Discussion of heaven, hell, & immortal soul

I’ll play devils advocate for a moment if I may. Here’s a good clip from James Randi on why you can’t prove a negative.

Or a quick summary as it pertains to this discussion, a scientist will accept something as true when evidence shown proves it is so or isn’t so, you couldn’t prove ghosts don’t exist (for example), only that evidence we have doesn’t indicate that they do, but that is not proof they don’t exist, nor can it be proven a soul doesn’t exist, as this might be another example of trying to prove a negative.

So the question should be to those making the claim, what evidence do you have that a soul does exist, what makes you believe such a statement is true. Shouldn’t the onus be on those who make the claim to back it up with evidence to support their claim?

I don’t think you read my posts. I said there was a scholarly consensus that the Bible does not teach an immortal soul, and that there isn’t an immortal soul. You promptly attacked this, claiming ‘If you are talking about Christian theologians who are also scholars, I’d say about 99% believe in an immortal soul’. To date you have failed to provide any evidence for your claim.

I saw below. You don’t address any of the reference sources I quoted. You attempted character assassination of Hebblethwaite, and attempted to deny that 19th century science had reached a consensus that there was no immortal soul. You failed to substantiate either point with evidence, and you failed to address the content of what was presented.

No. I have already provided abundant evidence for the scholarly consensus on the subject.

So you quickly Googled for a review, chose one which made some negative comments about the work, cherrypicked a few of those comments, and now claim without evidence that ‘he’s a biased hack’. That is intellectually dishonest. It’s what Fundamentalist Christians do. Nothing in the review you quoted contradicts the statement Hebblethwaite made concerning the consensus to which he referred. If you have any evidence that his statement is untrue, please present it.

I did not say this proves there is no soul. I pointed out that this was a scientific consensus even in the late 19th century, which is precisely why I quoted scientists. The quotations I provided are just a sample of that consensus. I note you failed to do anything with ‘It is a universal induction of science that modification of brain is accompanied by modification of consciousness, and that the destruction of brain results in destruction of consciousness. No exception to this law has ever been observed’.

Once more, do you have any evidence for your claims?

[quote=“Fortigurn”]

Once more, do you have any evidence for your claims?[/quote]

My only claims (regarding this exact back and forth) have been 1. the majority of Christian theologians believe in a soul 2. the majority of Christians in America believe in an immortal soul 3. there is no ‘scholarly concensus’ among Christian scholars that there is no such thing as a soul and 4. the existence of a soul has not been disproven.

I have provided ample evidence for that. You keep having to misrepresent my arguments to keep the discussion going.

(and btw-you provide one book on religious studies and I’ll provide one scholarly review…tit for tat. Don’t expect me to provide three reviews for your one book…just don’t have the time for that. If you want to provide more, I will do so as well).

Pity season 8 is the last season of house.

Sorry. I’ve never seen it. I just liked the straight to the point quote as it rings so true.

[quote=“Confuzius”]My only claims (regarding this exact back and forth) have been 1. the majority of Christian theologians believe in a soul 2. the majority of Christians in America believe in an immortal soul 3. there is no ‘scholarly concensus’ among Christian scholars that there is no such thing as a soul and 4. the existence of a soul has not been disproven.

I have provided ample evidence for that.[/quote]

I did not challenge the second of these claims since it was not in dispute (that was a point which you raised as a shifting of the goal posts), but I did ask you to provide evidence for the other three. To date, you haven’t provided any evidence for claims 1, 3, or 4; not a single sentence from any of the relevant scholarly literature, or indeed from any other source.

I provided about a dozen standard reference sources. You didn’t provide a single item of scholarly literature which contradicted anything they said. In fact you didn’t cite a word of scholarship in response to any of them.

Heaven or hell is what you make it, here on earth and in your lifetime. It’s a choice.

Love one another and go in peace, amen.

Two thousand years ago a guy was walking around claiming to be God’s son. He probably spoke arameic much of the time, but also greek and hebrew. Nothing of what he said was written down at the time, and we don’t know who eventually wrote the gospels (the story of the life of jesus) but we do know that they didn’t start until (lets be generous) about sixty years after he died, and we do know that it was written in Greek. Some three hundred or so years after that it was finally decided what would be included in the “Bible” and the text was translated again, this time into Latin. The church held on to that version until the middle ages when it was finally translated into English, and then eventually into hundreds of different languages. All of this supposedly happened as a result of inspiration from God, but what we now appear to be discovering is that it was VERY badly translated.

