Soul: the essence, existence and expression - Chambers, Oswald
Chapter V Soul: the essence, existence and expression
1. The term soul (generally
(a) applied to men and animals (genesis 1:2021, 24, 30)
(b) applied to men, not animals (genesis 2:7; 1 Corinthians 15:45)
(c) applied to men individually (genesis 12:13; 1 Samuel 18:1)
N. B. (1) never applied to angels or to god. (comp .
2 Corinthians 4:7. )
(2) never applied to plants . (see job 14:89. )
2. The truth about the soul (specifically)
(a) and spirit (genesis 2:7)
(b) and body ( James 2:26)
(c) and personality (Isaiah 29:24; Romans 8:16)
N. B. – The spirit is the essential foundation of man; the soul his peculiar essential form ; the body his essential manifestation.
We take first of all the term soul generally and specifically. The next chapter deals with the fundamental powers of the soul, which means the soul as it is influenced either by a degenerate intelligence or by the spirit of god; there we shall deal with the varied powers of the soul. Then the fleshly presentation of the soul will be considered, which means the soul manifesting and expressing itself in the bodily life: and finally, we shall deal with the past, present and future of the soul, and with the theses that have gathered round the doctrine of the soul, which are quite scriptural and yet lead to conclusions most unscriptural.
In the old testament the word soul, i. E. , animal soul, the soul that is present only in this order of beings, is mentioned about 460 times. In the new testament the word soul is mentioned about 57, with the same meaning. When the bible mentions a thing over five hundred times, it is time that Christians examined the teaching about it with care.
1. The term soul (generally)
The term soul generally, is used in three distinct ways. First, as applied to men and animals alike as distinct from all other creations; second, the more particular use of the word as applied to men distinguished from animals; and third, as applied to one man as distinct from another.
(a) applied to men and animals (genesis 1:2021, 24, 30)
The term soul here includes animals and men to distinguish them from every other form of creation.
The bible nowhere says that god has a soul; the only way in which the soul of god is referred to is prophetically in anticipation of the incarnation. Angels are never spoken of as having souls, because soul has reference to this order of creation and angels belong to another order. Our lord emphatically had a soul, but of god and of angels the term soul is not used. The term soul is never applied to plants. A plant has life, but the bible never speaks of it as having soul.
For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant. But man dieth, and wasteth away: yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he? ( job 14:710)
The distinction there is very clear; you can cut off a piece of a plant and the cut off part will grow; but if you cut off the limb of an animal and plant it, it will not grow, the reason being that a plant has no soul, but an animal has. There is nothing said in the bible about the immortality of animals. The bible says that there will be animals in the regenerated earth, but nowhere does it say that the animals which we see now are immortal and that when they die they are raised again. The bible indicates that everything which partakes of the curse through the fall will be restored by gods mighty redemption; nothing will be lost.
(b) Applied to men, not animals
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. (genesis 2:7)
And so it is written, the first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit. (1 Corinthians 15:45)
Soul, then, is something peculiar to men and animals, that god has not, that angels have not, and that plants have not. Man has soul, and brute has soul. What kind of spirit has a brute? Soul is the holder of spirit and body together, then it follows that there must be a spirit in the brute, otherwise we must revise our statement about soul. There is certainly a spirit in the brute, for the bible reveals that when an animal dies, its spirit goeth downward. The spirit of the brute is part of the spirit of entire nature, and when the brute dies its spirit goes back again into entire nature. The spirit of entire nature is manifestly a creation of god. The spirit in man which holds his soul and body together is entirely different from the spirit of a brute; it is the human spirit which god created when he breathed into mans nostrils the breath of life. God did not make man a little god; he breathed into his nostrils the spirit which became mans dis- tinct spirit, and man became a living soul.
Where does mans spirit go when he dies? The spirit of man . . . Goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast . . . Goeth downward to the earth (Ecclesiastes 3:21). Scientists tell us that death is a molecular disturbance, that when we die we are distributed into the spirit of entire nature. The bible says that the spirit of a man goes back to god. This does not imply that mans spirit is absorbed into god; but that mans spirit goes back to god with the characteristics on it for either judgement or praise. When we deal more narrowly with this subject later on, we shall find that the nature of mans spirit, whether it be sensual or spiritual, is to express itself in soul. The whole effort of the spirit is to try and express itself through the soul, that is, in ordinary physical life.
