Discovering The Soul

[Manonfire63]

When someone is talking about The Soul, which Soul are they referencing? Plato and The Soul? Abstract Philosophy God and the Soul? The Bible, and how The Bible references The Soul? Working to explain The Soul and The Bible, I have worked to do so in a way that your average person may be able to understand, and find or feel their soul. He are starting with a perception, we postulate that the Soul is a person, and has to do with decision making and identity, and given scripture, and various media or cultural references of The Soul, we may be able to see if we are right, and a bigger picture.

The Basis of Christianity

• 5 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.. (Deuteronomy 6:5)
• He answered, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" (Luke 10:27)

Song to Preface this: Huey Lewis "Heart and Soul."

What is a Soul? A soul is a person. Given a The King of Salem had 50 Souls, he had fifty person or servants. How did they identify themselves? Possibly as a servant of The King of Salem in some way. Loving The Lord with all your SOUL, may have to do with identity. Who was someone serving? Was someone a Servant of "Something Else" or a Servant of God? A child of God? A son of God? These may be good things to be as a Christian looking to love God with your Soul or identity.

A couple years ago I lived in walking distance from Duke University. Given someone was a Duke fan, or Duke Alumni, or had a lot of Duke Paraphernalia, they may have loved Duke University. How did they love Duke University? They loved Duke with their Soul or Identity. Someone with a Duke T-Shirt may be saying something about who he is, or was, or would like to be. When Duke wins or has done well in basketball, someone who loved Duke with their Soul or identity, they may have rejoiced? They felt good? In their soul, they rejoice, and feel a sense of happiness. That is where the soul is. Given anyone has been a sports fan at some point, and has identified as a fan of ___________ their soul rejoices when their team does well. Given I was to look up Soul in a Bible concordance, there are many of these feeling or sensing type verses where the soul is a place inside someone where there is passion. Someone loving God with Their Soul in a world of materialism and commercialism may have given up their Nike and Adidas, to be more as "Plain as John the Baptist?"

Given a musician signed a record contract, and said record contract was very strict, did said musician "Sell their Soul?" Given a musician has to sing all the songs said record company tells them to, and be at A or B place at a certain time, as said record company tells them to, and said musician has very little free will, would that be "Selling The Soul?" Given the record company was a servant of "The Purple Gang," or Kabbalists, or some other group not serving God, that may have been someone selling their soul to the devil? When we get the basics of what the Bible describes the Soul to be, there are a lot of interesting topics that come up. The Truth hurts. Knowledge brings sorrow. Ignorance is bliss? There is freedom in The Lord.

The Soul and Identity.

True Statements:

• The Song of Songs is in the Bible as a representation of God's Love for Israel or The Church.
• In the New Testament, The Church is a Bride for Christ.
• Christ is to man as a man is to woman or Christ is the head of man as man is the head of woman. (1 Corinthians 11:3)

Marriage has been an important part of The Bible and Faith and growing in understanding.

Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, (1 Peter 3:1)

Woman is meek before her husband. Man is meek before God. A woman loving her husband with her heart and soul may have taken his name. She is forging a new identity as Mrs. _____________. A married woman with a hyphenated last name is one foot in, one foot out? Who or what does she love more? Her husband or Feminism? Maybe she didn't quite want to leave her family and her old identity behind as a single female or "Daughter of?" Feminists tend towards socialism. Is a woman really married to her husband or more married to The State? Woman is meek before her husband. A man is meek before God.
Looking at the Soul like this, someone may be able to see God. (And Satan.) The Truth hurts. Knowledge brings sorrow. Ignorance is bliss?

Spirits

Given we are coming into an understanding of The Soul, what are Spirits? Spirits effect motivations. Here is a short list of some spirits mentioned.

• Deaf and dumb spirit (Mark 9:17-29)
• Lying spirit (II Chronicles 18:20-22)
• Perverse spirit (Isaiah 19:14; Romans 1:17-32)
• Seducing spirit (I Timothy 4:1)
• More at: Evil Spirits - Bible Study and Christian Teaching on Evil Spirits - Biblical Teachings

What are these Spirits doing? They are influencing. They are effecting motivations. Someone with a seducing spirit or spirit of prostitution may have been on tinder in the wrong way? Someone with a lying tongue may have been a habitual liar? Someone with one of these spirits, their character may have been molded a certain way. Their soul, who they are, may have been molded to something. Part of their identity, even if it was subconscious, may have been molded to something. Some Spirits are generational. They may have been passed down from Generation to Generation. There may have been generational curses on some families. (Deuteronomy 5:9) Some spirits someone may have picked up by being in sin, and being unrepentant. Someone's Soul or character may have been molded around something.

