Was Jesus 'mortal' or 'immortal' ?

[ElieG12]

As long as Jesus obeyed the rules that a human being must obey to remain healthy (which is equivalent to God's law), he would have lived forever as a human, because his body had not inherited imperfection from Adam, so Jesus did not inherit the natural death.

That he could have lived forever (eternal life) is not the same as he was immortal. A human being can live forever in appropriate conditions and following the rules (as if it were his body's instruction manual)... but a human being cannot live without oxygen, without food, without water to drink, at extreme temperatures, if seriously injures certain vital organs, if the external pressure is extreme, etc.

Human beings cannot be immortal, because they are physical and depend on external factors which God keeps stable. So although Jesus may have lived as a human forever, he was not immortal while he was human.

Angels, although they are spirit, are not immortal either. Jesus received immortality from the Supreme Creator after surviving all the tests to which he was subjected, and showing full obedience to God, his Father, the original source of life.

 

[Fred J]

The flesh is mortal, but can comfort the spirit; the spirit is immortal, and can render the flesh innocent. Together: both flesh and spirit are able to become perfect.

Those who are born of and after Adam are 'mortal', for all have sinned and fallen short of GOD's Glory.

For, in the beginning GOD created on earth all things including man and declared them all as, 'very good'.

For one have to bridle ones fleshly self passions and desires, and all of it's members from transgression, to achieve 'immortality'.

Adam was innocent, but he violated the commandment of GOD already given to Him prior in caution.

And. so do us Gentiles, even without the written Law as the 'schoolmaster', though we violate the law naturally in us.

Where our conscience is the 'schoolmaster', whether we are excused or accused of transgression.

 

[Fred J]

I'm asking how long does it take for a body to decay because someone brought up the point that Jesus must have been God because his body did not decay. And then there's Joseph a wealthy dude who probably spared no bills in burying Jesus based on all the Jews knew from hanging around the Egyptians. And why you think you know more than I do concerning the Scriptures is one of the great wonders of the world.

Is because based on your replies, it exposes that you testify the scripture as, 'babes in Christ'.

There's a saying, 'You need to learn how to crawl first before you learn how to walk.'

Since, you're wise in your own conceit, it is difficult to get through to you apparently.

 

[Peterlag]

Is because based on your replies, it exposes that you testify the scripture as, 'babes in Christ'.

There's a saying, 'You need to learn how to crawl first before you learn how to walk.'

Since, you're wise in your own conceit, it is difficult to get through to you apparently.

May I have a verse that I spoke about as a babe in Christ? Such a concept is impossible for me which is probably why you will not come up with a verse since I'm one of the most knowledgeable experienced guys in the world on the knowledge of the resurrected Christ.

 

[CadyandZoe]

'And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the FATHER,) full of grace and truth.' (John 1:14)

'And also written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.' (1 Corinthians 15:45)

'The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from Heaven.' (1 Corinthians 15:47)


How can we witness to others using the sound doctrine knowledge of the Holy Bible, if such a question arise ?

Mortal

An important element in the gospel is that Jesus died on a cross and was risen from the dead.

The message to us is this. If the Father can raise Jesus from the dead, he can also raise us from the dead.

The question is: What do you want and how will you get it?

 

[Spyder]

Bible hermeneutics is often discussed by not often performed. Those who do attempt to understand what the writers of the books in our bibles intended to convey to us are lost because of several reasons. Our first problem is that we don't have the mind or culture of a 2000-year-old Jewish person. The second is that bible translators did not either as they put the manuscripts into our language. The their issue is that we are people who enjoy being part of a group and believe if we correct if so many others agree with us.

I think it is important to understand how something can exist before it physically exists;

Article on “Preexistence” in the Dictionary of the Later New Testament & Its Developments helpfully notes that,

“The pre-existent state may be described as ideal (existence in the mind or plan of God) or actual (existence alongside and distinct from God).”

Thus, it is well understood within Biblical scholarship that pre-existence may mean either that something or someone may literally exist in Heaven (the ‘incarnational’ model already mentioned) or may be of the Jewish ‘ideal’ type where something or someone may exist in God’s mind before He literally brings it into material existence.

There is a mountain of Jewish literature that confirms how all-pervasive “notional” pre-existence was in Jewish thinking at the time of Christ. One of the most prominent scholars in modern christological studies, Larry Hurtado, states,

“There is today a virtual consensus among scholars that the pre-Christian Jewish tradition provides the most important background for the idea of pre-existence in the NT”.

