Why Did Christ Descend into Hades?

[Outrider]

Dicky,

Obviously you have to look at the scriptures as a whole. Anyone fool can proof text but that's not the same as understanding them, which only happens within the life of the Church as guided by the Holy Spirit, that same Holy Spirit through which the scriptures were written.

When you say 'guided by the Holy Spirit', does he send you a coin to flip to decide if a given passage is meant to be taken literally or figuratively or do you literally just pick and choose to suit your preconception?

O.

The life of the Church, that is not only the sacred scriptures but the ancient liturgies, the holy councils, the fathers, the lives of the saints etc.

That's lovely, but it still doesn't really get to the crux of the question - how do you decide which parts are implicit guidance and which are explicit instructions?

Those 'holy councils, the fathers ... the saints' all had to come to a conclusion on this, what's their take on it?

O.

[ad_orientem]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

[Outrider]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

To be fair, when I get down to it, most of the Protestants (and Catholics) that I've spoken with about this for any real amount of time either say it's about a 'feeling' - your 'personal judgment' - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, which are also a) mixed and b) not that bothered about the New Testament, in the main.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

O.

[Hope]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

ad_o, where did Jesus say that one would know if something was from the Holy Spirit if you thought with the mind of the Church?  I've always understood that one was to test everything (which of course includes the thinking of the church) by the Holy Spirit - not the other way round.

To be fair, ... - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, ...

Most of what Jesus taught (and Paul) is based on Jewish thinking.  It therefore makes sense to look at that body of thinking for an explanation of the background that Jesus and Paul was working from.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That sounds very similar to the approach taken by some non-Christians here, O.  ;-)

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

[Shaker]

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

I've never known ippy to misrepresent anyone, whereas your last example of it was earlier today.

[Outrider]

To be fair, ... - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, ...

Most of what Jesus taught (and Paul) is based on Jewish thinking.  It therefore makes sense to look at that body of thinking for an explanation of the background that Jesus and Paul was working from.

Certainly seems like a reasonable start, at the very least, into finding out what the original intention might have been.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That sounds very similar to the approach taken by some non-Christians here, O.  ;-)

Except that we don't believe it justifies the behaviour, we just think that methodology might explain some of the behaviour.

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

How is it misrepresentation? I know that you don't have to read the various parts that way, I know that many Christians would claim those elements are figurative and that's not what's really meant, but are you telling me that you can't see how some people can read passages that way? Doesn't history adequately show that it's been done, repeatedly?

O.

[Jack Knave]

I think that a very simple explanation of why Christ descended into hell has largely been missed (I seem to remember one or two posts making passing reference to this).  In order for the resurrection to have any value, Christ had to die first.  For the Jew, he therefore passed into Hades - from which he rose again on the 3rd day - not something that was a normal occurrence, thus showing that he had 'defeated' death.  Without descending to Hell (and note that the original word for descended didn't necessarily refer to physically downward action), he couldn't show this victory.

How does a God die?

If he defeated death then he didn't die?

[ad_orientem]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

ad_o, where did Jesus say that one would know if something was from the Holy Spirit if you thought with the mind of the Church?  I've always understood that one was to test everything (which of course includes the thinking of the church) by the Holy Spirit - not the other way round.

To be fair, ... - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, ...

Most of what Jesus taught (and Paul) is based on Jewish thinking.  It therefore makes sense to look at that body of thinking for an explanation of the background that Jesus and Paul was working from.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That sounds very similar to the approach taken by some non-Christians here, O.  ;-)

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

Hope,

In his dicourse with the Apostles after the Last Supper our Lord said he would send the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth. Test we must but it is not a private thing. How were the holy councils judged to have been ecumenical? Because they were accepted by the whole Church and by the fruits there of. Not because a person said so but by the acts of the Church itself. Likewie we must have the same mind set. In the same way we do not look to the Fathers merely because they say so, but because they too think with the mind of the Church. Same with the ancient liturgies, because they have been approved by continuous use and the saint through the holiness of their lives.

[Jack Knave]

Hope,

Do you have eye-witness evidence that proves that it didn't occur?

Just out of interest, what would eye-witness evidence of something not happening look like exactly?

Well, it could be a record produced the Jewish leaders and or 3rd party individuals'groups that the body had been shown to the public after the claims of Jesus' resurrection and corroborated by other 3rd party reports; it could be eye-witness accounts that the tomb in which he had been buried had not been opened but that a check had shown the body was actually still there.  There are plenty of things that the Jewish and Roman (if they'd been bothered) authorities could have done/produced to show that the resurrection hadn't happened.

But they couldn't do that if the event never took place in the first place. And you have no way of knowing if it did or not; being stuck in this part of history.

