Board index ‹ The Trinity

[Newbie]

1 John 3:16: "Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Spiritual death would mean that God died, which is not possible.

Physical death of his human nature would mean that the death of a man somehow paid the price for original sin, which would in turn mean that the penalty for original sin was merely physical death. Since the price has now been paid, why would we still die physically?

[jimwalton]

Jesus' death was both physical and spiritual. He bled physical blood, ceased breathing (Mk. 15.37), and was physically dead. His executioners (professionals at this sort of thing, y'know) confirmed that he was physically dead (Jn. 19.31-34).

But his death was also a spiritual death. His agonizing cry from the cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" illustrates that his death involved a separation from God, which shows us it was a spiritual death as well as a physical one. 2 Cor. 5.21 tells us that God made him to be sin for us (also Isa. 53.6). He wasn't a sinner, but the representative of sin. On Jesus fell the collective consequence of sin, which is spiritual death. He bore the guilt of sin, and so his death had to have been a spiritual death. Hebrews 9 and 10 speaks of the theological import of his physical and spiritual death.

By the way, spiritual death is not where your soul dies (which would be impossible), but where his soul was separated from God the Father. On the cross God made him the object of his wrath and judgment.

[William Hendershot]

Do you believe that the "being" of the Son of God ever actually died (ceased to exist), or merely left the physical body He had inhabited?

[jimwalton]

Great question. I'm pretty sure that in the definition of the Bible, death is never a cessation of existence. When your body dies, it is still there, though cold and pallid, and, according to the Bible, the soul/spirit (whatever you want to call it) continues on to its eternal fate and destiny. In Jesus' death, he became spiritually separated from the Father, hence, he *died*. His body no longer had the spark of life in it and was quite and totally dead. His soul/spirit left the physical body it had inhabited.

[William Hendershot]

So with His separation from God, Jesus was not God when He died, correct?

[jimwalton]

Thanks for asking. No, that's not correct. The theology of the Trinity maintains that there are separations of persons within the unity of God. The explanation comes in the distinction between the principle of divine action and the subject of divine action. The subject of divine action can be either the Father, Son, or Spirit, while the principle of all divine action is the one undivided divine essence. The person of the Son, on earth, could be separated from the person of the Father, in "heaven". Jesus didn't have to cease being God when He died; as a matter of fact, it is impossible that he ever stopped being God. John 1.1 lets us know that while he was different in person from the Father, he was still (and always) God.

[William Hendershot]

So, God died?

[jimwalton]

Yes, but we have to define what that means. It's far from a superficial concept. First of all, as I have said, death is not a cessation of existence; it's a separation from life. Jesus became separated from his physical life when he experienced physical death; he became separated from God the Father when he died spiritually. So yes, God the Son died both physically and spiritually, but the being of God in his undivided divine essence did not cease to exist.

[William Hendershot]

The Son of God was in heaven with God "in the beginning" in some form, which I am calling His spirit. The flesh and bones man was merely what the spirit of the Son of God inhabited for a short while until the spirit left the flesh and bones and returned to the Father.
In this scenerio, in what way did the Son of God actually die?

[jimwalton]

When his "flesh and bones man" ceased breathing on the cross and his physical brain waves stopped waving, he actually died a physical death on the cross. As you say, the spirit left the flesh.

When he took the sins of the world on himself (Isa. 53.6), he endured the wrath of God against sin (Rom. 1.18, 3.21-26; Gal. 3.13), and he spiritually died (1 Thes. 5.9-10)—not a cessation of spiritual existence, but a separation between Son and Father because the sins of the world were upon Jesus. Does that help?