Before Jesus came to the world how were people saved?

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From Adam and Eve's time till Christ was ministering how were people saved? Not to many people debate for instance Adam and Eve's salvation. Or Abraham or King Saul, or King David. But just how were they saved when Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? When Jesus was ministering people how were they saved? By believing that he was the Messiah? Were people saved before Jesus was born by believing in the messiah? Was it their works? Their sacrifices to God? Believing in the one true God? Keeping the ten commandments and the law? Just how were Jews saved before they rejected their Messiah? I'm confused.

Hello mmb, I'm wondering if you are any less confused now?
My (simple) understanding is that all who are saved, from the beginning to the end, are saved by God's grace through repentance and faith - faith in The Living Creator God.
The name of Jesus Christ and the fullness (and wonder) of the gospel were only fully revealed to mankind at the incarnation. All who saved are save by virtue of Christ's death and resurrection, even those who died before it happened. Have a chew on Revelation 13:8.
Where the saints went or where we go now, after death, is an interesting topic but irrelevant to question of how are people saved.
Mercy, Mercy, Mercy! Glory, Glory, Glory!

><>
 
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Deadworm

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Here are 6 texts the address the OP's question:
(1) Before Christ, pagans everywhere have a chance to be saved and God invites them to receive salvation:
"Turn to me and be saved, all you ends of the earth (Isaiah 45:22)."

(2) But why aren't they condemned by their sin?
"To be sure, sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone's account where there is no law (Romans 5:13)."

(3) Before Christ, pagans didn't even need to repent!
"God has now overlooked the times of human ignorance, but now He commands all people everywhere to repent (Acts 17:3)."

(4) But how can pre-Christian Gentiles who have not received the Law of Moses be saved? God regards their conscience, however limited, as the moral equivalent of the Law:
"When Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness (Romans 2:14-15)."

(5) But how can Gentiles from either the OT era or our era be saved apart from formal profession of faith in Christ? As long as they follow their conscience and strive to do good, they will be saved:
"To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor, and immortality, He will give eternal life (Romans 2:7)."

(6) In fact, even the wicked dead from the OT era can receive a chance to be saved by responding to the Gospel in Hades (1 Peter 3:19).
 
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Ovlov90

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No, thanks guysfor not being defensive. So often I ask an honest question and people take it as a challenge. This was new to me so I wanted to check it out. I asked a friend recently why he believed women could serve as pastors. He was insulted. I wasnt challenging his belief just asking the verses and context it was based on. Why he believed what he believed. This book is a 4 dimensional matrix spiderweb that goes on eternity. Amazing.
 
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Winken

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Isn't it a story that Jesus descended into hell and saved those who went there? I heard something along those lines. But what made a person worth saving? What saved people in OT times?
"Hell" is divided into "paradise" and egregious suffering. Jesus did not descend into the latter. Anyone who acknowledged Jesus as Messiah (Jew and prostylite) will be redeemed.

Matthew 12:38-40, Luke 16:19-26, Ephesians 4:8-10, 1 Peter 3:18-19,
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, and 1 Corinthians 15:51-52. As for the unbelievers, they continue to go down to torments waiting for their resurrection to the Great White Throne Judgement.
 
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msortwell

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So . . . salvation has ALWAYS been faith in the redeemer promised in Gen 3:15, through a series of covenants, it becomes increasingly clear that the promised savior is Jesus Christ, the son of God who would come and die for the sins of his people. There can be salvation my no other means.
 
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Francis Drake

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Point 1.-
Rev13v8
And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
Although Jesus died around 2000 years ago, his death was retrospective right back to the foundation of the earth. It happened
in the Garden of Eden,
when Jesus slit the throat of that innocent lamb, ripped its bloody skin off and placed it around the shoulders of Adam and Eve. -
Gen3v21The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.
Therefore all those who died from Adam onwards have their debt also paid by Jesus's blood.

