the Heaven, Hell & the Soul series
The Immortal Soul?
by haRold Smith
a citizen of the Commonwealth (Ephesians 2:19)
"Behold, the eye of YaHoVeH is on those who fear Him, on those who hope in His steadfast love, that He may deliver their
nephesh
from death..." Psalm 33:18-19
"Behold, his
nephesh
is puffed up; it is not upright within him, but the righteous shall live by his faith." Habakkuk 2:4
After the last article,
Where Is Heaven? (click on highlighted words to view content),
Bobbie wrote to ask, "My question is where does our spirit go when we die? Your teaching... helped me a lot in understanding Ephesians 6:12, but you did not mention where the spirit goes when it leaves the body. I will be 86 years old next month, and I look forward to the day when I shall see my Savior. I know that I have the kingdom of God abiding in me. I fellowship with the Lord. I abide in Him, and His Word abides in me. If, as some say, our spirit goes to Sheol when we die to await the resurrection what happens to the Kingdom of God abiding in us?"
In spite of the ancient
Greek philosophy
that has become embedded in our current culture, scripturally, apart from the Spirit of YaHoVeH - man has no spirit intrinsic to himself. YaHoVeH told Adam that on the day he ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil "he would die." But, he did not die physically. In fact, in
Genesis 5:5
we are told he lived for another 930 years. Consequently, if we are to pursue what scripture reveals about Truth - we have to rearrange our thinking about death to be in alignment with what the words tell us. The death YaHoVeH was speaking of was the death of Adam's shared image with the Father - YaHoVeH's Spirit. Since we are told in
Leviticus 17:11
that "the life is in the blood", when YaHoVeH breathed Life into Adam, it became his blood. In disobedience to YaHoVeH's Words, Adam brought darkness into the pure Light of that blood and it became corrupted necessitating
a separation
from the Spirit of Life, "lest he eat of the tree of Life" and remain in that condition forever
(Genesis 3:22).
Adam became as any other man of the world, thrust out of the Garden to make his own determination. He was now his own god. However, Adam and Chavah were still YaHoVeH's children, His Family. As their Father, He still loved them in immediately
fashioning clothing,
for them to cover their nakedness they were now aware of. The Hebrew word translated as the English "coats" in that verse is
kutonet
- the same Hebrew word used in
Exodus 28:4
to describe priestly garments. HE MADE THEM TO BE
PRIESTS UNTO HIM!!
YaHoVeH did not abandon His Family. He did not leave them destitute. He cared for them as any loving Father would - in spite of their careless recklessness. What Adam and Chavah had done could not be repaired or "fixed". Because they had now become their own god, they had no Spirit of LIFE in them to restore them to that place of intimacy with YaHoVeH. Part of the character of Spirit identified in
Exodus 34:5-7
is that the sins of the fathers are passed to subsequent generations until that sin is stopped. What the Family needed was a transfusion of blood that would return them to a pure state of being.
THE most dramatic illustration of what happens to us when we die can be seen in the passage from
John 11:38-44
where Yeshua calls Lazarus back from the dead. He did not call him back out of heaven - but from out of the grave. Why? Because Lazarus was dead - not hanging out in some ethereal nether land. There is no Hebrew thought in the Original Writings of a person's soul (which is translated as the English "spirit") being separated from the rest of what it means to be human. The division of man into "body-mind-soul" is a thoroughly Greek invention elaborated on by the Greek philosopher, Plato, in his book "the New Republic". The Hebrew word,
nephesh
has been translated into the English "soul" because of the influence of the Greek word
psyche
introduced into the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Tanakh (OT), also known as the LXX). In the Hebraic perspective, however, human beings are one homogenized entity - the person, the nephesh. When the Hebrew apostle Sha'ul (Paul) cites the Hebrew
Habakkuk 2:4
in Romans 1:17
and Galatians 3:11,
he is not speaking as if the soul could be saved but the body could not. Paul is speaking about the entire person, the Hebrew nephesh. Just as the verse in Habakkuk suggests, it is not a soul that is "puffed up", it is an entire way of being in the world that involves everything about a person - thoughts, choices, feelings, will and consequent actions. Compounding this doctrinal error is the unscriptural belief that humans possess an immortal soul. To this day, sophisticated scholars within Christendom teach that, at death, the soul goes to a place called "heaven" for doing well, or to purgatory or "hell" for committing various degrees of evil. This concept of the immortality of the soul being something apart from the rest of a man only began appearing into what became "Christian" theology some 200 to 250 years after the Resurrection of Yeshua when the writings of Ignatius, Marcion and Origen began the process of syncretism (which is the merging or fusion of different systems of thought or belief). However, the scriptures themselves do not teach the immortality of the soul; rather, they reveal, "...it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment; so Yeshua, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to rescue from death those who are eagerly waiting for Him."
