The Baha'i Studies Listserv David, You have to look at this metaphorically. If you look at it literally, it makes no sense. Literally, humans and apes evolved from common ancestors. The concept of "soul" is a metaphor. We say humans have a "soul". "The human soul" is a metaphor for what makes humans so different from other animals. To say that "humans always had a soul" can be seen as metaphorically true, even though it is literally true that, say, one billion years ago, humans did not exist yet. I suppose you could say that, even one billion years ago, the Ideal of "Humanity" existed as a Concept, a Platonic Ideal.
Ron On Sat, Oct 3, 2009 at 12:24 AM, David Friedman < [email protected]> wrote: > The Baha'i Studies Listserv > Can someone explain to me how humans and primates could have a common > ancestor yet one has a soul the other doesn't? Where did we get our > spirituality from and why don't primates have it? > > Regards, > David > > ------------------------------ > Click here View photos of singles in your area. > <http://clk.atdmt.com/NMN/go/163036679/direct/01/> > __________________________________________________ > You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:[email protected] > Unsubscribe: send a blank email to mailto: > [email protected] > Subscribe: send subscribe bahai-st in the message body to > [email protected] > Or subscribe: > http://list.jccc.edu:8080/read/all_forums/subscribe?name=bahai-st > Baha'i Studies is available through the following: > Mail - mailto:[email protected] > Web - http://list.jccc.edu:8080/read/?forum=bahai-st > News (on-campus only) - news://list.jccc.edu/bahai-st > Old Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] > New Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] > __________________________________________________ You are subscribed to Baha'i Studies as: mailto:[email protected] Unsubscribe: send a blank email to mailto:[email protected] Subscribe: send subscribe bahai-st in the message body to [email protected] Or subscribe: http://list.jccc.edu:8080/read/all_forums/subscribe?name=bahai-st Baha'i Studies is available through the following: Mail - mailto:[email protected] Web - http://list.jccc.edu:8080/read/?forum=bahai-st News (on-campus only) - news://list.jccc.edu/bahai-st Old Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] New Public - http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]
