Two Testaments, One Soul
Essay by Matthew McAffee
What hath Greece to do with Israel? On many levels, modern critical scholarship would be comfortable with a negative response to such a question. They would argue that the Greek ideas of the first century have so influenced the writers of the New Testament that they no longer resemble their Hebrew predecessors theologically. We might say that they have simply moved on with the times. This trajectory poses numerous problems for evangelicals and their view of Scripture, however. If the Bible reflects the divinely revealed will of God to humankind (2 Tim. 3:16), can we live with the “fact” that the Old and New Testaments represent different theologies reflective of their times and cultures [1]? Is God getting on with the times?
A Test Case: Hebrew nephesh
One area in which this kind of argument has gained ground has to do with the Israelite conception of the human constitution. Biblical scholars have commonly asserted that the Semitic view of the person is a holistic one, conceiving one’s existence in terms of the whole rather than the parts that constitute the whole. Typically, it has been argued that the Semitic understanding of personhood is quite different from the more compartmentalized perspective of the Greek world that has influenced the writers of the New Testament (e.g., body and soul) [2]. As the explanation goes, the Greek understanding would have envisaged persons as having a soul (one compartment of the whole), whereas the Semite would have thought of the individual as being a soul (the whole without compartments).
In his three-volume study on Israelite life and culture, Johannes Pedersen explains the holistic view of the human constitution this way: “The basis of its [i.e., soul] essence was the fragile corporeal substance, but by the breath of God it was transformed and became a nephesh, a soul. It is not said that man was supplied with a nephesh, and so the relation between body and soul is quite different from what it is to us. Such as he is, man, in his total essence, is a soul” [3]. In a similar manner, Aubrey Johnson explains that for the Israelites, “man is commonly thought of as a unit of vital power . . . seen to form a psychical whole . . . a potential unity is thought to exist between the whole and any such part, however separate the latter may appear to a more analytical mind” [4]. In other words, the ancient Israelites were incapable of compartmentalizing the human constitution into a few major components, whether as a dichotomy (body and soul) or trichotomy (body, soul, and spirit). Thus, the Hebrew word nephesh reflects this understanding and should be interpreted as signifying the whole “person.”
Not all biblical scholars, however, have lined up with the so-called consensus on the nature of Hebrew nephesh. When the biblical data for nephesh are scrutinized more closely, one wonders if the situation is much more complex than is often admitted. James Barr, for example, raises doubts about the sharp dichotomy often made between the earlier Semitic and later Greek understandings of the human constitution, offering this candid assessment:
I have to confess to having said some of this myself at times: but, when one looks afresh at the materials, is it true? Can it all be true? There are so many reasons against it. Is it even remotely plausible that ancient Hebrews, at the very earliest stage of their tradition, already had a picture of humanity which agreed so well with modern esteem for psychosomatic unity? How did they manage to get it all so perfectly right, when the Greeks, apparently, so thoroughly misunderstood everything? Is there not an obvious bias in so many modern textbooks, which seem to want nothing more desperately than to deny that the Hebrews had any idea of an independent ‘soul’, worse still an immortal one? May it not be mistaken semantic analysis, inspired by admiration for the very ‘totality thinking’ that it is supposed to demonstrate?[5]
Indeed, the status quo in biblical studies and its understanding of Hebrew nephesh is an oversimplification of the Old Testament perspective. The New Testament authors may not be so out-of-step with their Hebrew forefathers after all.
Genesis 2
Commentators have long noted that Genesis 2 assumes a monophysite [6] view of man’s composition in that the focus is placed upon the whole rather than the distinct components that make up the whole. John Skinner, for example, dismisses the trichotomist (or dichotomist for that matter) interpretation of man’s consisting of flesh, soul, and spirit, concluding that the text emphasizes “the whole man in possession of vital powers” [7]. More importantly, Skinner goes on to argue that no allusion to “man’s immaterial being, to his spiritual element,” lies in this text. Rather, it is God communicating vitality by breathing it into the nostrils of man [8]. Claus Westermann argues that there are no grounds for the view that humans were created immortal. A “living soul” is not placed within the body; a person is created as a “living soul” [9].
From the text itself, however, these scholars overlook the obvious. God fashions man out of the dust (‘apar) of the ground and then breathes into his nostrils the “breath of life” [10]. Yes, we are right in noting that the living nephesh is not put into the body. But at the same time, it is clear that the “breath of life” is placed within the newly formed dust to produce a living human being. In other words, according to Genesis 2:7, the fashioned dust plus the divine breath of life equals a living nephesh. This text provides the subtext of Qoheleth’s commentary in Ecclesiastes 12:7, where it is said that the dust (‘apar) of man returns to the earth while the spirit (ruaḥ) returns to God who gave it (cf. Eccl. 3:20-21). Qoheleth envisions a dual human composition in his allusion to the creation narrative, one element returning to the ground below and the other returning to God above [11].
Summary
Perhaps we have been overzealous in our holistic reading of the Old Testament in matters of the human soul. Besides, the cultural climate of the broader biblical world is often more complicated than we would like to admit. This fact is demonstrated by the recent discovery of the Aramaic Kutamuwa inscription from Zincirli, Turkey [12]. In this text, Kutamuwa presents himself eating and drinking with those who would commemorate him postmortem, explaining that his “soul” would be in the inscribed monument. Remarkably, this eighth century b.c. inscription from northern Syria reminds us that the cultural purveyors of an enduring soul were not exclusively Greek. This idea had been around for a long time and was not a Greek monopoly.
