davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) (05/14/91)
In article <May.13.01.27.49.1991.11687@athos.rutgers.edu>, mls@sfsup.att.com (Mike Siemon) writes: > In article <May.10.03.05.29.1991.6501@athos.rutgers.edu>, > davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) writes: > > > It has become clear to me that the popular views of body, soul, spirit come > > from Plato who believed in re-incarnation. > > How can this become clear when Plato did not say anyting supportive of > reincarnation, nor are his ideas about the soul (cf. _Phaidon_) much > like any modern "popular" notions? Have you ever read any Plato, David? > or are you just using his name as some old, influential non-Christian on > whom to cast blame? Plato seems to have believed (at least, this is the > simplest way of reading what he wrote, but Plato is always dangerous to > take too simple-mindedly) that souls are eternal and pre-existed bodies. > . . . . Soul - Nelson's Expository Dictionary of the Old Testament, edited by Merrill F. Unger and William White, Jr, pp. 388, 389: The real difficulty of the term is seen in the inability of almost all English translations to find a consistent equivalent or even a small group of high-frequency equivalents for the term. The KJV alone uses over 28 different English terms for this one Hebrew word. The problem with the English term "soul" is that no actual equivalent of the term or the idea behind it is represented in the Hebrew language. The Hebrew system of thought does not incude the combination or opposition of the terms "body" and "soul," which are really Greek and Latin in origin. poetic line, nephesh is often used as the parallel for the speaker, primary personal subject, and even for God, as in Ps. 11:5. [nephesh] enlightens many well known passages, such as Ps. 119:109: "My life [nephesh] is continually in my hand, Yet I do not forget Thy law" (NASB) Merrill F. Unger, Unger's Bible Handbook, p. 267: Hebrew poetry, unlike Occidental verse, does not posses meter or rhyme. Its basic structure is parallelism of thought arrangement rather than word arrangements. Common types of such parallelism are (1) 'synonymous parallelism', where the second line or stich repeats the first, giving a distich or couplet (cf. Job 3:11-12; 4:17; Ps 2:4); (2) 'antithetic parallelism', in which the second line presents a contrast- ing thought to emphasize the first (Job 42:5; Ps 34:10); (3) 'syn- thetic parallelism', in which the second and succeeding lines add a progressive flow of thought to develop the first (Job 4:19-21; Ps 1:3). "The Jewish Encyclopedia": Immortality of the Soul - The belief that the soul continues its exis- tance after the dissolution of the body is a mtter of philosophical or theological speculation rather than of simple faith, and is accordingly nowhere expressly taught in Holy Scripture . . . The belief in the immortality of the soul came to the Jews from contact with Greek thought and chiefly through the philosophy of Plato, its principal exponent, who was led to it through Orphic and Eleusinian mysteries in which Babylonian and Egyptian views were strangely blended. SOUL - . . . . . Only through the contact of the Jews with Persian and Greek thought did the idea of a disembodied soul, having its own indi- viduality, take root in Judaism and find its expression in the later Biblical books . . . . The "New Catholic Encyclopedia", Vol. 18 (NewYork: McGraw-Hill, 1967), p. 449: Nepes comes from an original root probably meaning to breathe, and thus the noun form means neck or throat opened for breathing, thence, breath of life. Since breath distinguishes the living from the dead, nepes came to mean life or self or simply individual life. Nepes is used in regard to both animals and humans. If life is human, nepes is equivalent to the person, the "I." After death the nepes goes to sheol [the grave]. The above summary indicates that there is no dichotomy of body and soul in the OT. The Israelite saw things concretely, in their totality, and thus he considered men as persons and not as composites. The term 'nepes,' though translated by our word soul, never means soul as dis- tinct from the body or the individual person. Other words in the OT such as sprit, flesh, and heart also signify the human person and differ only as various aspects of the same being. "Encyclopedia Judaica, Vol. 15 (New York: Macmillan Company, 1971), p. 175: Only in the post-biblical period, did a clear and firm belief in the immortality of the soul . . . . . become one of the cornerstones of the Jewish and Christian faiths. "The Zondrevan Pictoral Encyclopedia of the Bible, Vol. 5 , p. 496: The English translation of 'nephesh' by the term "soul" has too often been misunderstood as teaching a bipartite (soul and body): dichotomy) or