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Since you have no frame of reference as to what I am
saying Lance, how in the world would you know?
You reject it because your mind is full of old movies
and the teachings of these men. Broken cisterns and
blind guides.... jt
As you, and perhaps others interpret Scripture,
vis a vis the 'soul' you are COMPLETELY GREEK IN YOUR UNDERSTANDING. Can I get
an AMEN?
Blind
guides. This must be where 'G' gets his inspiration also as Jeeves
makes mention of all the same Geeks - oophs!
I mean Greeks. Studying the physical brain to
try and find the soul is on the same level as getting on Sputnik and
flying out into space expecting to see God... and excuse me - The idea
of an immortal soul arises from Genesis 2:7 which is NOT Greek
thought... Then he wades through the hodgepodge called tradition
(that makes God's Word of no effect) and quotes what Origen thought (that
is the guy who castrated himself because he didn't understand that the
power emanating from the cross could free him from lust) and mixes it
with a little Plato and Augustine. This may be where Jeeves gets his
wisdom but he can have it. Jeeves doesn't know his Bible. Soul does
not mean body, mind, and spirit
just becaue the oldtimers used to call
people souls. Soul means soul. Mind means mind. and
spirit means spirit. Spirit and soul can be divided by God's
Word... and both are different from the physical body.
What a waste of time that could be redeemed by
spending it in the presence and counsel of God. jt
(1) Beliefs - Whatever happened to the soul? (by Malcolm Jeeves)
First, I am suggesting that statements about the physical nature of human
beings made from the perspective of
biology or neuroscience refer to exactly the same
entity as statements made about the soulish or spiritual nature of persons
from the point review of theology or religious traditions. This disavows the
suggestion that human science speaks about a physical being whilst theology
and religion speak about a non-material essence or soul. Perhaps a better
way of saying this is that when we talk of souls we are talking about whole
persons: body, mind and spirit. One might say "we are souls, we
don't have souls". Such a view contrasts sharply
with views of soul and body in, for example, Socrates discourse on death. He
wrote "Does not death mean that the body comes to exist by itself, separated
from the soul, and that the soul exists by herself, separated from the body?
What is death but that?� (Socrates, Plato's Phaedo, Fourth century BC).
The idea of an immortal
soul arises not from the Bible but from Greek thought.
In the end, Plato records that Socrates lived out
his own teaching by drinking the poison hemlock in the serene conviction
that his immortal soul would now find release from its bodily prison. For
Socrates and Plato, bodily death was a welcome liberation. Indeed, it was
actually not dying.
In the centuries after Christ, theologians combined this Greek doctrine of the immortal soul with biblical
images of human nature. When Origen, a third century platonic philosopher, became the
father of theology, he built into Christian doctrine Plato's idea of the
soul. In the early fifth century, Augustine thought Plato to be the most bright in
all of philosophy. And in the sixteenth century, John Calvin, who was
heavily influenced by both Plato and Augustine, declared that Plato alone
"rightly affirmed" the immortal soul that "lies hidden in man separate from
body".
Second, whilst scriptural teachings about the image of God do not, by their
nature address directly any dualism-physicalism distinction, there is at the
same time nothing in their teachings that necessitates belief in an ontologically distinct soul. What is
clear from Scripture is that the image of God is primarily
relational.
That is, it implies a capacity to enter into a covenant relationship with
God and with other humans. Humans are considered unique from the rest of
God's creation primarily due to their capacity for covenant
relationships.
Third, any ideas we have about the nature of persons ultimately affect
the way we treat one another. What we understand about human nature impacts
on our ethics. Are there any consequences of the views I am putting forward
which might start us on a slippery slope of ethical or moral decline? In the
past, dualist views have certainly sustained a sense of caution about what
can appropriately be done to besouled bodies of other individuals. If an
immmortal soul is present, doesn't this force one to continue to honour and
love the seriously mentally defective or demented? The medical ethicist
Stephen Post, whilst recognizing that in the past dualism has played a
protective role within ethical systems, suggests that the fundamental
biblical motive for the care of those who have little ability to reciprocate
is not to be found in a dualist consideration of the soul of the other
person. Rather, he argues, it emerges from the ethos of bestowed love and
from the narratives of Jesus amongst the most vulnerable. Thus a narrative
of love and consideration to helpless, dying or deficient persons is
sufficient motive, and perhaps a more purely biblical motive, than the
consideration of a separate substantial soul.
(2) Practices-The Mind-Brain link and the Christian Life
By emphasising, in the way that I have, the unity of the human person, I
am, by implication, suggesting that the spiritual dimension to a person's life is no more immune to changes in the brain than other aspects of
mental life. Such a suggestion, at times, seems to surprise and trouble,
some Christian people. I do not believe that it should and may I now give
you three brief examples to illustrate why I think this is the case,
There are a number of well documented cases of what happens to devout
Christians when they develop Alzheimer's disease. The psychologist professor
Glenn Weaver documents the spiritual pilgrimage of a devout Christian lady
who after a life of regular attendance at church services where she was well
known as a gentle Christian, with a deep concern for her fellow
Christians , she began to develop the
tell tale symptoms of increasing forgetfulness. She struggled with the
problem in the way that many people do but she was fighting a losing
battle. She found that she could no longer remember
the names of those she wanted to pray for and her letters became verbose and lost much of their
content. This in turn made her increasingly anxious;
and her anxiety led onto depression and the classical textbook description
of developing Alzheimer's disease became evident.
