthians 15, where the term used for the resurrection body is soma pneumatikon, which is often translated as 'spiritual body'. It is sometimes thought (incorrectly, in my view) that this relegates that idea of the soma, the physicality of it, and emphasises the spirituality of it, thinking it as something incorporeal. But this view ignores that soma is never used to denote a metaphor. Rather the pneumatikon part denotes what it is that is the driving force behind the body. It is the Holy Spirit. So one could render soma pneumatikon as the 'Holy Spirit fuelled body'.
What so wrong-footed people with Jesus' resurrection was he was the only one. The idea of resurrection developed quite late in Judaism, but was still quite contentious (recall the Sadducees, who denied it, mocked Jesus by a question about marriage at the resurrection). Yet the view was that all would be resurrected at once. But Jesus was, as Paul puts it, "the firstborn from among the dead". He was first, the rest will follow.
So we only have the one case of resurrection proper. Lazarus was reanimated, as was Jairus' daughter, but these were not resurrections in the proper sense of the term. It was more of a foreshadowing of what was to come.
How the renewed physicality works, I don't think anyone really knows. There are only hints (like the fact that Jesus' resurrection body still bore scars) but I'm not convinced we can rely on these sufficiently to make overly-affirmative statements. I look forward to finding out.
I'm sure others here will have a quite different take to me on this one.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
Posts: 3791 | From: On the corporate ladder | Registered: Jan 2012
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SusanDoris
Incurable Optimist
# 12618
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Posted
Boogie
Very interesting OP.
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I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
Posts: 3083 | From: UK | Registered: May 2007
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Some years ago Mousethief once started a great thread on this called "what happened to all the fish" or some such, which has sadly, um, gone the way of all flesh.
quote:
Originally posted by Sipech:
But Jesus was, as Paul puts it, "the firstborn from among the dead". He was first, the rest will follow.
So we only have the one case of resurrection proper.
But even Jesus is in a class of his own, because what we appear to have a) is his this-worldly body transformed into his resurrection body (this obviously cannot apply to everyone) b) said body appearing (several times apparently unrecognisably!) on this earth, before ascending into, um, heaven and/or returning in the new creation. Which is not how things appear to pan out for everyone else.
The closer you look, the more confusing it gets.
[ 21. December 2015, 09:45: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Some form of continuity is as good as it gets for me.
Yes - I can't imagine no continuity, but is that just because it's a rather bleak prospect?
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
There's a tremendous medieval wall-painting in the basilica on the island of Torcello in the Venetian lagoon which shows the general resurrection ...
Beasts of prey are depicted vomiting up the people they've consumed - who are remarkably intact. So you've got lions, wolves, bears, leopards and so on with people coming out of their mouths as the Resurrection takes place ...
For some reason, there's even an elephant that's eaten somebody.
I always thought elephants were vegetarian. So now we know differently ...
There may be an image of it somewhere if you Google it - like so many of these medieval frescoes and mosaics, it's an awful lot of fun ...
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
There may be an image of it somewhere if you Google it - like so many of these medieval frescoes and mosaics, it's an awful lot of fun ...
There's one at the bottom of this regugitatory page.
[ 21. December 2015, 10:45: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Some form of continuity is as good as it gets for me.
Yes - I can't imagine no continuity, but is that just because it's a rather bleak prospect?
Protracted, painful, consciousness- and awareness-stripping dying strikes me as much bleaker. And many of us have that to "look forward to" whether or not we believe in continuity or oblivion. On another thread, I've just quoted this rather good quote from a dying Christopher Hitchens which makes the end-point rather well.
quote:
There'll be plenty of time for unconsciousness once this is all over.
And of course, if he's right, that's a pretty smart observation. But I don't believe he is.
Imagine the scenario of an eternal encounter between an unimaginably resurrected Hitchens and Mother Teresa ...
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
The Venetians were doing the best they could with the knowledge of the time. Clearly the tiger is not going to vomit up his prey; that human was long ago converted into tiger fur, baby tigers, and tiger metabolism.