tripartite (body, soul and spirit: trichotomy) anthropology. Equally misleading is the interpretation which too radically separates soul from body as in the Greek view of human nature. Porteus states it well when he says, "The Hebrew could not conceive of a disembodied nephesh, though he could use 'nephesh' with or without the adjective 'dead,' for corpse (e.g., Lev 19:28; Num 6:6)" (ibid). Or as R.B. Lau- rin has suggested. "To the Hebrew, man was not a 'body' and a 'soul' but rather a 'body-soul,' a unity of vital power" (cf. BDT, sS.V.). The most significant text is Genesis 2:7, "then the Lord God formed man of the dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being [nephesh]." "The Encyclopedia Dictionary of the Bible", p. 2287: The original meaning of 'nefes' and the concepts that are connected with it show that the 'nefes' (like the ruah) of a man was not con- sidered in Israel to be a sort of duplicate of him, as the 'ka' was in Egypt, or the 'psuche' among the ancient Greeks (e.g., Hom. Iliad 1,3), or was whatever words various primitive people have for the "soul." (C) It is sometimes thought that the Isrealites believed that the 'nefes' could exist apart from the body and that, after a man's death, his 'nefes' continued to exist in the nether world. But the OT really gives no basis for such an opinion. When it speaks of rescuing or delivering a man's 'nefes' from the nether world (Ps 30:3; 86:13; 89:49; 116:4; Is 38:17; Prv 23:14), it means no more than that this man is saved from dying (cfr. Ps 33:19; 56:14; 78:50; Jb 33:18, 22, 28) or that he was snatched from mortal danger; in all these cases the man's 'nefes' is merely a synonym for the man himself, with some emphasis on him as a "living" being (cfr., e.g., the parallelism in Ps 16:10, "You will not abandon my 'nefes' to the nether world, nor will You suffer Your faithful one to undergo corruption"; so also in Ps 49:16; cfr. Jb 13:14, where "my nefes" is parallel to "my flesh"). Random House, "The Dictionary of the New Testament", p. 707 Man became a 'soul' because God, who alone was the Living One, had breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. This soul was not in itself immortal . . . . The Greek word 'psyche', like the Hebrew 'nephesh', may be translated not only by 'soul,' but also by 'life,' 'person,' or even by a pronoun: 'I' or 'someone.' "Dictionary of Bible Theology", p. 565, 566: "Far from being a "part" which joins with the body to form the human being, the soul denotes the entire man, insofar as he is animated by a spirit of life . . . A soul is a man, it is someone . . . . The concept of the body common in the N.T. defines man as a complex orgganism, a whole, a unity. It is not simply the "form" of the organ- ism, as opposed to the substance which might be its content, but a mode of being essential to and constitutive of the human person. There is no human existence which is not bodily existence (cf. 1 Cor. 15:35ff), "Evangelical Dictionary of Theology", p. 1041: Mankind has breath, or spirit . . . when a person dies the spirit is returned to God (Ecc 12:7). Life and death, therefore, are represented in the BIble as a giving and a withdrawing of God's breath, or spirit; for all created life, including humanity, is utterly dependent on Him (Ps. 104). . . . As the principle of life, spirit is ascribed to beasts also (Gen. 6:17; 7:15). "New Catholic Encyclopedia", Vol 13, p. 517: Since God is the life-giver, life breath comes from Him and man lives as long as God's breath remains in Him (Jb 27:3; Is 42:5; Za 12:1). . . . In creatures with lungs, breathing is a natural sign of life, and in many languages the term connoting physical breath takes on the meaning of what it signifies, life. So in Hebrew, 'ruach' came to mean breath as significative of life in men (Gn 6:17; Ez 37:10) and in animals (Gn 7:22; Ps 104: 29). "A Theological Word Book of the Bible", p. 234: For the Hebrews man is of the earth; he is flesh, Isa. 31:3. In the post- exilic period 'Spirit' became a virtual synonym for 'soul' and 'heart', the seat of intelligence and emotion in man (cf. Job 20:3, 32:18, Isa 57:15, Dan 5:20). Human characteristics are described in 'spiritual' terms. "A Theological Word Book of the Bible", p. 144: SOUL (nephesh) means the living being. We might render it 'person' or 'personality', so long as we remember that in Hebrew thought even an animal is a 'nephesh' . . . SPIRIT (ruach), literaly wind, and in a person, breath, means that which is the mark of the living as opposed to the dead. This, however, does not distinguish it from soul (nephesh), and one would be tempted to make a distinction by calling 'ruach' the whole non-physical aspect of man were it not that it is difficult to say that the Hebrews did not conceive both 'ruach' and 'nephesh' as