From
BIBLE VS. TRADITION (1853):
THE SOUL NOT A GHOST. 17
without measure." The same reasoning would show that
man himself, as existing in this life, is a ghost, for God is
called a man, Exo. 15 : 3, " The Lord is a man of war."
The same principle of false reasoning would convert a
man's heart and eyes, as well as the heart and eyes of
beasts into so many ghosts, for they are called by the
same name as the eyes and heart, hands, and feet of God.
And a tree must have sense and feeling, because it is said
to have life as well as men. But what sort of theology
is this ? Cannot God possess an attribute that may be
entirely spiritual, yet called by the same name as one in
man that may be entirely corporeal ? If he cannot, then
how shall he be able, out of these stones, to raise up
children unto Abraham ? Matt. 3 : 9. Surely the souls
of these children would be corporeal, if made out of stones.
Again, God's soul cannot be separated from himself;
for if it can, then is he two Gods. " But to us there is
but one God." 1 Oor. 8 : 6. Allow God's soul to be him-
self as nephesh when applied to God, is twice translated.
Jer. 51 : 14, " The Lord of hosts hath sworn by his ne-
phesh" (by himself). Also in Amos 6:8; or him, as in
Pro. 6 : 16. " These six things doth the Lord hate, yea,
seven are an abomination of his (nephesh,) of him ;" and
we obtain the correct idea. As nephesh, the soul, com-
prehends the whole being of God, so does the same term
comprehend the whole being of man ; and never means a
principle that can live independently of the man or beast,
to both of which the term nephesh is indiscriminately ap-
plied ; and is twenty -five times correctly translated " them-
selves." Let two examples suffice for the present. " He
teareth (his nephesh) himself in his anger." Job 18:4. Did
Job tear his immaterial and immortal ghost ? u Back-
sliding Israel hath justified herself, (her nephesh) more
than treacherous Judah." Jer. 3:11. Has a nation a
ghost ?
Nay, but every nation has a being. Here, then, the
arguments of Luther Lee, and those of like (" ptrecious .?")
faith, are overthrown by the translators themselves, though
they were believers in the immortal-soul theory. It is
vain to endeavor to array the soul, which is the man him-
self, with the attributes of independent conscious existence,
spirituality, immateriality, and immortality, against the
plainest declarations of God's Word.
> BIBLE VS. TRADITION: IN WHICH THE TRUE TEACHING OF THE BIBLE IS
MANIFESTED, THE CORRUPTIONS OF THEOLOGIANS DETECTED,
TRADITIONS OF MEN EXPOSED BY AAEON ELLIS
SECOND EDITION. PUBLISHED AT THE OFFICE OF BIBLE EXAMINER. 1853