Hi Orion, you like the tough questions don't you! :wink:
After reading through this thread for a couple of days now, thinking over and double checking some things, I'm going to take a stab at trying to come up with a coherent answer. Because I've taken so long to jump in, my post is going to be somewhat long. :o Please bear with me.
Drew, it's going to sound as though I'm totally disagreeing with you, and I'm not. I thought your point about reality as being monistic was well taken and spot on. So, now I'm going to divide the body and spirit again! Again, bear with me.
You've heard the phrase, "From the moment you're born, you're dying." (Maybe not, but my older brother used to scare the heck out of me with that one.) Anyway, there's a lot of truth in this. Although we are alive, we are physically dying in the sense that our bodies are undergoing a process which will ultimately cause total breakdown and back to dust we go. Spiritually, we take a somewhat different track. Once we sin, we die spiritually. The spiritual death is much more sudden a thing. Some theologians argue that we are born spiritually dead, I believe that spiritual death takes place upon one's first willful sin against God. No matter, the point is, once sin enters the picture our spirit undergoes death. Our bodies do as well, but it's a slower process.
It's this somewhat confused dual track that we are on that causes us to forget exactly what Drew pointed out, that there really isn't a "spiritual" and a "physical" in the sense that the one has nothing to do with the other. I agree that reality is monistic, but nonetheless our physical bodies and our spirits have, as the result of sin, been ...fractured might be a good word. It's this fracture that causes us to walk around and talk and make love and drive a Jaguar, all the while we are in the death throes. It's also what can cause someone to go to church every Sunday, take communion, be baptized and still yet be spiritually dead.
There will come a time when the body and spirit will be made whole once more. This is the promise of the resurrection. One day, we will be restored to what we were meant to be, monistic in the truest sense, just as Adam and Eve were before the Fall, and just as Jesus is now, sitting in Heaven.
The answer to your question Orion, lies in this: The Fracture of our bodies and spirits is part of God's plan of grace. By allowing our physical and our spiritual to operate separately for awhile, He gave all of mankind an opportunity to be restored to eternal life. If we fail to avail ourselves of this opportunity, once our bodies and spirits are restored, we will finally undergo the second death, which is eternal.
Again, the penality of sin is death, complete death, both physical and spiritual. So, when Jesus offered His life in exchange, it was His full life, both physical and spiritual, that He offered.
Orion, you said somewhere in the context of this conversation that Jesus death was "only physical". This is incorrect. Remember the gut-wrenching cry He made from the cross, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me." Jesus DID undergo spiritual death in that He was separated for a time from the Father. There was a time when Jesus was dead both physically and spiritually. But, upon resurrection, His body and spirit were reunited and whole again, just as ours will be.
God was appeased by Jesus' sacrificial death. And, since He was appeased by it, the wages of death were paid. Jesus, being innocent all along, was restored to life. So, now there is a valid plan of salvation in place to those who avail themselves of it. Remember there is one and only one 'unforgivable sin'. That is blaspheme of the Holy Spirit. There have been a lot of ideas, some downright silly, of what blaspheme of the Holy Spirit is. The truth of the matter, it isn't very complicated. It is the work of the Holy Spirit to bring about our regeneration. As He brings to us the salvation of God, and we reject it, we've blasphemed Him. Ergo, no salvation for us.
Which brings us to the eternal question of the poor schmuck who lived in the Amazon rainforests about 200 years BC. What of his salvation, if he never had any opportunity to hear of God and His plan of salvation. I believe Romans 1:18-20 answers that question clearly, even though we might not like the answer much. The phrase in Romans 1:19, "for God made it evident to them" is the key phrase which speaks of the work of the Spirit within these men. One thing I get out of Romans 1, is that God does deal with these men, via what they could and did know.
However many (including us) are priviledged to know much more than such a man, and we're not accountable for what he knew then but what we know now.
Which brings me to the animal sacrifices. Drew is again correct when he pointed out that the animal sacrifices themselves didn't accomplish the forgiveness of sins. If they could have done such a thing, then there would have been no reason for Jesus to have died. What saved the Old Testament believers was their faith, as is clearly explained in Hebrews 11. Because they had faith, and put shoes on their faith by being obedient to God's commandments, they are partakers of salvation, just as we are who put our faith in the finished work of Christ.
But, there was a bloodbath going on in the temple of God for thousands of years. If the animal sacrifices didn't forgive the sins, why then have them? I believe the answer to that was so that we would be partakers in the consequenses of sin. During one the sin atonements, the person bringing the sacrifice had to actually place his hand on the head of the animal as it was being killed. Being a farm girl, I've put some animals to death, and believe me, it hits every physical sense. You see, you hear things, you feel things with your touch, you smell things, and as smell is so connected with taste, yes you taste things as well. It's all unpleasant. Before Christ's death, God did expect those who sought His forgiveness to partake at least somewhat in the ugly consequenses of sin and death. Why? I don't think anyone can actually claim to know the mind of God to say, but I believe it's that we can only have an inkling as to what true holiness is, and how much sin is an offense to His holiness. By sacrificing a pure and blameless animal, one actually participated in what it meant to be dead in sin.
I'm not pretending to have all the answers here Orion, and I don't want to fault you for asking the question. Quite honestly, when I first started reading the thread, I did think that perhaps you were just asking tough questions just to cause trouble. I've seen quite a few others do this at Christian forums. I don't think there is anything wrong with the questions you ask and if it helps you reconcile yourself to God, more power to you.
Just keep this in mind: You're not ever going to be held accountable for that which you do not know. The bottom line question we all have to face is, what are we going to do with what we do know?