in some way physical and having substance, modern notions of immateriality being beyond them. Pedersen differentiates thus: "'ruach' is the motive power of the 'soul'" (op. cit., p. 105), and illustrates from Ezra 1:1 'The Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus', i.e. moved Cyrus to do something, similarly Hag. 1:14. "Ruach' is frequently used of mental processes, especially viva- city, impulse, anger. "Dictonary of the Bible", pp. 836-839: The word "soul" is used in English Bibles to translate the Hebrew 'nepes'. The translation is unfortunate; soul in common speech reflects a complex of ideas which go back to Greek philosophy as refined by medieval scholasticism. In the philosophy of Plato the soul is a pure spiritual principle, the subject of thought really distinct from the body, and immortal; . . . . . In Aristotelian philosophy the soul is united with the body as a form united to matter; it is the subject of thought but its spirituality and immortality are less evident . . . . Then NT employs the Greek 'psyche', tranlated in English by soul . . . . The NT use of the term is heavily dependent on the OT use and shows little or no effect of Greek philosophyical concepts . . . . In these uses, as in the use of 'psyche' to signify life, the NT adds nothing to the OT conception of 'nepes' . . . . In common speech, however, the Greek concept of 'psyche' as a distinct spiritual principle is usually read into the term, and thus the concept of salvation and eternal life may become Platonic rather than Biblical. The 'psyche' in the NT is still the totality of the self as a living and conscious subject, and it is the totality of the self which is saved for eternal life. "Zondervan Pictoral Encyclopedia of the Bible", p. 497: It should be noted that the NT does not make a clear distinction between 'psuche' and 'pneuma' (spirit). First Thessalonians 5:23 and Hebrews 4:12 are exceptions, and can best be understood not as affirm- ing a trichotomous anthropology but as figures of speech . . . . To derive exact phsychological descriptions from these two statements is pressing the non-technical language of Scriptures too far. On 1 Thes 5:23 -- "Manual of Christian Doctrine", L. Berkhof, (Eerdman's), p. 123: distinct elements in man rather than as three different aspects of man. When Jesus summarizes the first table of the law by saying, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul and with all thy mind," in Matt. 22:37, He does not have in mind three dis- tinct substances. Such expressions simply serve to emphasize the fact that the whole man in intended. "Death and the Soul", by George Wisbrock (a Baptist), pp 207,208: Plato Plato (427-347 B. C.) was greatly influenced by Pythagoras. Like Pythagoras, Plato believed an immortal soul dwelt within man and that it would separate from man's physical body at death. He also believed this immortal soul could reincarnate into another human body, and that it would transmigrate into lower class plants and animals if it had been extremely evil in supposed previous lifetimes. Plato further believed that if a particular soul had been "good enough" during its period of punishment here on earth, then its perpetual cycle of incarnation and transmigration would cease. Once a soul had redeemed itself by appeasing the offended god or goddess who had sent it to earth, it would supposedly return to the offended diety's pres- ence either in the heavens above or in the earth below. Further still, Plato, many of the other Greek philosopehrs, and the majority of the Greek population during his lifetime, believed that their gods and goddesses were in control of all the affairs of man's life on earth -- as well as of all the alleged spiritual abodes in which 'souls' were then believed to reside both before birth and after death. More than any other Greek philosopher, Plato was responsible for the spread into Western minds of the false teaching about the alledged immortality or the soul and of its assumed ability to reincarnate and transmigrate into various kinds of bodies. Because of the prominence given to Plato as the person most responsible for the development of a belief in the continuation of a soul's life after death, much of our current duscussion will focus upon what he wrote about death and the soul. Plato and Socrates Plato's thinking about the immortality of the soul was no doubt heavily influenced during his twenty year stay in Egypt. He was also influ- enced by the thinking of Socrates (469?