The Departing and Returning Whole Man: Sellers on the Soul—Part V

[Previous installments of this series on Otis Q. Sellers on the soul: I, II, III, and IV.]

Sellers continues to mine Genesis for what it teaches about nephesh, traditionally translated “soul” and, not surprisingly, finds confirmation in the Greek Scriptures: “The lessons to be learned in Genesis 2:7 are reaffirmed in the New Testament,” specifically 1 Corinthians 15:45:

And so it is written, the first man Adam became a living soul.

Sellers also finds in Genesis an implicit equation: A + B = C

      1. The Lord God formed man of the dust of the earth.
      2. [The Lord God] Breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
      3. Man became a living soul.

From these statements Sellers infers that it “is the whole man that is the soul, and not some part of man.” Here is biblical anthropology in a nutshell, rarely if ever represented in popular theology.

… [I]t was the original man made of the soil that became a living soul. The spirit is possessed by man, but it is no part of man—it is a part of God. By it the original man became something he was not before. What he became depends for its continuance upon God. Man has not been changed into divine spirit. He only has this dwelling in him at the pleasure of God. It may be withdrawn, and if it is, man sinks back to the soil from whence he came. If this happens, man is no longer a living soul, he becomes a dead soul. In view of this, how glorious is the fact of resurrection. [My emphasis—AGF]

But the “Authorized Version” renders Genesis 2:19 this way:

… out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature [נֶ֣פֶשׁ חַיָּ֑ה, nephesh chaiyah] that was the name thereof. [My emphasis—AGF]

Sellers was not amused:

The translators again yield to their opinions and render nephesh by “creature” in this passage. Apparently, they determined to cover the fact that the Scriptures teach that all the lower creatures are living souls—the same as man. [My emphasis—AGF]

Sellers notes that some commentators “freely admit that man, equally with the lower creation, is called a living soul, yet they hold that neshamah [נשמה, “breath”] is used only of man and never of the animals…. Genesis 7:21-22 seems to stand against this theory.”

And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man: All in whose nostrils was the breath [נִשְׁמַת־, nishmat] of life of all that was in the dry land, died.

The Hebrew word translated “breath” is נִשְׁמַת־, nishmat, a form of נשמה, neshamah.

“I do not say there is no distinction between men and beasts.” Sellers continues, but

this difference cannot be established by saying that man alone has neshamah. It will have to be established from other sources. Chief among these are the pause, the counsel, the deliberation that attended the creation of man, and the fact that man was made in God’s image and likeness.

Moving on to Genesis 9:4-5, Sellers notes that “for the first time, we find the blood used as a figure of the soul.”

But flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood [דָמ֖וֹ, damow] thereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood [דִּמְכֶ֤ם, dimkem] of your lives will I require; at the hand of every beast will I require it, and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man’s brother will I require the life of man.

“The blood is not the soul,” Sellers explains, “but it is God’s figure or illustration of the soul….” It is intimately connected to soil and air:

We learned from Genesis 2:7 that the soul has its origin in the combination of the spirit with the body. The spirit came from God and is identified with the breath or air. The body came from the earth and is identified with the soil. What can portray this better than the blood?

The blood is fed by the food we eat, all of which comes from the soil. It is fed from the air and is thus linked with the breath. For its continuance as blood, it is more dependent on the air than on the soil. When this same truth is stated in Leviticus, we are given an additional truth that it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul. In Isaiah 53:12 we read concerning the Lord Jesus. “He poured out His soul unto death.”

We know that as to fact it was His blood which He poured out, while as to truth it was His soul.

Sellers proceeds with his concordance:

Genesis 9:10-12, 15, 16 “relate to the living souls in the ark and emphasize again the fact that animals and birds are called living souls.”

Genesis 12:5: “And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son … and the souls [הַנֶּ֖פֶשׁ, hanephesh, “the people”] that they had gotten in Haran ….”

… [I]t occasions no surprise to find men called souls, for that is just what they are….. The soul, in Scripture, is not somethi0ng a man has, but it is something man is. The full realization of this will cause us to cease believing that Scripture treats of some fraction of man rather than man as a whole. We will quit preaching salvation for a fraction of the man and declare a salvation for the whole man. The Scriptures always regard man as a complete unit, one solidarity; one in his creation, one in his fall, one in his redemption, one in his death, one in resurrection, one in eternal life, or else one in the everlasting destruction that awaits him beyond the judgment. [My emphasis—AGF]

Soul = Person

In Genesis 12:13 נֶ֣פֶשׁ, nephesh is used “for the first time as a figure of speech…. As the soul is the whole man, so, in Scripture when one says, ‘my soul,’ he uses it in the same sense that we use the pronouns I, myself, or me as the occasion may require. Proof of this is seen in those passages where the soul is spoken of in relation to God: ‘And my soul [נַפְשִׁ֖י, naphshi] shall abhor you,’ Leviticus 26:30; ‘Your appointed feasts my soul [נַפְשִׁ֖י, naphshi] hateth,’ Isaiah 1:14’; ‘My beloved, in whom my soul [ψυχή μου, psyche mou] is well pleased,’ Matthew 12:18.” The last echoes and fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah 42:1: “In whom my soul [נַפְשִׁ֖י, naphshi] delighteth.” Sellers elaborates:

In these passages “my soul” means I. May we say—not some part of God, but God Himself. We will, therefore, find nephesh used over and over again in the manner of a personal, emphatic, or reflexive pronoun. It must be remembered that nephesh always means soul, but “my soul” carries the meaning of I, myself, or me; “his soul” is him or himself; “thy soul” is thyself. [My emphasis—AGF]

Or, one might say that “person” is a good translation of nephesh. See, for example, Genesis 14:21, which King Jimmy’s translators rendered: “And the king of Sodom said unto Abram, Give me the persons [הַנֶּ֖פֶשׁ, hanephesh], and take the goods to thyself.” [My emphasis—AGF]

“It would be interesting to know,” Sellers comments “just what mental processes led the translators to introduce a new rendering for the word nephesh here when it would have been so simple to render it ‘souls.’ This passage, correctly translated, is a good example of the Biblical use of the word ‘soul.’”

