RR, let me throw out a couple of ideas which if you consider them, might assist in your thinking as you are studying Scripture and learning these things the faith in Christ. I say this because what I am suggesting should not be a substitute for His Word, but it might trigger the proper thinking when studying so that God the Holy Spirit continues in His work in you.
Re: death. In our culture, there is a tendency to associate death with an existential perspective of annihilationism or possibly simply a of lack of function.
Instead consider death as “a state of existence involving separation”.
So the first death is a state of existence involving separation of something(soul/soul&spirit) from the human body. The physical body may have ceased to function biologically, per the laws of the physical domain, and lost biological life.
Next, we need to identify human life.
Scripture refers to the human as possessing physical bodily life, soul life, and spiritual life. This is discernible from animals with soul and physical life.
One can argue for the dichotomous nature from OT Hebrew, but the New Testament and from our Lord Christ Jesus we also understand a three component anthropology. Since the 3 component model is the more general, while it is being studied, one might want to retain the distinctions between body, soul, and spirit. If the linguistics end uup with identical functions, then that will become obvious as they are studied, BUT considering the reborn person has a reborn spirit, things of the spirit might not be understood through Scripture unless that distinction is maintained in our thinking.
It’s been said that the 5 bodily senses are the method of perception of the body. Rationalism is the perception of the soul in its heart and mind. Meanwhile faith is a method of perception in the human spirit of spiritual things.
It might be said, using the trichotomous model, that every human born has a body and soul, while the believer who is reborn, now has a body, soul, and spirit. So all the arguments about Christians trying to convert unbelievers is hogwash. Only God can regenerate or create a human spirit and place it in a human. other humans don’t have that ability. Even God the Son didn’t perform that work, it is the work of God the Holy Spirit. Same God, but a different ministry.
There are several different types of death mentioned in Scripture. Spiritual death, Positional death, Carnal death, Production of dead works by a believer, Sexual Death, the 2nd Death, and the Sin unto Death are the ones I’ve found in Scriptural studies.
Take for example the Fall in the Garden. Something happened upon original sin. Adam and Eve did not immediately physically die. They also did not immediately loose their ability to rationalize, because they became conscious of their nakedness and they hid from God, and Adam basically said the woman made me do it. They were very well thinking and physically alive. They were not in fellowship with God from a perspective of righteousness, so it might be said they died spiritually with the righteousness of God,..i.e. a state of existence involving separation.
The ceasing to function aspect of death is frequently identified with the separation of either the soul or spirit life from the body life or the removal of life which had been imputed into the soul, or spirit, or body from that being.
Actually, I agree with much of your post and some of it is what I used to believe. But as I started really studying scripture and not just believing what “older” Christians said, I started coming away with some strong disagreements with what I had been taught. For example, I always had a hard time with the second death being a “separation from God” because nothing exists outside of his presence. It is like saying my TV exists outside the presence of electrical outlets.
IOW, I believe “death” means the end of something, not a separation, though as a young Christian I believed otherwise. After all, you pretty much HAVE to believe that if you believe in everlasting punishment as discussed in the “turn or burn” evangelism.
And I see the soul as the “mind” part of the body. The software on which the brain functions, if you will. I believe it dies with the body as with animals. Animals have one death. Humans are resurrected and go on to either eternal life, or the second death. And death is the opposite of life. It is not “life everlasting, but in torment”. That is clearly NOT what the bible says. It says some go to eternal life, and others do not. If you do not go on to eternal life you, by definition, die.
I’ve studied this issue from both perspectives. And the side I come down on is based on information in two general areas: 1. Which one seems to agree with the interpretation of most scripture on the subject (remembering words like “death” are english translations - symbols - for the Greek and Hebrew equivalents in the bible. And if they meant “separation”, the english translation would have been “separation”. And 2. Which most to be in line with the God of the bible?
I noticed that every single time in the bible that God is very displeased with a person or people and takes the “ultimate” action, his action is ALWAYS to destroy them, NEVER to torture them. It is almost as though it is to simply wipe them from existence.
I could go on, but I think you get mu gist.