-399 B.C..), his most respected teacher. Several of Plato's writings discuss Socrates' life and thoughts about life after death. Almost all of what we know about Socrates has come to us form the pen of Plato, who worote about the last days of Socrates' life in his works 'Phaedo, Euthyphro, The Apol- ogy, and Crito'. Some scholars believe that many of the comments Plato ascribed to Socrates about the existence of an assumed indwelling soul were far more an expression of his own thinking than they were of Socrates' per- sonal beliefs . . . . "A Dictionary of Christian Theology", (Westminster Press, 1969), p. 316: The ancient Church inherited from Greek thought the notion of a soul- substance which was by nature immortal, and this conception was often intertwined with biblical teaching about resurrection. In the bibli- cal view a man dies and literally ceases to exist . . . . On the Greek view death is merely a change in the manner of existence. "The Temple Dictionary of the Bible", p. 777: On Justin Martyr (A.D. 100-163) -- In the fragment of his treatise on the Resurrection we have this statement: "The body is the dwelling of the soul, the soul the dwelling of the spirit." We find a similar statement in his dialogue with Trypho; he makes Trypho say, "As the body without the soul is dead, so is the soul without the quickening spirit (zootikon pneuma)," proving that Justin thought this distinction to be one recognized by Jews as well as Christians. Similarly Irenaeus, "The soul and the spirit are certainly a part of man, cer- tainly not the man; for the perfect man consists in the coming and the union of the soul receiving the Spirit of the Father, and the admixture of the fleshly nature which was molded after the image of God" (Robert's translation). Many of the Gnostic heresies assumed this tri- chotomy. "The Encyclopedia of the Lutheran Church", 1965, p. 2236: Even a church father like Origen, steeped as he was in Greek philoso- phy, discarded the idea of a pre-existent soul found in Neo-Platonism because such a notion was contrary to the Christian concept of God as the Creator of all things. If God alone is eternal and all things including man are created by God 'ex nihilo' [out of nothing], then souls cannot be immortal and uncreated as Plato taught. Most authori- ties agree that an immaterial and immortal soul which is thought of as some part of man separable from his mortal body is neither a biblical nor a Christian idea. "New Catholic Encyclopedia", p. 467: The Soul in the OT means not a part of man, but, the whole man -- man as a living being. Similarly, in the NT it signifies human life: the life of the individual, conscious subject . . . . the Bible does not speak of the survival of an immaterial soul. This is not surprising if one considers that categories of Greek philosophy are not likely to be found in Semitic copies of literature. Wesleyan scholar, J.A. Beet, "Immortality of the Soul", pp. 53,54: The phrase, "The soul immortal', so frequent and conspicious in the writings of Plato, we have not found in pre-Christian literature out- side the influence of Greek Philosophy; nor have we found it in Chris- tian literature until the later part of the second century. We have noticed that all the earliest Christian writers who use this phrase were familiar with the teachings of Plato; that one of these, Tertul- lian, expressly refers both the phrase and doctrine to him; and that the early Christian writers never support this doctrine by appeals to the Bible, but only by arguments simlilar to those of Plato . . . . We have failed to find any trace of this doctrine in the Bible . . . It is altogether alien, both in phrase and thought, to the teachings of Christ and his apostles. Lutherin writer J. A. Kantonen in "The Christian Hope", pp. 28,29: It has been characteristic of Western thought ever since Plato to dis- tinguish sharply between the soul and the body. The body is supposed to be composed of matter, and the soul of spirit. The body is a prison from which the soul is liberated at death to carry on its own proper nonphysical existence. Becuase of its immaterial spiritual nature the soul has been considered indestructible . . . This way of thinking is entirely foreighn to the Bible. True to Scripture and definitely rejecting the Greek view, the Christian creed says, not "I believe in the immortality of the soul" but "I believe in the resurrection of the body." its own. It would be more in keeping with the New Testament to speak of soul-life rather than of the soul as such. 