Chapters 8 to 9 - Christ’s Teachings and Today’s Christianity

- 38 - • The ‘Resurrection of the dead’ therefore has not the slightest thing to do with the resurrection of the physical bodies. There i s n o ‘resurrection of the flesh’ such as is contained in the creeds of the various Christian denominations. In the early centuries of the Christian era, the creeds did not speak of the ‘resurrection of the flesh’, but of the ‘Resurrection of the dead’, thus conveying the consoling message that all those who were spiritually dead, including Lucifer, would ultimately return to God. Later these words were changed, when the false doctrine was introduced that the earthly bodies of those who had died would come back to life, in spite of the fact that Paul has given the true doctrine in the words: I Corinthians 15: 44: ‘That which is sown is a natural body; that which is raised is a spiritual body.’ Not even Christ's earthly body was raised. Like the physical bodies of all mortals, it had been created from the od of the earth and, like them, it returned to the earth, with this exception: it was not transformed into terrestrial od by way of decay, but by dematerialization effected by the spirit world. In the same way as Christ’s corpse, the bodies of men like Enoch and Elijah had been transformed into od. • A l l human bodies are created from the od of the earth and into the od of the earth they are a l l ultimately transformed. This is a law that admits of n o e x c e p t i o n. To the Christians of today, the ‘Resurrection of the dead’ means the restoration of the physical body, and Christ’s Resurrection on Easter Sunday is regarded by them as the reunion of his spirit with his body, which had lain in the grave for three days. These are whol ly mi staken ideas ! For, to repeat it once more, Christ’s Resurrection from the dead merely means his return from the realm of the spiritually dead, his return from hell, into which his spirit had descended. The Apostolic creed expresses this correctly in the words: ‘Descended unto hell, on the third day risen from the dead.’ This would be clearer still if phrased as follows: ‘Descended unto the dead, on the third day returned from the dead.’ The term ‘Resurrection of the dead’ confuses you as it does, because the word ‘death’ means to you only the cessation of life on earth, and ‘the dead’ makes you think only of corpses, graves and churchyards. You do not take the wording of the Bible into account, according to which ‘death’ means separation from God, and ‘the dead’ are those who are thus separated. The incorrect translations of certain Biblical passages have also contributed liberally to this misunderstanding, as, for example, the passage in the Book of Job: Job 19: 25-26: ‘I know that my Redeemer lives and he will appear as the last upon this earth. Then shall I see God, though my skin be in tatters and I without my flesh.’ These words have been completely distorted into the opposite meaning in the version: ‘I know that my Redeemer lives and will at last raise me from the dust, when I shall be covered with this my skin and in my flesh I shall see God.’

RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjI1MzY3