[Jack Knave]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

ad_o, where did Jesus say that one would know if something was from the Holy Spirit if you thought with the mind of the Church?  I've always understood that one was to test everything (which of course includes the thinking of the church) by the Holy Spirit - not the other way round.

To be fair, ... - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, ...

Most of what Jesus taught (and Paul) is based on Jewish thinking.  It therefore makes sense to look at that body of thinking for an explanation of the background that Jesus and Paul was working from.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That sounds very similar to the approach taken by some non-Christians here, O.  ;-)

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

Hope,

In his dicourse with the Apostles after the Last Supper our Lord said he would send the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth. Test we must but it is not a private thing. How were the holy councils judged to have been ecumenical? Because they were accepted by the whole Church and by the fruits there of. Not because a person said so but by the acts of the Church itself. Likewie we must have the same mind set. In the same way we do not look to the Fathers merely because they say so, but because they too think with the mind of the Church. Same with the ancient liturgies, because they have been approved by continuous use and the saint through the holiness of their lives.

And yet when they came to replace Judas they drew lots....very inspired!!!

[Red Giant]

I think that a very simple explanation of why Christ descended into hell has largely been missed (I seem to remember one or two posts making passing reference to this).  In order for the resurrection to have any value, Christ had to die first.  For the Jew, he therefore passed into Hades - from which he rose again on the 3rd day - not something that was a normal occurrence, thus showing that he had 'defeated' death.  Without descending to Hell (and note that the original word for descended didn't necessarily refer to physically downward action), he couldn't show this victory.

How does a God die?

If he defeated death then he didn't die?

The fact that the whole resurrection thing is based on a total misunderstanding of death does seem to undermine it more than somewhat.

[jeremyp]

And of course there is plenty of real empirical evidence of experimentation from multiple sources multiple times that disproves the claims of Jesus, aren't there, Shaker.

That's somewhat dishonest of you.

We haven't got as far as the claims of Jesus, we're still on the claims of anonymous writers from 40 years later who don't tell us who their sources are.

And no, when someone like you or bhs categorically claim certain things for the Bible, it us not up to others to disprove you.  The burden of proof is on the claimant.

It's a medically proven fact that dead people do not come alive again.

Game over for you.

[ad_orientem]

It's not down to personal judgment. You have to look at the whole, that is, you have to think with the mind of the Church. That is how you know it is of the Holy Spirit. Don't listen what the Protestants say.

ad_o, where did Jesus say that one would know if something was from the Holy Spirit if you thought with the mind of the Church?  I've always understood that one was to test everything (which of course includes the thinking of the church) by the Holy Spirit - not the other way round.

To be fair, ... - or they revert to the cultural expertise of the Jewish traditions, ...

Most of what Jesus taught (and Paul) is based on Jewish thinking.  It therefore makes sense to look at that body of thinking for an explanation of the background that Jesus and Paul was working from.

Essentially, then, there is no definitive - everyone can 'feel' for which bits they want to be literal and which figurative, and no-one can tell them they're wrong.

That sounds very similar to the approach taken by some non-Christians here, O.  ;-)

That opens the opportunities for people to pick the hate-riddled nonsense in there - the homophobia, the slavery-apologism, the racism, the tribalism, the misogyny - and claim it as God's will. That's really the best system an all-knowing, all-loving deity could come up with?

Isn't misrepresentation a human trait, O?  I'd suggest you have a word with ippy - he's a past-master of the skill.

Hope,

In his dicourse with the Apostles after the Last Supper our Lord said he would send the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth. Test we must but it is not a private thing. How were the holy councils judged to have been ecumenical? Because they were accepted by the whole Church and by the fruits there of. Not because a person said so but by the acts of the Church itself. Likewie we must have the same mind set. In the same way we do not look to the Fathers merely because they say so, but because they too think with the mind of the Church. Same with the ancient liturgies, because they have been approved by continuous use and the saint through the holiness of their lives.

And yet when they came to replace Judas they drew lots....very inspired!!!

Indeed! Not one man's whim!

[jeremyp]

Well, it could be a record produced the Jewish leaders and or 3rd party individuals'groups that the body had been shown to the public after the claims of Jesus' resurrection and corroborated by other 3rd party reports;

That assumes there were significant claims of a resurrection to deal with. If there had been no resurrection and the stores we have are legends from 30 years later, there would have been no incentive to produce a body at the time.

it could be eye-witness accounts that the tomb in which he had been buried had not been opened but that a check had shown the body was actually still there. 

What tomb? It's most unlikely that Jesus was buried in anything so grand.

There are plenty of things that the Jewish and Roman (if they'd been bothered) authorities could have done/produced to show that the resurrection hadn't happened.