Glenn Weaver, however, points out that in her case there was much more to
her experience than the usual textbook account. She was deeply troubled about her relationship with God. She
felt she was personally responsible for falling away from her former close
walk with God ,and that she was deserting her friends through her friendship
and prayers. She concluded that because of her lack
of faith God was setting her aside because she was no longer fit for his
service.
As she continued she became more confused and began to lose control of
her natural processes and away from the security provided by her home and
husband, she would wander about violating the commands of her nurses and
then describing bizarre sexual disturbances in an explicit way. She came to believe she'd committed sins that
provoked God's wrath and the continued deterioration of her condition and
the fact that the doctors could not help her confirmed her in her beliefs.
Eventually she lost all interest in her daily
devotions and prayer. The main point here is quite simple; with neural changes there
are psychological consequences and these in turn affect spiritual awareness.
Such is the unity of the human person.
My second example is the attempts to explore the association of
some forms of religiosity and the
occurrence of mystical experiences with their possible neural
substrates, an attempt which has continued from time
to time over the last thirty years. Many who write on the topic begin with
the apostle Paul's Damascus Road experience and then quickly move on to talk
about the religiosity of the typical
epileptic patient, something which has been
recognised since at least 1838 by Esquirol.
The debate will continue as more evidence becomes available. However, as
one recent study by David Tucker and his associates has reported, "the data
indicate that hyper-religiosity is not a consistent interictal trait of
individuals with temporal lobe epilepsy. Further, although hyper-religiosity
and temporal lobe epilepsy may co-occur in a few individuals, it does not
appear to be a direct causal relationship between repeated seizure discharge
in the temporal lobes and hyper-religiosity."
Third, I suggest that a return to a more holistic view of the human
person, prompted in part by recent developments in neuroscience has helpful
implications, I believe, for understanding the spiritual distresses that are
well documented in the experiences of Christian leaders and from which we
all, from time to time, suffer . It means that the
spiritual dimension to our personality is not immune to the changes in our
biological and neural
substrates. I have already given you one example of
this in the specific instance of Altzheimers disease.
The psychiatrist Gaius Davies has documented how some of the outstanding
men and women of God whom all acknowledge have been greatly used by him are
also found on close study often to be those who have endured significant
swings in the immediacy of their felt awareness of the presence and power of
God. Davies shows how in the case of some of these people it is possible for
us, with the benefit of hindsight, and informed by the advances in
psychiatry at the end of the 20th-century, to be fairly sure that some of
their experiences were pathological in the sense that today we would
classify them in accepted categories of psychological
illness.
Some were obsessive compulsive, some were manic depressive, some
struggled with specific phobias, and so on. Among those studied by Gaius
Davies were John Bunyan and Amy Carmichael, William Cowper, CS Lewis, Martin
Luther, Gerard Manley Hopkins and J. B. Phillips .
The relevance of his studies to us today is that there are those amongst
them whose illness probably had a significant biological and biochemical
etiology and these would include Luther, Cowper, Shaftesbury and Phillips. Luther was probably
an obsessive compulsive/depressive; Cowper suffered six serious depressive
breakdowns and made several suicide attempts; Shaftesbury was probably a
manic/depressive suffering from a bi-polar affective disorder (he reported
how his moods swung from �wild joy� to �cruel despondency�. Phillips was
probably an obsessive-compulsive. Despite all these
things they triumphed to our lasting benefit. We do indeed �have this
treasure in earthen vessels�.
Those of you, who like me enjoyed the fascinating BBC television series by Susan Greenfield on
the brain, may remember that in her first lecture
she made several references to the religious or spiritual dimension to a person's life
and personality. It is interesting that following
her presentation there were a number of letters to the press complaining
that she was attacking religion and the spiritual dimension to life.
While we can understand the sensitivity, for some people, of singling out
religion for reference in this way, a little thought would quickly indicate
that it was unjustified. To be more specific, Susan Greenfield could as
easily have indicated that in due time, using appropriate brain imaging
techniques, we may be able to say a little more about which systems in the brain are most active
when she is talking about brains and their
properties.
No one, I think, would have then gone on to argue that because we may
understand something of brain mechanisms underlying her fascinating
presentations, therefore, we could give no validity to the brain story that
she was telling us. In a word,
understanding something about the brain mechanisms underlying mental life
tells us nothing, one way or the other about the truth claims of the
statements being made at the time.
To be more specific because this is an important point, she could as
easily showed us a picture of Einstein's brain drawing attention to
some of its unusual features, but this
would have told us nothing at all, one way or the other about the truth of
his theories. What I believe is much more relevant
is that by welcoming every new bit of
information about the neural substrates of spirituality, should give us insights which will enable us to understand
ourselves better, but more importantly will enable us to show more sympathy
and compassion to those who may be going through what in past centuries used
to be called " the dark night of the
soul".
His most recent book is 'From Cells to Souls
- and Beyond' (editor) with an essay by Alan Torrance entitled 'What is a
Person?' It addresses the important issue of the
mind/brain as well as the rampant dualism and
gnosticism one sees in society at large, the believing community
and, on TT.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: April 19, 2005 21:49
Subject: [Bulk] Re: [TruthTalk]
Saved - Salvation
"Portraits of Human
Nature: Scientific & Theological" by Malcolm Jeeves. Anyway,
I think that is what you are talking about. I was thinking I had
sent one of his books home with you. Is that right?
Bill
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, April 19, 2005
6:56 AM
Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Saved -
Salvation
Bill , what
was the title and author of that CD from the pyschiatrist we listened
to some on the trip to Miss?
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