It is the soul that animates the body. For someone to die, one's soul must experience (spiritual) death (alienation from God). When the Protestants say we are born "dead" they mean spiritually deprived of life.
Kosta: Is man immortal by nature?
FK: Spiritually, "Yes"
No! The immortality of the soul is conditional on God's grace. Fallen from grace, there is no life (God) in us.
The immortality of man was not "created" as his essence; it was attained from the tree of life; if we are immortal by nature, we would be God and we could not sin.
Adam and Eve were created neither mortal nor immortal, but potentially both.
Where does that rule come from? If you are made immortal by grace, do you then have the divine nature or essence?
That's a nonsensical question, FK. :) Immortality is attained through Grace. It's not an immutable quality of our nature.
In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, we are clearly told that the rich man was well aware of his surroundings. The condemned will feel whatever causes weeping and gnashing of tee
The Jews believed that the afterlife was no different than the present life. In fact, in that same story, Lazarus is carried by the angels and the rich man is simply buried. Lazarus is in Abraham's bosom, and the rich man is begging Abraham to "save" him.
It's a verbal tapestry woven for the pubic to understand, but it also contains Christian concepts mixed with Judaic traditions. We know that being deprived of God is extremely uncomfortable for a soul, even unbearable. We do not know the true nature of that torment, but it has been likened to burning and gnashing of the teeth for the common man to understand.
Yes, dead "in sin", but not dead as to existence. When we are born we obviously have souls. Those souls never cease to exist, therefore, they are immortal.
The immortality of man was not "created" as his essence; it was attained from the tree of life; if we are immortal by nature, we would be God and we could not sin.
Then you have a special theological definition of the concept of immortality that is unknown to us. The Bible speaks of sinners going to hell for eternity tons of times. I have always considered it a basic Christian principle and had no idea that there were entire groups of Christians who disagreed with it, as you appear to.
The Jews believed that the afterlife was no different than the present life.
Is that what you believe?