There is no soul or spirit at all...

If there is no soul and spirit then how do you explain that only humans can experience emotions, communicate (usually) with a high degree of intellengence and comprehension and know right from wrong. How do we know right from wrong?

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It's probably in the brain. In ancient Egypt, they thought it was in the heart.

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Quote:

If there is no soul and spirit then how do you explain that only humans can experience emotions, communicate (usually) with a high degree of intellengence and comprehension and know right from wrong. How do we know right from wrong?

Emotions are not just human experiences, nor is intelligence. It has been shown time and time again that higher primates also possess the same basic abilities that humans, for so long, assumed were the only ones capable of them.... Try to kick a monkey in the rear and see if he/she won't go after you, out of anger. Not surprisingly, dolphins have been shown to have their own language and syntax. Language is so ubiquitous to lifeforms that we often overlook and not recognize it.

As far as right and wrong, have you noticed that it is very culture dependent? Why is it ok to have capital punishment in the States and yet not ok to have it in Canada, for example? Why is it ok for some to have abortion and not for others? Why is it ok to kill one person and not another? ...very subjective issues, aren't they?

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bach, "Culture dependent" is right on the target. Wink

Glad somebody else sees the obvious.

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I would suggest that Dauer had it right on Page one. The soul or spirit are mistakenly taken materially, but can be experienced in an eternal—non-temporal—sense. In other words the soul can be experienced subjectively but not understood objectively.

The sense of the spirit or soul taken metaphorically as in "the team spirit" makes more sense even in a spiritual context than the usual use of soul in a religious material sense. Taking the term soul in a material sense should be relegated to childhood as should be the spirit of giving as personified in Santa Claus.

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Re: There is no soul or spirit at all...

theantibuddha wrote:

Intrepid wrote:
And until a few hundred years ago nobody could prove that the world was not flat!

Well except for the greeks... and a lot of sailors... and the phoenicians I think, not to mention the muslims...

In fact it was only christians who couldn't prove that. Odd, hmmm?

Yes, the ancient Greeks knew the world was a sphere. The circumferance was calculated to a very accurate degree. All one had to do was take a reading of Polaris, the north star, and travel one degree north—about 75 miles—and multiply by 360 degrees.

In grade school, I was wrongly taught that the Europeans thought the Earth was flat, but Columbus thought he could sail west to Asia. He could have too if he had better ships and if he hadn't bumped in N. America. As it was he would have been in trouble if N. America hadn't existed.

The ancient mariners saw the north star moving toward the horizon as they sailed south, and it presented a problem in sailing down the coast of Africa because when they crossed the Equator the north star disappeared. This was right at the time of Columbus.

Unfortunately, when Rome was sacked in the 5th century, most of the ancient knowledge was lost to the Europeans who descended into the dark ages of Feudalism and Monasticism. The Muslims had preserved the ancient Greek knowledge, and when the Europeans overran Spain in the late 11th century they rediscovered that knowledge.

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RexRed wrote:

Daur

If life just spontaneously happened then an egg would not need a sperm... It would just grow on it's own... think about that one for a bit...

How does that relate to what I said at all?

Quote:

Isaiah 43:7
Even every one [human] that is called by my name: for I have created him for my glory, I have formed him; yea, I have made him.

Comment:
created=spirit
made=soul
formed=body

Are you saying God created and formed but he did not "make" anything? That contradicts this scripture... If these words (formed, made and created) meant the same thing they would not be in the same verse.

Firstly, Isaiah was written much later than the Torah. Second, it's called a parallelism. My only claim is that the authors of the Torah made no implications of an immortal soul separate from the body and it cannot be shown based on that text alone. You have shown nothing to prove me wrong.

Quote:

Thessalonians 5:23
And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And this is from a much, much later source from a group that had deviated far from the evolving religious beliefs of the Israelite people (and if you give me stuff from them I won't accept it as evidence of the beliefs of the authors of the Torah either.) Why should I concern myself with what it says and how does it reflect in any way on the beliefs of the people of the Torah?

Quote:

Now, you have not shown me biblical scripture that says the soul and body are one act of God... Is this because it is believed out of theological tradition and has no biblical footing?

I never said Torah says that. I said it never mentions a soul. You have not show a place in the Torah where the soul is mentioned, and backed it up using only Torah. I can show you that nefesh doesn't automatically mean soul (as I have), that ruach doesn't automatically mean soul (that one is quite obvious), using Torah. If you read "soul" into it, you are basing that on later sources. My statement was only regarding what the authors of the text themselves believed.

Quote:

Now your doctrine combining the soul and body only confuses the understanding of further thought.

Later Christian concepts cannot even be understood without a firm understanding of body, soul and spirit.

I'm not a Christian. I'm Jewish. Sometimes before a garden can grow more beautiful, the old weeds must be pulled up. I have no problem doing a little weeding. I don't object to the idea of a soul, nor do I deny it. From my first post:

Quote:

I think the soul is a metaphor for those aspects of ourselves to which we cannot assign physicality, an all inclusive model for the experiential and psychological aspects of self, although in some cases there will be a distinction between the animal drives and that which transcends the animal drives. There is a soul in the same way as there is an id, ego, and superego. They're both models that help us speak about elements of ourselves/the world that go beyond the physical.