(Hebrews 9:27,
Matthew 16:27).
Neither do the scriptures reveal that when one dies, the soul goes to heaven or hell leaving the body behind. Rather, it clearly shows that when one dies they await the resurrection of the dead - both of the righteous and of the wicked
(Daniel 12:2,
John 5:25-29,
1Corinthians 15:24-28,
Revelation 21:8).
The apostles were witnesses that Yeshua was resurrected from the dead, fulfilling the
promise of YaHoVeH
that is vital to others within His Family having the hope of also being raised from the dead
just as
He was.
Yeshua tells us that YaHoVeH's Kingdom is
within or among
the faithful. The faithful are those who keep the Words of YaHoVeH - just as Yeshua did
(John 8:28,
Deuteronomy 7:9).
The Kingdom of YaHoVeH is not a place somewhere inside of us. It is the righteous themselves who comprise the Kingdom of heaven where YaHoVeH's throne abides -
living stones
who are now His Temple.
Most believe eternity begins when they die; however, as seen in
Isaiah 57:15
YaHoVeH abides, occupies, dwells, and lives in eternity. Eternity accompanies YaHoVeH's throne. YaHoVeH's throne sits in the midst of His Kingdom. Thus, since the Kingdom of YaHoVeH exists in eternity, those who comprise His Kingdom become eternal as well. This is why Yeshua says that to know, to become intimately acquainted with the Nature of Spirit IS
eternal life.
To understand Spirit, therefore, is to first come to a Hebrew understanding of eternity.
Revelation 22:13,
Isaiah 44:6,
and Isaiah 48:12
tell us that, with YaHoVeH, there is no beginning and there is no end. He IS the Alpha and the Omega; He IS the beginning and the end. Without a beginning and without an ending - there is only right now. If we are to abide in YaHoVeH's Kingdom, we must abide in the same dimension that He occupies which is eternal - right now, right now, right now. Yeshua's admonition to take
no thought for tomorrow
was a comment about abiding in the Nature of Spirit today. With YaHoVeH there is no future and there is no past - only now. The
definition of time
is a man-made system of measurement from one cyclical event to another. If there is no beginning and there is no ending, there can be no cyclical event from which to take a measurement from nor an ending to calculate the measurement between the two events - hence, there is no time in eternity. Even though Hebrew words have been translated into the English paradigm as "time" - there is no specific word for "time" as we know it in Hebrew. The Hebrew words translated as the English "time" have meanings relating to a general "day"
(yom),
an appointed meeting (mo'ad),
an event ('ad),
a second event (sha'ne),
a footstep (pah'am),
in that case or place ('az<), etc.
Our concept of time was invented in 1847 to serve the purposes of the British Rail System. Obviously, this "railway time" (as it was called) was needed to coordinate the management of the trains traveling through each town across Britain - but it did not interfere with the "local" time kept in those towns. It wasn't until 1929 that the world adopted the 24 hour global time measurement. Although we imagine that time "zones" have always been part of life, this is not true. They are less than 100 years old - and they are entirely artificial, determined only by the agreement of various nations to divide the globe into longitudes.
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...time
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By looking even further back in history, we find that the mechanical clock was not invented until the 13th century. Prior to that invention, time was usually determined by sun dials. Of course, using a sun dial meant that the time of the day varied according to the season and location on the globe. In other words, before 1929 there was no worldwide standard of time measurement. More importantly, the adoption of a universal standard of time was motivated by the need to regulate production across geography (Lewis Mumford,"The Monastery and the Clock", page 326). Why is this little recognized fact so important for us? It is important because once we see why our lives became regulated by this artificial device, we can begin to comprehend that the 24 hour day and the 24 global time zones are completely independent of the biblical Hebraic perspective. No "day" in scripture is 24 hours long - no year is 365¼ days. Everything depends on the season, the geography and the designation of sacred time. In fact, the only standard of measurement in scripture is the
Sabbath
and its occurrence every seven days is completely independent of astronomical clock time. The "week," a cyclical measure not connected to any astronomical event, is rooted in the Sabbath - established by YaHoVeH at creation, not by the sun or the moon or the rotation of the earth. This is important in understanding where principles of man have replaced the fundamental aspects of YaHoVeH - and frees us to immerse ourselves solely in His Nature. To remember to observe the Sabbath as YaHoVeH instructed in
Exodus 20:1-17
IS to immerse ourselves in His Nature which abides in eternity.