Point 2.-
Being "born again" did not start at Calvary or at Pentecost or at John3 with Nicodemus.
All OT saints like Noah, Abraham, Moses Rahab, Boaz, David, were born again.
New birth has always been the reward of anyone responding to the Spirit of God convicting his heart.

John1v12But as many as received Him, to them He gave the power to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.
The above verse about being born of God, does not only refer to the man Jesus we see walking in Galilee, but refers right back to the very beginning of John chapter 1, "In the beginning was the word........."

John1v1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was in the beginning with God. 3All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. 4In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. 5The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

Everything was created by the Word, who was both God himself and also with God.
Within that Word/God was both light and life to every man on the planet. We know that Jesus is the Word of God, but Jesus was the Word of God long before the creation of the world, long before Mary and Joseph were born.

Thus when OT believers responded to their creator God/Living word, they were responding to Jesus, the Messiah/Christ, and as such, they became born again.

Point 3.-

Despite millions of evangelists and preachers banging on about it, an unregenerate man whose human spirit is dead to God, cannot possibly comprehend why this man Jesus had to die for anyone, let alone yours truly!

ie. The message of the cross is shear foolishness to a spiritually dead man, someone who is perishing, and here's the proof.

1Cor1v18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

The only people who can comprehend the cross are those who already have the spirit of God in them! To rightly understand what the cross is about, we must be spiritually alive.

1Cor2v14 But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.

So we have a real dilemma here.
The church says that man must accept the teaching of the cross in order to obtain new life. Scripture states quite clearly that unless you already have that new life, the message of the cross is a closed book or complete foolishness to him!

The answer comes when we disconnect "New birth" (being born again) from "Salvation".

Being born again comes when anyone responds to the working of the Holy Spirit on any man, woman, or child on this planet. That receptivity enables that man to be impregnated by the spirit of God, and that impregnation will bring God's son to birth.

Check it out, one of the Greek words used for "seed" is "sperma"
1John3v9No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed (sperma) remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.

God's sperm, his Holy Spirit, impregnated our hearts when we responded to his whisper in our human spirit.


Comprehending the message of the cross, and its immense power, is so that God's sons can mature into what God wants them to be, instead of mere mortals subject to the ruler of this world.
The word "Salvation", all through the OT was about deliverance from Philistine Famine and Plague, not heaven when they died. The same is true in the NT. Salvation is about our walk as sons on earth, not scraping people through to heaven.


I know I was born again well over ten years prior to anyone telling me what happened on the cross. I distinctly remember the invisible presence of God in my bedroom as a child, and me responding to Him.
Later in my mid teens I heard Him speak to me again, he told me that he lived in my heart and not in churches.
I was in my mid 20s before I heard about what Jesus did for me on the cross. I realised the evangelists were talking about the God I already knew.
I then surrendered to him, but I had been born again for at least ten years.
 
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Neostarwcc

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Hello mmb, I'm wondering if you are any less confused now?
My (simple) understanding is that all who are saved, from the beginning to the end, are saved by God's grace through repentance and faith - faith in The Living Creator God.
The name of Jesus Christ and the fullness (and wonder) of the gospel were only fully revealed to mankind at the incarnation. All who saved are save by virtue of Christ's death and resurrection, even those who died before it happened. Have a chew on Revelation 13:8.
Where the saints went or where we go now, after death, is an interesting topic but irrelevant to question of how are people saved.
Mercy, Mercy, Mercy! Glory, Glory, Glory!

><>

I'm less confused now thanks! People were saved the same way they are today by faith in God and the messiah.
 
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Bible Highlighter

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From Adam and Eve's time till Christ was ministering how were people saved? Not to many people debate for instance Adam and Eve's salvation. Or Abraham or King Saul, or King David. But just how were they saved when Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? When Jesus was ministering people how were they saved? By believing that he was the Messiah? Were people saved before Jesus was born by believing in the messiah? Was it their works? Their sacrifices to God? Believing in the one true God? Keeping the ten commandments and the law? Just how were Jews saved before they rejected their Messiah? I'm confused.