Although I am sure it is equally flawed, I propose a 21st century image: the new OS. When you die, all that is you (your memories, personality, soul, etc.) get run through the Heavenly debugging software. They used to call this Purgatory, but essentially it peels out all the malware, bad viruses, and unwanted cookies -- the sins. While they're at it, they fix all the mis-spellings and the times when you used the apostrophe incorrectly. You are free from sin!
Once you are nice and clean, all your data is loaded onto a data stick (or some Heavenly equivalent) and God keeps it in a desk drawer, or a shoebox, or a file cabinet -- the same place you squirreled the Word document of the novel you wrote in 1989. Time does not pass for you there, and you are not aware of being stored.
Meanwhile, back out in the data center, the geek angels are installing the new mainframes with the vastly-expanded capabilities. When the new Heaven and the new Earth are ready, God hands over the data. We are all uploaded into a new and much more powerful system, where we can do and access things that we could not imagine, back when we were on our computers that were built (born) decades ago.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Of course, Brenda ... and I'm not sure medieval people were always quite as 'literal' as we assume they were ...
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
I don't think that our mortal remains have anything to do with our resurrection. Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. What is of the earth returns to the earth.
I believe that the Creator God will provide new bodies of one form or another, we won't know until the time comes, in the same way as God will form a new heaven and a new earth.
As we are so restrained by our thinking due to our concept of time, within which we are bound due to our current circumstances, and by our concept of reality which is bound by the matter we perceive with our human senses, it is very difficult for us to see other than in a mirror dimly.
We are promised everlasting life in God's eternal Kingdom of love. That has to be enough to hold onto.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Tortuf
Ship's fisherman
# 3784
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Posted
I have no earthly idea. What will happen is what will happen. Personally, I wouldn't mind looking like Kevin Klein.
On a less flippant note. I think I have already been resurrected/saved so what happens after I die is not a compelling issue.
Posts: 6963 | From: The Venice of the South | Registered: Dec 2002
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
I'm a bit wary of this shiny new sin-free body and soul idea.
If we're supposed to be dedicated to the worship of God for all eternity then surely fairly innocuous aspects of our personality which make us who we are individually and are important to us now, the clothes we like, the friends we have, the food we eat, the things we like to do for fun etc are all distractions from the heavenly bliss and will be swept away.
And what about people with genetic differences? What about people who are deaf and proudly identify with the deaf community? What about people who are BORN with no legs or extra fingers or anything like that and make a full life for themselves which has been shaped and directed by their genetic difference in a way that makes it hard to separate who they'd be without it?
Do we have in mind some sort of super shiny perfect meta human that actually isn't really human at all by virtue of being perfect and shiny? If this is the case then are 'we' resurrected at all?
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
That's an interesting point, (Macrina). I would say that it's the food we eat, the shit we shit, the clothes we wear, the inconsequential moments in the day - that contain the real bliss. Why would we go beyond this, when this is the beyond? The alternative sounds like a mind-fuck to me.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
I was given a glimpse of heaven in a vision once, in which there were more flower varieties than I could ever imagine with a range of scents that were far beyond any I had experienced, along with music which extended into greater ranges of tone I had heard, hard to describe. I was fully myself, with my own tastes, as I took in what I was given.
If this was heaven, (and I accept that some reading this will not believe the truth of my experience,) then all of the senses we have will remain, but they will not be limited to what we are currently familiar with.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Honest Ron Bacardi
Shipmate
# 38
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I'm a bit wary of this shiny new sin-free body and soul idea.
If we're supposed to be dedicated to the worship of God for all eternity then surely fairly innocuous aspects of our personality which make us who we are individually and are important to us now, the clothes we like, the friends we have, the food we eat, the things we like to do for fun etc are all distractions from the heavenly bliss and will be swept away.
And what about people with genetic differences? What about people who are deaf and proudly identify with the deaf community? What about people who are BORN with no legs or extra fingers or anything like that and make a full life for themselves which has been shaped and directed by their genetic difference in a way that makes it hard to separate who they'd be without it?
