Ruach is the word used in Genesis 1:2, that the KJV translates as “the Spirit”: *And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. *
FWIW.
Perhaps … I’m curious what the Hebrew scholars have to say about it …
Which has always seemed a cop-out to me, particularly for “yes or no” questions like this. There may be mysteries that the human mind can’t comprehend and all that rot, but “boolean answers” aren’t one of them.
There’s a difference between “can’t comprehend” and “can’t know”. We can comprehend other beings having or not having souls, maybe, but we can’t know whether they do or not. Or at least, the only way we could know would be God telling us, but E has apparently chosen not to do so, for reasons of Es own.
What about angels and such–do they have souls in Christian or Jewish theology?
Literally
You will have no other gods before my face.
Or if you want exact
Not shall have to you, gods other, beside my face.
That pretty much puts the kibosh on kali, real or imaginary.
Unless you can imagine a place the face of God is not?
One of the reasons I turned from christianity was the denial of animal souls, which are only logical if one accepts souls. Apart from the present Pope most Catholics have been particularly bad on the question, Prottie sects are generally more accepting, Lutherans and Wesley himself being more positive than most; however since christian theology is sprung from the dubious reasoning of pedantic ancient Hebrews it is not surprising it is bad.
Most theology is an exercise in conceit; and in itself man-centred, confidently expounding ideas allegedly revealed in order to exercise mental power over others.
Muslim authorities are just as divided; Buddhism is of course OK, but ultimately implies nobeing for all; Mormons are the best of all.
Spiritualism is also unclear, some saying yes, some saying animals go to their ‘group soul’ a horrific concept, and some saying, like Billy Graham that they will be in Heaven if the human who loved them needs them — a wholly ridiculous conditional concept.
Byron was no religionist, and certainly often annoying, yet:
Denied in heaven the soul he held on earth –
While man, vain insect ! hopes to be forgiven,
And claims himself a sole exclusive heaven.
And there in lies the problem, perhaps this isn’t a yes/no answer. Perhaps there are different levels/types of souls. You need to be open to shades of gray answers because the world isn’t always black and white or yes and no. Do animals have human type souls, probably not. Do they have spirit type souls, maybe but who is to know? God knows and it’s not really important that you don’t know, nice if you do but not necessary for you to definitely know in order to go on living your life.
Is light a wave or a particle?
Regards,
Shodan
Since the (General) question is about what the Bible says, I should point out that (unless I’m missing something), the Bible doesn’t say that whether or not animals have souls is something that only God knows or can know. Rather, it just doesn’t say at all.
See post #2. Spirit can be interpreted as meaning soul or a type of soul.
And anytime someone in the Bible ask who knows, the answer is always God knows. God knows all and comprehends all, it’s a standard response. So when someone is asking a rhetorical question such as “who knows?” it is a learning experience about Gods complete understanding and knowledge of everything, he is omniscient.
On distinctions among “Nefesh, Neshama, and Ruach”–knock yourself out.
It was always my understanding, from the plain meaning and feeling of the extraordinary psalm and prayer of praise beginning with “nefesh kol chai”–the nefesh of all living things [kol=all; chai=“life” (i.e., life, period)] that of course animals have it. And, although somewhere I believe this is lies in the Psalms as plain meaning when sheep dance – certainly it is hermeneutically plain in Job–the lion roaring, the whale doing whatever whales do–these animals declare the handiwork of God.(As do the planets and stars, so there goes that argument, I now see…)
Not only that, every time you eat a piece of fruit, you say/think the blessing:
Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha-olam, borei n’fashot [plural feminine] rabot v’chesronan, al kol ma she-barata, l’hachayot bahem nefesh kol chai, baruch chei ha-olamim.
In a more flowery translation than usual:
Blessed be You, the One who created so many different living things, all needing each other, to make one Life interwoven through them all, as one soul. Blessed be the Life of all worlds.
Does an animal have a human soul?
No and why would it want one?
It is alive though, and so is more than a random blob of dust and elements and chemicals.
And the life came from God, so when i dies, it will return to god, it does not just cease to exist.
It is said by Christians that an animals paradise is already had on earth and so when it dies it is gone exists no more.
But i doubt that is true, in the bible even the condemned do not cease to exist.
And i can see no God that creates life looking at a beaten and abused animal and deciding that yep it already had it’s paradise and calling it good.
If that were the case, why would he command the Jews to observe respect and compassion even for the animals they eat?
He did not give them full free will with the ability to randomly think and reason and such, but he did give them the ability to love and sacrifice and the ability to be individuals and have personalities.
God isn’t going to create that just to be a throw away item afterwards, not to me anyways.
I think you can tell by looking at the universe we know, that life was not a trivial thing that he just decided to sprinkle everyplace, im pretty sure he holds even the lowest order in great regard.
By some Christians, maybe.
No. See, that wasn’t so hard.
This is a pretty muddled thread, and I doubt i can help, but I can try.
I don’t know enough (or any, really) Latin, Greek or Hebrew. But if someone does, and can fit it to the theology I was taught, or for the love of Og, refute what I was taught and help the OP out, that’d be great.
We were working fine with this premise up thread. As we worked with the Latin words “animus” and “anima”.
So, as briefly as I can put it:
Humans have a soul, the animus, the seat of our rationality. Wherein we accept or reject God. We need this to get to heaven, and without it we can’t. We care for one another, because its the right thing to do. Yeah, I typed that. :rolleyes:
Animals have a spirit, the anima, the seat of … I dunno, being an animal. As distinct from being a plant or a rock. They can’t get to heaven, because they really aren’t vested in this whole God thing. They behave, the way instinct directs, and no one when writing the bible cared that much about horses and dogs, their behavior, and what happened when they died. Roy Rodgers is distraught. People whole love their “oogie moogie snookoms” more than another human didn’t write the Bible.
Thing is, the whole “animus” and “anima” logic is crap and we all know it. There’s no way to be sure of an animus, and the anima, needed to be an animal isn’t necessary for an animal to have senses and move. And we can’t use soul/spirit to describe chimp behavior, dolphin behaviors, and sentient robots (once we start building those.)
Heck, as was stated upthread, we have 3 words in Hebrew that are used for soul.
So the OP may have to accept that there is a tradition in a number of faiths that animals don’t have soul and don’t go to heaven. And a distinct lack of textual corroboration in the Bible as translated from Hebrew to Greek to Latin to King James version.
This is why I stopped reading the Bible. If I’m going to read a contemporary American English version of the KJV of the Latin of the Greek of the Hebrew text, then I might as well just go to the Westboro chuch and just not do what those bigots say. At least then the duplicity is honest.
Being that the Bible, the texts it is derived from, is not written for animals and does not even attempt to answer too much that does not pertain to who is God, where did we come, from how did we get here and how are we supposed to live, why would one expect it to go into any detail or make much mention of how god puts life into his other creatures nor how he receives them back when their life has finished?
