A SPIRITUAL BODY by Uriah Smith

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jul 22, 1862

A SPIRITUAL BODY.

By Uriah Smith

THERE is, says Paul, a natural body, and a spiritual body. 1 Cor. xv, 44. No one, we presume, believes in the existence of any person unless in his natural body or his spiritual body. Hence, believers in the conscious existence of man after death, hold that when he ceases to exist in this state, when he drops this mortal body, he at once commences his existence in the spiritual body, and this spiritual body is the same as "the house from heaven," of which Paul speaks in 2 Cor. v, 1. That man's future life is continued by means of this spiritual body is a well-defined view of Spiritualists, and all the believers in the immortality of the soul, are doubtless agreed in this.

This was the position of Eld. Jones in his late discussion with Bro. Hull at Charlotte, Mich. When arguing that Moses was literally on the mount of transfiguration, not by a resurrection, but by virtue of his immortal soul, or in his spiritual nature, he exclaimed with great emphasis, "You know there is a spiritual body, soma pneumatikon, as well as a natural body, soma psuchikon." His argument was that Moses was present on the mount in the spiritual body.

Now let us inquire further of Paul about this spiritual body. What is this body and when do we come into possession of it? Hear the apostle: "So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption; it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural body, soma psuchikon, it is raised a spiritual body, soma pneumatikon. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body." Paul is here talking of the resurrection of the dead, and declares that the spiritual body is the body that is raised. If, then, Moses was on the mount in the spiritual body, it follows as a matter of course that he had been raised from the dead; for the spiritual body is the one that is raised up from the grave. Eld. J. had been laboring hard to show that Moses had not been raised, since, if he had been, his case would furnish no evidence in behalf of man's consciousness in death. And when, from his own claim that Moses was present in the spiritual body, taken in connection with Paul's declaration that the spiritual body is the resurrection body, it was shown that Moses was there by virtue of a resurrection from the dead, his theology found itself, as the reader may imagine, in a very tight place. And how did he endeavor to free it from this embarrassment? In this way. Said he, "I said Moses was there with a spiritual body, not with his spiritual body!" Very well, that does not alter the fact that the spiritual body, as Paul declares, is the resurrection body, and so if Moses did not have his own spiritual body, it follows that the body of somebody else had been raised for him to take possession of! How this in any way helped his position, we are willing to leave immortal-soulists themselves to tell us. According to the proverb that one lie makes six more necessary, so verily it hath happened to the orthodoxy of our day; to extricate themselves from one absurdity, its adherents will plunge into half a dozen more, which are worse than the first.

Let the Bible student then hear in mind that the spiritual body, the only one that we ever have except the natural body, is the resurrection body, and that Paul recognizes only these two states of existence; namely, the natural body and the spiritual body. The one is the body in which we now live here, and the other is the body which we shall have after the resurrection from the dead. And between these two, or from the time that this mortal body is deposited in the grave, that is, sown in corruption, till it is raised in glory, and we obtain the spiritual body of which the apostle speaks, there is no conscious existence.

Verily, in the great doctrines of the word of God, even the wayfarer need not err. U. S.