So here is the kicker, if you believe that the original versions were inspired by god (and there are literally THOUSANDS of reasons you would NOT believe that) how is that God suddenly got so lazy that he allowed versions to exist that have been steering people down the garden path for the following seventeen hundred years? It isn’t as though the impact has been insubstantial.

There are only two ways out of this mess. One is to believe that God is a lazy, sinister bastard and the other is to admit that likely NONE of it is the actual word of God.

What is truly extraordinary is that it is still neccessary to even make these arguments.

[quote=“bob”]Two thousand years ago a guy was walking around claiming to be God’s son. He probably spoke arameic much of the time, but also greek and hebrew. Nothing of what he said was written down at the time, and we don’t know who eventually wrote the gospels (the story of the life of jesus) but we do know that they didn’t start until (lets be generous) about sixty years after he died, and we do know that it was written in Greek. Some three hundred or so years after that it was finally decided what would be included in the “Bible” and the text was translated again, this time into Latin. The church held on to that version until the middle ages when it was finally translated into English, and then eventually into hundreds of different languages. All of this supposedly happened as a result of inspiration from God, but what we now appear to be discovering is that it was VERY badly translated.

So here is the kicker, if you believe that the original versions were inspired by god (and there are literally THOUSANDS of reasons you would NOT believe that) how is that God suddenly got so lazy that he allowed versions to exist that have been steering people down the garden path for the following seventeen hundred years? It isn’t as though the impact has been insubstantial.

There are only two ways out of this mess. One is to believe that God is a lazy, sinister bastard and the other is to admit that NONE of it is inspired.[/quote]

And bob will be back with more false dichotomies and logical fallacies, after the break.

[quote=“Mick”][quote=“Confuzius”]
Makes it difficult to believe…this does not prove there is no soul. (you are also reaching out of the area of religious studies)
[/quote]

I’ll play devils advocate for a moment if I may. Here’s a good clip from James Randi on why you can’t prove a negative.

Or a quick summary as it pertains to this discussion, a scientist will accept something as true when evidence shown proves it is so or isn’t so, you couldn’t prove ghosts don’t exist (for example), only that evidence we have doesn’t indicate that they do, but that is not proof they don’t exist, nor can it be proven a soul doesn’t exist, as this might be another example of trying to prove a negative.

So the question should be to those making the claim, what evidence do you have that a soul does exist, what makes you believe such a statement is true. Shouldn’t the onus be on those who make the claim to back it up with evidence to support their claim?[/quote]
This proves that predicting the future is rubbish. Why else would he throw the Rain Deer of the WTC?

I wonder what percentage of Christians are with you on that statement. I’m guessing it’s less than 5%. Correct me if I’m wrong.
[/quote]

[quote=“The Barna Group”]The Afterlife

Belief in life after death, like the existence of God, is widely embraced: 8 out of 10 Americans (81%) believe in an afterlife of some sort. Another 9% said life after death may exist, but they were not certain. Just one out of every ten adults (10%) contend that there is no form of life after one dies on earth.

Moreover, a large majority of Americans (79%) agreed with the statement “every person has a soul that will live forever, either in God’s presence or absence.”

Heaven and Hell

The survey also explored peoples’ views of Heaven and Hell. In all, 76% believe that Heaven exists, while nearly the same proportion said that there is such a thing as Hell (71%). [/quote]

These statements don’t seem to add up.

I said the figure was closer to 40% than 5%. The figures from the Barna Group support this.

[quote=“Fortigurn”][quote=“Confuzius”]My only claims (regarding this exact back and forth) have been 1. the majority of Christian theologians believe in a soul 2. the majority of Christians in America believe in an immortal soul 3. there is no ‘scholarly concensus’ among Christian scholars that there is no such thing as a soul and 4. the existence of a soul has not been disproven.

I have provided ample evidence for that.[/quote]

I did not challenge the second of these claims since it was not in dispute (that was a point which you raised as a shifting of the goal posts), but I did ask you to provide evidence for the other three. To date, you haven’t provided any evidence for claims 1, 3, or 4; not a single sentence from any of the relevant scholarly literature, or indeed from any other source.

I provided about a dozen standard reference sources. You didn’t provide a single item of scholarly literature which contradicted anything they said. In fact you didn’t cite a word of scholarship in response to any of them.[/quote]

for point 1 and 2 you provided a single reference (same reference). I also provided a single reference of scholarly literature which tears your reference apart (in case you didn’t know, book reviews are scholarly references…they even go on a scholar’s CV). The reference you provided was bad, so we are sorta back to square one on these points.

