Immortality or Resurrection - William West (best pdf ebook reader for android TXT) 📗

one of the greatest lexicographers in history: ‘To go or run through, come to nothing, perish.’” Ashley Johnson, Founder and president of the Johnson Bible College, “The Resurrection And The Future Life,” Page 420-421, 1913, Knoxville Lithographing Company, church of Christ.
“When the Lord talked with men, and used human language, if he placed other meanings on the words than those understood by men, HOW COULD GOD TEACH US? Or if he used them in a figurative sense, in their last and most important application, why were we not apprised of the change...IF THE BIBLE DOESN’T MEAN WHAT IT SAYS, THEN NOBODY KNOWS WHAT IT DOES MEAN.” E. D. Slough, “The Indictment Of Eternal Torment—The Self-negation Of A Monstrous Doctrine,” Page 195-206, F. L. Rowe, Publisher, 1914, evangelist, church of Christ.
Those who believe men are now immortal have to make the words that God used not mean what they say. Is it not unreasonable to make words in the Bible has a meaning attached to them that is unlike the way they are used in any other book in the world, unlike the way they were used in the language of the people God was speaking to?
(1) LIFE must be changed to be not life but is only a reward to those who are born with eternal life. Is it not unreasonable to say the many times Christ promised eternal life to those that believe Him, that He only promised them a reward and not eternal life? And just as unreasonable to say that He promised life to only to a part a person that was born with eternal life and cannot die and only this immaterial part of a person will be in Heaven. This doctrine of an immortal soul that cannot die makes Christ promise us something over and over that we already had. Throughout the Book of John, Christ repeatedly promised life to those who believed and those who did not believe would not see life (John 3:36; 4:14; 4:36; 5:21; 5:40; 6:33, 39, 44, 47, 57, 63, 68). "That to all whom you have given him, he should give eternal life. And this is life eternal, that they should know you the only true God, and him whom you did send, even Jesus Christ" (John 17:2-3). There could not be a stronger statement saying only those who believe in Jesus will have life, and those who do not believe will not be given any life anywhere.
Alexander Campbell in his preface to "The Living Oracles," his translation of the New Testament said, "The reader will please to consider, that, when God spoke to man, he adopted the language of man. To the fathers of the Jewish nation he spoke in their mother tongue. By his Son, and his Son by the Apostles, spoke to every nation in its own language. When he spoke to any nation, he uniformly adopted the words of that nation in expressing his will to it. And that he used their words in the commonly received sense, needs no other proof than this, that if he had not done so, instead of enlightening them in the knowledge of his will, he would have deceived and confounded them: than which, no hypothesis is more impious. For example: were God to speak to us in English, and select from our vocabulary the words death, punishment, perpetual, and wicked; were he to use the last term as we use it, and annex to the others a significant different from that we affix to them--such as to mean life by the term death, happiness by the punishment, and a limited time by the word perpetual; and without apprising us of such a change, in their meaning...what a deception would he practice on us!”
How many changes "death" to "life," by changing "the wages of sin is death" to "the wages of sin is eternal life with torment"?
"Its uniform testimony (the New Testament) is that 'eternal life' hereafter will be the exclusive possession of the just, and that the wicked will certainly not obtain it: 'He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life.' Our simple enquiry is, what is meant by that Greek word translated 'life' in the passages referred to. Our Lord in addressing Himself to the Jewish people, Luke in writing a Gospel for the Gentile world, Paul in writing to Rome, the metropolis of heathenism, or Corinth priding itself on the Grecian tongue, James, Peter, and Jude writing to Christians wherever scattered over the earth, all alike use this word as universally understood. We have only, therefore, to refer to our classical dictionaries, and there we find its primary and universally accepted sense to be existence. If we want any further confirmation, let us listen to the Apostle James defining it's meaning, 'What is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeared for a little time, and then vanishes away.' On the classical usage, and express definition of the New Testament, we take our stand. Dictionaries of the New Testament, and commentators on it, may, if they please, put upon the phrase the sense of 'happiness' in the numberless passage where it occurs, but we deny to them the right to alter the meaning of a well understood Grecian word for the sake of bolstering up their baseless and horrid creed" Henry Constable, The Duration and Nature of Future Punishment" 1871.