Men were saved in the Old Testament by looking to the future Messiah for their salvation (i.e. Jesus) through the vehicle of faith. So men were all saved by Jesus through out history. Men were saved by Christ in the OT just as they are saved by Jesus in the NT (See 1 Corinthians 10:1-4).

In addition, the words "circumscion of the heart" is just another way of saying "born again" in the Old Testament.

Quick Review:

Circumcision of the Heart in the Old Testament.

(Which is obviously a spiritual renewal of one's heart):

Deuteronomy 10:16

"Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no more stiffnecked."

Deuteronomy 30:6

"And the LORD thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thou mayest live."

Jeremiah 4:4

"Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, and take away the foreskins of your heart, ye men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem: lest my fury come forth like fire, and burn that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings."

Ezekiel 44:9

"Thus saith the Lord GOD; No stranger, uncircumcised in heart, nor uncircumcised in flesh, shall enter into my sanctuary, of any stranger that is among the children of Israel."

Leviticus 26:41

"And that I also have walked contrary unto them, and have brought them into the land of their enemies; if then their uncircumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity:."

Jeremiah 9:26

"Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that are in the utmost corners, that dwell in the wilderness: for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart."

Having A New Heart in the Old Testament:

Ezekiel 11:19

"And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh"

Ezekiel 18:31

"Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel?"

Ezekiel 36:26

"A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh."

Circumcision of the Heart in the New Testament:

Acts 7:51

"Ye stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears, ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye."

Spiritual Circumcision in the New Testament:

Philippians 3:3

"For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh."

Romans 2:28-29

28 "For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:

29 But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God."

Colossians 2:11

"In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ"
 
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Devin P

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From Adam and Eve's time till Christ was ministering how were people saved? Not to many people debate for instance Adam and Eve's salvation. Or Abraham or King Saul, or King David. But just how were they saved when Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? When Jesus was ministering people how were they saved? By believing that he was the Messiah? Were people saved before Jesus was born by believing in the messiah? Was it their works? Their sacrifices to God? Believing in the one true God? Keeping the ten commandments and the law? Just how were Jews saved before they rejected their Messiah? I'm confused.
The
From Adam and Eve's time till Christ was ministering how were people saved? Not to many people debate for instance Adam and Eve's salvation. Or Abraham or King Saul, or King David. But just how were they saved when Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? When Jesus was ministering people how were they saved? By believing that he was the Messiah? Were people saved before Jesus was born by believing in the messiah? Was it their works? Their sacrifices to God? Believing in the one true God? Keeping the ten commandments and the law? Just how were Jews saved before they rejected their Messiah? I'm confused.
Well, as Jesus mentioned Abraham looking forward to His day - as the prophets talked about a Savior coming to reunite them to God, and as the Torah foretold of a Savior, it was something that was passed down. They knew, because God made sure that people - if their heart truly desired to know - would know.

There's something called the Mazzeroth - a gospel in the stars. There's a story, of salvation, written in the stars that foretell of Jesus. They were saved by faith, just as we are today. This is how Moses was able to stand face to face with God for 40 days, not because he was free of sin, but because he had faith. He feared, loved, and believed in God. Just as every great men of faith did all throughout the bible. Paul expands on this, for many great examples all the way up until Rehab - the prostitute who let down the scarlet cord.
 
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Unofficial Reverand Alex

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What makes you think Jesus can't time travel?
God has no limits; He can easily save anyone He wants to. I'm not God, so I can't say for sure, but I can't see him telling anyone who's lived a good life with good intentions that just because they didn't believe in Jesus, they can't go to heaven. Perhaps that's just God manifesting Himself in different ways; by bringing non-religious virtues of honor and other such encouragements of good deeds, He gives us all a chance to do His work of improving the lives of others, even to those who don't know or reject His name.
 