I don't reject the soul model, but I don't think that immortality is the most important element of this paradigm, and certainly not the most essential. I also don't think the soul is any more true than the id, ego, and superego, or less true for that matter, except for the extent to which it can serve as a useful model.

Dauer

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cicerone imposter wrote:

It's probably in the brain. In ancient Egypt, they thought it was in the heart.

A common and easily understandable belief. The heart is connected to every part of the body, is required for life, is centrally located and alters in its actions dependant upon our emotional state. Quite a logical and reasonable belief.

Galen is the first recorded proposer of the idea that the brain was the heart of the thinking process (forgive the pun, I couldn't resist). Galen was a physician in the Roman gladiatorial arenas who noticed the effects of head wounds upon mental processes.

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The irony with the Egyptians is the fact that they sucked out the brains of all the phaorohs for embaliming to carry them through their next life.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

The irony with the Egyptians is the fact that they sucked out the brains of all the phaorohs for embaliming to carry them through their next life.

With the brain removed from the Khet, perhaps the Ba and Ka are mindless in the afterlife. That'd be amusing. No wonder mummies are about as smart as zombies in all the monster movies. (Imhotep was never properly mummified in "The mummy" thus the brain was never removed).

... Very Happy

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Quote:

As far as right and wrong, have you noticed that it is very culture dependent? Why is it ok to have capital punishment in the States and yet not ok to have it in Canada, for example? Why is it ok for some to have abortion and not for others? Why is it ok to kill one person and not another? ...very subjective issues, aren't they?

Right and wrong are universals, but the difference between cultures is that they make exceptions to these rules. That, or the problem is complicated...

I would prefer to call it inter-subjective objectivity. :wink:

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Just my $.02 Book of Romans (in the Bible) states: Romans1:
18The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities-his eternal power and divine nature-have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

24Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator-who is forever praised. Amen.

26Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. 27In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.

28Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30slanderers, Godhaters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
So there you have it God gave us free will to choose as we wish, He also showed Himself to us through His creation.

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Jackofalltrades wrote:

If there is no soul and spirit then how do you explain that only humans can experience emotions, communicate (usually) with a high degree of intellengence and comprehension and know right from wrong. How do we know right from wrong?

The society of laws or the church tells you what is right or wrong, but that does not open the heart of compassion, and to function from a position of fear of punishment is not spiritual. The opening of the heart is the basic spiritual experience, and belief and conformity to dogma, if anything, precludes this personal experience. Think of "soul" as a verb, an experience rather than a noun, a thing that exists materially. Compassion can be thought of as merely a change of identity from egocentrism to a recognition of myself in the other. This is simply the golden rule that seems to be universally talked about, but is often overlooked by those that cite church dogma.

Therefore, I think that "soul" or "spirit" as in the soul or spirit of a team is closer to a spiritual reality than the soul in the context of the church, which seems more akin to animism, the belief that all things contain a material spirit or soul.

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Quote, "If there is no soul and spirit then how do you explain that only humans can experience emotions,..." The reason human's experience emotion is based on the chemicals in our brains. That's the reason why depression can be treated with chemicals. That's also the reason why we have people on illegal drugs, because it makes them feel good and invincible.

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dauer wrote:

RexRed wrote:
Daur

If life just spontaneously happened then an egg would not need a sperm... It would just grow on it's own... think about that one for a bit...

How does that relate to what I said at all?

Quote:

Isaiah 43:7
Even every one [human] that is called by my name: for I have created him for my glory, I have formed him; yea, I have made him.

Comment:
created=spirit
made=soul
formed=body

Are you saying God created and formed but he did not "make" anything? That contradicts this scripture... If these words (formed, made and created) meant the same thing they would not be in the same verse.

Firstly, Isaiah was written much later than the Torah. Second, it's called a parallelism. My only claim is that the authors of the Torah made no implications of an immortal soul separate from the body and it cannot be shown based on that text alone. You have shown nothing to prove me wrong.

Quote:
Thessalonians 5:23
And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And this is from a much, much later source from a group that had deviated far from the evolving religious beliefs of the Israelite people (and if you give me stuff from them I won't accept it as evidence of the beliefs of the authors of the Torah either.) Why should I concern myself with what it says and how does it reflect in any way on the beliefs of the people of the Torah?

Quote:
Now, you have not shown me biblical scripture that says the soul and body are one act of God... Is this because it is believed out of theological tradition and has no biblical footing?

I never said Torah says that. I said it never mentions a soul. You have not show a place in the Torah where the soul is mentioned, and backed it up using only Torah. I can show you that nefesh doesn't automatically mean soul (as I have), that ruach doesn't automatically mean soul (that one is quite obvious), using Torah. If you read "soul" into it, you are basing that on later sources. My statement was only regarding what the authors of the text themselves believed.

Quote:
Now your doctrine combining the soul and body only confuses the understanding of further thought.

Later Christian concepts cannot even be understood without a firm understanding of body, soul and spirit.

