The Body Incorruptible

*subscribing*

RDKirk said:

Christians do not receive an entirely different body. We are resurrected in our own bodies, but those bodies are transformed--glorified, incorruptible, and empowered by the Spirit--in the same manner as Christ’s resurrection body. That conclusion follows directly from Paul’s insistence on bodily continuity and Christological patterning.

The Gospels go out of their way to establish identity continuity between Jesus’ pre-death body and His resurrected body:
Same wounds (John 20:27)

• Physicality--He eats, can be touched (Luke 24:39-43)
• Personal recognition, even if delayed (Luke 24:16; John 20:14-16)

Yet that same body also exhibits new properties:

• Appearing in locked rooms (John 20:19)
• No longer subject to death (Romans 6:9)

So Christ’s resurrection body is:

• The same body
• Radically transformed

This combination is essential. If the body were discarded and replaced, resurrection would collapse into mere re-creation, not resurrection.

Paul does not treat Jesus’ resurrection as unique in kind, only unique in priority.
1 Corinthians 15 is decisive

Key assertions:

• “Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (15:20)
• “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (15:22)
• “He will raise us up by His power” (15:43)

The metaphor of firstfruits only works if the later harvest is of the same kind.
Paul’s seed analogy (15:36-38) is often misunderstood. He is not arguing for body replacement, but for transformation with identity continuity:

• The seed that is sown is what grows
• Yet what emerges is gloriously changed

Hence:

• “This perishable body must put on the imperishable” (15:53)

Not “a new body replaces the old,” but this body is changed.

Paul’s phrase “spiritual body” (sōma pneumatikon) does not mean non-physical.
Paul contrasts:

• Psychikos (animated by natural life)
• Pneumatikos (animated by the Holy Spirit)

The distinction is source of life, not material composition.
Proof:

• Paul insists it is still a sōma (body)
• Jesus’ resurrected body is the concrete example
• “He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies” (Romans 8:11)
• “He will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body” (Philippians 3:21)

Note the language:

• Your body
• Transformed
• Like His

Paul leaves no conceptual room for body replacement.
If “spiritual” meant immaterial, Paul would contradict the Gospels outright.

This is not merely textual--it is doctrinally required.
If God discarded the body:

• Death would still “win” over creation
• Redemption would exclude material reality
• Resurrection would collapse into Platonic dualism

Instead, Christian resurrection declares:

• Creation is redeemed, not abandoned
• Matter matters
• Death is reversed, not bypassed

The New Testament teaches bodily resurrection with continuity and transformation:

• Same body
• Same identity
• Radically glorified
• Patterned directly on Christ’s resurrection

Paul is explicit: whatever kind of body Jesus has now is the kind believers must have, or Christianity collapses at its foundation (1 Corinthians 15:14-19).

But what if that body has been utterly destroyed? It is said that every breath we take contains an atom from Julius Caesar's body. That's not likely true, but it's very likely that our bodies contain atoms from someone else's body. I'm going to speculate that a carbon atom is a carbon atom, an at that level God can use any atoms to create an identical body.

But what of children who died as infants or even embryos? I'm going to speculate they will be resurrected at the entelechy of their DNA: The peak, the best, of what they would have become.

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The principle here is that when you plant a seed, a seed does not pop out of the ground. The seed dies and something different emerges from the ground. And dismissing that a physical body is planted like a seed but a spiritual body pops up out of the ground does not follow the pattern established in the text that the physical body comes first, then the spiritual body comes later.

1 John 3:2 provides guiding principles about how all this plays out:


First, God has not yet revealed the details to us. So we don't know how it will all play out. The 1 Corinthinans 15 passage leaves us with a metaphor that our new bodies will be as different from our current bodies as an acorn is from an oak tree, but we still can't get our heads around what that means (because God has not shared those details with us).

Second, though we don't know what our future bodies will be like, we do know that we will be like Him. And we also know that being like Him means we will see Him as He is in all of His glory. No one in the here and now can look upon the Lord and live, but in our new bodies we will be able to see Him face to face. This is how we know that the disciples were not looking at Jesus' fully glorified body because they lived to tell about it.