Do we have in mind some sort of super shiny perfect meta human that actually isn't really human at all by virtue of being perfect and shiny? If this is the case then are 'we' resurrected at all?
Wouldn't such an individual be some sort of idealisation, i.e. not a real person at all? The resurrection narratives seem to imply that there is continuity with what went before but not identicalness. That the resurrection body is not limited by constraints of time or space. The new heaven and the new earth are a unity, caused by the fusion of the old heaven and the old earth, which therefore cease to be in the form they are at present, but which nevertheless have their antecedents in the old. So it's not about sweeping away the old for some shiny replacement model in that respect.
I suppose the word I'm heading towards is "transcendence". It is not that the good things we have achieved are of no consequence - rather that our own shortcomings are transcended.
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Anglo-Cthulhic
Posts: 4857 | From: the corridors of Pah! | Registered: May 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
It's all stuff we make up. Apart from the risen Christ. And He said nothing about it. Absolutely nothing. He made up stuff about it when was a bloke of course. Because He couldn't know a thing about it. It'll be cool. That's all we need to know, all we can know.
What's to explain?
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Love wins
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Anglican_Brat
Shipmate
# 12349
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Posted
Jesus' words to the Sadducees on their hypothetical case of the woman with seven husbands offer one insight to me.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+22%3A23-32&version=NRSVACE
I interpret Jesus' answer to the question of the resurrection to mean that all of our earthly institutions/practices/customs all will not make sense once we cross the other side of the eschaton. What occurs after death is a mystery for us, because frankly we are not there yet.
The hope and faith we have is that God is beyond death, and that in his eyes, we are alive.
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It's Reformation Day! Do your part to promote Christian unity and brotherly love and hug a schismatic.
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
I don't know if any of it's true. But, for me, I think the most important things are that everyone is there, safe, and well, and home.
I think I can cope with whatever details there may be.
In Christian circles, butterflies are often used as an explanation of resurrection: the caterpillar thinks it's dying--and it is, in a sense--but it becomes something new. This Scientific American article describes the process. Some of the process is a bit TMI; and if you're squeamish, you might want to avoid the pic at the very end of the article.
Bored Panda has "19 Before And After Photos Of Butterfly And Moth Transformations".
And there's always the hand-written and hand-drawn book "Hope For The Butterflies", by Trina Paulus.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
It's all stuff we make up. Apart from the risen Christ. And He said nothing about it. Absolutely nothing. He made up stuff about it when was a bloke of course. Because He couldn't know a thing about it. It'll be cool. That's all we need to know, all we can know.
What's to explain?
Dorothy Sayers, novelist, author of the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries, and a Christian, wrote a play called "The Man Born To Be King", about Jesus. When Lazarus comes toddling out of his tomb, Jesus says "Now, don't give away any state secrets!"
![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
Wouldn't such an individual be some sort of idealisation, i.e. not a real person at all? The resurrection narratives seem to imply that there is continuity with what went before but not identicalness. That the resurrection body is not limited by constraints of time or space. The new heaven and the new earth are a unity, caused by the fusion of the old heaven and the old earth, which therefore cease to be in the form they are at present, but which nevertheless have their antecedents in the old. So it's not about sweeping away the old for some shiny replacement model in that respect.
I suppose the word I'm heading towards is "transcendence". It is not that the good things we have achieved are of no consequence - rather that our own shortcomings are transcended.
Yes it would be an idealisation, that was what I was trying to say and the source of my discomfort with the idea. It all sounds very nice in principle but I'm really not sure how you can have something human without the 'flaws' that make us so. I am not sure how you'd tell the difference for example between an angel and a transcended human. It just seems like a comforting myth designed to help us make sense of this rather cold, unfeeling and cruel world*.
*which is also just as full of wonder, love and tenderness but we must be realistic in our assessment of nature and the natural world.
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Imagine the scenario of an eternal encounter between an unimaginably resurrected Hitchens and Mother Teresa ...
Actually, at the time, I wrote sort of a little skit here. (Can't find it in the archives, not even with Google. I think I have it on an external hard drive.)