(c) Applied to men individually
Say, i pray thee, thou art my sister, that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee. (genesis 12:13)
And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. (1 Samuel 18:1)
These passages describe the use of the term soul as an individual personal soul distinct from every other soul. An individual soul cannot be divided or cut up. In popular language we speak of a person expressing soul in music, or in literature or art; or we refer to him as being hard and mechanical and soul-less, and it is to this aspect of soul we are referring here. The phrases beautiful soul and mean soul 6 refer to the individual aspect of soul. When demon possession is referred to in the scripture (e. G. Luke 8:2639), the body is the location or habitation of other spirits besides the mans own spirit. Thought takes up no room, spirit partakes of the nature of thought, and there is no limit to the number of spirits a mans body may hold during demon possession.
2. The truth about the soul (specifically)
(a) The soul and spirit (genesis 2:7)
What is the relationship between spirit and soul? Where did the soul come from? The soul has no existence until the spirit and the body come together; it holds its existence in fee entirely by spirit, which statement is the needed complementary truth of what has already been stated,
that soul is the holder of spirit and body together. What is the spirit in a fallen man? For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of god knoweth no man, but the spirit of god (1 Corinthians 2:11). We must approach this subject by making a distinction between sensual man and spiritual man. The spirit in a fallen or sensual man is his mind, which has a vast capacity for god, to whom, however, he is dead, and the spirit of a fallen man is imprisoned in his soul and degraded by the body. A sensual person may have mar- vellous ideas, wonderful intelligence, and yet his whole life may be corrupt and rotten. Take oscar wilde for instance. It would be difficult to find a more flagrant example of gross immorality, and yet while in prison, after a life of unthinkable immorality, oscar wilde wrote a most amazing book entitled de profundis, a book which shows a wonderful grasp of our lords teaching. The spirit in oscar wilde was nothing more than an intellectual spirit, a spiritual capacity that had no life in itself and was enslaved by the body through the soul. Instead of a fallen mans intelligence being able to lift up his body, it does exactly the opposite; a fallen mans intelligence severs his intellectual life more and more from his bodily life and produces inner hypocrisy. In the case of the lives of certain poets and literary men and geniuses, the exception is to find a man who has a clean life as well as a good mind. You can never judge a man by his intellectual flights. You may hear the most magnificent and inspiring diction from a man who his sunk lower than the beasts in his moral life. He has a sensual spirit; that is, instead of his soul allowing his spirit to lift up his body, it drags it down, and there is a divorce between the mans intellectual life and his practical life.
A spiritual man is quite different. Jesus Christ was a spiritual personality; the holy spirit filled his spirit and kept his soul and body in perfect harmony with god. The meaning of the atonement is that Jesus
Christ has power to impart to us the holy spirit. Holy spirit has life in itself, and immediately that life is manifested in our souls, it wars against what we have been describing. Slowly and surely if we mind the holy spirit who fills our spirit and reenergises it, we shall find that he will lift our soul, and with our soul our body, into a totally new unity until the former divorce is annulled. In a spiritual personality the spirit of Jesus Christ enables the material body of a man to show his nature. The spirit of a man cannot do this for it has not life in itself. Never judge a man by the fact that he has good ideas; and never judge yourself by the fact that you have stirring visions of things. We are told that a man cannot teach the doctrine of entire sanctification unless he is entirely sanctified himself, but he can. The devil can teach entire sanctification if he pleases. This power is one of the most dangerous powers of the soul. There are spiritual persons and sensual persons. A sensual person is one in whom the divorce between mental conception and practical living is discernible. The only solution of the problem lies in receiving the holy spirit, not believing him, or complimenting him; but receiving him. When we receive the holy spirit, he so energises our spirit that we are able to detect the things that are wrong, and we are enabled to rectify them if we mind the holy spirit. This is the scotch use of the term mind, and it means remember to obey. It carries with it the meaning of another scotch word, lippen, that is, trust. Mind the holy spirit, mind his light, mind his convictions, mind his guidance, and slowly and surely the sensual personality will be turned into a spiritual personality.