The idea that we carry our current physical bodies into heaven with us on the basis that Jesus showed the disciples the holes in his hands and in his side does not support the idea that dead bodies would be re-worked if they were utterly destroyed or built into the best of a potential future state if destroyed while an embryo of infant. Since Jesus appeared to His disciples in the same body that He died in (same age, same holes, etc), then it would be hard to argue that it would be different for us.

So, the best thing to do is to say we don't know what form we will take. But we can all rejoice over the fact that we will be like Him and we will see Him as He is.

NewLifeInChristJesus said:

35 But someone will say, “How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?” 36 Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. 37 And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain—perhaps wheat or some other grain. 38 But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body...​

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42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption. 43 It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. 44 It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. 45 And so it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.​

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46 However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual. 47 The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. 48 As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly. 49 And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man. (1 Cor 15:35-38, 42-49)​

The principle here is that when you plant a seed, a seed does not pop out of the ground. The seed dies and something different emerges from the ground. And dismissing that a physical body is planted like a seed but a spiritual body pops up out of the ground does not follow the pattern established in the text that the physical body comes first, then the spiritual body comes later.

1 John 3:2 provides guiding principles about how all this plays out:

Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. (1 Jn 3:2)​

First, God has not yet revealed the details to us. So we don't know how it will all play out. The 1 Corinthinans 15 passage leaves us with a metaphor that our new bodies will be as different from our current bodies as an acorn is from an oak tree, but we still can't get our heads around what that means (because God has not shared those details with us).

Second, though we don't know what our future bodies will be like, we do know that we will be like Him. And we also know that being like Him means we will see Him as He is in all of His glory. No one in the here and now can look upon the Lord and live, but in our new bodies we will be able to see Him face to face. This is how we know that the disciples were not looking at Jesus' fully glorified body because they lived to tell about it.

The idea that we carry our current physical bodies into heaven with us on the basis that Jesus showed the disciples the holes in his hands and in his side does not support the idea that dead bodies would be re-worked if they were utterly destroyed or built into the best of a potential future state if destroyed while an embryo of infant. Since Jesus appeared to His disciples in the same body that He died in (same age, same holes, etc), then it would be hard to argue that it would be different for us.

So, the best thing to do is to say we don't know what form we will take. But we can all rejoice over the fact that we will be like Him and we will see Him as He is.

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If I plant an acorn, I don't get a plum tree, an apple tree, or a puppy. I get an oak tree. It is an explicit continuation of identity.


Also, please do not get caught up on "natural body" and "spiritual body". The English here is, unfortunately, less precise than the Greek.

The Greek has soma psuchekos (literally: "soulish body") and soma pneumatikos (literally "spiritual body". The translation of psuchekos as "natural" is because it was the best choice earlier translators into English could come up with. Because the meaning is the kind of bodily life we have now, our current "natural" bodily life, which is also mortal, corruptible, and dishonorable. But the Greek word psuchekos indicates this present kind of existence, so "soma psuchekos" or "soulish body" refers to our bodily life now where we are animated--alive--by our animal breath, we breathe, we eat, we sleep and we are in bondage to our appetites, mortal, corruptible (we get old, we get sick, and our bodies decay and rot in the ground).

A "soulish body" or soma psuchekos does not mean a body composed of some material called "soul". And by the same token, "spiritual body" or soma pneumatikos does not mean a body composed of some material called "spirit". Rather it speaks, in contrast, to the kind of bodily life we will have in the resurrection. The contrast is between soulish and spiritual.

Go and read Romans 8:11, the body in the resurrection is made alive by the Holy Spirit. So "soma pneumatikos" or "spiritual body" is probably best understood as "Spiritual body" with a capital-S. This is about the quickening, life-giving power of the Holy Spirit. In the resurrection our bodies are not immaterial, they are alive, fully physical, but with a new kind of life: the invincible life of the Spirit, and these bodies therefore are no longer mortal but immortal, no longer corruptible, but incorruptible. No longer like Adam's old flesh, but like the Flesh of the Son of God who is seated at the right hand of the Father.

This is not idle speculation. This is one of the most central and fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith. So much so that St. Paul argued that those who say the body doesn't rise are denying Christ's resurrection.

