“In the most distinct manner God shows us that man is a compound being, having a body and soul distinctly and separately created; the body out of the dust of the earth, the soul immediately breathed from God himself.”
To the same end see the reasonings of Landis, Clark (D. W.), and others. Aware of the importance to their system of maintaining this interpretation, they very consistently rally to its support the flower of their strength. It is the redan of their works, and they cannot be blamed for being unwilling to surrender it without a decisive struggle. For if there is nothing in the inspired record of the formation of man, that record which undertakes to give us a correct view of his nature, to show that he is endowed with immortality, their system is not only shaken to its foundation, but even the foundation itself is swept entirely away.
The vital point, to which they bend all their energies, is somehow to show that a distinct entity, an intelligent part, an immortal soul, was brought near to that body as it lay there perfect in its organization, and thrust therein, which immediately began through the eyes of that body to see, through its ears to hear, through its lips to speak, and through its nerves to feel. Query: Was this soul capable of performing all these functions before it entered the body? If it was, why thrust it within this prison house? If it was not, will it be capable of performing them after it leaves the body?
Heavy drafts are made on rhetoric in favor of this superadded soul. Figures of beauty are summoned to lend to the argument their aid. An avalanche of flowers is thrown upon it, to adorn its strength, or perchance to hide its weakness. But when we search for the logic, we find it a chain of sand. Right at the critical point, the argument fails to connect; and so after all their expenditure of effort, after all their lofty flights, and sweating toil, their conclusion comes out--blank assumption. Why? Because they are endeavoring to reach a result which they are dependent upon the text to establish, but which the text directly contradicts. The record does not say that God formed a body, and put therein a superadded soul, to use that body as an instrument; but he formed man of the dust. That which was formed of the dust was the man himself, not simply an instrument for the man to use when he should be put therein. Adam was just as essentially a man before the breath of life was imparted, as after that event. This was the difference: before, he was a dead man; afterward, a living one. The organs were all there ready for their proper action. It only needed the vitalizing principle of the breath of life to set them in motion. That came, and the lungs began to expand, the heart to beat, the blood to flow, and the limbs to move; then was exhibited all the phenomena of physical action; then, too, the brain began to act, and there was exhibited all the phenomena of mental action, perception, thought, memory, will, &c.
The engine is an engine before the motive power is applied. The bolts, bars, pistons, cranks, shafts, and wheels, are all there. The parts designed to move are ready for action. But all is silent and still. Apply the steam, and it springs, as it were, into a thing of life, and gives forth all its marvelous exhibitions of celerity and power.
So with man. When the breath of life was imparted, which, as we have seen was given in common to all the animal creation, that simply was applied which set the machine in motion. No separate and independent organization was added, but a change took place in the man himself. The man became something, or reached a condition which before he had not attained. The verb “became” is defined by Webster, “to pass from one state to another; to enter into some state or condition, by a change from another state or condition, or by assuming or receiving new properties or qualities, additional matter or a new character.” And Gen. 2:7, is then cited as an illustration of this definition. But it will be seen that none of these will fit the popular idea of the superadded soul; for that is not held to be simply a change in Adam’s condition, or a new property or quality of his being, or an addition of matter, or a new character; but a separate and independent entity, capable, without the body, of a higher existence than with it. The boy becomes a man; the acorn, an oak; the egg, an eagle; the chrysalis, a butterfly; but the capabilities of the change all inhere in the object which experiences it. A superadded, independent soul could not have been put into man, and be said to have become that soul. Yet it is said of Adam, that he, on receiving the breath of life, became a living soul. An engine is put into a ship, and by its power propels it over the face of the deep; but the ship, by receiving the engine, does not become the engine, nor the engine the ship. No sophistry, even from the darkest depths of its alchemy, can bring up and attach to the word “become” a definition which will make it mean, as applied to any body, the addition of a distinct and separate organization to that body.
To the inquiry of Prof. Mattison, “If he was ‘a soul’ before, then how could he become such by the last act of creation,” it may be replied, The antithesis is not based upon the word soul, but upon the word living. This will become evident by trying to read the passage without this word: “And the Lord God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a soul.” That is not it. He became a living soul. He was a soul before, but not a living soul. To thus speak of a dead soul, may provoke from some a sneer; nevertheless, the Hebrews so used the terms. See Num. 6:6: “He shall come at no dead body,” on which Cruden says, “in Hebrew, dead soul.”
Kitto, in his Relig. Encyclopedia, under the term Adam, says:--
“And Jehovah God formed the man (Heb., the Adam) dust from the ground, and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living animal. Some of our readers may be surprised at our having translated nephesh chaiyah by living animal. There are good interpreters and preachers who, confiding in the common translation, living soul, have maintained that here is intimated a distinctive pre-eminence above the inferior animals, as possessed of an immaterial and immortal spirit. But, however true that distinction is, and supported by abundant argument from both philosophy and the Scriptures, we should be acting unfaithfully if we were to assume its being contained or implied in this passage.”
The “abundant argument from both philosophy and the Scriptures” for man’s immortal spirit, may be more difficult to find than many suppose. But this admission that nothing of the kind is implied in this passage, is a gratifying triumph of fair and candid criticism over what has been almost universally believed and taught.