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Soyeong

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From Adam and Eve's time till Christ was ministering how were people saved? Not to many people debate for instance Adam and Eve's salvation. Or Abraham or King Saul, or King David. But just how were they saved when Jesus hadn't died on the cross yet? When Jesus was ministering people how were they saved? By believing that he was the Messiah? Were people saved before Jesus was born by believing in the messiah? Was it their works? Their sacrifices to God? Believing in the one true God? Keeping the ten commandments and the law? Just how were Jews saved before they rejected their Messiah? I'm confused.

The one and only way that there has ever been to become saved is by grace through faith. In John 8:56, Jesus said that Abraham saw his day and was glad, so people before the cross were saved through faith in the promised redeemer in the same way that we are saved.
 
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Blade

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My view? Adam and Eve.... CROSS....US. Jesus can not lie and He said 'For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them." Why are you saved? Granted they did not go up.. yet went to a different place for those that longed for the Messiah.
 
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TuxAme

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God isn't limited to the "present". He is outside of "time" as we know it. So, Christ's sacrifice was, is, and will be applied to everyone. This isn't to say that all will be saved, only that all may be saved, regardless of when they were or will be born.
 
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Francis Drake

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I'm less confused now thanks! People were saved the same way they are today by faith in God and the messiah.
Their faith was in the creator God himself, not a future messiah that few had heard of.
Its only as we collate the OT prophetic words together that we can see a picture of Jesus. Those who lived prior to those prophecies could not have had faith in them.
 
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They weren't saved...in the strictest sense, which I think you had in mind. They either went to Hell or (depending on whom you talk with) to either Paradise or a Limbo (not to be confused with the old idea of a Limbo for unbaptised children).

These latter ones--Moses, Abraham, et al--were released to Heaven upon Christ's sacrifice on the Cross. That's the conventional view of the matter.

Albion,

Romans 4:1-8 (NIV) provides an answer regarding Abraham:

Abraham Justified by Faith
4 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, discovered in this matter? 2 If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about—but not before God. 3 What does Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”a]">[a]

4 Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. 5 However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness. 6 David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the one to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:

7 “Blessed are those
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
8 Blessed is the one
whose sin the Lord will never count against them.”b]">[b]​

Abraham was justified by faith.

Take a read of Hebrews 11 to discover what the eternal condition was for other saints of the OT. Read the 'by faith' statements.

See: What was the Old Testament way of salvation? - Got Questions

Oz
 
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Original Happy Camper

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The promise of a messiah coming wasn't even made until long after they were dead and buried.

Genesis 3:15
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

"Luther took Gen 3:15, what has been called the “proto-evangelion,” as the original promise of the gospel. God comforted Adam and Eve in the face of their sin by promising to send his own son as the seed that would crush the serpent’s heel."

http://pdf.amazingdiscoveries.org/References/RtR/PDF-905/The Reformers and the Law .pdf

"
It was in Eden that Adam and Eve were promised a Saviour:

And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel (Genesis 3:15).

The Seed in this verse is God Himself—Jesus. God's own Son, on the day Adam and Eve sinned, stepped in to take their place. Later in verse 21, Adam and Eve are given tunics of skin to cover their nakedness. This skin is from the first lamb that had to die. This lamb was a symbol of God's own Son that would come one day and die in the place of humanity.

7359-Lamb-CC-Flickrx320.jpg

The lamb was also the first announcement that a Saviour—the Seed—would come, born a part of the human race to redeem humanity from Satan's dominion. The lamb signified that God would buy back with blood what was His in the first place."

The Gospel Story
 
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Original Happy Camper

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when Jesus slit the throat of that innocent lamb,

I disagree with you on this point. Look to the sanctuary service where the sinner killed a lamb to be the blood sacrifice for his sins,

"Here the sinner is figuratively transferring his own sins upon the lamb to be slain. And he is the one to kill it, signifying that his own sins killed an innocent life. Then all the sins of the penitent were, through the blood, transferred to the sanctuary. The service resulted in the blessing of forgiveness."
Solemn Preparation

I find no evidence in scripture that Jesus slayed the lamb in the Garden of Eden. But I do fine scriptural support for the sinner to slay the lamb. ( if you have scriptural evidence please share it with us)

Hebrews 13:8
Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.
 