ViaCrucis said:

If I plant an acorn, I don't get a plum tree, an apple tree, or a puppy. I get an oak tree. It is an explicit continuation of identity.


Also, please do not get caught up on "natural body" and "spiritual body". The English here is, unfortunately, less precise than the Greek.

The Greek has soma psuchekos (literally: "soulish body") and soma pneumatikos (literally "spiritual body". The translation of psuchekos as "natural" is because it was the best choice earlier translators into English could come up with. Because the meaning is the kind of bodily life we have now, our current "natural" bodily life, which is also mortal, corruptible, and dishonorable. But the Greek word psuchekos indicates this present kind of existence, so "soma psuchekos" or "soulish body" refers to our bodily life now where we are animated--alive--by our animal breath, we breathe, we eat, we sleep and we are in bondage to our appetites, mortal, corruptible (we get old, we get sick, and our bodies decay and rot in the ground).

A "soulish body" or soma psuchekos does not mean a body composed of some material called "soul". And by the same token, "spiritual body" or soma pneumatikos does not mean a body composed of some material called "spirit". Rather it speaks, in contrast, to the kind of bodily life we will have in the resurrection. The contrast is between soulish and spiritual.

Go and read Romans 8:11, the body in the resurrection is made alive by the Holy Spirit. So "soma pneumatikos" or "spiritual body" is probably best understood as "Spiritual body" with a capital-S. This is about the quickening, life-giving power of the Holy Spirit. In the resurrection our bodies are not immaterial, they are alive, fully physical, but with a new kind of life: the invincible life of the Spirit, and these bodies therefore are no longer mortal but immortal, no longer corruptible, but incorruptible. No longer like Adam's old flesh, but like the Flesh of the Son of God who is seated at the right hand of the Father.

This is not idle speculation. This is one of the most central and fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith. So much so that St. Paul argued that those who say the body doesn't rise are denying Christ's resurrection.

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Soma means "body", not soul.


Psuche means "soul".

It is clear that the body that is buried in the ground is not the same body that is resurrected. Otherwise, Paul would not have said so explicitly: "But someone will say, 'How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?' Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain—perhaps wheat or some other grain. But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body." (1 Cor 15:36-38). The "body that shall be" is as different from "what you sow" as a plant is from the seed from which it came.

RDKirk said:

This combination is essential. If the body were discarded and replaced, resurrection would collapse into mere re-creation, not resurrection.




But what if that body has been utterly destroyed? It is said that every breath we take contains an atom from Julius Caesar's body. That's not likely true, but it's very likely that our bodies contain atoms from someone else's body. I'm going to speculate that a carbon atom is a carbon atom, an at that level God can use any atoms to create an identical body.

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Hi brother. Thanks for your post. Is very well thought out. Now here is where my tiny mind gets stuck every time and it seems you have the same problem which is not surprising since fully understanding God’s ways is not possible in this life. I quoted both portions of your post where I’m stuck at.

The sticking point for me is that an identical body does not equal the same or original body. I can build two identical buildings but they are not the same. Identical twins might be identical but they are not the same. So if God created an identical body for those whose bodies have fully decomposed and since an identical body is not the same as the original body then doesn’t this amount to a re-creation of the body?

NewLifeInChristJesus said:

4983 σῶμα [soma /so·mah/] n n. From 4982; TDNT 7:1024; TDNTA 1140; GK 5393; 146 occurrences; AV translates as “body” 144 times, “bodily” once, and “slave” once. 1 the body both of men or animals. 1A a dead body or corpse. 1B the living body. 1B1 of animals. 2 the bodies of planets and of stars (heavenly bodies). 3 is used of a (large or small) number of men closely united into one society, or family as it were; a social, ethical, mystical body. 3A so in the NT of the church. 4 that which casts a shadow as distinguished from the shadow itself. [Strong, J. (1995). In Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon. Woodside Bible Fellowship.]​

Soma means "body", not soul.

