Pew: Key findings about COVID-19 restrictions that affected religious groups around the world in 2020
“Religious groups criticized government-mandated public health measures in 54 countries (27% of all analyzed), often stating the rules were a violation of religious freedom.” - Pew
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[RajeshG]
Unfortunately, all vaccines have side effects, including MMR, influenza, and even the Chicken Pox vaccine. What you have to compare to is the total mortality of the disease you are trying to prevent. As of today, 1.09 million Americans have died of COVID….
when we traveled to the local regional Children’s Hospital for one of our children just after they were born there was a boy there who had gotten the flu… the “simple” flu…He lost both legs and both arms as a result of the disease.
Sickness is one of the results of the fall into sin of mankind, and there is no perfect way to deal with it in this natural life.
What are you talking about me demanding everyone agree with me?
Because you have had some pretty strong words for those who don’t agree with you and acted like they are wrong for disagreeing with you and should conform to your beliefs.
If you want to extend it to other things, you have to connect the “thing” to corrupting and mixing with the Holy Spirit. With sex with a prostitute, that is easy. With illegal drugs, I think the argument can be made.
Saying a medicine is that is… sketchy at the least. How does COVID vaccine corrupt the Holy Spirit?
COVID doesn’t corrupt the Holy Spirit. Neither does sexual immorality or illegal drugs. The point is that it corrupts the temple of the Spirit. The connection seems pretty clear. When you put dangerous or unproven things in your body, you are endangering the body, the temple. You already acknowledged this to be true. I am not sure why you wouldn’t extend it to medicines, not all of which are proven or good. The ironic thing is that prior to an Emergency Use Authorization, I think the vaccine would have been an illegal drug for the simple reason that it had not gone through the testing process.
So it is entirely reasonable to apply 1 Cor 6:19 in one of the ways it has been applied for a very long time. It is certainly not outside the bounds of orthodoxy.
[Larry]What are you talking about me demanding everyone agree with me?
Because you have had some pretty strong words for those who don’t agree with you and acted like they are wrong for disagreeing with you and should conform to your beliefs.
If you want to extend it to other things, you have to connect the “thing” to corrupting and mixing with the Holy Spirit. With sex with a prostitute, that is easy. With illegal drugs, I think the argument can be made.
Saying a medicine is that is… sketchy at the least. How does COVID vaccine corrupt the Holy Spirit?
COVID doesn’t corrupt the Holy Spirit. Neither does sexual immorality or illegal drugs. The point is that it corrupts the temple of the Spirit. The connection seems pretty clear. When you put dangerous or unproven things in your body, you are endangering the body, the temple. You already acknowledged this to be true. I am not sure why you wouldn’t extend it to medicines, not all of which are proven or good. The ironic thing is that prior to an Emergency Use Authorization, I think the vaccine would have been an illegal drug for the simple reason that it had not gone through the testing process.
So it is entirely reasonable to apply 1 Cor 6:19 in one of the ways it has been applied for a very long time. It is certainly not outside the bounds of orthodoxy.
Let me try again Larry. The corruption Paul spoke of was not physical. It is spiritual. As a parallel Jesus told the Pharisees it is not physical food that corrupts them, but their words and thoughts! Matthew 15:11 etc. So, Paul’s objection is not sex with prostitutes physically, but sex with prostitutes spiritually. To extend this verse to other things you need a parallel idea. This verse does not extend to vaccines or medicine becuase the physical body is not the point at all!
I have a friend who is a “Young, Restless and Reformed” individual. He was attacking the idea of vaccines mandates as an assault on his religious freedom. He pointed to the verse around our bodies being a temple and why they do not take vaccines. He failed to see the connection with his two full length arm tattoos.
This post is evidence of eroding religious freedom as a result of Covid 19. We have people on here arguing that others should not have religious freedom on an issue because it does not match up with their religious views and then they are arguing that the govt should enforce the taking of religious freedom because it doesn’t matter to them. Essentially they are saying that as long as the government holds a view similar to their’s, it is okay for the government to take religious freedom. The early Baptist were very concerned about this very thing at the founding of the USA. They insisted on separation of church and state for this very reason. They did not want a situation where the Presbyterians or Lutherans agreed with the government and then took away rights from the Baptists or vise versa. Some of you are falling into that very trap of endorsing a state religious view and using the power of government to enforce it (telling someone they do not have a right to their religious view is taking a relgious position). What some of you are doing is definitely an erosion of our religious liberty. I have consistantly spoken against dominion theology and Theonomy because they try to impose a religious government that would erode freedom of religion- yet, some of you are falling into the same trap by simply pushing a different political issues than what the dominion people would typically push.
[Mark_Smith]The corruption Paul spoke of was not physical. It is spiritual. As a parallel Jesus told the Pharisees it is not physical food that corrupts them, but their words and thoughts! Matthew 15:11 etc. So, Paul’s objection is not sex with prostitutes physically, but sex with prostitutes spiritually.
This is wrong. Paul was not talking about “sex with prostitutes spiritually.”
1 Cor. 6:13 Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.
14 And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by his own power.
15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid.