Regarding the Jewish understanding of foreknowledge, the article in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia is helpful:

…the term foreknowledge is an expansion of the idea of God’s “counsel” or plan, regarding it as an intelligent prearrangement, the idea of foreknowledge being assimilated to that of foreordination. The same idea is found in [1 Pet. 1:20]. Here the apostle speaks of Christ as a lamb “foreordained” by God before the foundation of the world…It has the idea of a purpose which determines the course of the Divine procedure.

This evidence must be seriously considered before we conclude Jesus was actually living and conscious as God before his appearance on earth, otherwise we run the risk of imposing on the Bible our own traditional cultural reading, no matter how “orthodox” we may imagine it to be. That is the error of eisegesis, reading into the text, rather than exegesis, reading out of the text as the original readers thousands of years ago would have done.

Notional pre-existence is the idea that something or someone may ‘exist’ in the mind of God before actualizing on earth in history at the appointed time. What God purposes and decrees is considered so certain that it is spoken of as though it already exists. Indeed God is the One who “calls those things which are not as though they were” (Rom. 4:17). That is, what God promises already exists with Him “in Heaven”. When Jews spoke of something or someone pre-existing in heaven they understood it was “ideal” or “notional” in God’s foreknowledge, but not yet actual on earth. That is, it already existed in God’s mind and in God’s plan.

This is why Jesus could say "Before Abraham, I am." Yahweh and prophesied His purpose from the earliest days of Adam.

This topic can be searched, and one can find several resources that support this character of Jewish thought.

 

[Spyder]

Also important but seldom seen is a objective word study. Perhaps bible translators were simply hoping to help us understand, but the understanding they were shooting for is the one that they themselves hold onto. Beware the writings that are amending by capitalization and punctuation that did not exist in the manuscripts except by scribal insertions and errors.

We are given to make assumptions that are not valid because of them. Sometimes, those assumptions become illogical doctrines and dogma. Those are selected as the arbiter of who is Christian and who is not.

If we do not have the ability to humble ourselves and even consider that someone else may be right while we are not; no growth takes place. God's spirit can work in us when we don't blank our minds with our own loud voices.

The dangers of Christian groupthink​

By their very nature, groups naturally bend toward conformity. We've all experienced the challenge of spending concentrated time with people whose opinions and values are different than ours— this is why some people find family gatherings such a challenge.

Religion easily creates a culture that's like conformity on steroids. Belief in a God who has made himself known through Scripture presupposes that there's only one right answer to every question, and it's clergy's job to reveal it.

You'd think that the fact that Christendom is so fractured would humble and enable us to focus on the living savior we all share more than the theological or political boxes we've check off. After all, if it was so easy to have the correct opinions, we wouldn't have over 21,000 denominations in the world. Meanwhile, people are just looking for a place to wrestle with the claims of Christ and the way it informs their worldview.

 

[BARNEY BRIGHT]

It’s alright @BARNEY BRIGHT we just differ in the belief of having souls. Because when Yahavah breathed into Adam he became a living soul who was created in the image of God, having a mind/will/emotions. Eve also was created in the image of God also, which her also bearing a soul, which is believed in by faith. Thank you for sharing and pointing out that you don’t believe in souls? I guess.

Cause it’s not case for me to battle. Everyone has to choose for themselves and see what the spirit leads us to do which is love our neighbor as ourselves. You are my neighbor.

You're right, everyone one of us must choose what scriptural truth the Bible is teaching. It seems you and I differ in what the scriptures are teaching us regarding the word Soul and whether Jesus was mortal or immortal, when he came to earth as a human being. I believe that human beings are living Souls, because what I believe by faith, is that the physical human body became a living Soul when God blew the breath/spirit of life into the physical human body. I also believe by faith that God's only begotten Son came to earth as a mortal living Soul, and didn't become immortal until after his resurrection from the dead. I also believe by faith that when Jesus was resurrected from the dead he was resurrected as a immortal life giving spirit who had also inherited incorruption. I also believe by faith that the human beings who are Jesus Christ's brothers, who will be kings and priests with Jesus in that heavenly Messianic Kingdom will get a resurrection like Jesus and also be resurrected from the dead as immortal spirit beings and inherit incorruption.

