Jehovah's Witness wrote:
DEATH The bible does not support the teachings of consciouse survival of any part of a person after their physical body ceases to function. Physical death is always presented as the end of all consciousness (the end of all thought, action and feeling). When a person dies, they cease to exist and are in the exact same state as they were before they were conceived or created, in short a dead person no longer exists anywhere as a conscious feeling thinking being.
There are a number of Scripture passages that speak to the existence of the soul after death. Here is one:
Sheol beneath is stirred up to meet you when you come; it rouses the shades to greet you, all who where leaders of the earth; it raises from their thrones all who were kings of the nations. All of them will speak and say to you: “You too have become as weak as we! You have become like us!� Your pomp is brought down to Sheol, and the sound of your harps; maggots are the bed beneath you, and worms are your covering (Is. 14:9-11).
These verses are part of an oracle which offers a prophecy of God. In this case, the Lord is outlining the future fall of Babylon and its king. However, scholars don’t stop there. Barry Webb, in his commentary says that the king is “a representative figure, the embodiment of that worldly arrogance that defies God and tramples others in its lust for power� (The Message of Isaiah, InterVarsity Press, 1996, p. 83). So it isn’t merely for that time and those people. As Webb notes, it refers to all those down through history who commit crimes against humanity. He describes how they end up in Sheol.
J. A. Motyer, in his commentary, says it expresses several Old Testament truths about the dead. First and foremost is the fact that they are alive, meaning that “in the Bible, death is never a termination, but a change of place and state with continuity of personal identity� (The Prophecy of Isaiah, InterVarsity Press, 1993, p. 143).
There are other Scripture passages that speak to the ongoing existence of one’s soul after physical death. For example, there is Rev. 6:10 in which the martyrs cry out to God, saying, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?�
Then there is the account of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31. Some people consider it a parable, but I don’t. Jesus never names anyone in his parables and uses general examples for all to relate to. Even if it were a parable, Jesus never told fanciful stories, that is, stories in places with no correlation to real people and real places. So he didn't make up the existence of a place where spirits went following death.
And Peter tells us that Jesus preached to the spirits in prison (1 Peter 3:18, 19), a passage which refers to Jesus descending to Sheol to show those who had died bodily that he had fulfilled the prophecies regarding the Messiah.
And then there is Paul's statement that to be absent from the body is to be with the Lord (2 Cor. 5:6-8). How could it be better to be with the Lord if one was unconscious? See here:
https://www.gotquestions.org/absent-from-the-body.html
There are more, but I think that’s a good start.
shnarkle wrote:
I don't think anyone is denying that Sheol can be used figuratively to denote the abode of the dead. Your previous claim was that it is used literally, but no one seems to have any examples to support this assertion which is why we were hoping you might have a few we missed.
I think the above Scripture passages answer your concern.