16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.
17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
Paul clearly distinguishes being “one body” and “one flesh” with a harlot from being “one spirit” with the Lord. Neither body nor flesh in this passage signifies the immaterial part of man.
You are making an invalid comparison between Paul’s teaching in 1 Cor. 6 and Jesus’ teaching in Mark 7 and Matt. 15.
So, Paul’s objection is not sex with prostitutes physically, but sex with prostitutes spiritually. To extend this verse to other things you need a parallel idea. This verse does not extend to vaccines or medicine becuase the physical body is not the point at all!
No, Paul’s concern is that the physical sex (what you do with the body) corrupts or harms the temple of the Spirit. This verse has long been held to apply to things we put in our bodies. And you acknowledged that above. If you don’t want to apply to vaccines, then don’t. But you can’t demand others agree with you.
[Larry]So, Paul’s objection is not sex with prostitutes physically, but sex with prostitutes spiritually. To extend this verse to other things you need a parallel idea. This verse does not extend to vaccines or medicine becuase the physical body is not the point at all!
No, Paul’s concern is that the physical sex (what you do with the body) corrupts or harms the temple of the Spirit. This verse has long been held to apply to things we put in our bodies. And you acknowledged that above. If you don’t want to apply to vaccines, then don’t. But you can’t demand others agree with you.
I don’t get it. How does the physical act harm the temple of the Spirit?
Isn’t the language of the passage all about the spiritual? You are joined to Christ, and the sexual act makes you one flesh with the harlot.
1 Corinthians 6:15 (NASB1995)
15Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take away the members of Christ and make them members of a prostitute? May it never be!
It seems to me that Paul’s objection here is primarily the spiritual realm, not the physical.
If it is just the physical, then anything one puts in the body that harms it is forbidden. A lot of fat preachers have more to worry about than vaccines!!
Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3
I don’t get it. How does the physical act harm the temple of the Spirit?
First the fact that we don’t get it is irrelevant, and I am sure you agree. Even if we don’t understand, a command or principle still stands.
Second, there seems to be little distinction between the spiritual and physical in some ways. This was an old idea that spiritual people could do whatever they want with their bodies because they are just passing away anyway. That is likely the point of the Corinthian slogan in v. 13 that Paul is refuting. Far from not mattering what we do with our bodies, it does matter because they are the temple of the Spirit.
Isn’t the language of the passage all about the spiritual? You are joined to Christ, and the sexual act makes you one flesh with the harlot.
No, I think the language is primarily physical. As you cite, your bodies are the members of Christ, not your spirits. And you must not join the members of Christ to the members of a prostitute. That seems to make no sense spiritually. It only makes sense physically.
If it is just the physical, then anything one puts in the body that harms it is forbidden. A lot of fat preachers have more to worry about than vaccines!!
I agree. This is how the verse has been used historically.
Again, whether or not this is the right argument from 1 Cor 6, it is at least a possible argument.
[Larry]I don’t get it. How does the physical act harm the temple of the Spirit?
First the fact that we don’t get it is irrelevant, and I am sure you agree. Even if we don’t understand, a command or principle still stands.
Second, there seems to be little distinction between the spiritual and physical in some ways. This was an old idea that spiritual people could do whatever they want with their bodies because they are just passing away anyway. That is likely the point of the Corinthian slogan in v. 13 that Paul is refuting. Far from not mattering what we do with our bodies, it does matter because they are the temple of the Spirit.
The interpretation has to be intelligible, otherwise the application is just your opinion. For an application to have any force, it has to have strong ties to the meaning of the words we are interpreting.
[Larry]Isn’t the language of the passage all about the spiritual? You are joined to Christ, and the sexual act makes you one flesh with the harlot.
No, I think the language is primarily physical. As you cite, your bodies are the members of Christ, not your spirits. And you must not join the members of Christ to the members of a prostitute. That seems to make no sense spiritually. It only makes sense physically.
Really? What does “one flesh” mean? It doesn’t actually mean one body, it means something in the spiritual realm. It doesn’t just mean married, otherwise it could never be true when someone joined with a harlot.
The union of two people involves more than physical contact. It is also a union of personalities which, however transient, alters both of them (6:16).
David K. Lowery, “1 Corinthians,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures, ed. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck, vol. 2 (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1985), 516.
Paul urged his readers not to think of sexual intercourse as simply a physical linking of two people for the duration of their act. God views intercourse as involving the whole person, not just the body. It is the most intimate sharing that human beings experience. A physical union takes place that symbolizes the spiritual union of a husband and a wife in marriage. Sexual relations very deeply affect the inner unseen emotional and spiritual conditions of the individuals involved.
Tom Constable, Tom Constable’s Expository Notes on the Bible (Galaxie Software, 2003), 1 Co 6:16.
Sexual union in and of itself is not incompatible with union with Christ (see 7:1–7), even in the case of the believer married to the unbeliever (7:12–16). Here Paul has in mind union with a prostitute. The NIV translates the participle in 6:16 in the middle voice, “he who unites himself.” The basis of Paul’s claim is Gen 2:24, “They will become one flesh.” In the sexual act two people become one, forming an enduring bond with one another.