 

[BARNEY BRIGHT]

Do you have a verse that says... The only begotten Son of God was originally in heaven with God until God sent his only begotten Son to mankind?[/QUOTE\] John 6:37-40, 62; John 8:23, 42 are teaching me that before the only begotten son of God came to earth he was in heaven with his Father who is God. These verses are teaching me that it was the only begotten Son of God who was sent by the Father who is God, that it was the only begotten Son of God who came down from heaven, to do his Father's will. I believe what these scriptures are teaching me when they show that the only begotten Son of God had a prehuman life. Its very clear that Jesus had a prehuman life in heaven with his Father who is God, and this goes right along with the scripture at John 20:17 that say after Jesus was resurrected from the dead that he has a Father and God that was his apostles and disciples Father and God. So here in this scripture Jesus isn't teaching that he was his apostles and disciples Father and God, but that the person who is his Father and God is his apostles Father and God.

 

[MatthewG]

You're right, everyone one of us must choose what scriptural truth the Bible is teaching. It seems you and I differ in what the scriptures are teaching us regarding the word Soul and whether Jesus was mortal or immortal, when he came to earth as a human being. I believe that human beings are living Souls, because what I believe by faith, is that the physical human body became a living Soul when God blew the breath/spirit of life into the physical human body. I also believe by faith that God's only begotten Son came to earth as a mortal living Soul, and didn't become immortal until after his resurrection from the dead. I also believe by faith that when Jesus was resurrected from the dead he was resurrected as a immortal life giving spirit who had also inherited incorruption. I also believe by faith that the human beings who are Jesus Christ's brothers, who will be kings and priests with Jesus in that heavenly Messianic Kingdom will get a resurrection like Jesus and also be resurrected from the dead as immortal spirit beings and inherit incorruption.

Good for you man, thank you for sharing out what you believe.

 

[The Learner]

Both, he was fully man and fully G_d

 

[Fred J]

May I have a verse that I spoke about as a babe in Christ? Such a concept is impossible for me which is probably why you will not come up with a verse since I'm one of the most knowledgeable experienced guys in the world on the knowledge of the resurrected Christ.

There you go 'babes in Christ', as Jesus said, "You will know them by their fruit."

When you proudly brag about your 'self', that's already a 'red flag' for believers of the 'Sola Scriptural'.

 

[Fred J]

Mortal

An important element in the gospel is that Jesus died on a cross and was risen from the dead.

The message to us is this. If the Father can raise Jesus from the dead, he can also raise us from the dead.

The question is: What do you want and how will you get it?

If Jesus was 'mortal', a body should have been found inside the tomb on the third day.

For it is written, 'Flesh and blood shall not inherit the Kingdom of GOD.'

While apart from Jesus, all the asleep saints in Christ shall rise from the dead, and they shall be changed at a blink of an eye.

According to Isaiah ch. 53, Jesus suffered and died for the transgression and iniquities of the guilty, while Him without sin and blameless.

Due to His Holiness and purity, He rose in the same body he was buried, where the scars and wounds are visible to witnesses.

Pondering merely in some of these, how can Jesus be 'mortal' like us ?

 

[CadyandZoe]

If Jesus was 'mortal', a body should have been found inside the tomb on the third day.

Why? Jesus was resurrected so his body was free to leave the tomb.

Pondering merely in some of these, how can Jesus be 'mortal' like us ?

Hebrews 2:14

 

[Spyder]

Both, he was fully man and fully G_d

Verse please?

 

[RedFan]

May I have a verse that I spoke about as a babe in Christ? Such a concept is impossible for me which is probably why you will not come up with a verse since I'm one of the most knowledgeable experienced guys in the world on the knowledge of the resurrected Christ.

Oh, the irony! You've just furnished proof of being a babe in Christ with this very comment. Ponder a bit on Philippians 2:3, learn some humility, and grow in Christ.

 

[Peterlag]

Oh, the irony! You've just furnished proof of being a babe in Christ with this very comment. Ponder a bit on Philippians 2:3, learn some humility, and grow in Christ.

So what you're saying is an expert in a certain field should tell the amateur that they are better and you quote Philippians to prove your point. Try that on the operating table. Tell the Doc's to bring in the less qualified so you can practice Philippians 2:3.

 

[Peterlag]

There you go 'babes in Christ', as Jesus said, "You will know them by their fruit."

When you proudly brag about your 'self', that's already a 'red flag' for believers of the 'Sola Scriptural'.

I tell the truth and you call it brag. Is a doctor bragging when they tell you they are an expert? Should we tell the Doc's they are boastfully expressing pride in themselves because they are professionals in their field? I'm one of the best in the world in the field of understanding who the resurrected Christ is and what are some of his characteristics. I'm just telling the truth. And yeah you can't come up with a verse that I handled poorly because there are none. So you attack me personally. All over the world this is done and taught that when one cannot win on the issues being discussed. That they then attack the other person personally. This is what is happening here.