5590 ψυχή [psuche /psoo·khay/] n f. From 5594; TDNT 9:608; TDNTA 1342; GK 6034; 105 occurrences; AV translates as “soul” 58 times, “life” 40 times, “mind” three times, “heart” once, “heartily + 1537” once, and not translated twice. 1 breath. 1A the breath of life. 1A1 the vital force which animates the body and shows itself in breathing. 1A1A of animals. 1A12 of men. 1B life. 1C that in which there is life. 1C1 a living being, a living soul. 2 the soul. 2A the seat of the feelings, desires, affections, aversions (our heart, soul etc.). 2B the (human) soul in so far as it is constituted that by the right use of the aids offered it by God it can attain its highest end and secure eternal blessedness, the soul regarded as a moral being designed for everlasting life. 2C the soul as an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death (distinguished from other parts of the body). [Strong, J. (1995). In Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon. Woodside Bible Fellowship.]​

Psuche means "soul".

It is clear that the body that is buried in the ground is not the same body that is resurrected. Otherwise, Paul would not have said so explicitly: "But someone will say, 'How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?' Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain—perhaps wheat or some other grain. But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body." (1 Cor 15:36-38). The "body that shall be" is as different from "what you sow" as a plant is from the seed from which it came.

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I'm not sure why you think I said soma means soul. I very clearly was talking about the word psuchekos (the adjective form of psuche).

The point I was making is that the distinction isn't one of material. The soma psuchekos, the "soulish body", isn't a body made of soul--I point this out because the contrast to soma psuchekos is soma pneumatikos. Pneumatikos is the adjective form of pneuma, spirit. So the contrast isn't physical/non-physical. The contrast is psuchekos/pneumatikos. It's the contrast between this present kind of life, our fallen, sinful, mortal life at present; and the future kind of life wherein we are made fully alive by the power of the Spirit, bearing the fullness of the image of God in Christ.

Let's go back to St. Paul's seed metaphor. Again, what is sown is not a thing that is different from is grown; it's not an ontological change. The change is one of glory. Look at the small humble acorn, now look at the great mighty oak tree. An acorn is still an oak, but in seed form; an acorn doesn't produce something entirely different: you don't plant an oak seed and get something that's not an oak. What is sown and what grows is still an oak--but the difference is one of glory.

The body is sown, in this present soulish mortal sinful condition; but what rises is the body, alive by the Holy Spirit, immortal, perfected.

Right now we are human like Adam, bearing his weak decaying human flesh.
But in the resurrection we will be human like the Risen Jesus Christ, bearing His glorified, incorruptible human flesh.

It's still flesh.
It's still solid.
It's still the body.

If this body stays in the ground, decays, moldering forever. Then that is saying there is no resurrection of the dead. The word resurrection, anastasis in Greek, literally means "stand again". The prefix ana- means "again", it's comparable to the prefix "re-". And the Greek word stasis means "to stand". So literally anastasis is "re-standing" or "stand again". This is even the case with the word resurrection, borrowed into English from French (and ultimately from Latin), it is literally from "re-" (again) and "surgere" ("to rise"); hence "rise again". The "again" makes no sense unless that which is spoken about was, at some point risen, i.e. standing.

The very words used really do mean what they say. We, in our bodies, will rise again. Not as we are now, but as Christ is.
And Jesus, to be explicitly clear, has the same flesh He had when He was conceived in Mary's womb; the body of the God-Man is a human body. He showed the wounds, saying "touch Me" "feel Me" "place your hand in the wound on My side"--He ate fish.
We have only one example of someone rising from the dead, and it's Jesus. And consistently the Bible tells us that just as Christ rose, so too shall we rise.

If we can't look to our Lord Jesus Christ to show us what resurrection means, then "resurrection" means nothing at all in Christianity. And, again, without resurrection Christianity is worthless trash. And we are a more pitiable and sorry bunch of suckers than any other people ever.

Christianity means nothing without resurrection.

RDKirk said:

I don't know. Another speculation is that God makes sure across the generations that the atoms of believers never cross.

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Possible. I’ve thought it as if God knows every hair in everyone’s head then He is powerful enough to keep up with everyone’s atoms.

ViaCrucis said:

I'm not sure why you think I said soma means soul. I very clearly was talking about the word psuchekos (the adjective form of psuche).