Whether we like it or not, arguments about the age of the universe may be irreconcilable. There is evidence both for a recent creation and for an ancient universe. It is our stereotypical thinking about the nature of time that causes a problem. We view time as an absolute - as a single dimension measured by a fixed master clock. In reality, time is multidimensional but, because of the separation away from the Eternal One, we are trapped in one-dimensional linear time and extrapolate our limited understanding across the ages from a narrowness of vision. To be able to see the broader perspective of eternity requires our vision to undergo some stretching beyond what has been traditionally handed down to us
(Mark 7:6-8).
The Messianic Writings announce that all men in their natural state are "...dead through trespasses and sins... following the course of this world... the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience"
(Ephesians 2:1-2).
Sin is merely a separation
from the Nature of the Source of Life, who is YaHoVeH, by disobedience to His Words - and IS the definition of death, which prevents an entry into the Kingdom of YaHoVeH
(Matthew 7:21,
John 3:3).
People need rescue because they are dead - separated from the source of Life (see what it means scripturally to
Become Human).
So, then, if our traditional concepts of heaven and an immortal soul are not in accordance with scripture - just what is the promise we are given to hope for? What does it mean to be risen from the dead? What is the
hope of glory
found in Yeshua? A promise is not realized until it is fulfilled. It is we who try to overlay a man-made concept of time upon someone who abides in a place where time is non-existent. The Hebrews of the Messianic Writings understood that when a person dies - they just die
(Mark 9:9-10).
The reason Yeshua was the "firstborn among many brethren" to example before us what waiting on that promise was about
(Romans 8:29).
When Yeshua was in that tomb - He was dead. He did not go anywhere - He was in the grave. Many point to the passage from 1Peter 3:18-20, however, to refute that statement - but let's see what those words actually say:
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For Yeshua also has once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to YaHoVeH, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit of YaHoVeH:
by which Spirit also He (YaHoVeH) went and preached unto the spirits in prison;
which some time were disobedient, just as when once the long-suffering of YaHoVeH waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water." 1Peter 3:18-20
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Words mean things - but the absence of words in scripture does not call for assumptive speculation. In the same way
the Church
and Lucifer
have been found not to be scriptural entities through the way they have been traditionally presented, the phrase "He descended into hell" originated with the Roman Catholic Church and is found in
the Apostles' Creed
- but that has only been known since the third century. This phrase was evidently derived from an unusually-worded portion of Peter's First Epistle just above. However, the first thing to note in this passage from Peter is that the Greek word "Hades" (translated as "hell") does not actually appear. "Hades" is the underworld god of Greek mythology and, even though it is mentioned as "hell" in the Creed (and elsewhere in both OT and NT Greek translations), it does not appear in the Original Hebrew Writings - particularly not appearing as a holding place of permanent punishment of those utterly lost forever as previously noted in the article
Is There A Hell?.
These words of Peter describing whatever kind of preaching took place - were not in hell. They were given in the world of men and, evidently, in the world of those who lived prior to the flood known as the Antediluvians. The "spirits in prison" are simply those who are separated from the eternal, timeless Nature of Spirit who, thus, are in bondage to the nature of man - and they exist in all generations of men
(Psalm 24:3-10,
see the King of Glory for a scriptural understanding of a generation).
The passage itself confirms this fact as there were only eight righteous souls who were delivered from that Antediluvian period because they listened to that preaching and acted on it. We get indignant at the mention of purgatory, knowing that's not found in scripture but, our popular concepts of an immortal soul come from the same place as does purgatory - a traditional Roman Catholic theology of an afterlife of immortality under-girded by Greek mythology and philosophy.
Yeshua did not resurrect Himself - that was the Father's doing. Had the Father not raised Him, He would still be there
(Romans 8:11).
Since there is no "time" in eternity, consequently, there is only a split second between a person's death and their resurrection. This is why scripture describes those who have died as being "asleep" because when you are asleep, there is no conscious awareness of the passage of "time". Events that may be separated by hundreds or even thousands of years in our time frame can pass in eternity "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye"
(1Corinthians 15:52).
This is how, from a Hebraic perspective, Yeshua could be slain "from the foundation of the earth",
before Adam,
without actually having existed before his appearance in the flesh. Becoming
echad
(Hebrew for "one") with YaHoVeH means entering into the eternal dimension of Spirit. It was through the Resurrection that Yeshua was showing to all of creation YaHoVeH's Faithfulness in keeping His Covenant to
restore His Kingdom
to His Family and all who would attach themselves to that family
(Leviticus 19:34).
The lesson of scripture is not about leaving - it is learning to live while staying firmly planted on earth. We are not holding our collective breath in order that Messiah will come to rescue us from a defiled earth. We are learning to breathe while we restore the goodness of YaHoVeH's Kingdom right here on earth - today, as it was in the beginning.
???Questions???
Please feel free to email me at harold@hethathasanear.com.
While not claiming to have all
the answers, it would be an honor to partake with you of what Spirit is uncovering.
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