 

[MatthewG]

God in Christ made Jesus more of a man.
Jesus by his flesh was made more of God.
Consider the holiness of Yeshua, how he is one’s redemption, sanctification, wisdom.

It’s now Yahavah who dwells in you by the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit of Christ which you receive upon deciding to choose to have relationship with Him. You are able to ask your Father in heaven, who adopts you as his son or daughter to help you by the spirit. To remain faithful, to love, to have patience, to provide any and all supplication to and upon the one whom you trust, and worship with all your heart, mind, will, and strength. Continue to remain faithful and you will be spiritually fulfilled and rewarded for choosing daily to do the will of Yahavah, instead of one’s own desired will. In love for him, others and yourself.

 

[O'Darby]

Bible hermeneutics is often discussed by not often performed. Those who do attempt to understand what the writers of the books in our bibles intended to convey to us are lost because of several reasons. Our first problem is that we don't have the mind or culture of a 2000-year-old Jewish person. The second is that bible translators did not either as they put the manuscripts into our language. The their issue is that we are people who enjoy being part of a group and believe if we correct if so many others agree with us.

I think it is important to understand how something can exist before it physically exists;

Article on “Preexistence” in the Dictionary of the Later New Testament & Its Developments helpfully notes that,

“The pre-existent state may be described as ideal (existence in the mind or plan of God) or actual (existence alongside and distinct from God).”

Thus, it is well understood within Biblical scholarship that pre-existence may mean either that something or someone may literally exist in Heaven (the ‘incarnational’ model already mentioned) or may be of the Jewish ‘ideal’ type where something or someone may exist in God’s mind before He literally brings it into material existence.

There is a mountain of Jewish literature that confirms how all-pervasive “notional” pre-existence was in Jewish thinking at the time of Christ. One of the most prominent scholars in modern christological studies, Larry Hurtado, states,

“There is today a virtual consensus among scholars that the pre-Christian Jewish tradition provides the most important background for the idea of pre-existence in the NT”.

Regarding the Jewish understanding of foreknowledge, the article in the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia is helpful:

…the term foreknowledge is an expansion of the idea of God’s “counsel” or plan, regarding it as an intelligent prearrangement, the idea of foreknowledge being assimilated to that of foreordination. The same idea is found in [1 Pet. 1:20]. Here the apostle speaks of Christ as a lamb “foreordained” by God before the foundation of the world…It has the idea of a purpose which determines the course of the Divine procedure.

This evidence must be seriously considered before we conclude Jesus was actually living and conscious as God before his appearance on earth, otherwise we run the risk of imposing on the Bible our own traditional cultural reading, no matter how “orthodox” we may imagine it to be. That is the error of eisegesis, reading into the text, rather than exegesis, reading out of the text as the original readers thousands of years ago would have done.

Notional pre-existence is the idea that something or someone may ‘exist’ in the mind of God before actualizing on earth in history at the appointed time. What God purposes and decrees is considered so certain that it is spoken of as though it already exists. Indeed God is the One who “calls those things which are not as though they were” (Rom. 4:17). That is, what God promises already exists with Him “in Heaven”. When Jews spoke of something or someone pre-existing in heaven they understood it was “ideal” or “notional” in God’s foreknowledge, but not yet actual on earth. That is, it already existed in God’s mind and in God’s plan.

This is why Jesus could say "Before Abraham, I am." Yahweh and prophesied His purpose from the earliest days of Adam.

This topic can be searched, and one can find several resources that support this character of Jewish thought.

Very interesting! It dovetails nicely with philosophical Idealism that I've mentioned elsewhere. The basic philosophical positions are Materialism (all is matter), Dualism (mind and matter are distinct) and Idealism (all is mind). Idealism is as old or older than the other two positions but has received increasing attention in recent decades as materialist scientists struggle with the "hard problem of consciousness" (i.e., how immaterial mind could arise out of matter). In books such as The Idea of the World, Bernardo Kastrup argues that Idealism actually meshes with the scientific data better than Materialism or Dualism.

In Christian terms, the basic notion would be that our reality is a construct of the mind of God. This would explain how God "spoke" the creation into existence ex nihilo - i.e., it's all a mental construct. We as individuals collectively experience this mental construct but also have our internal lives of perceptions, thoughts and emotions. We are likewise mental constructs, albeit with free will, inside the master mental construct. I haven't tried to think this through in any connect-the-dots sort of way, but it seems to me that it has the potential to resolve some of the core mysteries and puzzles of Christianity.

FWIW.