For point 3, you have provided nothing (unless you were sorta lumping in it with the same reference you provided for 1 & 2…which then, I did address).

You did provide many references stating that an immortal soul is originally a Greek idea and one not native to either Judaism or Christianity. I never disputed that point so did not supply any references in dispute either.

For point 4, you even admitted it is impossible to prove a negative, so, again, it has not been ‘disproven’.

But don’t the good Christians get to come back to life in one form or another after Jesus returns and sets up a “new jeruselum” (or whatever stupid, fantasy wish fulfillment crap it is what the the Bible talks about)?

This is not only factually inaccurate, it shows you didn’t read my post. For points 1 and 3, I provided about a dozen standard reference sources. You didn’t provide a single item of scholarly literature which contradicted anything they said. In fact you didn’t cite a word of scholarship in response to any of them. The only scholarship you cited was in response to the quotation by Hebblethwaite, you didn’t respond with any scholarship in reply to any of the standard reference sources.

As I have already pointed out, I didn’t dispute claim 2 since it was not in dispute (that was a point which you raised as a shifting of the goal posts). Yet you now claim ‘for point 1 and 2 you provided a single reference (same reference)’. You appear to have forgotten what actually happened.

No you didn’t. You claimed ‘That book was not well received by the scholarly community’, but you provided no evidence for this; you simply quoted a single review. You then committed the dishonest tactic of quote mining to give the impression that the statement from Hebblethwaite was inaccurate. But nothing in the entire review which you quoted, actually disputed the statement of Hebblethwaite’s which you were attempting to disprove. Your use of the review was intellectually dishonest, and failed to make your case.

As I have pointed out, the articles say more than that. You claim that the articles support the doctrine of the immortal soul despite the fact that they acknowledge the doctrine is not native to either Judaism or Christianity. Yet you provide no evidence for this claim, and until you have actually read the articles, it’s clear you have no idea what they actually say; you’re just making things up.

The fact is that not only do the standard reference works I cited acknowledge the doctrine is not native to either Judaism or Christianity, they also deny that humans possess an immortal soul: NDT refers explicitly to ‘biblical theology’s large-scale rejection of all dichotomist anthropologies’; EBD says explicitly ‘human beings do not have souls—they are souls’; NIDNTT says explicitly ‘The soul is simply that area in which decisions are made concerning life and death, salvation and destruction’, and ‘it must not be imagined that this implies the concept of the soul as the real and valuable part of man, the eternal and permanent element. That would be a misunderstanding’; PDTT says concerning the doctrine of the immortal soul ‘Many contemporary philosophers have rejected this dualistic picture of the human soul in favor of materialism. Surprisingly, many theologians agree’.

If you want to support your claim that these articles support the doctrine of the immortal soul despite the fact that they acknowledge the doctrine is not native to either Judaism or Christianity, you have to provide evidence for it. You never provided any evidence for your claim that if I were to visit a conference of the Society of Biblical Literature and ‘Start telling everyone there that there is a scholarly consensus that there is no immortal soul or hell’, they would ‘just laugh you outta the conference room’.

This demonstrates just how little you know about modern scholarship in the field. Contrary to your claim, Professor Leander Keck, president of the Society of Biblical Literature in 1995, commented to evangelical theologian Jeffrey Boyd ‘I kind of like offbeat ideas, such as your idea that we should bring the soul back into biblical studies’.[1] Yes, the 1995 president of the Society of Biblical literature viewed the idea of bringing the soul back into biblical studies as ‘offbeat’. The fact is that the doctrine of the immortal soul has long been abandoned by scholarly biblical studies. In fact one of the key points raised by Boyd’s work is his complaint about the fact that modern theological scholarship doesn’t even treat the doctrine as a matter for serious discussion.

This is another indication that you’re not reading my posts. I said no such thing. On the contrary, I explained twice exactly why there’s a scientific consensus that the existence of an immortal soul has been disproven decisively by indisputable scientific evidence.


[1] Boyd, ‘Reclaiming the soul:the search for meaning in a self-centered culture’, p. 72 (1996).