So, we have come full circle. Neither the Bible itself, nor its cultural environment, demand an ideological wedge between the Old and New Testament views of personhood. We should exercise caution in accepting everything the scholars deem to be true. The “competing theology” viewpoint arises from the abandonment of divine revelation in favor of the Bible as a human product. What the above example illustrates is the need for careful and sensitive readings of the biblical text on its own terms. Instead of resorting to the defensive, these interpretive challenges are opportunities for Christian interpreters to return to the Scriptures with renewed interest in understanding their meaning. Though the jury is still out on the burgeoning array of scholarly theories (some of them good, and others not so good), the Bible remains. It has something to teach us. In the end, it is not so much God getting on with the times, but us.
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[1] We are not arguing against the Bible’s ability to reflect a variety of theological emphases. At times, such differing theological perspectives might appear paradoxical without being contradictory. This essay is concerned about purported competing theologies that evade harmonization.
[2] It is worth noting with James Barr (The Semantics of Biblical Language [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961], 12-14) that this particular strand of Greek thought (what Barr calls “the Pythagorean-Platonic”) that has become operative in how we define their understanding of the human constitution represents only one (and a late one at that) of many other traditions.
[3] Johannes Pedersen, Israel: Its Life and Culture I-II (Oxford, 1929), 99.
[4] Aubrey R. Johnson, The Vitality of the Individual in the Thought of Ancient Israel (Cardiff: University of Wales, 1949), 8. More recently, Barr (The Garden of Eden and the Hope of Immortality [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993], 1ff.) discusses the broader issue of the immortality of the soul and points out that throughout the twentieth century it was commonplace among biblical scholars to argue that this idea has never been a part of biblical belief. He notes the influence Oscar Cullmann’s work, “Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead?” in Immortality and Resurrection, ed. Krister Stendahl (London: Epworth Press, 1958), 9-53.
[5] Barr, The Garden of Eden and the Hope of Immortality, 36-7.
[6] The term “monophysite” refers to the view that defines the human constitution holistically, arguing that the Bible emphasizes the unity of personhood instead of the various components of the self.
[7] John Skinner, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Genesis (International Critical Commentary 1; New York: Scribner’s, 1910), 57.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Claus Westermann, Genesis 1-11: A Commentary (trans. by John J. Scullion; Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984 [English]), 207.
[10] See Barr, The Garden of Eden, 36-47, where he sharply criticizes what he calls the “the Hebrew ‘totality thinking’ and the soul.”
[11] Westermann (Genesis 1-11, 204) makes mention of this text in his commentary on Genesis 2:7, arguing that it likely has more to do with man coming out of the earth than refering to man’s creation from the earth. Accordingling, he critiques Gunkel for suggesting that the allusions to Genesis 2 in a text like Ecclesiastes 12 changes the theology of the former to suit the monotheism of the latter, Westermann countering, “The description of human beings created out of earth reaches back into the primitive cultures.”
[12] On the recent excavations from this site, see J. David Schloen and Amir S. Fink, “New Excavations at Zincirli Höyük in Turkey (Ancient Sam’al) and the Discovery of an Inscribed Morturary Stele,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 356 (2009): 1-13. For a translation and discussion of this text, see Dennis Pardee, “A New Aramaic Inscription from Zincirli,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 356 (2009): 51-71.
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About the Author: Matthew McAffee serves on the ministry/biblical studies faculty at Free Will Baptist Bible College. He returns to the faculty while completing a doctorate in Northwest Semitics at the University of Chicago. He is also a graduate of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and Free Will Baptist Bible College. He has ministered in Free Will Baptist churches in Virginia, Tennessee, Illinois, and Canada. He is married to Anna, with whom he has two daughters, Abigail 7 and Lydia 3.
July 10, 2012
Mr. McAffee,
I would like to commend you on such a detailed and scholarly approach to the concept of a changing theology rather than a changing God or Scripture. I would like to ask: Do you view the soul or “nephesh” as denominating the whole of a person, with the body and spirit being dichotomous parts which make up the whole?
July 10, 2012
Phillip,
Thanks for the comment. As for your question, I believe the data from the OT concerning the human constitution is a bit more nuanced and complex. For example, there are a number of cases where nephesh does appear to denote the human self (e.g., when nephesh occurs with a pronominal suffix as a reflexive pronoun: himself, herself, itself, etc.). On the other hand, the meaning of this term historically was “throat” or “neck.” We find this meaning all over the place in Ugaritic texts, but there are a couple instances in the OT as well. One of the stronger cases is found in Isaiah 5:14, which reads literally: “Therefore, Sheol has enlarged its nephesh and opened its mouth without measure.” From the parallel, “its nephesh” could easily be taken to mean “its throat.” Some translations read “its appetite,” which is a perfectly fine rendering of nephesh in many places throughout the OT, but seems forced here.
I say all of this to emphasize that in the ancient mindset, a particular part of the body (in this case, the throat) eventually came to designate more symbolically ones existence as a whole. I don’t think that they were necessarily thinking about different components of the self.
It is also important to point out that Hebrew does not have a word for “body.” One curiosity is that in a number of places, a dead corpses is called a “nephesh” (e.g., Num. 5:2).
As you can see, I am still trying to sort some of these things out, but the short of it all is that the OT conception of nephesh is quite complex. Perhaps my response will ignite additional discussion.