EP10 | Am I My Body? A Robust Response to Gregg Allison

Описание: Are you just a body—or something more?
If you are your body, how can you be consciously present with the Lord after death and before the resurrection?
In this episode, I explain why that question exposes a serious problem in modern theological anthropology—and why the historic Christian view of the soul still matters.

In this episode, I respond to my former professor, Gregg Allison, on a topic that sits at the very heart of what it means to be human. Greg recently wrote an article for Christ Over All challenging my “Soul View” of identity. While I have deep respect for his work, I argue that the “Embodied Person” view runs into a major problem of logical incoherence.

If you’ve ever wondered how the “I” at the center of your thoughts can survive bodily death to be present with the Lord prior to the final resurrection, this conversation is for you.

I break down why the Christian tradition has consistently relied on a robust account of the soul to make sense of our hope—and why affirming the soul does not mean rejecting the body. Far from being “Gnostic,” this view is the only way to fully understand why the resurrection truly matters.

What We Cover
The Incoherence Problem: Why you can’t say “I am my body” and still affirm a conscious intermediate state
Common Sense Dualism: How the language of Scripture presupposes a unitary, immaterial subject
Natural vs. Essential Embodiment: A crucial distinction that avoids both Gnosticism and materialism
“Souls Don’t Worship”: Responding to the claim that souls are objects rather than persons
Metaphysics isn’t just theological chess—it’s about the reality of our hope in Christ. Let’s dive in.

Timestamps

0:00 – Why I’m responding to Greg Allison
04:32 – The Incoherence Problem explained
06:53 – My three goals for this response
11:02 – Does Scripture think you’re a liver or a subject?
17:31 – The Intermediate State: The acid test for identity
28:45 – Naturally but not essentially embodied
36:05 – Who is the “person” in the intermediate state?
41:45 – Responding to the “Gnostic” charge
46:28 – The hinge point in theological anthropology

Deepen Your Study

Humans, Both Creaturely and Divine (Intro to Theological Anthropology): https://a.co/d/frXLbdo
Greg Allison’s article (Christ Over All): https://christoverall.com/article/con...
John Cooper, Body, Soul, and Life Everlasting: https://a.co/d/gMHUzeI

I’m Joshua Farris. I write and speak at the intersection of analytic philosophy and Christian theology, offering a philosophically grounded defense of the traditional Christian understanding of the soul and human nature.
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