OzSpen,

>>after the resurrection (based on the NT evidence), there was 'a new mode of transformed physicality’ that Wright calls 'transphysicality’.<<

This is exactly what I had in mind when I wrote above that “Belief in Resurrection … does not make sense without belief in a Reality beyond the physical/material” which I believe is the standard Catholic position.

Wow! Transphysicality. That is a word to conjure with. Wright must be the laughing stock of the theological community. What could it possibly mean? It is always a sign of desperation when those trying to defend an impossible argument make up words that refer to completely undefined concepts. So, Jesus was not actually returned to his body as number IV in the thirty nine articles of religion propose but to some kind of mix between a spiritual body that can go through walls and disappear at will but also eat fish with his disciples. I guess that this transphyisical body is in orbit around Neptune as we speak. It is is wonder it is not picked up by one of our interplanetary explorers. Honestly, the silliness goes on!

Sells,

<< Wow! Transphysicality. That is a word to conjure with. Wright must be the laughing stock of the theological community. What could it possibly mean?>>

Your ignorance is exposed. ‘Transphysical’ was not invented by Wright. See: http://ericweiss.com/the-long-trajectory-8-the-transphysical-worlds. Reincarnation uses it.

Instead of being a laughing stock, Wright is one of the most prominent historians of the historical Jesus. Robert Spitzer SJ wrote of transphysical self-consciousness (soul).

Your error happened because you didn’t read Prof. N T Wright. If you read his tome, The Resurrection of the Son of God (2003), you’d know exactly how Wright explains the use of this word.

On his homepage, Wright asked: ‘What could have generated, in particular, Paul’s clear view of Jesus’ resurrection, articulated here in terms of going through death and on beyond into a new son of existence, and of Jesus’ new body as both physical and in a sense as transphysical, possessing new properties but remaining definitely human?’ http://ntwrightpage.com/2016/04/05/early-traditions-and-the-origins-of-christianity/

<< It is always a sign of desperation when those trying to defend an impossible argument make up words that refer to completely undefined concepts.>>

No desperation, but Sells lack of knowledge of the English language.

Wright explained what he meant: ‘This new mode of embodiment [of future resurrection body] is hard to describe’ so he uses ‘transphysical’, which ‘is not meant to describe in detail what sort of a body it was that the early Christians supposed Jesus already had…. The early Christians envisaged a body which was still robustly physical but also significantly different from the present one…. We might say not that it will be LESS physical, as though it were some kind of ghost or apparition, but MORE’ (Wright 2003:477-78).

<< I guess that this transphyisical (sic) body is in orbit around Neptune as we speak. It is is (sic) wonder it is not picked up by one of our interplanetary explorers. Honestly, the silliness goes on!>>

Now, who is the one who is ‘the laughing stock of the theological community’? It sounds like Sells.

OzSpen,

Thanks for the links. I found the Eric Weis reference very obscure. This is surely on the fringes of accepted philosophic discourse. It certainly is not theology. My problem is that it appeared to me entirely speculative, more science fiction than acceptable argument.

The link to Wright was more in my line of expertise but I found that his agonies about the resurrection was more the result of his literalistic reading. Sure, Paul expected the end of the world in his own terms. That does not mean that we accept his expectation. We must let Paul be a man of his times. In all of this I would say that the bible is the gift of God and the work of men.
As men we must read with compassion for others who have written in a different time.

We must understand that between them and us lies a whole world of science and technology. We now know that heaven cannot be a place in the heavens or hell a place below the earth. We must live in modernity, knowing its profound faults, the insistence, for example, that everything must turn on fact. We must accept that even if the bones of Jesus are discovered in Palestine the Church will not fall!
I'm off to church. Have a blessed Sunday
Pete

I think that if you claim to have 'found God';
- It may be just as likely you 'lost yourself'.

You see new Christians ranting incoherently who think they've gained God's wisdom and authority just because they got saved, and believe in him.
But most are is self righteous and fail to understand that you don't get wisdom and ethics or remove yourself from sin from believing Jesus existed, but from what he taught.
New Christian's incoherent ranting is evidence of a dangerous belief system with the power to make a person lose all sense of themselves.

About whether God exists:
I think the correct and most logical answer is 'I don't know'.
It may be just as likely that people who say they KNOW that God does or doesn't exist might advertising a mental illness.

[Cont.]
Christians only see the world from their point of view.
Like a car accident, different people viewing the accident from different vantage points might have a different understanding of what happened.

Christians become close minded in their single vantage point belief.
They can't see the bigger picture or understand others points of view because those peoples vantage points are not accessible to them.

You'd have to be an agnostic or athiest to view the bigger picture from a different vantage point, and they can't do this because they already believe and have their mind set in stone.