What is the bible saying about a soul and a spirit

by jwfacts 5 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  jwfacts

  I am not sure i believe the bible, but am still trying to come to terms with whether we have a soul or spirit that goes on after death. I am also interested in seeing how the bible is similar/different than other religions. I have done research on the web in regards to what the bible says a soul is and get a variety of fairly different and generally not well presented ideas.

  As a Witness obviously we are taught that we are the only religion teaching truth and our concept differs from virtually all other religions. The idea being we are a soul, we die, Jah chooses if he wants to resurect us at which state we are a soul again. Spirit is just some somewhat meaningless thing.

  Does anyone have any interesting ideas on what the difference between a soul and spirit is, along with scriptual backing? Or is there any well researched articles you can direct me to on the web?

  Thanks - Paul
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  googlemagoogle

  i'm an atheist, but i did a lot of research on this too before turning atheist ;-)
  
  actually the WT position is "backed up" by only one single verse in the whole bible, ignoring other verses and aplied wrong. the "but the dead don't know anything" verse... don't remember where exactly it is, i think ecclesiastes or proverbs.
  
  iirc this verse really applies to not talking to the dead for informations, as they don't know any more than we do anyway.
  
  bible passages like saul talking to samuel's spirit, hiob referring to sheol as a place of constant work (similar to the greek idea of hades), jesus referring to the afterlife as heaven and hell like the way most christian denominations view it, paulus talking about the 3rd heavens and on and on...
  
  jesus' illustration about lazarus and the rich man always troubled me. they said, it's just an illustration. but why the heck would jesus, talking to jews, use an illustration that's completely unrelated to the culture? i mean, why would he, god's son, tell them about heaven and hell if he actually knows they don't exist?
  
  what really opened my eyes on this one, was flavius josephus' descriptions of the jewish sects. josephus said to have been in all three popular sects (saducees, pharisees and essenes) and stayed with the pharisees in the end. the picture he paints of the pharisees is completely different to the one presented by christians.
  
  but the most interesting part is their believe in an immortal soul that goes to sheol, the underworld. and it becomes even more interesting that paulus, who lived at about the same time as josephus (only born earlier), referred to himself as a PHARISEE when having an argument in the sanhedrin about the resurrection...
  
  so yes, the bible does know the immortal soul. keep in mind though, that it was written by different people, believing different things. so it has a lot of different views. there's no red line from beginning to end as we were always told. it's not there.
  
  it is a very interesting task to research the bible. just be honest to yourself... you might well end up an atheist too ;-)
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  jwfacts

  Interesting answer. I am tending to agree with you. The reason there are 30000 Christian sects is that there is 30000 ways of interpretting the bible. On almost every subject i research there is a plethora of different scriptures that conflict on many points.

  A religion starts with a predifined basic belief on each point. They accept the scriptures that support their belief and explain away the scriptures that don't.
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  googlemagoogle

  exactly. any single opinion that is presented along the lines of "the bible says ..." or "what the bible really teaches" is selective.
  
  the witnesses are so focussed on the door-to-door advertising, as they point out that particular verse as most important. you can ask them, if everything jesus said has to be done? if they say yes... tell em to sell their house and give the money to the poor. that's what jesus said...
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  Legolas

  actually the WT position is "backed up" by only one single verse in the whole bible, ignoring other verses and aplied wrong. the "but the dead don't know anything" verse... don't remember where exactly it is, i think ecclesiastes or proverbs

  Quick thought (Before thinking it over)...Why is that verse literal...and the on where jesus says 'let the dead bury the dead' not?
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  googlemagoogle

  are you questioning the faithful and discreet slave?!!!