First, apologies for the many following typos…tying this on a tablt (很麻煩)

This is not only factually inaccurate, it shows you didn’t read my post. For points 1 and 3, I provided about a dozen standard reference sources. You didn’t provide a single item of scholarly literature which contradicted anything they said. In fact you didn’t cite a word of scholarship in response to any of them. The only scholarship you cited was in response to the quotation by Hebblethwaite, you didn’t respond with any scholarship in reply to any of the standard reference sources.[/quote]

Look back, you only gave one reference. You keep compounding issues. You clearly do not even have a grasp of what we are talking about. Maybe next post you will say you provided evidence that ramen noodles are yummy, I dunno.

You quote mined yourself. Out of an ENTIRE book you gave about a paragraph, nice try. I have noticed, you have provided no other quotes for the majority of contemporary Christian theologians not believing in a soul.

Not
a
sinlge
other
reference

except the really crappy biased one. WHY??? Because you can find no others.

If you want, keep compounding issues in your ignorance (ie the doctrine not appearing in the NT…therefore modern theologians have revised classical Christian theology and have, in light of contemporary scholarship, rejected the idea of an immortal soul) but NOT A SINGLE REFERENCE regarding the notion of the soul claims that…they only keep talking about the doctrine not being in the NT.

You, in your biased, revisionist (peculiar) Christian theology which you hold so dear, have commited the great sin of letting your own believs color your perception.

YOU may have revised your own notions of Christianity in light of contemporary scholarship, but the MAJORITY of Christians in the US have not. Unles you can provide another reference except for the biased book which was not well accepted by the scholarly community…I guess we are just going to go back and forth as you try to equate the lack of a soul in the NT to a lack of this doctrine in contemporary Christianity.

However, the fact that (except for the crap quote) you cannot supply A SINGLE reference (even amidst you how many years of the SBL journal???) that states the notion of an immortal soul is actually a minority opinion amongst contemporary Christiantheologians shows how full of hot air your assertion is.

This is your belief, you have that right, but your Christian belief about the lack of an immortal soul is the minority (get over it).

[quote]If you want to support your claim that these articles support the doctrine of the immortal soul despite the fact that they acknowledge the doctrine is not native to either Judaism or Christianity, you have to provide evidence for it.
[/quote]

Your lack of understanding as to how the study of religion happens is quite breathtaking, like the grandcanyon.

I never said those references SUPPORTED the notion of a soul (therefore, no need to cite a reference for something I actually never asserted…).

Guess you missed when I clarified this point last time…

SCHOLARS ON SOUL IN NT=not there
SCHOLARS ON EXISTENCE OF SOUL=???

They say nothing about the second, only the first. They neither confirm nor deny the existence of the soul; merely state it was originally a Greek idea.

Perhaps they are (unlike you) unbiased about their belief in the soul and therefore did not try to push it (either way).

You are jumping to conclusions, based on your own beliefs and partly on the scholarship.

Again, the scholarship is silent on whether or ot a soul exists.

If you really do not get this (since you want to assert your own revisionist Christian interpretation) well then, so be it.

I gave nearly a dozen references.

That isn’t quote mining. Quote mining takes place when quotations are used to misrepresent the source as presenting a view they didn’t present or don’t hold. That’s what you did. The quotation I provided from Hebblethwaite represented his views accurately.

On the contrary I gave you around a dozen standard reference sources, which refer explicitly to ‘biblical theology’s large-scale rejection of all dichotomist anthropologies’ (NDT). Again, ‘Many contemporary philosophers have rejected this dualistic picture of the human soul in favor of materialism. Surprisingly, many theologians agree’ (PDTT).

Have you read all the articles from which I quoted? If you haven’t read them, how can you claim that they don’t reject the idea of an immortal soul? If you have read them, why do you falsely claim ‘they only keep talking about the doctrine not being in the NT’? The fact is that they don’t simply talk about the doctrine not being in the NT.

Not at all. The view I hold is the view I’ve always held. My Christian sect stands in the Socinian tradition, which has held this view for over 400 years. I’m delighted that 20th century scholarship finally caught up with what my faith community has always believed; additionally, it took modern science almost 200 years to catch up with us.

Irrelevant, that was never the point under contention.

[quote]SCHOLARS ON SOUL IN NT=not there
SCHOLARS ON EXISTENCE OF SOUL=???