(b) The soul and body
For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also. ( James 2:26)
The body has the earth as its ancestor. The being of man plants its foot on the earth and the being of earth culminates in man, for both are destined to the fellowship of one history. We have insisted all through these studies that from gods standpoint mans chief glory is his body. But we have this trea- sure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of god, and not of us (2 Corinthians 4:7). The treasure is gods spirit being manifested in a human spirit. Gods spirit cannot be manifested in angels, or in animals, or in plants; it can only be manifested in human earthen vessels. Do not make that mean that Paul is pouring contempt on the earthen vessel; it is exactly the opposite.
Jesus Christ took on him the nature of the earthen vessel, not the nature of angels. Of the earth, earthy, is mans glory, not his shame, and it is in the earth, earthy, that Jesus Christs full regenerating work is to have its ultimate reach. Mans body and the earth on which he treads are to partake in the final restitution. Our souls history is not furthered in spite of our bodies, but because of our bodies. Nothing can enter the soul but through the senses, god enters into the soul through the senses. The words that i speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. Beware of the absorption type of mysticism, it is never presented in the bible. All that the soul retains comes through its bodily senses, and when the holy spirit is finding his way into a mans spirit it is through the bodily senses on the physical side. He shall glorify me, said Jesus; in my mind, my imagination, in and through my body. And again, he shall bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever i have said unto you. This can only be done by the material brain working through the body. Beware of all inward impressions. Beware of all instincts which you cannot curb by the wisdom taught in gods book. If you take every impression as a call of the spirit of god, you will end in hallucinations (see 2 Thessalonians 2:1012). Test every movement by the tests Jesus Christ has given, and they are all tangible, sensible tests. The way to test men, Jesus says, is by their fruits. We say that the fruit of the spirit has altogether to do with the spiritual, but the bible reveals that the spiritual must show itself in the physical. God knows no divorce whatever between the three aspects of a mans nature, spirit, soul and body, they must be at one, and they are at one either in damnation or in salvation. If a man has not the holy spirit of god energising his spirit, he will come to be judged more and more by the judgement passed on his bodily life. Beware of the people who teach that though a mans body may sin, his soul does not. No such distinctions are taught in gods word. In gods judgement, body, soul and spirit go together.
If a man is not enlivened by the holy spirit, his intelligence has no power to lift him; he cannot lift himself by his ideas, or intelligent notions, or knowledge. That is why intelligence is never the primary thing from gods standpoint. If any man will know my doctrine, says Jesus, let him do the will (see john 7:17)performance of the will before perception of the doctrine always in spiritual matters. Immediately we receive the holy spirit and are energised by god, we shall find our bodies are the first place of attack for the enemy, because the body has been the center which ruled the soul and divided it from spiritually intelligent standards; consequently the body is the last stake of Satan. The body is the margin of the battle for you and me. Health is simply the perfect balance of the body with the outer world; when anything upsets that balance we become diseased. Immediately the holy spirit comes in, disturbance occurs, physically, morally and spiritually, and the balance is upset. Jesus Christ said, i came not to send peace, but a sword. What balance will the holy spirit give back? The old one? No! We can never get back the old balance of health again; we have to get a new balance, viz. , that of holiness, which means the balance of our disposition with gods laws. We shall find the choppy waters come just there. So many misunderstand why it is their bodies are attacked now that they are spiritual in a way they never were attacked before they were spiritual. We shall deal later with the difference between natural sickness and demoniacal sickness. The bible has a great deal to say about them both. The bible is the only book that throws light on our physical condition, on our soul condition, and on our spiritual condition. In the bible the sense of smell and sight, etc. , are not used as metaphors only; they are identified with the nature of the souls life. This accounts for what people are apt to call the vulgar teaching of the bible.
God has safeguarded us in every way. Spiritual- ism is the great crime; it pushes down gods barriers and brings us into contact with forces we cannot control. On the other hand, if we give ourselves over to Jesus Christ and are ruled by him, the holy spirit can do through us anything he chooses. I beseech you, therefore, brethren . . . Present your bodies a living sacrifice, and bodies means faculties as well. Why should we expect god to deal with less than the devil deals with? A good man is a flesh and blood good man, not an impression. The body is the vessel of the soul, and it enables the soul to turn its inward life into an outward life.