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wayfarerfound
Newbie Alert
Joined: 28 Sep 2007
Posts: 4
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 Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2007 9:29 am Post subject: What is a soul? |
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Dear Friends,
Recently a new fall show was advertised where the main character had his soul sold to the devil by his parents. So, in consideration of the subject, what is a soul? |
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atoz
Emperor of the Solar System
Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Posts: 4189
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| Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2007 1:27 pm Post subject: Re: What is a soul? |
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| wayfarerfound wrote: | Dear Friends,
Recently a new fall show was advertised where the main character had his soul sold to the devil by his parents. So, in consideration of the subject, what is a soul? |
Good q, wff.
Seeing that devil only wants to exchange the currency of God's Love for his Currency of Hate, and wd even buy that Love if we wanted to sell it,
'soul' in that fall-show refers to Love.
Matthew 16:26
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
In reality, that is also true:
all people who love with any conditions or prices and say things like 'I love you if,' rather than 'I love you period,' have sold or prostituted their Love to the devil at that price or condition.Romans 13:8. Rev 12:9.
Hope that helps.
With the Love that is unconditional & free, and so can not be sold at any price, except for the price of no price, Isa 55:1,
atoz |
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lone-traveler
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 6342
Location: USA
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| Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:46 pm Post subject: |
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Mat 26:38 Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me.
Luk 1:46 And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,
Gen 2:7 And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
Jhn 1:9 [That] was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
I'm thinkin that the soul is the spirit...
hugs
lone |
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Steven3
Lion King
Joined: 10 Jul 2007
Posts: 1205
Location: UK
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| Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:11 pm Post subject: Re: What is a soul? |
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Hi Wayfarerfound
| wayfarerfound wrote: | Dear Friends,
Recently a new fall show was advertised where the main character had his soul sold to the devil by his parents. So, in consideration of the subject, what is a soul? |
1. In Judaism any physical living creature. Check blueletterbible to see how nephesh is used in the OT.
2. In Platonism the undying immortal psyche of man.
3. In the NT primarily the OT "soul", but with the concept that God can resurrect the dead and "destroy body and soul" in Gehenna on judgment day. This idea is often called 'soul-sleep' by those who want to mock it, but it's what the Bible teaches.
4. In modern Christianity a mish-mash of ideas including medieval legends like "selling your soul" to the devil. The "soul" is not an entity to be sold, and in the Bible the devil is only an allegory. He doesn't really exist.
God bless 
Steven |
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Plotinus
Tiger
Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 843
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2007 5:48 am Post subject: |
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Thanks for asking this question wff.
Let me state my personal belief that no one can really define what soul is. Each culture has had slightly different ideas about the relationship between body, soul and spirit -- what they are and which is immortal -- but the bible does not give simple definitions and we are left to try to understand what is given to us.
Steven is right to refer to the words psuche in Greek and nephesh in Hebrew. For the Greeks, psuche was the principle of bios, that is life itself. Plato argued that the principle of life could not die, because that would deny its own nature. However, the Greek Platonists did not divide up the world into the animate and the inaminate to the extent that we do. For many of them, the principle of bios pervaded all creation, in the sense that creation is filled with God's creatures.
Trying to understand soul is like trying to understand time, or eternity, or being itself. We are so close to it, and it so pervades our existence that we cannot see the forest for the trees. One might also ask what is not touched by soul? Whenever matter exhibits unexpected freedoms and rejoices in new qualities or modes of being, it seems that soul must be there. |
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Plotinus
Tiger
Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 843
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2007 10:53 am Post subject: |
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To my previous comment I should also add that I do not think that souls can be sold to the devil. I understand the devil or satan to be a personification of the principle of evil, much the same way that in the OT, wisdom is personified as a female individual.
Pure evil contradicts itself. Its substance must melt away to nothingness. |
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atoz
Emperor of the Solar System
Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Posts: 4189
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| Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2007 2:57 pm Post subject: |
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| Plotinus wrote: | Thanks for asking this question wff.
Let me state my personal belief that no one can really define what soul is. Each culture has had slightly different ideas about the relationship between body, soul and spirit -- what they are and which is immortal -- but the bible does not give simple definitions and we are left to try to understand what is given to us.
