Resurrection Defined

So many times discussions, disagreements, and outright debates reduce to definitions. Unless we define what we mean by the use and context of certain words, both sides will talk past one another and nothing is accomplished. Such has been my experience with the word 'resurrection'.
There are two categories for the word resurrection and its variants (rise, rose, raised, etc.) as used in scripture: literal and metaphorical. In all cases, all contexts, the word resurrection carries with it the idea of that which is dead returning to life. There is no exception to this anywhere in scripture.
== Word Etymology ==
The word resurrection in the Greek is ἀνάστασις (anastasis) and comes from the roots ana and histemi. A literal translation of this is to stand up among. Anistemi is used in a host of places to mean simply stand up or rise, such as a person rising up from their bed in the morning, or rising up from a chair from sitting to standing position. In this sense, the word resurrection itself is a figure of speech in that anastasis is a type of standing up. Contextually though, this standing up or rising is from a specific state - death.
== Literal Resurrection ==
Much debate has happened over the nature of the resurrection. I examined one of the longest, most in depth expositions on the topic found in scripture, 1 Corinthians 15, and I will be referring to it from time to time in this article as well. Once it is shown what the natures of the resurrections are in scripture, much of the disagreement can be dispensed with.
What is meant by "literal" resurrection is that it isn't a figure of speech but an actual return of that which is dead to life.
=== Physical Resurrection ===
All metaphors must be anchored in concrete realities. If they are not, then the metaphor can mean anything and everything and therefore has no meaning at all. It loses all its power as a figure of speech to explain or describe something.
The concrete reality of physical resurrection is at once the most basic and most important of the resurrections in that all other types of resurrection are understood from it. Physical resurrection is seen in both the Old and New Testaments as a returning to physical life by someone whose body had ceased to be alive.
#1 Kings 17:17-24 - Elijah resurrected the son of Zarephath's widow
#2 Kings 4:35 - Elisha resurrected the son of the Shunammite woman
#2 Kings 13:21 - A dead man comes back to life when he touches Elisha's bones
#Luke 7:13-15 - Jesus resurrects the widow's son at Nain
#Matthew 9:25 - Jesus raises Jairus' daughter
#John 11:43-44 - Lazarus
#Matthew 27:52-53 - faithful dead Jews were resurrected after Christ was crucified
#Jesus was physically resurrected (see the ends of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, Acts 2, and 1 Corinthians 15).
#Acts 9:36-42 - Peter raises Tabitha
#Acts 20:9-12 - Paul raises Eutychus
In each of these cases, it was the body that was dead and the body that was returned to life and it was called resurrection.
=== Spiritual Resurrection ===
The other type of literal resurrection is spiritual resurrection. Without going into too much depth and convoluting the whole thing, when someone sins, they die spiritually (Ezekiel 18:4, 20; James 5:19-20). The nature and meaning of this type of death can be explored in another article, but it is enough here to understand that the Bible explicitly states that the soul dies when it sins (outside of Christ - see 1 John 1:7).
For those who have sinned, there is a way for their soul to be returned to life. It has to be in Christ. To get into Christ, one has to be immersed in water into Christ. The most vivid description of this type of resurrection is in Romans 6:3-18.
Again, we see that which is defined as dead being made alive called resurrection.
== Metaphorical Resurrection ==
There are cases in scripture where the word or concept of resurrection is not used literally. In these cases it builds on the fundamental idea of that which is dead (or appears to be dead) returning to life. We see this easily in Ezekiel 37 and the valley of dry bones. Here, the prophet Ezekiel uses the metaphor of resurrection to prophesy about the return of the Jews from Babylonian captivity and the Jewish State becoming active again.
I also believe that Revelation uses the concept of resurrection this way. In Revelation 20:5-6, John writes of the "first resurrection" in opposition to the "second death". I believe this to be the resurrection of the cause of Christ/the church after Jewish persecution has brought the church low before the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and ended Judaism.
This type of resurrection is not literal. Nothing is actually dead, nor is anything brought to life in a real sense. Instead, these causes or groups are deemed "dead" in a way that helps the reader understand just how dire things seemed and then "resurrected", brought back to "life" to show the contrast to the dire position and the power and glory of God as He keeps His promises even when man thinks all is lost.
== A Brief Refutation of Full Preterism's "Resurrection" in AD 70 ==
If we understand the Biblical definition of resurrection. The overall concept, whether used literally or metaphorically, then there is an issue with the Full Preterist position that The Resurrection (or any literal resurrection) took place in AD 70 when Jerusalem was destroyed. 
The Full Preterist doctrine teaches that in AD 70 when Jerusalem was sacked and the Temple destroyed, Hades was emptied of all its inhabitants and particularly the faithful in Hades (Abraham, Noah, Moses, and dead Christian martyrs) all went to Heaven. 
There is a host of issues I have with this, but in this article, I want to address only one. This isn't a resurrection. Grant for a moment that this event literally happened, that Hades was emptied of all the souls in it and the faithful went to Heaven. That's not a resurrection. 
The faithful are not spiritually dead anymore. They have been reconciled to God at the cross by the blood of Jesus. Particularly Christians are spiritually alive through immersion into Christ (Romans 6). That's why they get to go to Heaven. So it isn't their spirits being brought back to life. If they aren't being brought back to life spiritually, then it's not spiritual resurrection.
It is understood that these people are physically dead at the time that their spirits are in Hades. Yet in the FP paradigm, their bodies don't come back to life at all. They skip that altogether and are just translated into Heaven as a spirit being. If that which is dead does not come back to life, it's not resurrection. Resurrection is a change of state from death to life, not a change in location. What they are talking about is Ascension.
The idea that some unseen spirit-only event in AD 70 was The Resurrection as described in 1 Cor. 15 and 1 Thess. 4 just doesn't fit when the definitions are properly understood.
== The Resurrection ==
Again, I go into this idea in great detail in my article on 1 Corinthians 15-16. The Resurrection that Paul speaks of, hopes to yet take part in, is not spiritual in nature. He's already spiritually alive in Christ (Gal. 2:20; Romand 6). The Resurrection he looks forward to will be the same in nature as Christ's. As Christ was returned physically to life, so too, will the dead. The faithful (already spiritually alive) will be returned to physical life, then transformed along with all those faithful who are still physically alive, and then they'll all go to Heaven. This is simple to understand and its the only sequence that makes sense, the only consistent use of the word resurrection as defined by scripture.
In Truth and Love.