What is the origin of ''souls''?

Question

When was the term soul first utilized and in what religion. What was the inital description of a soul. Finally what does the word soul represent for you.

Thanks a krabajillion!

Answer 1

The Jews got this idea, not from the Bible, but from the Greeks. Between the seventh and fifth centuries B.C.E., the concept seems to have made its way from mysterious Greek religious cults to Greek philosophy. The idea of an afterlife where bad souls would receive painful retribution had long held great appeal, and the notion took shape and spread. Philosophers debated endlessly on the precise nature of the soul. Homer claimed that the soul flitted off at the time of death, making an audible buzzing, chirping, or rustling sound. Epicurus said that the soul actually had mass and was, therefore, an infinitesimal body.

But perhaps the greatest proponent of the immortal soul was the Greek philosopher Plato, of the fourth century B.C.E. His description of the death of his teacher, Socrates, reveals convictions much like those of the Zealots of Masada centuries later.

It was evidently during the Maccabean period, in the second century before Christ, that Jews began to assimilate this teaching from the Greeks. In the first century C.E., Josephus tells us that the Pharisees and the Essenes, powerful Jewish religious groups, espoused this doctrine. Some poetry that was probably composed in that era reflects the same belief.

This is what I believe a soul is: at Genesis 2:7: “Jehovah God proceeded to form the man out of dust from the ground and to blow into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man came to be a living soul.” Note that the first man “came to be” a soul. That is to say, Adam did not have a soul; he was a soul, just as someone who becomes a doctor is a doctor. The word “soul,” then, here describes the whole person.

The first-century Christians did not view the soul as the Greeks did. Consider, for example, the death of Jesus’ friend Lazarus. If Lazarus had had an immortal soul that flitted off, free and happy, at the time of death, would not the account in John chapter 11 read very differently? Surely Jesus would have told his followers if Lazarus was alive and well and conscious in heaven; on the contrary, he echoed the Hebrew Scriptures and told them that Lazarus was asleep, unconscious. Surely Jesus would have rejoiced if his friend was enjoying a wonderful new existence; instead, we find him weeping publicly over this death. (Verse 35) Surely, if Lazarus’ soul had been in heaven, reveling in blissful immortality, Jesus would never have been so cruel as to summon him back to live a few more years in the “prison” of an imperfect physical body amid sick and dying mankind.

Answer 2

For you, and for Ms. Kristevonne (who has "come to the belief that catholics shield their faith and their monks regardless of how so much they're proven the mistake and it doesn't matter what crimes they devote. They are taught from delivery ..."): I am a Catholic, I was once now not "taught from delivery" however modified as a center-elderly grownup. Formerly Baptist, while I learn and studied Scripture and when put next it to what I was once listening to from the pulpit, there was once particularly a bit of lacking. So it was once the Bible that led me proper to the doorways of the Catholic Church. I discover not anything in Catholic doctrine that's unscriptural. And feel me, my dating with Christ is far nearer now then ever earlier than. According to the Gordon-Conwell Seminary -- NOT a Catholic tuition, however a Protestant one -- absolutely ninety% of Christian evangelization is directed closer to OTHER CHRISTIANS (sure, that involves Catholics) instead than to humans who have no idea Christ. Shouldn't you be available in the market with the ten% who're honestly obeying the Great Commission given through Christ, alternatively of losing time right here with anti-Catholic blather? Or is truly evangelization too dicy, face-to-face? Edited: If you're real in a Muslim nation, and I will take you at your phrase approximately that, then I will hold you in prayer. You are unsuitable approximately the Catholic Church, however you are additionally a brother in a possibly perilous trouble. Whether you keep in mind me a sister or now not is not valuable.

Answer 3

The word soul was first used by the Greek philosophers to describe the living essence of a person - what made them alive. The word soul in the New Testament of the Bible is part of the tripartite nature of a person - body, soul and spirit. The soul is made up of the mind, motions and will.

Answer 4

Don't know the origin of the word but we are spiritual beings (souls) having a human experience.

Answer 5

I don't know the origin of the word, but its probably something Greek. I'm guessing souls started to be 'fact' in the ancient and prehistoric world because of the fear of death.

Answer 6

jewish...for i breathed into him the breath of life and He became a living soul...Genesis..its the flesh...but God will keep our memories at death..