Only if there actually were any significant resurrection stories going around at the time.

[Red Giant]

Hope,

Do you have eye-witness evidence that proves that it didn't occur?

Just out of interest, what would eye-witness evidence of something not happening look like exactly?

Well, it could be a record produced the Jewish leaders and or 3rd party individuals'groups that the body had been shown to the public after the claims of Jesus' resurrection and corroborated by other 3rd party reports; it could be eye-witness accounts that the tomb in which he had been buried had not been opened but that a check had shown the body was actually still there.  There are plenty of things that the Jewish and Roman (if they'd been bothered) authorities could have done/produced to show that the resurrection hadn't happened.

A body wouldn't prove anything.  Obviously when you died and went to Hades, you didn't take your body with you, you left it behind for the maggots.  Nobody thought you were going to reclaim it when you came back, so nobody would be at all surprised if it were still rotting in the grave.

If (which is unlikely) people did go round claiming to have seen Jesus alive, though admitting that they didn't actually recognise him by sight, their story would have had as much credibility as somebody saying a carrot was a reincarnated princess.  But if people want to believe total woo there's not a lot anybody can do about it.
 

[Sassy]

Dear Jack,

Didn't someone rise up into heaven in the OT? Ezekiel?

Elijah, which makes me wonder about Jesus freeing OT saints from hell, are Elijah and Moses OT saints?

Gonnagle.

The Saints never went to hell.
As you can see from Dives and Lazarus. One ends up in hell and the other at the bosom of Abraham with the divide.
So from hell, Dives could see Lazarus and Abraham and they could see him.
We know that at the point of Christ's death the graves of Saints opened and they were restored to life.

King James Bible

50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.

51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,

53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.


Christs power over life and death is show by the immediate affect his dying had on the saints already dead.

Eternal life and the Kingdom of God are for the believer.
The Saints would not have been in hell. For they would be like the others resting in sleep awaiting the coming of the Messiah and now the return.

Sass you have no evidence for your statement! You might believe it to be true, but that is a million light years from it being so.

The witnesses are the evidence. You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.
Maybe you can show us some. Thought not. So why present a comment which even you have no logical reasoning for.
We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

[Red Giant]

Ah yes, the witnesses.  Like Dr Watson writing his eye-witness accounts of the cases of Sherlock Holmes.  Must be all true then.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Sassy,

You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.

First, how would you propose that someone prove that anything never happened?

Second, how would you propose to establish that the accounts written down decades after these witness accounts are accurate, and for that matter that these witnesses actually saw what they reportedly thought they saw?

[Outrider]

The witnesses are the evidence.

1. Eyewitness testimony is unreliable
2. Eyewitness testimony delivered decades after the fact is even more unreliable
3. Allegations of eyewitness testimony from vested interests who weren't there themselves is highly questionable.

You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.

And you have no proof Mohammed didn't ascend on a winged horse, that Joseph Smith didn't have an angel help him decipher conveniently disappearing golden tablets, that Nut and Geb didn't give birth to the world and that Xenu didn't blow up DC-9 shaped nuclear bombs to embed tortured thetan spirits into the Earth, yet you don't (I suspect) accept any of those claims.

The burden of proof is on the claimant - we aren't saying, definitively, 'that never happened', we're just saying that your claims are not believable, and you don't have any evidence to put before us that would make us put them in a different category to, say, the King Arthur myth.

We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

We do deal with it the same as with anything from history - which is to say that we update the ideas with later ones as they become evident, and we don't make assumptions that can't be supported by the available data.

History is replete with evidence of Christianity, and there is some evidence for a figure around whom the story of Jesus is founded. There's nothing to back up the idea of a god or his magical avatar, however.

O.

[floo]

Dear Jack,

Didn't someone rise up into heaven in the OT? Ezekiel?

Elijah, which makes me wonder about Jesus freeing OT saints from hell, are Elijah and Moses OT saints?

Gonnagle.

The Saints never went to hell.
As you can see from Dives and Lazarus. One ends up in hell and the other at the bosom of Abraham with the divide.
So from hell, Dives could see Lazarus and Abraham and they could see him.
We know that at the point of Christ's death the graves of Saints opened and they were restored to life.

King James Bible

50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.

51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,

53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.


Christs power over life and death is show by the immediate affect his dying had on the saints already dead.

Eternal life and the Kingdom of God are for the believer.
The Saints would not have been in hell. For they would be like the others resting in sleep awaiting the coming of the Messiah and now the return.

Sass you have no evidence for your statement! You might believe it to be true, but that is a million light years from it being so.