Basically, CH arrived in Heaven, to his surprise. God stepped out from behind a pillar and said "Boo". CH said he'd have to pay off some bets now! Asked God if there was a good poker game anywhere. God answered something like "Yes. You'll find Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and assorted others...and the dealer is Mother Teresa." (Ended there.)
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Golden Key
Shipmate
# 1468
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Posted
{Tangent}
Ok, I found it on the "RIP Hitchens" thread at Archive.org.
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Blessed Gator, pray for us!
--"Oh bat bladders, do you have to bring common sense into this?" (Dragon, "Jane & the Dragon")
--"Oh, Peace Train, save this country!" (Yusuf/Cat Stevens, "Peace Train")
Posts: 18601 | From: Chilling out in an undisclosed, sincere pumpkin patch. | Registered: Oct 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Gaudy Night is among my most memorable reads.
But Lazarus woulda known NOWT. Like Jesus. Nearly ...
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
But Lazarus woulda known NOWT. Like Jesus. Nearly ...
Which means in translation what? "wouldna know NOWT" isn't normal English. Does it mean he knew nothing? I am not internet searching on expensive rural data for translation.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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Macrina
Shipmate
# 8807
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
But Lazarus woulda known NOWT. Like Jesus. Nearly ...
Which means in translation what? "wouldna know NOWT" isn't normal English. Does it mean he knew nothing? I am not internet searching on expensive rural data for translation.
Would have known nothing.
Posts: 535 | From: Christchurch, New Zealand | Registered: Nov 2004
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
It's not the truth, Raptor Eye, it's the interpretation.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
It's not the truth, Raptor Eye, it's the interpretation.
The truth comes through, Martin, if the interpretation helps us to meet with God.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
All truth is interpretation.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Sorry Raptor Eye, I wasn't saying that what you said is not the truth as you see it, that you were not being truthful. That you were not being completely accurate in reporting what you experienced. Neither were you being untruthful in your interpretation. But your interpretation that you had a vision, your metanarrative, can only be received as that. There is no rational, faithful need to believe otherwise.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
And as for meeting with God, well we invoke an icon, an avatar - a role, a script, a story - of Him in our minds. That maps with Him in so far as it is gracious, kind, merciful, forgiving, healing, correcting, patient, trusting, encouraging. We can call that meeting Him if we like.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
It's language to describe experience rather than interpretation, Martin. It is what it is.
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
And as for meeting with God, well we invoke an icon, an avatar - a role, a script, a story - of Him in our minds. That maps with Him in so far as it is gracious, kind, merciful, forgiving, healing, correcting, patient, trusting, encouraging. We can call that meeting Him if we like.
At some point, we face up to and clear down the images we have created in our minds, as they are not God. That is greatly challenging.
At some point, we encounter the love of God and recognise God's nature of forgiveness, grace, etc.
In the meantime, we may do as you have said, hold on to the truth where we recognise it in others, and hold on to our own familiar images. If we follow Christ, we will remain on track.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Where does He lead?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
How?
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Love wins
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
"And he leads his people on
To the place where he is gone."
I have sung this a thousand times.
But my OP question remains the same - what does it mean?
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
The hope and faith we have is that God is beyond death, and that in his eyes, we are alive.
I like this, I think.
But deep down I also find myself feeling "Yes, but what about my loved ones - are they alive in their own eyes too?" If we are simply to be 'one in/with God' why did he bother with the whole universe thing in the first place?
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Alisdair
Shipmate
# 15837
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Posted
Perhaps it's not so different to a baby being born into a 'reality' that previously it had almost no concept of, except the barest glimmer, and yet there is no doubt the world of the unborn child is very much a part of the greater reality outside the womb.
Posts: 334 | From: Washed up in England | Registered: Aug 2010
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Out individual, unique personhood isn't annihilated in the Borg.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Our ... this is happening more frequently. 'smee age.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Raptor Eye
Shipmate
# 16649
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
Where does He lead?
He leads us into encounter with God.