In Genesis 17:14 God says that the uncircumcised man—“that soul,” that nephesh—is to be cut off from the people: “It was the whole man who was cut off,” Sellers underscores, “not some fraction of him.”

The KJV translators of Genesis 19:17-19 rendered forms of nephesh—נַפְשֶׁ֔ךָ, naphshekah (v. 17);  and נַפְשִׁ֑י, naphshi (v. 19)—“your life” and  “my life” respectively. But Lot “spoke of saving his soul.”

The Hebrew word for life is chay (חַי), and the Greek word is zoe (ζωή). If we trace out these words, we will discover that life cannot be lost, cannot be saved, cannot die, cannot be killed, cannot be destroyed. cannot be taken by another, cannot be given up, and cannot be retained. Men may speak of life after this manner, but the Scriptures never admit any such possibilities. In the Word of God, the soul is subject to all these things. [My emphasis—AGF]

It’s illogical, Sellers implies, to say that a life died. A person can lose his life, but his life cannot. A person can die. “My soul shall live” (Genesis 19:20) means, “I shall live.” “Lot continued to be a living soul, that is, he himself continued to live. 

Emotions and the soul

“In Scripture,” Sellers observes, “man’s senses and emotions are connected with the soul. A soul is a being that can desire.” Genesis 23:8 should be translated: “If it be your soul (נַפְשְׁכֶ֑ם, napshekem; from nephesh) that I should bury my dead.” (Not “if it be your mind.”)

This is a figure of speech in which one word is put for another which it suggests. The thought is “if it be your desire that I should bury my dead.” But, “soul” is used in place of desire, just as we may say “a good table” meaning “good food.” In the exercise of mental faculties, the manifestation of certain feelings and compassions, the word “soul” is often substituted.

Sellers anticipates an objection.

Some may ask if “my soul” means “I,” why was the word “I” not used? It must not be forgotten that Hebrew is not English. In English one does not say, “My soul is hungry,” when food is desired. Yet, this is just what a Hebrew would say. And when he said, “my soul is hungry,” he meant just what we mean when we say, “I am hungry.” If this question is pressed as to why he did not say, “I am hungry,” if that is what he meant, the answer is that an ancient Hebrew did not talk like a modern Englishman. “My soul” is a Hebrew idiom.

Genesis 32:30 says Jacob’s soul (נַפְשִׁ֑י, naphshi, from nephesh), that is, Jacob himself, was preserved. “Life needs no preservation,” Sellers reminds us, “because of its relationship to God.”

Shechem’s desire for Dinah (Genesis 34:3, 8) is represented by נַפְשׁוֹ֙ (naphshow, from nephesh) in both verses. “Man is a living soul and therefore capable of all emotions. Man can love and can desire because he is a living soul.” 

Death = Return

“And it came to pass, as her [Rachel’s] soul (נַפְשָׁהּ֙, naphshah, from nephesh) was in departing, (for she died) that she called his name Benoni ….” (Genesis 35:18) “seems to bring in a radical change of thought, but viewed in the light of what we have learned from the Word up to this point, it presents nothing new and brings in no change. The important thing in this passage is the explanatory parenthesis.”

In this passage for the first time we read of the soul departing, and this is immediately explained as meaning that she died. It was Rachel who was departing; and it was Rachel who died. There are not two Rachels here, one that departed and another that died. At death man as a living soul is gone, and in resurrection man as a living soul returns. [My emphasis—AGF]

Consider these two verses:

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. Genesis 3: 19.

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit return unto God who gave it.” Ecclesiastes 12:7.

Sellers comments:

For every return there must be a departure. If I am visiting friends, that which to them is my departure will to my wife be my return. In Eccl. 12: 7 we have the return of two things, and these two things are the very elements that constitute man as a living soul. The return of these two things is the soul departing.

Detailed explanations are often necessary, but they become cumbersome in ordinary conversation. Thus, the simple, “I took a cab,” is not quite true, but it is so much better than a detailed explanation…. In Ecclesiastes 12:7 we have a detailed statement which can be expressed in the words “the soul departs.”

It may be that some, hard pressed to support a theory concerning the soul, will lay hold of the simple words of this verse to prove that the soul is the real man or some fraction of man that moves out of the body at death. I judge the same person could see a full confession of motor theft in the words, “I took a cab.”

The souls of Esau’s house, referred to in Genesis 36:6, were living men and women.

The translators of Genesis 37:21 have Reuben saying “Let us not kill him,” but the Hebrew has “Let us not take his life (נָֽפֶשׁ, naphesh).” Sellers says this is the first of the fourteen times that nephesh is not represented in the KJV translation.

Every nephesh passage that Sellers studied (not all of which have been listed in this post) supports this conclusion:

There is no passage in Genesis that teaches the independent existence of a human soul that for a short time makes its home in the human body. The real man does not reside in some part of man, but in the whole. The real man is neither the spirit nor the body, but he is that which came about as the result of the union of these two.

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