The Deep Mystery (Pt. 2)   --   "Ignition Point"

Last time we met, we discussed Genesis 2:7’s detailed break-down of how (and of what) human beings are actually composed.  We have a body (made from the dust), and we are energised by the “breath of life” (spirit of life) that God gives to us.  If either of these things is missing, so is the person in question.  Only when they are working in conjunction is there a “person.”  The parts themselves do not constitute a “soul” / “person” / “being”.

Consider it this way.   Imagine a car (or any type of vehicle you might prefer: boat, airplane, 18-wheeler, etc).  That vehicle is composed of various bits (wheels, an engine, doors, steering wheels, etc), all contributing to the functioning of that very vehicle.   However, if you have no way to start that vehicle (say, with a “key”?) then that convoluted assembly of various parts is really just a pile of plastic and metal, for the most part.   The “key” is needed to start the engine.  A key is what gets everything working together.   In other words, without the key, you got a great paperweight (if you can move it onto the paper, that is).

The same can be said for the “breath of life” that God gives to us.  It’s not the vehicle itself.  It’s what puts the vehicle in motion.  It's the "ignition point." But if you don’t have the key, you have a big problem.  You've got no "ignition" happening.

Similiarly, if we don’t have God’s breath in our bodies, we are “toast.”  Dead as a door nail.  About as energised as one, too.

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Interestingly, the Scriptures back up this idea.  Psalm 104:24-30 (NLT) says it this way:

    “O Lord, what a variety of things you have made! In wisdom you have made them all.
    
    The earth is full of your creatures. Here is the ocean, vast and wide, teeming with life of every kind,             both large and small. See the ships sailing along, and Leviathan, which you made to play in the sea.

    They all depend on you to give them food as they need it. When you supply it, they gather it. You open     your hand to feed them, and they are richly satisfied. But if you turn away from them, they panic. When     you take away their breath, they die and turn again to dust.  When you give them your breath, life is            created, and you renew the face of the earth.”     (Emboldening added for emphasis)

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Notice that this gift of “breath” is given to all creatures, and here it is focused especially on the animal kingdom being the ones needing this blessing.  Both humans and animals rely on the breath that God gives to animate them, to give them “life”, enabling them to be who or what they are.  Without His Gift of breath, back to dust they return.

This is worth noting.  All of creation, human kind animal kind, are made from the dust, and are dependent on this breath (animating life force) from God.  But once again, please don’t mistake this gift of the breath for something that lives on after death.  It is merely that which enables being to move about and think and be what they are.  But once it is “taken away”, once this mortal life ends, then the whole being ceases to be entirely. 

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Or lets think of it another way:  how many people actually believe that animals have souls?  (There may be more than you think, actually! See an ancient argument leaning toward this in Ecclesiastes 3:18-21)  Many people these days have started to wonder why animals shouldn’t be though to have “souls” that live on (I think in an attempt to be “fair”).  Others (such as Hinduism) believe in the transmigration of souls, and so being who are people today and who die, may indeed become a cow or dog later on today.  Thus, this worldview / religious viewpoint makes room for the notion of animals having souls, as well.  

But is that what the Bible actually teaches?

Interestingly, the same text cited above (Ps. 104:24-30) differs in some key ways in other translations.   Check out the last couple of verses of that same section in the New American Standard Bible (NASB1995):

    “You give to them, they gather it up; You open Your hand, they are satisfied with good. You     hide Your face, they are dismayed; You take away their spirit, they expire And return to             their dust. You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; And You renew the face of the             ground.”  (Ps. 104:28-30)

This translation freely uses the word “spirit” (instead of “breath”, as the NLT) does.  But why?  Aren’t these two different words?  If so, why the difference?

Well, interestingly, the word translated here as both “breath” and “spirit” are derived from the same Hebrew word:  “ruach”, which can be translated a number of ways, but most often will be translated as “breath”, “wind”, or “spirit.”

Yes.  That’s right.  

ONE Hebrew word can translated into THREE separate English words!

(See why translators have a bit of a challenge figuring things out sometimes?)

Now that we realize that the Bible translators aren’t trying to fool us, it becomes our job to try and figure out which of these translations is the better.  Is one of them more consistent with what we’ve seen so far?

Well, we looked at Genesis 2:7 before.  And today we looked as Psalm 104 (especially verses 28-30).  Both of them speak of God being the source of life.  Both speak of men and animals as having come from the dust.  But one of them speaks of God giving “spirit” and one argues in favour of “breath.”  Which one is more consistent with Gen. 2:7?

Obviously, in this case, the “breath”.  In fact, as far as I could search on Biblegateway.com, there isn’t a single English translation on there that renders “ruach” anything but “breath” in that verse.

So for the sake of consistency, why not just keep it as such?  It also helps us to avoid misunderstandings that arise when we use the word “spirit” (or “soul”), which is something we’ll be looking at next time we share.