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Be still, and know that I am God! Psalm 46.10
Posts: 4359 | From: The United Kingdom | Registered: Sep 2011
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Starting from where? How? By what means?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie
If we are simply to be 'one in/with God' why did he bother with the whole universe thing in the first place?
This is a question we have only been able to ask for a few hundred years, and really realise the implications for maybe 150. We are on the outskirts of a galaxy with 200 million stars in a local cluster of some 25 galaxies, in a universe where, in every direction there are more galaxies back to the beginning of time and the universe. Yet we exist and try to understand. We want to be important as a collective humanity and individuals. Are we as special as we wish to be? Do we know the least thing yet, with our religion, science, philosophy, music and arts? Probably we know just the smallest things only. We can't even stop ourselves from hoarding the essentials of life away from others of our kind, and we enjoy killing and putting our fellow humans down. We enjoy destroying the basic environment of our planet. It all makes me think that we have a long way to go before we can even ask the right questions. The answer might as well be 42, pi, to sing and dance, to count beetles, smell flowers, or type on smart phones with one finger. I had thought at one point that Christianity had the answers to the basic questions, but I think my questions were wrong. A better point is that we have been show how to live, and to not seperate that living with how to die. Life and death are both states of beingness. We can't know much more except by hopeful believing, no one can tell you the secret. You are alive, so then live. When not alive anymore and in the other state of beingness, you will get the answers or they won't matter because you haven't any further awareness. But it isn't worth fretting too much about it. As Darwin wrote, a dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton.
For myself, the hoarfrost and stars of the morning beside this lake, with the memory of northern lights from yesterday afternoon with the only sound being skis against the snow, and then waking up to a bugger of a squirrel scratching away again under the cabin again are nearly enough. And it doesn't matter if it isn't enough. That's all I get just now.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Philip Charles
Ship's cutler
# 618
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Posted
Taking Brenda's idea further.
quote:
Meanwhile, back out in the data center, the geek angels are installing the new mainframes with the vastly-expanded capabilities. When the new Heaven and the new Earth are ready, God hands over the data. We are all uploaded into a new and much more powerful system, where we can do and access things that we could not imagine, back when we were on our computers that were built (born) decades ago.
In the geek world data can be stored in many ways. Magnetic patterns on a hard drive, On/off switches in RAM, Patterns of pits on a DVD. Printed out on paper. Data can also be transmitted over distance by internet etc.
At the moment Philip Charles is contained in a biochemical device called a body. Using the geekish analogy I assume that the are other devices that could contain Philip Charles. The resurrection occurs when someone is transferred from from the biochemical device to another device (St.Paul's spiritual body) via some divine fibre network.
Always push an analogy beyond its limit.
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There are 10 kinds of people. Those who understand binary and those who don't.
Posts: 89 | From: Dunedin, NZ | Registered: Jun 2001
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Philip Charles:
Taking Brenda's idea further.
quote:
Meanwhile, back out in the data center, the geek angels are installing the new mainframes with the vastly-expanded capabilities. When the new Heaven and the new Earth are ready, God hands over the data. We are all uploaded into a new and much more powerful system, where we can do and access things that we could not imagine, back when we were on our computers that were built (born) decades ago.
In the geek world data can be stored in many ways. Magnetic patterns on a hard drive, On/off switches in RAM, Patterns of pits on a DVD. Printed out on paper. Data can also be transmitted over distance by internet etc.
At the moment Philip Charles is contained in a biochemical device called a body. Using the geekish analogy I assume that the are other devices that could contain Philip Charles. The resurrection occurs when someone is transferred from from the biochemical device to another device (St.Paul's spiritual body) via some divine fibre network.
Always push an analogy beyond its limit.
I don't know about "beyond its limit." That all works pretty well for me.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Entirely reasonable to me. And consider how, in our lifetimes, all of this has become not only imaginable, but possible. Do you remember when, if you wanted to hear a song, you used a vinyl disc that had to be spun at either 33 or 78 rpm? This disc held one song. In our lifetimes we have moved to where my Ipod Nano, measuring 1.5 inches square, holds 5000 songs. No, I have no difficulty at all in believing that the Heavenly geek squad has tech that we cannot conceive of.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Philip Charles:
In the geek world data can be stored in many ways. Magnetic patterns on a hard drive, On/off switches in RAM, Patterns of pits on a DVD. Printed out on paper. Data can also be transmitted over distance by internet etc.