'Psuche' is the unique- ness or the individuality of a particular life, not some separable indestructible substance. Paul Tillich, January 14, 1960, while addressing the New York Society for Clinical Psychiatry, on the "Meaning of Health": "Man should not be considered as a composite of several levels, such as body, soul, spirit, but as a multidimensional unity . . . . In every dimension of life, all dimensions are potentially or actually present . . . . He is a unity which unites all dimensions. This doctrine stands against the dualistic theory which sees man as composed of soul and body; or body and mind; or body, soul, and spirit, etc. Man is one, uniting within himself all dimensions of life -- an insight which we partly owe to the recent development of medicine, especially psychia- try. Rudolph Bultmann, "Theology of the New Testament", pp. 203,204: Let us cast a glance once again at the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. It cannot be explained by weakness of faith on the part of the church that it took over a point of view which came from such a different source -- that of Greek philosophy, and was so utterly foreign to its own essential teaching. Somewhere in the Christian faith there must have been some opening through which this foreign doc- trine could penetrate. Assuredly, from the Biblical standpoint, it is God alone who possesses immortality. The oppinion that we men are imortal because our soul is of an indestructible, devine, essence is, once for all, irreconcilable with the Biblical view of God and man. "The Encyclopedia of the Lutheran Church", p. 2236: The term soul is being used less and less in current theological thought and literature. Even religious literature, sermons, and modern translations of the Bible avoid the word soul. For example, if one turns to Matthew 16:26, he discovers that the Greek word for soul (psyche) is translated "soul" in the King James Version and by Moffatt, but as "life" in the Revised Standard Version and by Weymouth, and with the word "self" in the new English Bible. All of which indicates that in modern English and American usage terms like self, ego, life, per- son, or personality are being used in preference to the word soul.
cash@convex.com (Peter Cash) (05/18/91)
In article <May.14.00.07.26.1991.7069@athos.rutgers.edu> davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) writes: > ...A masterly compendium of quotes about Plato, Greek Philosophy, and the > conception of the soul as found in the Bible. Thank you! However, I'm not quite sure (having missed the previous postings) what relationship you think there is between the Platonic conception of the soul and the resurrection of the dead. Therefore, I would like to add that belief in an immortal and immaterial soul has no relevance to faith in life after death. Therefore, if we grant (as you so cogently argue) that the notion of an immortal and immaterial soul is not Biblical, but a philosophical interpolation, then this has no bearing on the issue of resurrection. Belief in a Platonic soul is not necessary to belief in the resurrection of dead, or eternal life in heaven. Since Christ has promised me (and all who believe) that we will drink the new wine of paradise with him, we shall do so. Metaphysical questions about minds, bodies, souls, and spirits have nothing to do with it. One day, I will die. One day, I will live again. It is not necessary that I posit an explanation of how the trick will be done; I don't have to theorize that my "soul" somehow survives death, and is one day placed back in a body. (Such theories don't have much explanatory value anyway; they raise more questions than they settle, and constitute excess baggage.) -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ | Die Welt ist alles, was Zerfall ist. | Peter Cash | (apologies to Ludwig Wittgenstein) |cash@convex.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
davidbu@loowit.wr.tek.com (David E. Buxton) (05/23/91)
In article <May.18.01.56.42.1991.3509@athos.rutgers.edu>, cash@convex.com (Peter Cash) writes: > . . . . . > Since Christ has promised me (and all who believe) that we will drink the > new wine of paradise with him, we shall do so. Metaphysical questions about > minds, bodies, souls, and spirits have nothing to do with it. One day, I > will die. One day, I will live again. Consider the many movies from Hollywood that leverage the popular notions of speeding away to heaven when we die. It is typical in these movies that the departed loved one returns to haunt a house(s), torment the living, or communicate and assist the living. So, what is at first glance quite innocent ends up as spiritualism. Thousands of Christians would be spared the many popular forms of modern spiritualism and the fringes and outright New Age theologies that are so entrenched already in Christianity. Sure, you yourself may be thoroughly secure from Christian Spiritualism, but many are not. The Bible warns us that we cannot serve two masters, we cannot be Christians and Spiritualists, but so many prophessed Christians know little of the difference, are vulnerable to the delusions of Satan, who we are warned is capable of masquerading as an angel from God - offering dilussions designed to lead astray the very elect of God. So, it is really no small issue after all. Dave (David E. Buxton)