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Paul: I Corinthians 15

Paul discusses a number of issues regarding the Christian faith in his letter to the Corinthians. In his address, he acknowledges Jesus Christ’s resurrection, delves into matters concerning death and eternal life in heaven, discusses the confidence and faith of Christians as well as the human body and the spiritual body. According to Paul, those who labor in the Christian faith would not be disappointed by the Lord. That by being unmovable and standing steadfast in the Christian faith one would be changed and would acquire victory, even in death, through the Lord Jesus Christ.

The death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ according to the Christian faith is what leads Paul to the conclusion that there’s life after death. If Christians fail to accept that the dead are resurrected, then he says that they lack faith in Christ’s resurrection and this is tantamount to claiming that the preachers have lied and are thus false witnesses of God in support of his conclusion on the resurrection of the dead. If the dead are not resurrected, then it means that Jesus Christ was not raised from the dead and such a person who does not believe in the resurrection of the dead lacks faith and is therefore a sinner and would as a result perish.

Simply put, Paul’s analogy about the body that dies and that which resurrects means that when one dies, it is the natural body that is gone, the resurrection of the dead simply implies life in the form of a spiritual body: that is a different life from that before death.  Through the use of an analogy, Paul has been able to convey the message in an explainable way. It would have been difficult to explain matters of mortality and immortality as well as resurrection, especially to unbelievers. The use of analogy is thus an effective way of elucidating this point. By contrasting Adam with Christ, Paul acknowledges the fact that Adam was the first born of God’s creation of human beings, whereas Christ was the first born from the dead. That analogy previously used is unfit for this explanation and that’s why it has been dropped. Paul unites the two points together by informing that Jesus was a spiritual being whereas Adam had a natural body implying existence of both the natural body and the spiritual as before death and after death respectively.

Thomas Henry Huxley: From Agnosticism and Christianity

Thomas Henry Huxley asserts that the principle of Agnosticism implies that unless one can give evidence to logically support or justify certainty of a given proposition, it is wrong to claim that that is the objective truth. He goes ahead to differentiate Theology from Ecclesiasticism; he says that Theology is in part scientific and in part involves the championship of assumed conclusions regarding how true a given form of Theology is. This aspect of championing foregone conclusions is what he calls Ecclesiasticism. Huxley holds that whether the ecclesiastical hypotheses are discovered to be untrue, the causes for the development of morality among the human kind would continue to operate.

C.S Lewis: What Christians Believe

Lewis talks about the various conceptions of God in his writing. He discusses Pantheism and a separate view held by the Christians, Mohammedans and the Jews.  Pantheism is the view that God is beyond good and evil, whereas the view held by Mohammedans, Jews and Christians is that God is righteous, good and is a hater of hatred and a lover of love.  My take on his argument on God’s existence is that he fails to convince that God is inexistent. This is because he says he bases this argument on his idea of just and unjust which he admits is a flop. Dualism refers to the belief in the existence of two powers that are equal and independent; good and bad, that fight on the universe an endless war.

In his arguments against dualism, Lewis says that the bad power ought to be someone who appreciates badness just for the sake of it if dualism is to be held true. However, in reality no one loves badness just for the sake of it. Secondly, under dualism, the bad power is unable to supply himself with either the good impulses required to pervert or the good things that are desirous. He is thus supplied these things by the good power, hence the lack of independence. Lastly, everything that makes a bad man effective in being bad are all good things.