Given someone has God's Holy Spirit, they say "Jesus is Lord." They may tend to think about God, and talk about God a lot, and be prone to God-centric activities. Their Soul, and God's Holy Spirit, overtime, may have entwined. They are "One with God" leading towards an understanding of Theosis.

 

[WowLookADuck]

Depends on who that "someone" is, of course.

 

[Manonfire63]

In Philosophy/Theology, any philosopher who is making statements about The Soul or Spirits.......they are potentially engaging in a Mysticism. Were they of false shepherds bring people to God and the light of the Lord, or false shepherds?

Given we come into understand of The Soul and Spirits, we are potentially close to The Reality of God, headed towards understanding of things like exorcism. God is scary. Some people, they have worked to hide away God.

To Occult - To hide away.

Given someone understands Faith, he may be able to see God. He may be able to see Satan's schemes, working in a particular way, to lead people away from Faith. (2 Corinthians 2:11)

Part of Spiritual Warfare has been a war of words a war of thoughts. (2 Corinthians 10:5) How does man perceive himself? How does man perceive God?

 

[SetFree]

Matt 10:28
28 And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear Him Which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
KJV

Heb 4:12
12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
KJV

Jesus told us to not fear those who can kill our flesh body, but not our soul. In Ecclesiastes 12:5-7 it is revealed that if the "silver cord" is severed, meaning death of our flesh body, then the flesh goes back to the earthly elements where it came from, but our spirit goes back to God Who gave it. That "spirit" includes our soul, as they cannot be separated.

1 Kings 17 with Elijah covering the child with his body, and praying to The Father to allow the 'soul' of the child to come back into its flesh body, reveals the soul is joined with one's spirit which both leave at death of the flesh.

In 2 Corinthians 5, Apostle Paul showed that if our earthly tabernacle (i.e., our flesh body) were dissolved, we still have a building of God, a house not made with hands (i.e., a spirit body), eternal in the heavens...

2 Cor 5:1
5 For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
KJV

Paul taught that in the 'present tense', meaning we have that spirit body with soul in us right now.

Simply then, our spirit body with soul is of the heavenly dimension order of Spirit, and is not of material matter, but of Spirit. Thus we are dual in nature the way God made us. Per John 3:6, Lord Jesus showed that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit, showing the existence of 2 separate dimensions of existence, the earthly and the heavenly.

 

[Soulx3]

Certain details below are not from any of the accounts of the Four Evangelists, as they are incomplete, but rather from The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God, an expansion of the four Gospels of Christ, and The Notebooks, all by Jesus through His spokesperson, Maria Valtorta.

__________________________________________

Jesus says:​

What distinguishes animal-man from animal-brute?
"The soul." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. II)

Where does the soul of each man come from?
"From God and they belong to Him, but not even He violates the freedom of the soul, which is thus free to give itself or not." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. I)

Who is God?
"The most intelligent, powerful, perfect Spirit." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. III)

What is a soul? Why did God give man a soul?
"It is the true nobility of man, because of his soul, there is the blood of God, because a soul is the spiritual blood—as God is a Most Pure Spirit— of the Creator of man: of the eternal, Almighty Holy God. Because of the soul, which is in him, and which is alive as long as it is united to God, man is eternal, powerful, and holy. It is naturally inclined to worship because it remembers the One Who created it: God." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. II)

"This wonderful thing which is a soul, a thing created by God to give man His image and likeness as an unquestionable sign of His Most Holy Paternity, shows signs of the qualities characteristic of Him Who creates it. It is therefore intelligent, spiritual, free, immortal, like the Father Who created it. It is perfect when it originates from the divine thought and in the instant of its creation it is identical, for a thousandth of instant, with the soul of the first man: a perfection which understands the Truth through free gift. A thousandth of an instant. Then, once it is formed, it is stained by original sin. To make it clearer for you I will say that it is as if God were pregnant with the soul which He creates and the creature, in being born, were wounded by an indelible mark." This means while it is thought it is perfect. The creating thought lasts a thousandth of an instant. The thought then becomes actual fact, and the fact is subject to the law brought about by sin. (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. III)

