Have you ever heard a pastor say something like, "Our job is to win as many souls as possible" or something to that affect? I have. And it bothers me. The main reason is because it promotes (in my opinion) a lazy Christianity--one where we have no concern for justice NOW or care of creation. I also think it downplays (probably not intentionally, but it does, nonetheless) resurrection and new creation. And so when I read this essay by Wendell Berry on "Christianity and the Survival of Creation" in his book, Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community, it struck a chord with me. Here it is:
"Genesis 2:7...gives the process by which Adam was created: '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.' My mind, like most people's, has been deeply influenced by dualism, and I can see how dualistic minds deal with this verse. They conclude that the formula for man-making is man = body + soul. But that conclusion cannot be derived, except by violence, from Genesis 2:7, which is not dualistic. The formula given in Genesis 2:7 is not man = body + soul; the formula there is soul = dust + breath. According to this verse, God did not make a body and put a soul into it, like a letter into an envelope. He formed man of dust; then, by breathing His breath into it, He made the dust live. The dust, formed as man and made to live, did not embody a soul; it became a soul. 'Soul' here refers to the whole creature. Humanity is thus presented to us, in Adam, not as a creature of two discrete parts temporarily glued together but as a single mystery.
"We can see how easy it is to fall into the dualism of body and soul when talking about the inescapable worldly dualities of good and evil or time and eternity. And we can see how easy it is, when Jesus says, 'For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?' to assume that he is condemning the world and appreciating the disembodied soul. But if we give to "soul" here the sense that it has in Genesis 2:7, we see that he is doing no such thing. He is warning that in pursuit of so-called material possessions, we can lose our understanding of ourselves as "living souls"--that is, as creatures of God, members of the holy community of Creation. We can lose the possibility of the atonement of that membership. For we are free, if we choose, to make a duality of our one living soul by disowning the breath of God that is our fundamental bond with one another and with other creatures."
2 comments:
Hey this is Daniel... This article is fantastic and it makes perfect sense. Why would Jesus make a dualistic statement when He fully understands the Trinity and our "imageness" of our Creator. He realized the relationship we have that is a total mystery with God and ourselves. I really don't know how to word that, but in my mind that is what it sounds like. Good post!
That makes sense Daniel. It just happened again today at church. The whole talk about Jesus wanting to save our souls heard over and over again by the average lay member, in my opinion, leads to this (very unbiblical) image of disembodied spirits "in heaven" (up in the sky?) after death and speaks very little (if at all) to the resurrection of our physical bodies and the new (recreated), physical earth that we will inhabit.
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