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Albion

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Abraham was justified by faith.

Take a read of Hebrews 11 to discover what the eternal condition was for other saints of the OT. Read the 'by faith' statements.

Oz
You can say that Abraham was saved by Faith, all right, but he didn't go Heaven until after Christ, which is why I included the comment about being saved in the "strictest" sense. It took the Cross to reconcile Mankind to God and I understood the question of this thread to be asking how any mortal could reach Heaven before the Savior had come.
 
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Original Happy Camper

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By faith and then sacrifices . Nobody went to heaven tho they all went to hell , you can see that in story that Jesus told us about rich man and Lazarus .

Hell had two parts , paradise where "good" people went and hell where "bad people " went ( only God is good so that's why the " " ) .

When Christ died he went to hell and preached to souls which were in paradise part of hell and took them out (Matthew 27:52) that's why feast is called first fruits ( plural ) and not fruit .

"Jesus told this story as a sharp rebuke to the Jewish religious leaders. In the parable, the rich man represents the Jewish nation, and the poor man represents the Gentiles.

The rich man had the knowledge of the King of kings (purple is the colour of royalty), and the means to attaining righteousness (white linen). But as the parable unfolds, Jesus turns the viewpoint of the Jewish leaders on its head by placing the rich man in "hell" and the poor man in "Abraham's bosom."

Jesus was saying that personal status does not guarantee salvation. He was telling the Jews that they could only find salvation in God’s grace, not their own works or lineage. The Jews claimed Abraham as their father (John 8:39), but in the parable "Father Abraham" was unable to help the rich man.

The New Testament states that those who are in Christ are Abraham's seed (Galatians 3:29), and that Christ came to restore the wounded and brokenhearted. Only those who realize their own spiritual poverty and need for Christ can attain His blessings.

Through this story, Jesus was also revealing to the disciples their new task: to break tradition and preach the Gospel with power to the Jews and the Gentiles alike.

As each scene unfolds in the parable, it conveys a spiritual truth contrary to the mindset of the Jewish leaders. The modern trend of taking this parable literally in order to support the doctrine of hell does great injustice to the intent of the story, and causes us to miss the deeper message it holds."


You stated
"When Christ died he went to hell and preached to souls which were in paradise part of hell and took them out (Matthew 27:52) that's why feast is called first fruits ( plural ) and not fruit ."

You might want to read this
Did Jesus Really Descend into Hell?
 
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Original Happy Camper

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I understood the question of this thread to be asking how any mortal could reach Heaven before the Savior had come.

I agree with your understanding of the OP

MY reply to the OP

"If the doctrines of hell and purgatory do not properly reflect God's character, what is the truth about the afterlife?

This difficult issue has confused many over the centuries. Paganism has influenced Jewish scholars such as Josephus, who believed that the dead went either to heaven or to hell while they waited for the resurrection. He believed that the righteous were assigned to safety in "Abraham's bosom" while the wicked were confined to a place where they could hear and see the fires of hell. These views are inconsistent with the clear teachings of Scriptures that the "dead know not any thing" (Ecclesiastes 9:5).

Likewise, today's Christian scholars also cling to the doctrine of an immediate afterlife in heaven or in hell. They cite Jesus' promise to the thief on the cross, as well as the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, as evidence that we go to heaven or hell as soon as we die. However, we must study the whole Bible in order to properly understand the context of these two passages.

Nothing written in the Bible will contradict itself. If a concept seems out of line with God's character or with other passages of Scripture, then we are probably not understanding the concept properly in the first place. Read more about how to study the Bible wisely

Scripture simply does not teach an immediate afterlife. The Lazarus that Jesus raised from the dead certainly did not go to heaven or "Abraham's bosom" when he died. In fact, the whole concept of "Abraham's bosom" was a myth circulating in Jesus' time. He used that myth to illustrate a point about the snobbery of some Israelites towards the poor, the outcast, and the Gentiles. in Jesus' time. Read the story"

An Immediate Afterlife?
 
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