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I'm not sure either. Maybe it's old age. But making ψυχικός mean "soulish" (pointing to the inner man) instead of "natural" (pointing to the physical body) in 1 Corinthians 15:46-49 does not fit the context...

ViaCrucis said:

The point I was making is that the distinction isn't one of material. The soma psuchekos, the "soulish body", isn't a body made of soul--I point this out because the contrast to soma psuchekos is soma pneumatikos. Pneumatikos is the adjective form of pneuma, spirit. So the contrast isn't physical/non-physical. The contrast is psuchekos/pneumatikos. It's the contrast between this present kind of life, our fallen, sinful, mortal life at present; and the future kind of life wherein we are made fully alive by the power of the Spirit, bearing the fullness of the image of God in Christ.

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I do not disagree the passage contrasts our fallen, sinful, mortal life in the present and the holy righteous glorified life we will live in the future. But as I have explained several times now, I do not agree that it indicates we will have the exact same physical body in the resurrection that we have now.

ViaCrucis said:

Let's go back to St. Paul's seed metaphor. Again, what is sown is not a thing that is different from is grown; it's not an ontological change. The change is one of glory. Look at the small humble acorn, now look at the great mighty oak tree. An acorn is still an oak, but in seed form; an acorn doesn't produce something entirely different: you don't plant an oak seed and get something that's not an oak. What is sown and what grows is still an oak--but the difference is one of glory.

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Of course it is true that a corn stalk does not come from an acorn. Only oak trees do. But that an oak tree srouts up from an acorn does not provide evidence that an oak tree has the same body as an acorn does. The question Paul raised and answered was, "With what body do they come?" And the answer is they are not the same.

ViaCrucis said:

The body is sown, in this present soulish mortal sinful condition; but what rises is the body, alive by the Holy Spirit, immortal, perfected.

Right now we are human like Adam, bearing his weak decaying human flesh.
But in the resurrection we will be human like the Risen Jesus Christ, bearing His glorified, incorruptible human flesh.

It's still flesh.
It's still solid.
It's still the body.

If this body stays in the ground, decays, moldering forever. Then that is saying there is no resurrection of the dead. The word resurrection, anastasis in Greek, literally means "stand again". The prefix ana- means "again", it's comparable to the prefix "re-". And the Greek word stasis means "to stand". So literally anastasis is "re-standing" or "stand again". This is even the case with the word resurrection, borrowed into English from French (and ultimately from Latin), it is literally from "re-" (again) and "surgere" ("to rise"); hence "rise again". The "again" makes no sense unless that which is spoken about was, at some point risen, i.e. standing.

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I see this as missing the point. We live in a physical body, like a suit of clothes. We look forward to shedding these clothes and being further clothed. What is clear in the mataphor is that ous suit of skin that we got from Adam is simply that, a suit of skin. We are not our clothes. We live in our clothes. And when we shed this body of skin, we will continue to be the same person we are now (presently joined to the Lord and one Spirit with Him), but we will have different clothes fashioned in the image of Christ with all His glory. Then, our clothes won't be fighting against us as they are now.

ViaCrucis said:

The very words used really do mean what they say. We, in our bodies, will rise again. Not as we are now, but as Christ is.
And Jesus, to be explicitly clear, has the same flesh He had when He was conceived in Mary's womb; the body of the God-Man is a human body. He showed the wounds, saying "touch Me" "feel Me" "place your hand in the wound on My side"--He ate fish.
We have only one example of someone rising from the dead, and it's Jesus. And consistently the Bible tells us that just as Christ rose, so too shall we rise.

If we can't look to our Lord Jesus Christ to show us what resurrection means, then "resurrection" means nothing at all in Christianity. And, again, without resurrection Christianity is worthless trash. And we are a more pitiable and sorry bunch of suckers than any other people ever.

Christianity means nothing without resurrection.

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I was hoping this argument would go away because it is unbecoming. But I will address it one time then move on.

We are not discussing whether or not the dead are raised. We are discussing the bodily form that a person has when he is resurrected. It is clear that we do not have all the details that answer that question because God has not yet revealed those details (1 Jn 3). But you are confident that any other view than your own makes Christianity "worthless trash".