DOES A MAJOR NEW TESTAMENT FIGURE SAY JESUS LIVED IN NOAH'S DAY?

Apart from the gospels and the book of Acts you would never guess that anybody thought that Jesus lived in the first century but perhaps centuries before.

1 Peter 3 says that Jesus was put to death in his human body but he was raised in the spirit and he went to preach to the spirits in prison who had sinned when Noah was building the ark and this visit was a success because we are told a few lines later that Jesus has everything subjected to himself. Jesus was not going to go on a wild goose chase anyway. We are not frankly told whether what Jesus preached to them was salvation or judgement. But he made them his subjects which does not necessarily mean that they were willing subjects. No hint is given that he preached salvation to them therefore he did not for Peter would say. This being the case when the passage says they sinned it is most probable that Jesus did not go to convert them but had another reason for the visit. Peter would have told us if Jesus did make them change their ways.
 
Peter said that Jesus was made alive in the spirit so his resurrection was the resurrection of a ghost not a body. If Jesus had a soul he could not be made alive for he would already be alive so it was not the soul that was meant. There was no need for Jesus to go to them in spirit when he would get a spirit like body as St Paul said he got. He could appear to them without going to them by giving them remote vision. That he had to go personally suggests a struggle with them. And why just the people who were alive when the ark was being constructed? This suggests that he lived in their time and knew them. When Jesus went to judge the dead of the flood and it was a struggle for him it indicates that he lived about that time for had he lived after there would be other people many of whom were worse to face to judge as well.

Some see in this a hint that the spirits may have sinned but been saved by faith alone which the early Christians said was the only way of salvation so Jesus went to tell them after death that he was the one who had saved them and to explain to them that they had to follow him. There was something that saved them or at least made them want Christ which was why they were the only ones graced with a visit. They could only have been saved if Jesus had told them to trust in a blood sacrifice of the Son of God without necessarily telling them that he was the Son of God. Some Christians agree that as long as you believe in this sacrifice that is enough to save you for you know of Jesus even if you don’t know of him by name. You know the essentials and what he does. If the hint is there then why just those spirits? It would still indicate that though Jesus could have gone to them after their and his own death he must have preached the gospel to them in their time on earth for why them only? The answer is that he must have lived among them.

So Jesus lived at the time of Noah according to this chapter. He died before the flood. He might not have been known as Jesus when alive but he is called Jesus now for he saves people at the right hand of the Lord God. Perhaps the Christians decided to call him Jesus when this mystery man started appearing in the latter-days.

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The WWW

Who is GA Wells? Rev Dr Gregory S. Neal
www.errantskeptics.org/G_A_Wells.htm

The Silent Jesus
www.askwhy.co.uk/awcnotes/cn4/0325SilentJesus.html#Justin

Apollonius the Nazarene, The Historical Apollonius versus the Historical Jesus
www.apollonius.net/bernard1e.html

Why Did the Apostles Die? Dave Matson,
 www.infidels.org/library/magazines/tsr/1997/4Why97.html
 
The “Historical” Jesus by Acharya S
www.truthbeknown.com/historicaljc.htm

How Did the Apostles Die?
www.infidels.org/library/magazines/tsr/1997/4/4front97.html

History’s Troubling Silence About Jesus, Lee Salisbury
www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=102

Steven Carr discusses the Christian and apostolic martyrs
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs.htm
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs2.htm

Challenging the Verdict
A Cross-Examination of Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsOne.htm
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsTwo.htm
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsThree.htm#Twelve

The Martyrdoms of Peter and Paul, Peter Kirby
http://home.earthlink.net/~kirby/

The Martyrdoms: A Response, Peter Kirby
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs3.htm

BIBLE VERSION USED
 
The Amplified Bible
The King James Version