[Esaias]

Originally Posted by coksiw

If the souls are not separate from the body, then how could you explain these verses without deviating a lot from the obvious and simple meaning?

[Rev 6:9 NKJV] When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held.

[Rev 20:4 NKJV] And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was committed to them. Then [I saw] the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received [his] mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.

1. It's a vision. Are the souls literally stuck underneath a literal altar? During a sacrifice the blood of the animal was poured out at the base of the altar. These martyrs gave themselves as willing sacrifices if you will for the gospel. Abel's blood "cried out to God" in Genesis when he was murdered. Was literal blood vocally screaming from the ground? No, rather his death demanded justice and God was aware of it. The life (soul) is in the blood. So the souls under the altar represent the martyrs' deaths for God demanding justice, and God is fully aware of it and in due time will avenge them.

2. What did John see come to life to rule? Those who had died. In the OT dead bodies are called dead souls.

And also the story of Lazarus?

Jesus gave a parable about a beggar named Lazarus and a rich man. The parable says nothing about souls leaving bodies, by the way, and all descriptions in the parable are thoroughly physical: water, fire, finger, tongue, Abraham's bosom, etc. The rich man and his brothers is Caiaphas and his brothers who ruled the priesthood. They wouldn't believe even if a poor guy (named Lazarus) rose from the dead. Shortly after He gave the parable, His friend (named Lazarus) died and He raised him back to life. The priests still refused to believe.

The word in Hebrew, at least, means literally breath of life, and as any other languages, can have different meanings according to the context: basically it could refer to the material part of "you" or the immaterial part of "you".

The word means living creature or a "life", a living being, and the animus or quality of being alive. Adam became a living soul, not Adam was given a living soul.

I am not surprised that in the Torah, the immaterial aspect wasn't that explicit as it is in the new testament. The Torah mentions little about the resurrection as well, and OT in general as well, until Daniel.
The resurrection was sort of encoded in the language of the Torah, instead of being a clear explicit promise:

[Mat 22:31 NKJV] "But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying,
[Mat 22:32 NKJV] 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."


I think the captivity brought to the Jewish an awakening for the eternal things; as their hope of enjoying their land again languished.

The oldest literature in the Bible is the book of Job which EXPLICITLY speaks of the resurrection. Abraham believed in resurrection (otherwise he wouldn't have been willing to offer Isaac as an offering). The idea that the NT brings in a change in the religion ("a new focus, changing from the land promise to the promise of disembodied bliss in heaven after death" etc) is the way the paganisers have corrupted the Truth and introduced pagan concepts into Christianity.

At times the Bible talks about spirit and soul almost interchangeably. Some say that the spirit is what keeps the soul and the body together implying that when the spirit is gone, the soul separates from the body. A living soul is a soul in a body, and of course, with spirit.

This is incorrect, the problem is people already have the pagan immortal seperable soul concept in place and then they interpret Scripture (wrongly) to coincide. Just like trinitarianism or universalism.

But again, at times in the Bible, human "spirit" refers to the immaterial part as a whole.

My head can't fully develop a theology of the topic from what I understand when reading. What I know as truth is that there is an immaterial part that it is eternal and aware. Your "you" that can sin, and can be judged and sent to hell, and still be guilty after the body is back to the dust. And also, that the immaterial part is not complete without the material part, hence the desire for resurrection, otherwise we wouldn't need it.

You are following pagan ideas which conflict with certain Biblical statements, thus it's confused to you. Begin in Genesis, and forget everything you think you know about it, and just let the Bible itself tell you what a human is, and you will discover a totally consistent theology or doctrine of man and salvation as you go through the whole Bible. You will also discover that the Bible speaks very differently than the common teaching. It is common to hear about people now in heaven, doing this or that, and the preaching is almost always on going to heaven at death. Most people's hope is going to heaven when they die. The Bible for some reason doesn't talk like that. The reason is because most people have a belief that is foreign to the Bible. Therefore the belief they have is based in error. The Bible should give us our beliefs en toto. But most are given their beliefs first, then the Bible is treated as a disjointed patchwork quilt of supposed prooftexts for the preconceived ideas people have.