Isn't the Book of Revelation just a fable and not literal?

[polonius]

http://www.usccb.org/bible/revelation/0

Introduction to Revelation – New American Bible Revised Edition

This much, however, is certain: symbolic descriptions are not to be taken as literal descriptions, nor is the symbolism meant to be pictured realistically. One would find it difficult and repulsive to visualize a lamb with seven horns and seven eyes; yet Jesus Christ is described in precisely such words (Rev 5:6). The author used these images to suggest Christ’s universal (seven) power (horns) and knowledge (eyes). A significant feature of apocalyptic writing is the use of symbolic colors, metals, garments (Rev 1:13–16; 3:18; 4:4; 6:1–8; 17:4; 19:8), and numbers (four signifies the world, six imperfection, seven totality or perfection, twelve Israel’s tribes or the apostles, one thousand immensity). Finally the vindictive language in the book (Rev 6:9–10; 18:1–19:4) is also to be understood symbolically and not literally. The cries for vengeance on the lips of Christian martyrs that sound so harsh are in fact literary devices the author employed to evoke in the reader and hearer a feeling of horror for apostasy and rebellion that will be severely punished by God.

[myth-one.com]

Only those who have believed in this life will be resurrected to eternal life. There is no evidence Adam will be included.

. . . Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe Adam will ever be resurrected or given another chance for life.

All humans who ever lived will be made alive again, or resurrected:

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. (I Corinthians 15:22)

All includes both believers and nonbelievers! However, all will not be resurrected at the same time. There will be an order to the resurrections:

But every man in his own order: Christ the first fruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. (I Corinthians 15:23)

So Jesus will be resurrected first, and that has already occurred. The resurrection which we presently await is the one at which those "that are Christ's" will be resurrected. Those "that are Christ's" refers to Christians. This resurrection for all Christians occurs at the Second Coming of Jesus to the earth, or "at his coming."

All deceased believers will be resurrected to everlasting spiritual life at the Second Coming.

All deceased nonbelievers will be resurrected as humans after the thousand year millennium:

But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished . . . (Revelation 20:5)

So deceased believers will be resurrected to everlasting life and all other dead humans will be resurrected to human life.

Specifically, Adam will be resurrected as a human after the millennium, be taught the scriptures, and make his decision to accept or reject everlasting life through Jesus at that time.

If he accepts Jesus as his Savior, he will be born again as a spirit into everlasting life.

If he rejects everlasting life, he will perish quickly in the lake of fire -- never to live again.

[polonius]

JehovahsWitness wrote:

. . . Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe Adam will ever be resurrected or given another chance for life.

QUESTION: Is that because Adam is only a fictional character first written about during the Babylonian captivity to try to explain why everything dies?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 162 by polonius]

No, not at all. Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe Adam will be resurrected because he has already been judged by God as being unworthy of everlasting life. He made his choice, there will therefor be no ransom for him.


JW

[polonius]

No, not at all. Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe Adam will be resurrected because he has already been judged by God as being unworthy of everlasting life. He made his choice, there will therefor be no ransom for him.


JW

RESPONSE: Are you sure that it isn't because Adam was a fictional person only created by an 800-700 BC writer (when the first 7 books of the Bible were written as a legend of Israel's origin?)

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 164 by polonius]

Yes quite sure, Thank you for asking.

WHAT HOPE FOR ADAM AND EVE?

11. What questions arise as to Adam and Eve and a resurrection?

11 The Sacred Scriptures hold out no hope of a resurrection for Cain the murderer, but what about Cain’s father and mother, Adam and Eve, our own first human parents? This is a much discussed question today. Do Adam and Eve deserve a resurrection? Do they come within the loving provision of God for the resurrection of the human dead? What, if anything, stands as an irremovable bar to their being raised from the dead under God’s kingdom? Since Jesus Christ “gave himself a corresponding ransom for all,� do not our first human parents have a right to some benefit from that “ransom for all�?—1 Tim. 2:5, 6.

12. To whom does Adam bear a resemblance, according to Romans 5:14?

12 In Romans 5:14 the Christian apostle Paul writes: “Nevertheless, death ruled as king from Adam down to Moses, even over those who had not sinned after the likeness of the transgression by Adam, who bears a resemblance to him that was to come.� That is to say, Adam the first man on earth bears a resemblance to Jesus Christ, whose coming had been promised in the garden of Eden when Jehovah God the Judge was about to sentence Adam and Eve for the transgression in which both of them were sharers.

13, 14. How does Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15:45, 21, 22, show a further resemblance between Adam and Jesus, and so through whom must we gain everlasting life?

13 Pointing further to that resemblance between Adam and Jesus Christ, the apostle Paul writes in his matchless chapter on the resurrection: “It is even so written: ‘The first man Adam became a living soul.’ The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. For since death is through a man, resurrection of the dead is also through a man. For just as in Adam all are dying, so also in the Christ all will be made alive.�—1 Cor. 15:45, 21, 22.

14 So, just as all of us humans had to depend upon the first man Adam for the earthly life that we enjoy today, so now all of us who are dying have to depend, one and all of us, upon Jesus Christ, “the last Adam.� There will not be another person on earth like Adam; so, if we desire to gain everlasting life on earth, we shall have to gain it through this “last Adam,� Jesus Christ.