They say nothing about the second, only the first. They neither confirm nor deny the existence of the soul; merely state it was originally a Greek idea.[/quote]

Again, you are making claims about what these articles say. But have you actually read them? How can you say they neither confirm nor deny the existence of the soul when they say things like this:

  • human beings do not have souls—they are souls’ (EBD)
  • The soul is simply that area in which decisions are made concerning life and death, salvation and destruction’, and ‘it must not be imagined that this implies the concept of the soul as the real and valuable part of man, the eternal and permanent element. That would be a misunderstanding’ (NIDNTT)
  • ‘Human life is never to be conceived of in terms of an independent immortality’, ‘Neither the references to the shadowy existence of Sheol, nor those passages which could be interpreted as implying some form of continued conscious existence prior to this final resurrection (see Intermediate State), provide sufficient ground for maintaining the Gk. concept of an independent immortality of the soul’ (NDT)
  • ‘Far from referring simply to one aspect of a person, “soul” refers to the whole person.’ (EDB)
  • ‘Man is a unity of body and soul—terms which describe not so much two separate entities in man as the one man from different standpoints’, ‘Where hope of an after-life exists, it is not because of the intrinsic character of the soul itself’ (BEB)

Evidence please; the quotations I have provided show otherwise. Nevertheless, this new position of yours is a dramatic retreat from your previous position; you initially claimed that 99% of Bible scholars who are also Christians, believe in the immortal soul. Your gradual withdrawal from your initial position is most interesting. Remember what the 1995 president of the Society of Biblical Literature said? What he said contradicted completely your claim about the position of the SBL on the soul. A search of the 25 years of the SBL journal which I own, only reinforces the truth of this; references to the immortality of the soul are confined almost exclusively to discussion of Greek, Roman, and other pagan religious material, and it is stated repeatedly that the Bible contains no doctrine of the immortal soul.

Yes, let’s return to the Society of Biblical Literature, and the comments of its members on the idea of an immortal soul. When evangelical theologian Jeffrey Boyd raised the doctrine of the immortal soul with one of the leaders of the SBL in 1997, he was dismissed for his naivete. Boyd writes, ‘One of the senior leaders of the Society of Biblical Literature criticized me in March 1997, arguing that my ideas about soul-body dualism were naive, that they were “coming out of left field”’; Boyd, ‘Self-Concept: In Defense of the Worrd Soul’, in McMinn & Philips (eds.), ‘Care for the Soul: Exploring the Intersection of Psychology and Theology’, p. 111 (2001). Again, this is the complete opposite of what you claimed.

You claim the scholarship is silent on whether an immortal soul exists, but standard reference sources say things like ‘human beings do not have souls’ (EBD), ‘Human life is never to be conceived of in terms of an independent immortality’ (NDT), ‘Far from referring simply to one aspect of a person, “soul” refers to the whole person.’ (EDB), and 'The soul is simply that area in which decisions are made concerning life and death, salvation and destruction (NIDNTT). Your claim is clearly false.

Many sensible people who have read the English version of the New Testament with all it’s references to eternal this, everlasting that and come away with anything the idea that we would all be judged, and either punished or rewarded depending upon whether or not we are uneducated and/or delusional enough to believe the bullshit presented therein. You could argue that the “original” (whatever the hell that would be given that it was written so many years after the fact) didn’t imply that then you are stuck with the question of why
god
would allow such a version to confuse people for so many years. You are aware I take it that a good deal of confusion on the issue existed, exists, and will no doubt continue to exist in the future? And you do believe that the Bible was directed by
god
in some way I take it.

This bit seems to indicate that there “is” some eternal reward afterall, but only for the good Christians? Where does the soul reside in the interim, does it like go in a big freezer and exist in a state of suspened animation, or does it like appear, sort of like “poof” magico when
god
decides to bring you all back to Jeruselum after murdering all the rich people or what exactly?

Personally I’d like to believe that there’s something beyond death (not necessarily heaven or hell or whathaveyou), that YOU carry on somehow, in whatever form. That death isn’t the end of the road. But my mind and logic and science tells me otherwise. So it’s somewhat depressing, but hey, at the same it also allows me to understand why some people would rather believe in what their religion tells them to-- It’s easier on the mind that way.

At the end of the day though I believe that your reality IS reality, because whatever your brain believes in, your body will follow accordingly. So it’s just better for the health to find a good balance between knowing facts and holding faith. Who cares if it’s a white lie, as long as you’re not harming or hurting other people. In this case I do think you need to be a little selfish and not give a fuck about outside opinion. Whatever keeps you sane, right?

Being truly, unequivocally at peace with the matter is what I hope to achieve one day.