The Eschatological Aspect of St. Paul's Teaching About «Natural Body» and «Spiritual Body» in Russian Biblical Scholars' Writings

Abstract

One of the central issues of St. Paul's eschatology is the teaching about «natural body» and «spiritual body» which many Russian biblical scholars' writings are devoted to. Renewal and transfiguration of human spirit in the image of Christ inevitably changes human body that after the Resurrection becomes imperishable, spiritual, similar to Christ's body in his transfiguration. The truth of Christ's Resurrection is absolutely immutable and mandatory to the whole renewed humanity and therefore the question of the modification of postmortem human's state is quite fair. The St Paul's theology lets us suppose that human's soul leaving the terrestrial body carries with it an organ that it has formed during the earthly life. That's exactly why the individual existence of the dead becomes possible through their corporal transfiguration and uprising of the human nature. The material human's Resurrection guarantees the connection between their present and future being with all the characteristics and becomes possible only thanks to the secondary creative act of divine intervention from the outside.