15. How do Adam and Jesus resemble each other as to sonship?

15 When on earth, as previously in heaven, Jesus Christ was a Son of God. Adam, to whom he bears a resemblance, also started out as a “son of God,� but an earthly son. When it traces the earthly descent of Jesus Christ back through King David and the patriarch Abraham and the prophet Noah, the genealogical table given us in Luke 3:24-38 ends up by saying: “The son of Enos, the son of Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.� Like Jesus Christ, Adam was created a perfect son of God almost six thousand years ago.

16, 17. How was a wife provided for Adam, and what was God’s stated will for them?

16 In order to provide a suitable earthly companion for Adam, Jehovah God created a wife for Adam by using a rib taken from Adam’s side as a basis from which to proceed. So the resulting woman Eve was bone of Adam’s bone and flesh of Adam’s flesh. In fact, just as Jesus Christ himself said concerning other human married couples, Adam and Eve were not two, but were “one flesh.� (Gen. 2:7-23; Matt. 19:4-6) Then God their Creator-Father stated his will for them, just as we read it, in Genesis 1:28:

17 “God blessed them and God said to them: ‘Be fruitful and become many and fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving upon the earth.’�

18. According to God’s will, what was not to spread from Adam and Eve to all the world of mankind?

18 Thus a world of mankind was to be produced. Not sin and imperfection, but righteousness and human perfection were to spread from this first couple to all mankind. If they did not sin, then death, which is the penalty for sin, would not enter into the world and spread to all their offspring. God had warned Adam, when still a single man in the garden of Eden: “As for the tree of the knowledge of good and bad, you must not eat from it, for in the day you eat from it you will positively die.�—Gen. 2:17.

19. What penalty for sinful disobedience was held out to Adam, and, if he sinned, would it be due to ignorance?

19 Here is a fact not to be overlooked. God did not tell Adam that, if Adam disobeyed this divine command and died, he did not have to worry, inasmuch as God his heavenly Father would provide a ransom for Adam and resurrect him from the dead to another opportunity to gain everlasting life on earth in the garden of Eden. What if God had held out such an expectation to Adam? Well, then, it would have been an encouragement to sin when Adam was tempted. It would weaken the force of God’s warning about the death penalty for the sin of disobeying God. In harmony with that fact, the Bible shows that only death, without any hope of relief, was held out to Adam if he sinned. His sin would be without excuse. Sin by him would not be a sin of ignorance.

Source https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/196 ... Adam&p=par

[polonius]

Polonius posted:

RESPONSE: Are you sure that it isn't because Adam was a fictional person only created by an 800-700 BC writer (when the first 7 books of the Bible were written as a legend of Israel's origin?)

JW replied:

Yes quite sure, Thank you for asking.

Question: Do you have any evidence or is just a personal belief without supporting evidence?

[tam]

Peace to you both,

The Judgment has not yet occurred. So no one - including Adam - has yet been judged.

The wages of sin is death. Adam died. That does not mean he does not receive a resurrection; nor does that mean he never repented or learned love - albeit now through his suffering.

But everyone receives a resurrection (the first resurrection for Christians in which there is no judgment, Rev 20:4-6; the second resurrection for everyone else who has died). At that second resurrection, the great and the small ALL stand before the throne of God. Some are resurrected to life; and some are resurrected to judgment and the second death (Daniel 12:2; Rev 20:11-15; John 5:28, 29).



And God may have mercy upon whomever He chooses.


The second resurrection is described here:

Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.




Peace again to you both,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 167 by tam]

Well , I'm sure I've mentioned before that I don't think one can take everything in the book of Revelation in its literal sense. I don't believe that when we read the rest of the dead "the rest" is used in the absolute but rather in a relative sense. Same for Corinthians and other passages, ie "all" does not mean all humans that have ever existed but "all in God's memory" (meaning "all" the people that God remembers with the intention of bringing back to life).




JW

[polonius]

Peace to you both,

The Judgment has not yet occurred. So no one - including Adam - has yet been judged.

RESPONSE: Not necessarily so.

Tam claims:

The Judgment has not yet occurred. So no one - including Adam - has yet been judged.

RESPONSE: Aren’t you forgetting the “particular judgment� that takes place immediately after death?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particular_judgment.

Many Christians believe the dead are judged immediately after death and await judgment day in peace or torment because of the way they interpret several key New Testament passages.[1] In Luke 16:19–31, it appears that Christ represents Lazarus and Dives as receiving their respective rewards immediately after death. To support this, these figures must be regarded as types of the just man and the sinner. To the penitent thief (cf. Dismas) it was promised that his soul instantly on leaving the body would be in the state of the blessed: "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise." (Luke 23:43)

[tam]

Peace to you polonius,

Peace to you both,

The Judgment has not yet occurred. So no one - including Adam - has yet been judged.

RESPONSE: Not necessarily so.

Tam claims:

The Judgment has not yet occurred. So no one - including Adam - has yet been judged.

RESPONSE: Aren’t you forgetting the “particular judgment� that takes place immediately after death?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particular_judgment.

Many Christians believe the dead are judged immediately after death and await judgment day in peace or torment because of the way they interpret several key New Testament passages.

Many people believe many things that are untrue. Two separate times for the exact same judgment makes no sense.

If the dead are judged immediately upon death, then there is no point or need for yet another day of judgment, wherein the dead are judged according to their deeds.


And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne. And there were open books, and one of them was the book of life. And the dead were judged according to their deeds, as recorded in the books. The sea gave up its dead, and Death and Hades gave up their dead, and each one was judged according to his deeds. Rev 20:12, 13


Death and Hades (the world of the dead) GIVE UP the dead IN them, and THEN the dead are judged according to their deeds.



Peace again to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy