16 June 2025
Credo
The historical view of Christianity on the nature of human beings is one of anthropological dualism, that is, the view that each human being has a soul and a physical body. This view was held by major Christian thinkers like Augustine and Aquinas, and is currently advocated by philosophers like Richard Swinburne and J.P. Moreland. However, historians like Adolf Harnack have alleged that anthropological dualism is a consequence of the influence of Greek Platonism on Christian thought. More recently, scholars like Joel Green and Nancey Murphy maintain that the biblical view of man is that of monism which regards human beings not as immaterial or soulish beings, but as holistic, physically embodied and relational beings. Monism argues that according to the Bible, a human being is not divided into separate parts, i.e. body, soul and spirit. It is a unified or holistic self. Furthermore, since human existence requires bodily existence, there is no possibility of disembodied existence of the soul after death.
Critics of dualism argue that the biblical terms like “soul” and “spirit” do not describe different parts of a human being, but rather, they describe the whole person from different perspectives. This debate calls for a closer look at the biblical terms used to describe human nature: flesh (bāsār), soul (nepeš) and spirit (rûaḥ).
(1) Bāsār, flesh and nepeš, soul
The creation account of man in the Book of Genesis depicts man as dualistic. Man is a creature of flesh (bāsār). Bāsār is composed of dust (āfār) (Gen. 1:26). However, an additional non-physical element, soul (nepeš) is added to him. “Then the LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature (נֶפֶשׁ חַיַּה nepeš ḥayyâ)” (Gen. 2:7). It should be noted that soul (nepeš) refers to the entire man. Nepeš eventually is equated with the whole man (Gen. 34:3; Psa. 42:2), an individual soul. Hence, a man can say, “my soul lives” or “let my soul die” (Judg. 16:30; Num. 23:10). On the other hand, Scripture also describes death as the departure of the soul to the place of the dead (Gen. 35:18; Job 10:20-22). Nepeš is at once physical and spiritual.
(2) Rûaḥ, Spirit
Spirit (rûaḥ) can refer to wind or human breath. Rûaḥ is used as a parallel term for “the breath of life” (nəšāmâ) (Gen. 2:7). Job 34:14 says that “if he [God] should gather to himself his spirit (rûaḥ) and his breath (nəšāmâ), all flesh would perish together, and man would return to dust.” Rûaḥ is vital power which God gives to animate all living creatures. Conversely, at death the body returns to dust, but the spirit returns to God (Gen. 3:19; Eccl. 12:7).
(3) Flesh (bāsār) and spirit (rûaḥ) combine to form the soul (nepeš). Rûaḥ is the life-power, the animating dynamic of a person while soul (nepeš) is the more personal or subjective condition of life since it is the seat of emotions and desires.
Barton Payne gives a helpful chart which maps the relationship between the constituent elements of man.
Turning to the New Testament, Paul uses the customary Greek terms for body, soul and spirit. However, Paul uses them in his own distinctive way. Spirit (pneuma) refers to one’s inner self viewed in terms of relationship to God and to other people; Soul (psyche) refers to the vitality of the individual from the point of view of one’s body and flesh. But psyche goes beyond its relationship with bodily life in that it involves the whole personality, that is, the intellectual and emotional aspects of the whole person. G. E. Ladd observes that “Paul never speaks of the salvation of the soul, nor is there any intimation of the pre-existence of the soul. “Psyche is that specifically human state of being alive which inheres in man as a striving, willing, purposing self.”
The question arises whether monism, which argues that there is no disembodied existence after biological death, is consistent with Scripture. In the Old Testament, death involves disintegration of a person’s vital power, cessation of bodily life, and separation of the body and the soul (nepeš) (Gen. 35:18; 1 Kings 19:4). Everyone who dies is described as going to Sheol (שְׁאוֹל) (Psa. 31:17; Gen. 37:5; Job 14:13). Sheol can be just a reference to a grave, but it also refers to the abode of the dead, that is, the underworld. The denizens of Sheol, that is, the spirits or shades (רְפָאִים֙ rəpāʾîm) of Sheol are described as being reduced to a weak and shadowy existence, but they also possess some form of consciousness (Isa. 14: 9-11). This post-mortem consciousness in Sheol would seem to contradict the claims of monism.
In the New Testament, Jesus regards psyche as an entity in the individual standing over against his or her body and capable of salvation. He contrasts the death of the body and the destruction of the soul (Mt. 10:28). John saw the souls (psychas) of the martyrs under the altar crying out to God (Rev. 6:9-10); these souls will be resurrected during the second coming of Christ (Rev. 20:4).
Paul does not speak about the survival of either soul or spirit after the death of the body like the Greek philosophers. But he does speak about the human being surviving death. With death, one is “away from the body…at home with the Lord” (2 Cor. 5:1-8). Furthermore, the post-mortem existence is not one of a disembodied spirit as God will ‘clothe’ us with a new and better garment. Paul is probably pointing to an intermediate body which awaits the believer immediately after death and before the final resurrection. Paul also expresses his optimism about survival after death when he tells the Philippians that his “desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better” (Phil. 1: 23-24). Paul climaxes his hope with the declaration that the coming of Christ will mean the transformation of our lowly bodies into the likeness of Christ’s glorious body (Phil. 4:3-21), or a spiritual body (1 Cor. 15:44).
The contrast between Paul’s anthropology and Platonic anthropology is evident. While Platonic anthropology seeks out ways for the soul to be released from its bodily imprisonment, Paul emphasizes that God’s redemption is not merely salvation of the soul; it includes the redemption of the body. Salvation involves the transformation of our fragile present bodies into glorified bodies. Unlike Greek thought, the essence of Christian hope of the perfect life after death is one of a glorified bodily existence.
To summarize, the Bible regards human beings as dualistic, as being both bodily and spiritual. However, biblical dualism should not be identified with Platonic dualism unreservedly. In contrast to Platonic thought, there is no biblical text which unambiguously suggests that (1) the soul, spirit and the body function independently of the other and (2) soul/spirit, being spiritual, is dichotomized from the organic functions of a living person. Indeed, the Bible views human beings holistically, in that all their psychosomatic faculties work together as an integrated unity. John Cooper highlights the distinctiveness of biblical holism which
affirms the functional unity of some entity in its totality, the integration and interrelation of all the parts in the existence and proper operation of the whole…It implies that the parts do not operate independently within the whole, and that they would not necessarily continue to have all the same properties and functions if the whole were broken up…And holism does not necessarily imply that if the whole is broken up, all parts disintegrate into chaos or nothingness. Secondary systems might continue to exist, although without all the properties and capacities they had when integrated within the whole. [John Cooper, Body, Soul and Life Everlasting (Eerdmans, 2000). p. 45]
Cooper distinguishes between “ontological holism” (which he rejects) and “functional holism” (which he accepts). Ontological holism asserts that the existence of the whole functional system is a necessary condition for the continued self-identical existence of the parts of the whole. If the system breaks up, the parts cease to exist. As such, since humans are “indissoluble unities” there can be no disembodied existence of the soul after death. By contrast, “functional holism” recognizes the integration and interrelation of all the parts in the existence and proper operation of the whole, without assuming that each part would necessarily cease to function or disintegrate into nothingness if the whole were broken up. Cooper cites the example of water or H2O: Both hydrogen and oxygen atoms retain their atomic integrity after they are separated by electrolysis. Likewise, the spirit/soul (consciousness) of a person continues to exist after the death of the person (biological organism).
The Bible shares some affinities with Platonic dualism in regarding the human person as comprising both physical existence and soul-spirit existence. Furthermore, the Bible is dualistic since it envisages some form of provisional human existence in the intermediate state after biological death. But in contrast to Platonic dualism, the Bible teaches that complete personhood is premised on one living a fully integrated existence (holism). To conclude, we may describe biblical anthropology as either “holistic-dualism” or “dualistic holism”.