I'm not a Christian. I'm Jewish. Sometimes before a garden can grow more beautiful, the old weeds must be pulled up. I have no problem doing a little weeding. I don't object to the idea of a soul, nor do I deny it. From my first post:

Quote:
I think the soul is a metaphor for those aspects of ourselves to which we cannot assign physicality, an all inclusive model for the experiential and psychological aspects of self, although in some cases there will be a distinction between the animal drives and that which transcends the animal drives. There is a soul in the same way as there is an id, ego, and superego. They're both models that help us speak about elements of ourselves/the world that go beyond the physical.

I don't reject the soul model, but I don't think that immortality is the most important element of this paradigm, and certainly not the most essential. I also don't think the soul is any more true than the id, ego, and superego, or less true for that matter, except for the extent to which it can serve as a useful model.

Dauer

Daur

I am working on a website that I will link to.
It will have Genesis verse 1 and 2 with all of the transliterated words next to the English ones. I am about half done I started lastnight.

I am doing this so everyone interested in this post will be on the same page so to speak. So we can all easily see the transliterated Hebrew words behind the English ones and discuss the particulars. I have found some very interesting things in doing this but I am excited to have this page up so everyone can give their input from this perspective.

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http://rexred.com/genheb.html

here is what I have done so far

I will be changing this page more. I am going to add more transliterated Hebrew words. I am going to add color too to make it more readable. I will be italicizing the words that need to be done so.
I am doing thiss so it can be discussed in more detail.

Copy this html to you computer but overwrite it in a few days because it will be more exhaustive.

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RexRed wrote:

http://rexred.com/genheb.html

here is what I have done so far

I will be changing this page more. I am going to add more transliterated Hebrew words. I am going to add color too to make it more readable. I will be italicizing the words that need to be done so.
I am doing thiss so it can be discussed in more detail.

Copy this html to you computer but overwrite it in a few days because it will be more exhaustive.

If I want to know what the Hebrew word is, I look at the Hebrew text. The reason your translation fails is because it is a translation from a semitic language into English based on your worldview. I would suggest not doing what you are doing and instead working closely with a lexicon to check the context of the many places each word appears. I will submit my problems with your translation as they relate to our discussion in this thread. If you wish to discuss these chapters in greater depth, create another thread and I'll gladly join you. If you want a better idea of how I would understand the text to have originally been meant, see if you can find a copy of Everett Fox' translation of the Torah at a library. On to only my issues as they relate to the issue of the mentiion of a soul:

You translate nefesh as soul. Why? How do you know that nefesh means soul? Pull out a lexicon. Look up every place you can find it in the Torah (Nothing later than the Torah as we are only discussing Torah) and ignore how the word is translated. Just use nefesh instead of the translation and based on the context see what makes the most sense. If you don't know a word that fits best, make up a compound word, but make no assumptions. Go only by context. Don't assume anything about the meaning.

I don't see anything else that relates as there is nothing else that you have translated in a way that would indicate a soul.

Dauer

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dauer wrote:

RexRed wrote:
http://rexred.com/genheb.html

here is what I have done so far

I will be changing this page more. I am going to add more transliterated Hebrew words. I am going to add color too to make it more readable. I will be italicizing the words that need to be done so.
I am doing thiss so it can be discussed in more detail.

Copy this html to you computer but overwrite it in a few days because it will be more exhaustive.

If I want to know what the Hebrew word is, I look at the Hebrew text. The reason your translation fails is because it is a translation from a semitic language into English based on your worldview. I would suggest not doing what you are doing and instead working closely with a lexicon to check the context of the many places each word appears. I will submit my problems with your translation as they relate to our discussion in this thread. If you wish to discuss these chapters in greater depth, create another thread and I'll gladly join you. If you want a better idea of how I would understand the text to have originally been meant, see if you can find a copy of Everett Fox' translation of the Torah at a library. On to only my issues as they relate to the issue of the mentiion of a soul:

You translate nefesh as soul. Why? How do you know that nefesh means soul? Pull out a lexicon. Look up every place you can find it in the Torah (Nothing later than the Torah as we are only discussing Torah) and ignore how the word is translated. Just use nefesh instead of the translation and based on the context see what makes the most sense. If you don't know a word that fits best, make up a compound word, but make no assumptions. Go only by context. Don't assume anything about the meaning.

I don't see anything else that relates as there is nothing else that you have translated in a way that would indicate a soul.

Dauer

http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=1234031#1234031

Here is a new post that we can specifically discuss the first few chapters of Genesis and transliterated words. I will still be in this post commenting but I do not want to get too detailed on my own subject in someone else's post.

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If you don't believe in spirits or souls, then that's your choice. I mean, whatever fits you best. But maybe you should try to see beyond what's material because believing in souls and spirits doesn't exactly mean you have to believe in any religion. Just try to find the answers to your questions until you find what is true to you, because you may be wrong but then again, you may be right too.

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burnette, I'm not in the habit of driving across rivers unless I can see a bridge.

Why would I jump to the conclusion that such things exist when the evidence suggests otherwise?

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There is no soul or spirit at all...

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