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But before we finish up here today, let’s also consider one other verse:  Ecclesiastes 12:7.  I’ll borrow the KJV in sharing it:

      ““Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who     gave it.”

This verse happens in a context where the writer of the book (whom many think may have been Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived) argues in favour of putting God as the top priority in your life, especially at an early age, before you start to age and things go all pear-shaped.   The writer uses a number of intriguing metaphors, all seemingly chosen to indicate the onset of “death” in way or another (e.g., vv. 2-6)   And thus he ends his list with verse seven.

Notice the parallels it has to Genesis 2:7.

    — Dust returning to the earth
    — God having given something

Note the KJV (along with most Bibles, as far as I am aware), uses the word “spirit” here though.  

Notice how that differs from the Gen. 2 context?  Gen. 2 used “breath”, but the translators here chose “spirit”, even though if you look carefully at Eccl. 12:7, you’ll see it’s an exact reversal of Gen. 2:7!  

Once again, for the sake of consistency, we can see that the route that would cause the least challenge would be to maintain the usage of the same word used in Gen. 2:7 here.  This would also alleviate any temptation for people to think that Eccl. 12:7 is indicating that people somehow “float off up into Heaven” or something when you die, rather than it merely being the reverse of the transaction made in Gen. 2:7.  
In other words, the breath given us at birth leaves us at death.  There is nothing of “us” in this.  It is simply the energising force that has enlivened us.  But once that “key” is out of the “ignition”, the engine shuts off, and all we have going for us is a deteriorating pile of carbon.  End of story.  

I know it may not sound like a ‘happy” ending at this point in time.  But please trust me.  There’s more to this story than we’ve seen so far.  Don’t worry.

The Deep Mystery (Pt. 1)  -- Looking More Closely at Genesis 2:7

[Apologies.  I've been away from my desk (to engage in writing) longer than I had originally expected.]

As I mentioned in my last entry, people are perennially delving into the great and deep mystery of what happens when you die.   The obvious challenge with this is that you don't typically have people "coming back from" death. It's essentially a one-way trip.  There are no brochures detailing what to expect.

Admittedly, you do have a small class of people who will sometimes claim to have died "for 'x' number of minutes" and in that time claim to have seen / experienced all sorts of incredible things (whether it be encountering departed loved ones; figures from their religious faith traditions; spirit creatures; horrors beyond description; hellish scenes of torture being applied to those who have done evil in their earthly lives; pleasures and joy beyond the human ability to communicate, etc). Sometimes these are referred to as "near-death experiences."  Some of these tales have later been exposed as falsifications, people telling stories for money, fame, or both.  Others cling to the claim that what they saw was what they experienced, and therefore, what the "other side" is like.   How does one choose whether to trust in these testimonies or not?  Is there a way to measure or gauge what is true about such claims?  Or just to know what the reality is about this mystery called "death"? 

To cut a long story short (or to truncate a rather lengthy argument), I think it safe to say that the Seventh-day Adventist faith tradition has chosen to trust the Bible as a place where truth can be mined and gained, and as an authority with regard to such questions.  Thus, the following articles are offered on the topic, utilising the teachings of Scripture to demonstrate and uncover what has been held as mysterious and unknowable for most of human history.  There have obviously been plenty of theories about the subject, but as we shall see, the Bible takes a particular stance on the matter, one which is consistent throughout the Book itself.

So let us begin.

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Genesis 2:7 (KJV) — “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

Genesis 2:7  (NASB1995) — “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."

I don’t think it would be wrong to say that the foundational text for exploring this matter has been Genesis 2:7, since it addresses the very creation of humankind, and teaches some valuable insights that can then be applied throughout the rest of the Biblical narrative.  

You’ll likely notice I’ve used not one, but two different Bible translations in this case.  I’ve done so because many love the KJV, and consider it to have its own inherent authority.  But I’ve also chosen the more contemporary (yet still conservative) New American Standard Bible (1995 version) because of what it demonstrates in the vernacular (common way of speaking).  But I’ll elaborate upon this more shortly.

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The text here is set in the context of the Creation of this world by an Almighty Deity known here has “The Lord God.”  This Being chooses to initiate human life through what appears to be a rather crude process: He simply gathers up some of the carbon material that this world is made from and shapes a bipedal form from it.   Imagine, if you will, a mannequin, or a sand person one might make at the beach.  It is shaped like us, but it is inert, just a piece of wonderful art that is there for the moment, but will most likely disappear at the next windstorm or rainfall.  

Until, that is, God does something additional.  It says that He breathed into this lifeless simulacram the “breath of life.”  This action is what transforms the storyline from a cosmic origin story merely told about a planet to one about those who then up inhabiting that planet ever after.  It is at this precise moment that “mankind” / “humankind” enter the stage of the Biblical narrative.   And this “introduction” of them into reality at this point of the story really needs to be emphasised, precisely because they were not there before this.  Humanity did not exist before this moment in time.  They were not waiting “spiritually” in the wings for a physical form to be afforded them, like moving into a new house.  This is the inception point of all those who would inhabit this planet ever after.