(2) DEATH must be changed so that it does not mean death but eternal life with torment for those who can never be dead. The dead are not really dead for death is only "a loss of well being" a loss of happiness and is eternal life with torment. Death must be changed to be not death but a doorway to a spiritual world where all, both the saved and the lost are alive and have eternal life; to the saved death means an instant doorway to a greater and fuller life; to the lost an instant doorway to an eternal life of pain. In no plain language can death be said to be the wages of sin to an immortal being that cannot die.
Death is made to be not death but a mere change in the mode of existence. To many, death means to be alive, to have eternal life, but separated from God and tormented by God. To make the word "death" fit their view; they must make it figurative. The true meaning of the word will destroy their view. All plain passages like Romans 6:23 (the wages of sin is death) must be changed into figurative language, but they cannot tell us how they know what the figurative language means. They cannot tell us how they know "death" means "life." A basic rule of Bible study, which is accepted by most, is a word or a passage must be assumed to be literal unless the context demands that it must be taken figuratively. They cannot tell why the word "death" must be made figurative other than it would destroy their teaching if it were used with it’s true meaning, it's universally understood meaning. If there were a Hell, for those in it to feel pain they could not be dead, they would have to be just as alive as those in Heaven; they would have to have life just as eternal as believers.
When the death of anyone is spoken of in the Bible, the modern phraseology (they have gone to be with Christ, have gone to their reward, have gone to be with their loved ones in Heaven, etc.) is never used. Not even Abraham is said to have gone to his home in Heaven at his death before the judgment. "And Abraham breathed his last and died in a ripe old age, an old man and satisfied with life; and he was gathered to his people" (Genesis 25:8 New American Standard Version). Such a radical change of death to life in torment is a denial of death; an attempt to evade death by saying the real person is immortal and therefore is not subject to death. It is a deliberate carefully thought out wresting of the scriptures (2 Peter 3:16).
DEATH HAS BEEN CHANGED TO LIFE
• Those that refused to have God in their knowledge “are worthy of DEATH” (Romans 1:28-32), but are given life in Hell.
• Sin is “unto DEATH” (Romans 6:16) “Leads to DEATH” New International Version, has been changed to sinners live forever in torment.
• “The wages of sin is DEATH” (Romans 6:23), but the wages can never be paid because man teaches an immortal soul cannot die.
• “For if you live according to the flesh, you must DIE” (Romans 8:13), but an immortality soul would have has eternal life and could not die.
• “For the end of these things is DEATH” (Romans 6:21). “These things result in DEATH” New International Version. This has been changed to, “For the end of these thing is eternal life in torment.”
• “Acts that lead to DEATH” (Hebrews 9:14) New International Version
• “His servants you are whom you obey; whether sin unto DEATH, or obedience unto righteousness” (Romans 6:16).
• “For to be carnal minded is DEATH” (Romans 8:6).
• “Sin…brings forth death”(James 1:15) but we are repeatedly told that an immortal soul is not subject to death.
(3) DIE "If you live after the flesh, you must die; but if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you shall live" (Romans 8:13). The immoral soul doctrine must make die to mean exactly the same thing as live, just live in two different places; therefore, die and live both mean eternal life! Die and live must both be interpreted to means to exist forever! Who can believe it? It is obvious that die is only interpreted to mean "eternal life in torment" when it serves the purpose of the doctrine of eternal torment, and all other times "to die" really means "to die"; also that we must have someone tell us when "die" means "eternal life in torment" and when "die" really means "die"; and without this help we could never know when God intended us to understand the opposite of what He said and when He intended us to understand what He said in the way He said it.
(4) DESTRUCTION must be changed to be only a loss of well being. The traditionalist argument is that the words "destroy" and "destruction" should not be taken with their established meaning but be interpreted as "a loss of well being" or an "irreparable loss." How could anyone know this without a revelation from God? How can the Scriptures speak of the destruction of the lost if they are not destroyed? Why would God say He were going to destroy the lost if He knows the soul is immortal and He could not destroy it? Destruction has been changed to existing forever in torment.
(5) DESTROY must be changed to mean to preserve forever. They must add, "Can never be" to destroyed and make it read, "Can never be destroyed." They argue that an immortal soul cannot die, therefore, "destroy" cannot mean "destroy" and the Bible did not really mean "destroy" when it said "destroy," just as "death" cannot really mean "death;" but these words must mean something; therefore, they are changed and given a meaning that is the opposite of their true meaning; many words must always be changed and used with a meaning that is the opposite of what the words mean. They argue that nothing can be annihilated in the scientific sense,