The witnesses are the evidence. You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.
Maybe you can show us some. Thought not. So why present a comment which even you have no logical reasoning for.
We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

What people claimed to have witnessed is NOT evidence if what they say they witnessed is not in the slightest bit credible. Besides which, what they claim to have witnessed was not written down until many years after Jesus was dead.

[Hope]

How does a God die?

JK, one needs to go back a stage in the Christian calendar to answer this question.  Christians believe that God became human in the form of Jesus.  As such, he was able to experience all that humans experience - including death - which is why there is no suggestion that he raised himself from death but was raised from death (the difference between the active and passive modes of the verb).  In case you aren't aware, this coming to earth as a humnan being is what Christians celebrate towards the end/beginning of each year - the timing depending largely on the calendar one uses.

[Sassy]

Sassy,

You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.

First, how would you propose that someone prove that anything never happened?

Second, how would you propose to establish that the accounts written down decades after these witness accounts are accurate, and for that matter that these witnesses actually saw what they reportedly thought they saw?

Selective reasoning and cherry picking isn't my bag.

We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

My point is not about me...  It actually applies to anything in history and witness accounts.
It applies to people like Floo and yourself. Either direct the points toward the actual content of post or don't reply at all.

[Sassy]

Dear Jack,

Didn't someone rise up into heaven in the OT? Ezekiel?

Elijah, which makes me wonder about Jesus freeing OT saints from hell, are Elijah and Moses OT saints?

Gonnagle.

The Saints never went to hell.
As you can see from Dives and Lazarus. One ends up in hell and the other at the bosom of Abraham with the divide.
So from hell, Dives could see Lazarus and Abraham and they could see him.
We know that at the point of Christ's death the graves of Saints opened and they were restored to life.

King James Bible

50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.

51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,

53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.


Christs power over life and death is show by the immediate affect his dying had on the saints already dead.

Eternal life and the Kingdom of God are for the believer.
The Saints would not have been in hell. For they would be like the others resting in sleep awaiting the coming of the Messiah and now the return.

Sass you have no evidence for your statement! You might believe it to be true, but that is a million light years from it being so.

The witnesses are the evidence. You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.
Maybe you can show us some. Thought not. So why present a comment which even you have no logical reasoning for.
We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

What people claimed to have witnessed is NOT evidence if what they say they witnessed is not in the slightest bit credible. Besides which, what they claim to have witnessed was not written down until many years after Jesus was dead.

Which confirms my point...

We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

Evidence in a court of law is witnesses accounts.
In a court witnesses who witness things are producing EVIDENCE.
You cannot have it both ways. You have selective reasoning and acceptance of what people witnessed in history and recorded/
So you choose what you believe.

[Sebastian Toe]

, it is widely known that the Flood story was allegorical -

Have you broken the news to TW yet?
He will be upset!

[floo]

Dear Jack,

Didn't someone rise up into heaven in the OT? Ezekiel?

Elijah, which makes me wonder about Jesus freeing OT saints from hell, are Elijah and Moses OT saints?

Gonnagle.

The Saints never went to hell.
As you can see from Dives and Lazarus. One ends up in hell and the other at the bosom of Abraham with the divide.
So from hell, Dives could see Lazarus and Abraham and they could see him.
We know that at the point of Christ's death the graves of Saints opened and they were restored to life.

King James Bible

50 Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.

51 And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent;

52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,

53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.


Christs power over life and death is show by the immediate affect his dying had on the saints already dead.

Eternal life and the Kingdom of God are for the believer.
The Saints would not have been in hell. For they would be like the others resting in sleep awaiting the coming of the Messiah and now the return.

Sass you have no evidence for your statement! You might believe it to be true, but that is a million light years from it being so.

The witnesses are the evidence. You have no proof it never happened and the witnesses never saw it.
Maybe you can show us some. Thought not. So why present a comment which even you have no logical reasoning for.
We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

What people claimed to have witnessed is NOT evidence if what they say they witnessed is not in the slightest bit credible. Besides which, what they claim to have witnessed was not written down until many years after Jesus was dead.

Which confirms my point...

We deal with the bible the same as anything from history. It is all presented from people at the time. You can decide what you believe but you cannot disbelieve one thing by choosing without disbelieving the other... but there is selective reasoning so you choose what you believe.

Evidence in a court of law is witnesses accounts.
In a court witnesses who witness things are producing EVIDENCE.
You cannot have it both ways. You have selective reasoning and acceptance of what people witnessed in history and recorded/
So you choose what you believe.

Sass, witnesses in court are cross examined on the evidence they give to see if it is credible, if not it is thrown out! If the so called 'eye witnesses' to the events surrounding the life of Jesus had been cross examined on their claims, I suspect that would have been throw out too!