Steven is right to refer to the words psuche in Greek and nephesh in Hebrew. For the Greeks, psuche was the principle of bios, that is life itself. Plato argued that the principle of life could not die, because that would deny its own nature. However, the Greek Platonists did not divide up the world into the animate and the inaminate to the extent that we do. For many of them, the principle of bios pervaded all creation, in the sense that creation is filled with God's creatures.
Trying to understand soul is like trying to understand time, or eternity, or being itself. We are so close to it, and it so pervades our existence that we cannot see the forest for the trees. One might also ask what is not touched by soul? Whenever matter exhibits unexpected freedoms and rejoices in new qualities or modes of being, it seems that soul must be there. |
Hi Plo,
Since Love, being unconditional, is in- and un-definable,
you just described Love above!smile
Going with you in The Soul of Love that touches everything,
atoz |
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Plotinus
Tiger
Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 843
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2007 10:10 am Post subject: |
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Atoz, perhaps a quote is in order. Its source is eponymously discovered.
"What is this Dionysiac exultation that thrills through your being, this straining upwards of all your Soul, this longing to break away from the body and live sunken within the veritable self? These are no other than the emotions of Souls under the spell of love." |
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atoz
Emperor of the Solar System
Joined: 28 Jun 2007
Posts: 4189
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| Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2007 2:15 pm Post subject: |
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| Plotinus wrote: | Atoz, perhaps a quote is in order. Its source is eponymously discovered.
"What is this Dionysiac exultation that thrills through your being, this straining upwards of all your Soul, this longing to break away from the body and live sunken within the veritable self?
These are no other than the emotions of Souls under the spell of love. |
Great quote, Plo!
Thanx!
So The Spell of Love shows us that what Immortal-Soulists and Non-immortal-Soulists mean is the same thing: The Immortal Soul of Immortal Love that they both believe in!!
Spell-bound & Spell-checked By the Immortal Heart & Soul of Self-en-titled Love,
atoz |
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eleven
Lion King
Joined: 28 Sep 2007
Posts: 1396
Location: Pennsylvania
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| Posted: Thu Oct 04, 2007 4:12 pm Post subject: Re: What is a soul? |
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Steven wrote:
| Quote: |
4. In modern Christianity a mish-mash of ideas including medieval legends like "selling your soul" to the devil. The "soul" is not an entity to be sold, and in the Bible the devil is only an allegory. He doesn't really exist.
God bless
Steven |
Steven, (and others) Do you agree with this statement? |
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Argenta
Labrador
Joined: 24 Apr 2007
Posts: 322
Location: UK
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| Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 7:44 am Post subject: |
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| Plotinus wrote: | | Trying to understand soul is like trying to understand time, or eternity, or being itself. We are so close to it, and it so pervades our existence that we cannot see the forest for the trees. One might also ask what is not touched by soul? Whenever matter exhibits unexpected freedoms and rejoices in new qualities or modes of being, it seems that soul must be there. |
I find it perplexing that you can comment on the qualities and functions of a soul without knowing how to define it or what it is.
Those who believe that humans have souls tend to believe that souls are immaterial (can survive the death of their bodies) but can affect matter, for example, souls may affect our emotions which definitely have a material basis. If it is true that souls can affect matter then it should be possible to detect them. So would someone be able to help me out and suggest a way that we could positively detect the existence of souls?
One more question, is belief in souls a necessary precondition for belief in heaven or hell?
Argenta |
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lone-traveler
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 6342
Location: USA
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| Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 9:39 am Post subject: |
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Luk 1:46 ¶ And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,
psuche
Transliteration
psychē
Pronunciation
psü-khā' (Key)
Part of Speech
feminine noun
Root Word (Etymology)
Outline of Biblical Usage
1) breath
a) the breath of life
1) the vital force which animates the body and shows itself in breathing
a) of animals
b) of men
b) life
c) that in which there is life
1) a living being, a living soul
2) the soul
a) the seat of the feelings, desires, affections, aversions (our heart, soul etc.)
