The Nature of Man

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Introduction

 

What is meant by the nature of man?

This is the question of what makes up a human person.  Is the person just a body?  Do humans have a soul?  What is the soul? etc.

 

What does the Bible teach us about this?

The Bible teaches us that there are two parts to every human person,

1. a material part which we refer to as our body, and
2. an immaterial part which we call the soul.

This is what the Bible teaches us as we hope to make clear below; secular philosophers “lick the glass vessel, but never touch the pottage.” (p26)

 

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Old Testament

 

Where does the Bible teach that humans have a body?

We find this in the story of man’s creation:

Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. (Genesis 2:7)

Here we read of man’s body being formed from the dust of the ground.  This is the material stuff of which God made man.  It is noteworthy that man’s body was not made from anything divine.  People do not emanate from God.

 

Where does the Bible teach that humans have a soul?

In the same text, we read that God breathed life into man.  This time, we note that God does give something of Himself to man.  It is this part of man, whatever we may choose to call it, which contains the divine image.  This is consistent with what God teaches us in Genesis 1:26.  The result of God’s action here is that man becomes a living soul, that is a living person.

 

What does this teach us about man’s nature?

This text teaches us that the body of a person can be lifeless; and until God acts, it remains lifeless.  When God does act, then the body becomes living.  It is clear then, that there are, at least, two parts to the human person.  There is the physical, material thing which we call body;  then there is the immaterial part which is usually referred to as the soul.  It is this soul which makes a body living.  Without it, a body is lifeless.  Similar thoughts are found in these verses:

• For as long as life is in me, and the breath of God is in my nostrils, (Job 27:3)
• But it is a spirit in man, and the breath of the Almighty gives them understanding. (Job 32:8)
• The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life. (Job 33:4)
• But they fell on their faces and said, “O God, God of the spirits of all flesh, when one man sins, will You be angry with the entire congregation? (Numbers 16:22)
• The burden of the word of the LORD concerning Israel. Thus declares the LORD who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him, (Zechariah 12:1)

In this list, note especially Job 32:8 where the spirit is said to be in man which implies a distinction between soul and body.  This verse also teaches us that a person’s reason or intellect belongs to this immaterial part of a person.

 

How are we to understand Genesis 7:22?

This verse is from the story of the great flood:

All flesh that moved on the earth perished, birds and cattle and beasts and every swarming thing that swarms upon the earth, and all mankind; of all that was on the dry land, all in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, died.  Thus He blotted out every living thing that was upon the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky, and they were blotted out from the earth; and only Noah was left, together with those that were with him in the ark.  The water prevailed upon the earth one hundred and fifty days. (Genesis 7:21-24)

This verse is significant because it states that animals too have “the breath of the spirit of life.”  This seems to put animal life and human life on the same level.  Delitzsch points out, however, that breathing is simply the principle of physical life in a person, and humans have this in common with animals:

Breathing, however, is common to both man and beast; so that this cannot be the sensuous analogon [counterpart] of the supersensuous [beyond our physical senses] spiritual life, but simply the principle of the physical life of the soul. Nevertheless the vital principle in man is different from that in the animal, and the human soul from the soul of the beast. This difference is indicated by the way in which man received the breath of life from God, and so became a living soul.  The beasts arose at the creative word of God, and no communication of the spirit is mentioned even in Genesis 2:19; the origin of their soul was coincident with that of their corporeality, and their life was merely the individualization of the universal life, with which all matter was filled in the beginning by the Spirit of God.

Buswell writes (p160):

This thought is borne out by the statement that God “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul.” The words, “living soul,” are exactly the same expression used for other forms of life. These words are translated “creature that hath life” in Genesis 1:20; “living creature” in Genesis 1:21; and ‘living creature” in Genesis 1:24. The distinction between man and beast is not the mere possession of a soul, as the word is used in the Old and New Testaments, but the distinction is that the soul of man is created in the image of God, whereas this is not the case with the souls or lives of the beasts. We see therefore that the statement in Genesis 2:7 that “man became a living soul” literally says no more than that man became a living being.

 

What other texts teach us to distinguish these two parts of each human person?

When Rachel died, we read this:

It came about as her soul was departing (for she died), that she named him Ben-oni; but his father called him Benjamin. (Genesis 35:18)

Here we have Rachel’s’ body dying while her soul does not die but leaves her (וַיְהִיוַיְהִי בְּצֵאת נַפְשָׁהּ).  A similar idea is given us in 1 Kings:

Then he stretched himself upon the child three times, and called to the LORD and said, “O LORD my God, I pray You, let this child’s life (נֶפֶשׁ־הַיֶּלֶד) return to him.”  The LORD heard the voice of Elijah, and the life of the child (נֶפֶשׁ־הַיֶּלֶד) returned to him and he revived.  Elijah took the child and brought him down from the upper room into the house and gave him to his mother; and Elijah said, “See, your son is alive.” (1 Kings 17:21-23)

The difficulty here is whether this refers to what we typically understand as a person’s soul or if it refers to a person’s life.

 

What evidence is there that the ancient Hebrews understood the possibility of the soul existing apart from the body?

Consider this text:

Remember Him before the silver cord is broken and the golden bowl is crushed, the pitcher by the well is shattered and the wheel at the cistern is crushed; then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and the spirit will return to God who gave it. “Vanity of vanities,” says the Preacher, “all is vanity!” (Ecclesiastes 12:6-8)

Here the metaphors of a broken silver cord, a crushed golden bowl, a shattered pitcher, and a crushed wheel all refer to the death of a human person.  At this time, the dust or the person’s body goes to the earth and is laid in a grave.  The text says, however, that the spirit (רוּחַ) returns to God.  This implies that the “spirit” here is not just one’s life breath but a real entity that God takes back to Himself.

 

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New Testament

 

What does Jesus teach us about the human person?

Jesus continues the Old Testament teaching that there is a part of the human person that is immaterial and that survives the death of the body:

Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matthew 10:28)

Here, the body dies but the soul remains.

 

What does Paul teach us on this subject?

Paul writes to the Thessalonians:

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass. (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24)

Here Paul identifies three parts of a human person, spirit, soul, and body.

 

How are we to understand this?