Why this emphasis?  Because some argue that the “substance” of humanity is to be found in the ethereal, the spiritual, the realm of the non-corporeal.   Some even go so far as to argue that God had made “human spirits” beforehand, and then decided (for whatever reason) to then place those “spirits” into physical bodies (again, for whatever reason).    But it needs to be pointed out that this is not what the story here indicates at all (nor ever after in the remainder of the Biblical corpus).

Once God chose to impart this Gift of breath (read: life) to this dirt dummy, a most incredible transformation took place.  The inert took on initiative.  That which had not existed suddenly did. Some refer to this as the “miracle of Creation”, and indeed, it is not difficult to see why.  Only an Omnipotent being could effect such an event.  It happened by the will of God in that moment, and proceeded from there.

This “breath” should not be understood nor confused with the popular misconception of “spirit” or “soul” that sees the life-giving energy of God as being the same thing as having a non-corporeal “copy” of yourself residing within you, like a driver who steers a car.  The “breath of God” is that which sustains life, that which empowers all life on earth, in fact.

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But we must be certain that we do not confuse the current (arguably global) misunderstanding of the definition of “spirit” / “soul” (as non-corporeal entity which is effectively immortal and everlasting), with what the Bible talks about here.  Notice especially what the Kings James Bible argues in favour of here; that once this Gift from God was given to this earthy shell, something marvellous occurred…but it is not that which you may well think occurred.  Note that the text says that “man became a living soul”.  Read that again.  Make sure you haven’t missed what it’s getting at.   Notice what it is not saying.   The text does not read:  “And man received a living soul”, but that “…he became a living soul.”  

Did you catch that?  See the difference? 

So often the popularised conception is that we are merely “shells” walking around, carrying this “soul” or “spirit” within us, just waiting to be released into the great Unknown to go on to fulfil whatever destiny we might envision for it (usually according to our personal or shared set of beliefs gained from our family, culture, religious background, or what have you).  

And people are free to believe what they will, but if we are to avoid being disingenuous, we should be willing to acknowledge that this starting text in the Biblical corpus does not argue in favour of the existence of a “ghost” in our “machines”! Quite to the contrary, in fact.  Man does not receive a living soul, but instead becomes that very thing! This is significant for our appreciation of all that yet remains to be considered in the overall context of the Bible.  If we are “souls”, that will very likely have a massive impact on the way that we then begin to understand and talk about who we are, and what happens to us when we die.  In the very least, we will have to start refraining from saying that when we die our “souls” go on to some other activity, whether above, below, or beyond Somewhere.  Biblically-speaking, that very phrase becomes nonsensical.  When you die, you, “the soul”, cease to exist!  That is the point that needs to be appreciated here! 

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Let’s try approaching this text from another angle.  Imagine for a moment that we try to turn this into a mathematical formula of sorts.  In this case, Genesis 2:7 would look something like this:

                [Formula 1]    Body  +  Breath of God  =  Living Soul (aka “Person” / Being”)

That seems straightforward enough, doesn’t it?

But what then happens if you should choose to reverse this formula?

         [Formula 2]   Living Soul (aka “Person” / Being”) — Breath of God  =   Body 

Again, a fairly straightforward proposition, right?

But this is where (and I have seen this so many times) people start to get really confused, and think that I am saying something other than what I am actually saying.   For example, in Formula 2, people tend not have a problem with the concept of a “body” being left after death.  We all know that is what happens.  You bury bodies.  You cremate bodies.  You entomb bodies. Yes.  We get it.

But what people don’t seem to appreciate as much is that you, the one we have been referring to a s “living soul” (a person / a being) no longer exists at this point in time.  They are usually willing to recognise that you may not be physically present, but in their grasp of the situation, you have merely shifted over to a non-corporeal form, a spiritual form, if you will.  But is that what the text (in reverse) is indicating? 

Let’s put Formula 2 in different words, shall we, and see if it makes a difference?

    A HUMAN BEING WHO LOSES OR HAS TAKEN AWAY FROM THEMSELVES THE BREATH (SPARK  / ENERGY) OF LIFE ENDS UP SIMPLY AS AN INERT CORPSE, A PILE OF INANIMATE CARBON. END OF STORY.   

See the difference now?

There is no “And then…” when it comes to any sort of transmigration of the “breath” (which people far too often equate with the mistaken definition of “spirit”) leaving the body.  The “breath” which God gave is not to be understood as the core definition of who we are. It is merely the source of life and energy afforded us by the grace of God, but it is by no means eternal nor immortal. 

There is no “And then….”

Death is an ending to the existence of that person / soul / individual / being.  Full stop. 

 

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But, some may ask, doesn’t the Bible teach that man is going to live forever?  Isn’t that one of the basic tenets of the Christian faith?  How can one of the first verses in the Bible seemingly contradict such a long-standing teaching?  (Or does it?).   Come back next time and we’ll go deeper on this.