At the moment Philip Charles is contained in a biochemical device called a body. Using the geekish analogy I assume that the are other devices that could contain Philip Charles. The resurrection occurs when someone is transferred from from the biochemical device to another device (St.Paul's spiritual body) via some divine fibre network.
Always push an analogy beyond its limit.
Yes, it's nice and I rather like it - but Philip Charles residing in his biochemical device has glands, hormones, neurochemicals, electrical impluses - you name it. All give him his thoughts/feelings/soul/spirit. I can't see how the 'real' Philip Charles can be separate from all this in order to be uploaded.
For example, when our brain stops working (dementia) there are glimmers of our 'real' selves left - but is it enough to upload anywhere? I suspect not.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Mudfrog
Shipmate
# 8116
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
quote:
Originally posted by Honest Ron Bacardi:
Wouldn't such an individual be some sort of idealisation, i.e. not a real person at all? The resurrection narratives seem to imply that there is continuity with what went before but not identicalness. That the resurrection body is not limited by constraints of time or space. The new heaven and the new earth are a unity, caused by the fusion of the old heaven and the old earth, which therefore cease to be in the form they are at present, but which nevertheless have their antecedents in the old. So it's not about sweeping away the old for some shiny replacement model in that respect.
I suppose the word I'm heading towards is "transcendence". It is not that the good things we have achieved are of no consequence - rather that our own shortcomings are transcended.
Yes it would be an idealisation, that was what I was trying to say and the source of my discomfort with the idea. It all sounds very nice in principle but I'm really not sure how you can have something human without the 'flaws' that make us so. I am not sure how you'd tell the difference for example between an angel and a transcended human. It just seems like a comforting myth designed to help us make sense of this rather cold, unfeeling and cruel world*.
*which is also just as full of wonder, love and tenderness but we must be realistic in our assessment of nature and the natural world.
This all shrieks of the old idea that anything material or physical is icky and not worthy of the presence of god. That might be true of Greek philosophy and life-denying monasticism, but it's not a Biblical concept and certainly not, IMHO, either healthy or God-inspired.
Where do we get this rather odd idea that all heaven is about is that it's a place where we will just be 'worship-fodder' for God and stand around all day singing praises with white robes and crowns on? If all God wanted was a host of shiny worshippers for eternity then surely he would content himself with the ranks of angels!
I don't believe it in the slightest! I think Heaven will be a place of life and activity, industry, experience and physical satisfaction. I see nothing in Scripture that suggests disembodied spirits flitting around being 'transcendent' and doing nothing more interesting than singing Gregorian chant around a metaphorical throne!
I'd like a real life please - and that will necessarily involve my whole spirit, soul and (glorified) body, so that I can run around and enjoy myself. Otherwise, what's the point?!
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"The point of having an open mind, like having an open mouth, is to close it on something solid."
G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 8237 | From: North Yorkshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2004
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
For example, when our brain stops working (dementia) there are glimmers of our 'real' selves left - but is it enough to upload anywhere? I suspect not.
I suspect otherwise from watching my grandmother. Most of the time she didn't seem to be there, but then you'd get one blessed rare moment when everything came back into focus and she knew you, she knew where and when she was, she made normal conversation and recalled old jokes--a lovely foretaste of the resurrection!--and then the curtain came down again, and she was all but nonverbal.
So it seems to me that the original "her" is still there, but stymied by its container so very little gets expressed. Rather like a computer with a bad, bad monitor connection that occasionally goes right for a brief moment. Fix the monitor and you're back in business.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'd like a real life please - and that will necessarily involve my whole spirit, soul and (glorified) body, so that I can run around and enjoy myself. Otherwise, what's the point?!
But, Like Macrina asked, how you can have something human without the 'flaws' that make us so?
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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