b) the (human) soul in so far as it is constituted that by the right use of the aids offered it by God it can attain its highest end and secure eternal blessedness, the soul regarded as a moral being designed for everlasting life
c) the soul as an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death (distinguished from other parts of the body) |
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Argenta
Labrador
Joined: 24 Apr 2007
Posts: 322
Location: UK
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| Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 10:24 am Post subject: |
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| lone-traveler wrote: | 1) the vital force which animates the body and shows itself in breathing
a) of animals
b) of men
b) life
c) that in which there is life
1) a living being, a living soul
2) the soul
a) the seat of the feelings, desires, affections, aversions (our heart, soul etc.)
b) the (human) soul in so far as it is constituted that by the right use of the aids offered it by God it can attain its highest end and secure eternal blessedness, the soul regarded as a moral being designed for everlasting life
c) the soul as an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death (distinguished from other parts of the body) |
Thank you for all this lone. But your contradictory definitions confirm my point and leave me with many questions.
"1) the vital force which animates the body and shows itself in breathing" Does this imply that any creature that can breath has a soul or is this a red herring and breathing is nothing to do with it?
"c) that in which there is life" Does this mean every living thing (bacterium, flowers, slime) has a soul?
"a) the seat of the feelings, desires, affections, aversions" This is a bit unlikely because we do understand the biochemical basis of these emotions and we know they are dependent on a physical brain (if parts of a brain are damaged the relevant functions stop working).
"b) the (human) soul in so far as it is constituted that by the right use of the aids offered it by God it can attain its highest end and secure eternal blessedness, the soul regarded as a moral being designed for everlasting life
c) the soul as an essence which differs from the body and is not dissolved by death (distinguished from other parts of the body)"
The last two statements are just assertions and cannot be believed until we have some confidence that the soul actually exists.
What evidence do you have that the soul is real rather than imaginary?
Love
Argenta |
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Plotinus
Tiger
Joined: 15 May 2007
Posts: 843
Location: Canada
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| Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 12:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Argenta wrote: |
I find it perplexing that you can comment on the qualities and functions of a soul without knowing how to define it or what it is.
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Fair enough. But the belief that you can only discuss something when you can define it is considered one of the classic fallacies of logic, namely Loki's fallacy. Can you define time? Can you define existence itself? Yet we exist within time, and believe that we understand some of the properties of time. Although we cannot define time, we believe, rightly or wrongly, that it is represented by a one-dimensional real variable. Similarly, it may be possible to study the soul even when it cannot be defined.
| Quote: |
Those who believe that humans have souls tend to believe that souls are immaterial (can survive the death of their bodies) but can affect matter, for example, souls may affect our emotions which definitely have a material basis.
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Being immaterial does not obviously imply survival after death. Judaism in early forms (prior to the Persian conquest of the middle east and today in some modern forms) accepts immateriality with possible extinction at death. Your reference to souls "affecting matter" seems to be a form of Cartesian interactionism. (The idea that soul is distinct from matter but mysteriously interacts with it.) However, there have been many thinkers who believe in souls but do not believe in Cartesian interactionism.
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If it is true that souls can affect matter then it should be possible to detect them. So would someone be able to help me out and suggest a way that we could positively detect the existence of souls?
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You are right if you are saying the following: if interactionism is true, then the interaction should be scientifically observable. (We should be able to find some spot in the brain where "ghostly fingers" manipulate the firing of brain cells. Obviously, no such spot has been found and probably does not exist.) But only a very small number of theologians, philosophers and mystics believe in interactionism as far as I can tell. Have you read David Chalmer's interesting book "The Conscious Mind" which explores his belief that consciousness supervenes on the material rather than intervening? He is a panpsychist fwiw.
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One more question, is belief in souls a necessary precondition for belief in heaven or hell?
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Not as far as I can see. It is logically consistent to believe in a heaven or hell that has no disembodied souls in it. It is also logically possible to believe that this world we live in is a gigantic simulation inside a megacomputer in another dimension and that the megacomputer's name is the Giga Oscillatory Device. Heaven and hell may then be subroutines and we little pieces of code. |
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lone-traveler
Emperor of the Universe
Joined: 02 Jul 2005
Posts: 6342
Location: USA
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| Posted: Fri Oct 19, 2007 1:42 pm Post subject: |
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Hi Argenta,
| Quote: | | Thank you for all this lone. But your contradictory definitions confirm my point and leave me with many questions. |
just sharing the definition of "soul" from the blue letter bible. thought it might help.
hugs
lone |
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