Mark Taylor, 1 Corinthians, ed. E. Ray Clendenen, vol. 28, The New American Commentary (Nashville, TN: B&H Publishing Group, 2014), 157.
This applies, according to Paul, not only to the act in marriage but also to the physical act in prostitution. When, therefore, a believer (who presumably is one body with Christ) has a sexual, bodily union with a prostitute, he is, in effect, “forcing” Christ to be united to the prostitute (v. 15). That thought is so repugnant to Paul that he uses his familiar mē genoito (lit., “May it not be!” or, “May it never happen!”) as a response
Verlyn D. Verbrugge, “1 Corinthians,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Romans–Galatians (Revised Edition), ed. Tremper Longman III & Garland, David E., vol. 11 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2008), 311–312.
As you can see, the commentaries (small sample) agree with what I am saying. It is more than mere physical union in view, it is a spiritual bonding.
[Larry]If it is just the physical, then anything one puts in the body that harms it is forbidden. A lot of fat preachers have more to worry about than vaccines!!
I agree. This is how the verse has been used historically.
Again, whether or not this is the right argument from 1 Cor 6, it is at least a possible argument.
I think you miss the point if you make this only about the physical. There is nothing the vaccine does to your spirit. Nothing.
BTW, I have had all four shots available to me. I am NOT anti-vax. What I am arguing for here is proper understanding of the Scriptures.
Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3
Undeniably, Jesus spoke of His physical body as the temple of God:
John 2:18 Then answered the Jews and said unto him, What sign shewest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things?
19 Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.
20 Then said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days?
21 But he spake of the temple of his body.
22 When therefore he was risen from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this unto them; and they believed the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said.
The Jews were utterly incapable of destroying Jesus’ inner man, and John explicitly says that Jesus spoke of the temple of His physical body.
Paul’s teaching in 1 Cor. 6:19-20 correlates directly with what Jesus taught about His physical body. The physical body of a Christian is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
The interpretation has to be intelligible, otherwise the application is just your opinion. For an application to have any force, it has to have strong ties to the meaning of the words we are interpreting.
Of course.
Really? What does “one flesh” mean? It doesn’t actually mean one body, it means something in the spiritual realm. It doesn’t just mean married, otherwise it could never be true when someone joined with a harlot.
Again, of course. But it happens through the physical. The physical is not irrelevant.
As you can see, the commentaries (small sample) agree with what I am saying. It is more than mere physical union in view, it is a spiritual bonding.
They also agree with what I am saying.
I think you miss the point if you make this only about the physical.
Yes, but it is not less than the physical. And I did not make it only about the physical. Your same objections could be raised against using this verse about smoking or drugs or alcohol or overeating. It doesn’t really matter because it isn’t spiritual. I would not make the dichotomy that there are things that are “only physical.” I wonder if you are not edging towards a sort of view of some of the Corinthians that the body is irrelevant; it’s only the spiritual that matters. I am sure you would not say that, but it seems like that is the direction you are headed here.
There is nothing the vaccine does to your spirit. Nothing.
But it might do something to your body, which is the temple of the Spirit. (Remember, “And in your spirit” was most likely not written by Paul but perhaps added by those with your view.) You are focusing on the spirit here but Paul’s focus is on the body and what they do with their bodies.
What I am arguing for here is proper understanding of the Scriptures.
I think we are both arguing for that, aren’t we?
Verse 19 gives a principle (your body belongs to the Spirit) from which the application of the preceding verses flow. What else does v. 19 apply to? What else should we not do with our bodies because they belong to the Spirit? Should we not treat them in certain ways? Should we not put certain things in them? Should we not use them for certain purposes?
Whether you agree with a particular application or not, the principle has to be applied.
In the end, people asked the biblical basis for objecting to the vaccine and I pointed out for some it is the same basis that people have long used for things like this. I don’t think it is particularly controversial and I don’t think it would have been controversial were it not for COVID. Whether one agrees or not, it is generally recognized as a long standing application of the truth of that verse.
You give these examples:
[Larry] Yes, but it is not less than the physical. And I did not make it only about the physical. Your same objections could be raised against using this verse about smoking or drugs or alcohol or overeating.
Obviously the physical is involved. I’m not denying that at all, neither am I saying the physical is irrelevant so “let’s do what we want.”
However: is smoking purely physical? It is true that there are physical components to addiction, but are you saying there are no spiritual elements?
the same is true for drugs, alcohol, and overeating - there is a psychic quality to the pleasure found in each of these things, which enslaves the soul.
Is the only issue with smoking, drinking, doping, or overeating the harm that it does the body? Surely not. There is a soul-destroying problem also, which takes the heart away from God.
As for vaccines? What spiritual harm is there? What provable physical harm? (Lots of legends on the internet, but nothing really confirmed. — this will queue the conspiratists!!!)
The passage in question, however, is dealing with a physical act that produces a spiritual harm. I don’t see how vaccines fit that category. That is my point.
Maranatha!
Don Johnson
Jer 33.3
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