Man and woman were made in the image of God with individuality, the
power and freedom to think and to do. Though created free beings, each is an indivisible unity
of body, mind, and spirit, dependent upon God for life and breath and all else. When our first
parents disobeyed God, they denied their dependence upon Him and fell from their high position
under God. The image of God in them was marred and they became subject to death. Their
descendants share this fallen nature and its consequences. They are born with weaknesses
and tendencies to evil. But God in Christ reconciled the world to Himself and by His Spirit
restores in penitent mortals the image of their Maker. Created for the glory of God, they are
called to love Him and one another, and to care for their environment. (Gen. 1:26-28; 2:7; Ps.
8:4-8; Acts 17:24-28; Gen. 3; Ps. 51:5; Rom. 5:12-17; 2 Cor. 5:19, 20; Ps. 51:10; 1 John 4:7, 8,
11, 20; Gen. 2:15.)

I notice there is nothing in this statement that says clearly that people do not have immortal souls or that nothing conscious survives death. I could imagine that someone who believes in the immortality of the soul could easily agree with the statement as it reads. The writers must have known exactly what their words communicate, so why did they choose to keep it out of the statement?

John317,
It is quite possible that not everyone on the committee that framed the wording of this statement was in agreement on this issue. I have observed that some on this forum who consider themselves faithful, conservative Seventh-day Adventist argue as if man was a dichotomy of body and and immaterial, immortal spirit. Just look at some of the discussion on the "I die daily..." thread.

It is a possibility...

STAN
THIS is an interesting statement

dgrimm60

There are unexplainable phenomenons such as OBEs. I can't claim legitimacy, or illigitimacy... BUT the documented cases claim that people had OBEs and proved that by describing thing that they could not possibly see.

We chalk it up to Satan's deception, but how would Satan fake such experience? Does he have ability to implant visual thoughts into our mind? If so, then why not go about deceiving that way to begin with?

There is contradicting evidence Biblically when you come to Body/Soul. Jews did not believe in such duality, but then a Gospel writer who was a Jew quotes Jesus saying:

"And do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both the soul and body in hell." Why would Jesus say that? The soul (or spirit) is distinctly shown as a separate entity. If it's merely God's breath, then why is it spoken of as being destroyed in hell?

Then there are 1 Pet. 3:19-20 "Spirits in Prison" that were disobedient during the times of Noah, and to who Christ went and preached. What are those?

Then there's the Rev. 6:9... perhaps symbolic, but nevertheless does beg the question.


But the ultimate question not the Nature of Man... but the nature of the existence all together as compared to the nature of God. What is the physical world? How does it work? What is human mind vs human body? Is it merely molecules combined to form a bio-robot... or is there something more to it?

When we say "My body". Who am I then, if the body is mine? Am I merely a brain? :)

There are many unanswered questions from the Bible that we can only speculate on until we experience the death firsthand.

Of course, forgot about the famous allegory:

"Whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord; ...we are of good courage, I say, and are willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:6-8)

Why use such language if it's potentially heretical?

Fccool i think you are asking valid questions. I think i have the answer to your first question. Can satan fake out-of-body experiences? the answer is definitely yes! You see, when i believed in New Age philosophy i thought i could attain a higher level of conciousness and evolution. This religion i had, was strengthened by the fact that i had lucid dreams, sleep parallysis, but also i ve had probably about a 100 out of body experiences in which i flew trhough my room and saw all the details. However, i didn t know they were really real or fake, so i looked at the details during the OBE and when i finally woke up i saw that they didn t match completely with the reality. I also sometimes thought i travelled through the universe (astral projection) but when i got too scared i forced myself to wake up. Then these thoughts entered my mind, if i would kill myself i would go to a place much better than this, because i was spiritually enlightned and i possess a mortal soul, i thought i was my own God, and there was no personal God. So yes, satan can trick men into believing we have an immortal soul.

now, concerning your second question, i don t really know the answer but i believe some adventist pastors dealt with this question. On the whole i would say, you can t use one sentence in the bible to disprove the coherency in the rest of the bible concerning this topic. Perhaps somebody else can give you the answer on that question.

For a relational and open study on this topic and the other 28 fundamentals, check out my free online Bible studies called "28 Stories."

http://vickids.adventist.org.au/28Stories

The studies are for all ages and will shape themselves based on the people involved. Use them for personal journaling or small group studies.