"A soul becomes thus incarnate in a human body, bringing with it the memory of the Creator, that is of the Truth, as a secret gem in the mystery of its spiritual being. A baby is born. It may become good, very good, or wicked. It may become anything because it is endowed with free will. The angelical ministry throws light on its 'memories' and the tempter darkness. If man craves after light and thus for a greater and greater virtue, making his soul the master of his being, the faculty of remembering increases in the soul, as if virtue made the wall interposed between soul and God thinner and thinner. That is why virtuous people in every country perceive the Truth, not in a perfect way, as they are dulled by contrasting doctrines or by lethal ignorance, but in a sufficient manner to give pages of moral perfection to the peoples to whom they belong. This means the religion of virtue practiced heroically predisposes the soul to the true Religion and to the knowledge of God." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. III)

When does one receive their soul? Where is one's soul?
The soul is infused into the embryo when the latter is sufficiently formed to receive it. (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. II)

"It is in the whole of man. It contains you and is contained within you. When it leaves you, you become a corpse. When it is killed by a crime that man commits against himself, you are damned, separated from God forever. Our body was created by God to be the temple of the soul, which is the temple of God. It must, therefore, be kept honest, otherwise the soul will be robbed of God's friendship and of eternal life." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. II)

What does a soul in Grace possess?
"Love, and by possessing love it possesses God, that is the Father Who preserves it, the Son Who teaches it, the Spirit Who illuminates it. It therefore possesses Knowledge, Science, Wisdom, Light." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. I)

What removes Grace from a soul?
"Original sin and the mortal one." (The Gospel as Revealed to Me, or The Poem of the Man-God: Vol. I)

"In man there are two memories opposed to each other: the memory of the Infinite Good; the memory of the hereditary lustful poison. The first, was left by God for the consolation of man, fallen from his primeval and perfect Grace and Innocence, from that virginity of spirit which, except for Mary, was no longer a dowry among those born of man. The second memory, was left by Satan in the heart of Adam and in those of his descendants, with his assault of the innocent virginity of Adam in Eden.

Baptism annuls the stain but not the incitement. Grace infuses strength to conquer the incitement but does not annul it. It remains like a secret thorn to irritate the indelible scar of the Fault. Not the wound: the scar. But if you are not vigilant, the scar, if irritated and not treated with supernatural means, becomes a wound again.

In every man there are then two opposed forces which fight in him from birth till death and which constitute his test, his victory or his defeat with regard to his supernatural destiny.

You [Maria] ask Me why God leaves this incitement even after the restoration of Grace [in man]? Out of justice. All in God is justice. His every operation is justice and loving justice.

Has not God perhaps left the memory of Himself in the soul created by Him? That memory which is a mysterious source of light which guides to the Light, though sensed in a different way by every living spirit, as is demonstrated by the moral laws of the best [civilizations] and by the more or less vivid gleams of supernatural light in the various revealed religions. Though these latter possess only fragmentary notions, they already teach the existence of a Supreme Being and the duty to live justly in order to possess Him beyond life.

Thus similarly, besides this infinite goodness, God leaves [in you] the other memory represented by the thorn of incitement. This keeps your pride at heel. If you felt that you were pure and perfect men, you would become Lucifers, believing that you are equal to God. It keeps your good will vigilant. It makes your love for God heroic. And, through the Father's compassion, it renders your faults less grave in His Eyes. Because, if you did not have in yourselves that incitement which agitates and bites your senses and reason with the cunning of the ancient Serpent, who generates it, you would not be judged "with mercy."

But much is forgiven you because much in yourselves is aroused not by your pure will, but by the imponderable forces of that incitement—which you do not always succeed in repressing.

But do not afflict yourself, [Maria]. It, too, serves to give a crown of glory. Because temptation is temptation; it is not sin. Because temptation conquered, is victory. Because enduring that secret thorn, without the will consenting to its seductions, is heroic patience. But the Holy Spirit will speak to you again about this in the Pauline Epistles.

Stay at peace. And endure. And offer [your sufferings] to save those who do not know how to endure the inherited allurements, without yielding [to them]." (The Notebooks)