Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu (Mark Sandrock) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: The missing body/Empty tomb Message-ID: Date: 14 May 91 03:54:19 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana Lines: 37 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu tblake@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Thomas Blake) writes: >Well, I've always looked upon Jesus as being like me, only where I have >a soul in my body, Jesus has something else. (God with skin on.) We have a soul, but the soul is also a "covering". Our essence is "spirit". In the case of Jesus, He would also have had a soul, but His essence would properly be called "Divine unsubstantiality". The essence is that which is truly "alive" within a person. E.g., the spirit animates the body. (It is spirit which is the "breath" spoken of in the Bible.) Animals have souls of animistic substantiality, but nothing of the spirit. Hence the old saw about the theory of evolution teaching that mankind is descended from "monkeys" fails to consider the difference in essence, which comprises the fundamental difference in nature between men and animals. >Now, as for whether the body was Christless at conception... Herein >lies much of the quandry over abortion. At what point does a fetus/baby >gain a sole? (At what point is it human?) The soul actually incarnates during the middle of the pregnancy. This event naturally corresponds with the first movements of the unborn child. From the moment of conception, however, there are invisible threads linking the soul to the physical body (fetus). Thus, with an abortion, these links are also being destroyed. A responsibility that should be borne in mind, as the Fifth Commandment surely applies to more than only physical killing, but also would apply on the "psychic level" of hope, trust, talents, and so on. Anything that bears real life within itself. Regards, Mark Sandrock -- BITNET: sandrock@uiucscs Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Internet: sandrock@aries.scs.uiuc.edu Chemical Sciences Computing Services Voice: 217-244-0561 505 S. Mathews Ave., Urbana, IL 61801