How the idea of Immortal Soul got into the Church

God made man in his own image, but did not make him immortal or of the same substance that he possesses. Our Creator is composed of spirit and is eternal. Humans were made, however, out of the ground or organic substance that constitutes the earth. Adam only became a living being (but not an immortal soul) when God breathed life into him

The first lie, in the Garden of Eden, the devil wanted Eve to believe revolves around the concept of an immortal soul. Eve stated she was instructed not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or else she would die.

Satan countered that God was lying and that she would not perish. We see that this lie has spread even into Christians today. God's justification for casting Adam and Eve out of the Garden was, "lest he put out his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever".

If all humans automatically have a soul that is immortal then barring them from the Tree of Life would not make a difference since they would already possess something that would keep them alive into the future. If, however, Adam and Eve did not possess an immortal soul that allowed them to live forever, then God's concern about them acquiring this ability is justified.

Here is one of the best explanation I have come across and every believer should carefully go through it and understand how this deception came into the church from what can only be called pagan Greek thought. 'Secular history reveals that the concept of the immortality of the soul is an ancient belief embraced by many pagan religions. But it's not a biblical teaching and is not found in either the Old or New Testaments....

The concept of the soul's supposed immortality was first taught in ancient Egypt and Babylon. "The belief that the soul continues in existence after the dissolution of the body is...speculation...nowhere expressly taught in Holy Scripture...The belief in the immortality of the soul came to the Jews from contact with Greek thought and chiefly through the philosophy of Plato, its principal exponent, who was led to it through Orphic and Eleusinian mysteries in which Babylonian and Egyptian views were strangely blended" (Jewish Encyclopedia, 1941, Vol. 6, "Immortality of the Soul," pp. 564, 566).

Plato (428-348 B.C.), the Greek philosopher and student of Socrates, taught that the body and the "immortal soul" separate at death. The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia comments on ancient Israel's view of the soul: "We are influenced always more or less by the Greek, Platonic idea that the body dies, yet the soul is immortal. Such an idea is utterly contrary to the Israelite consciousness and is nowhere found in the Old Testament" (1960, Vol. 2, "Death," p. 812).

Early Christianity was influenced and corrupted by Greek philosophies as it spread through the Greek and Roman world. By A.D. 200 the doctrine of the immortality of the soul became a controversy among Christian believers.

The Evangelical Dictionary of Theology notes that Origen, an early and influential Catholic theologian, was influenced by Greek thinkers: "Speculation about the soul in the subapostolic church was heavily influenced by Greek philosophy. This is seen in Origen's acceptance of Plato's doctrine of the preexistence of the soul as pure mind (nous) originally, which, by reason of its fall from God, cooled down to soul (psyche) when it lost its participation in the divine fire by looking earthward" (1992, "Soul," p. 1037)....' ..https://www.ucg.org/bible-study-tools/booklets/what-happens-after-death/the-history-of-the-immortal-soul-teaching

This deception that man has a 'spirit', 'immortal substance' is surreptitious to the truth to say the least and even more, it opens the door to spurious views regarding the afterlife, and it has permeated the religious world with its false promises and claims. Moreover, it offers promises of multiple choices that can be made in terms of one's salvation and multiple chances in terms of qualifying for salvation. Spiritism, reincarnation and necromancy in ways such as the worship and consulting of the dead, are only possible because of this deception.

The Word of God is very clear on this issue, this deception is of false hope which negates the message of the wages of sin and death. Moreover, if man continues to live, in this false idea of an altered state, then there is no need for a Savior, or the atoning death of Christ. Satan has spread this false idea through the Greek Hellenistic thought that crept into the church and has been spread by what can only be called his underlings of high order..

This verse is used to try to substantiate the belief in the immortality of the soul from the Bible:

2 Corinthians 5:8 KJV says, "We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord."

The problem is that they also ignore what the Bible clearly says elsewhere and misinterpret what the Paul is really saying in the above verse.