Thank you for this discussion and the chance to interact with you on this subject. It is quite helpful to me to understand this subject better.
I already notice one of my lack of understanding below. I would like to correct that.
Before proceeding I would like to say, I've been reflecting on this for 5-7 years; and it took years to digest many concepts letting the Holy Spirit confirm, correct, or add. It is healthy and necessary for anyone to "chew their cud" before swallowing any [spiritual] food giving a chance for the Holy Spirit to confirm, discard, or refine any part of it. So please don't take my respond to your post as I'm pressuring you to accept my view. I'm responding because your post broadens my thinking on the subject. Probably it would be more brotherly of me to not respond.
The fact that we “live and move and have our being in God suggests that our very consciousness, our self-awareness, our spirits exist inside the infinite bounds of His Spirit. All created existence and being takes place “in Him” and by Him.
I think consciousness and most of our self-awareness comes from the soul (physical mind) and not our spirit....
I already had as an understanding that all 3 parts (body, soul, and spirit (1Th 5:23)) had each their own mind. But in regard of consciousness and self-awareness I mainly view this as pertaining to the soul. Despite this is somewhat true as it is the soul thoughts that we are more conscious about, I now think that the body and the spirit also have consciousness and self-awareness because it has its own mind.
The mind should be distinguished from the brain.
I agree
The brain itself has no consciousness.
I'm wondering if this is false. I'll elaborate below.
The mind is seated in the brain. It has consciousness.
Yes this is true when referring to the mind of our soul and probably the mind of our body. But the mind of our spirit this is not true.
Here's my thoughts. For the body -- I think the brain is also the place (or part of it) of its mind when you come to consider the sympathic and parasympathic systems that involves many bodily functions. These are rooted in the brain and yet our soul's consciousness doesn't pick up on these. The soul will suffer the effect and be aware something is wrong when these system are malfunctioning or you are under an intense fight or flee situation that you will feel the effect. But I don't believe the sympathetic and parasympathetic systems are orchestrated by the mind of the soul. These are continual bodily responsibility and processes.
I wouldn't be surprise to find out that at the cellular level the mind of the body is there also as I remember in the years at Weimar studying health under Dr.Lee that he had that sort of understanding; plus reading other material talking about that. But that's a little bit over my head right now.
I do believe the body has its own mind and consciousness; yet it is something that the soul, in part, is mostly unaware of.
I say "in part|" as we also have the 5 senses (hear, see, touch...) that are experienced by the body that is perceived by specific location of the brain. I think these also pertains to the body. The soul does perceives the bodily senses very clearly. The soul uses these bodily senses received by the brain and process this information into its own intellectual thinking(mind) and makes decisions (that he shouldn't do) and command the body to do certain actions. And then we know that memories are stored in a specific location of the brain. Memories of the body and soul only???
So if my understanding is correct, I see that the brain is shared by both the body and the soul.
But there's a third mind -- consciousness and self-awareness -- that is found within our spirit which is call "the mind of Christ" (1 Cor 2:16) because our spirit agrees with everything of God -- like Christ agreed with everything of the Father. This mind of our spirit is the most important of the 3 entities we possess in our being; because its awareness and consciousness is perfect and based on truth. Whereas the mind, consciousness, and self-awareness of our soul is in enmity with God. The body suffers the consequences of the bad decisions of our soul and the pollution in our environment.
A day or two ago I was reading Sarah Peck, an Adventist teacher from the mid 20th century. She viewed the soul and spirit the opposite way from my first post: the soul as the living conscious being and the spirit as the character. And she had some scriptural support so she may be closer to the truth than I am.
Could you bring the key texts she uses to view the spirit as the character? I would be interested in seeing those.
Bringing character into this study will make things more complicated. With what I understand about our body unique DNA imprinting; I would say that character is found in the body too. Then when thinking about "evil character" then shouldn't character be found in the soul also? I haven't studied this; but isn't character dependable to the spirit we are moved by? including the evil spirits. I'm not disputing that character isn't found also in our spirit; but I wouldn't say that's its only place its found.
Then I'm sure that at the resurrection that each individual will retain its unique character for the New Creature created in you is a composite of "earth"(our DNA uniqueness) and "heaven" (the Father's seed).
However, from Sarah Pecks conclusion, I do not believe that she understood what Paul was saying about the difference of soul and spirit in 1Cor 2:9-16. I think it is worth viewing these texts closer as I believe that Paul had that understanding better than Sarah.
A Closer look at 1Cor 2:9-16 -- the differences of soul and spiritPaul brings the differences of Greeks "wisdom" and God's wisdom and how it may be perceived in the first 2 chapters of 1 Corinthians.
Greeks were dualistic believing in man having a material body and a
spiritual soul. So Paul presented a different truth that the Greeks needed to understand the difference between soul and spirit since they combined the two together. They needed to understand that their soul couldn't understand spiritual things. (1 Cor 2:14) Because if the world princes would of understood (via their soul consciousness)...they wouldn't of crucified Christ (1Cor 2:6-8).
Then Paul continues in v.9 by referring to Isaiah 64:4 saying,
9 …
Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him.Paul is speaking quite literally that the perception of our eyes and ears cannot perceive the revelation that comes by the Spirit of God. As I mentioned above, our soulish minds obtain its knowledge through the senses and respond to it. However our spiritual mind obtains knowledge, not through the physical senses like our eyes and ears; but by an inner revelation from the Spirit of God that is receive thru our inner spirit that "
searches all things, even the depths of God".
1Cor 2:10 "
For to us God revealed them through the spirit; for the spirit searches all things, even the depths of God."
So the person untrained in spiritual matters, obtains knowledge through the body parts which makes the soul dependent upon how the body senses things. So that's why the soul is said to be "carnal", "fleshy" or "natural" because it's knowledge source comes from the body and it empowers the body for its knowledge.
When Eve "
SAW that the tree was good for food and was a delight to the eyes" and acted upon it...is when she empowered the body for its source of knowledge and the soul became carnal.
I'm not changing subject but emphasizing 1Cor 2:10 with another text.
Remember in the other post in reference to "
the souls under the altar" in Rev 9:6 I said the following :
Since this text describes these souls being under the altar where the blood were pour on the ground; right now I'm suspecting there's a connection between the soul and the life(the breath) that is found in the blood. But Neshamah is not found in these prime laws about not eating blood.
Well I was looking for the wrong word, I should of looked for Nephesh the Hebrew word for SOUL which is found in Lev 17:10 "
For the life H5315 [Nephesh, soul]
of the flesh is in the blood:" The KJV above rendered Nephesh as "life"; but it is more accuratly rendered as "Soul". So a literal rendering of this text would be "
the fleshy soul is in the blood".
Last time I elaborated that the spiritual meaning of Lev 17:10 "
to not eat the blood" was to not abuse our brother by taking their life away from them. We should be like Christ who gave his life for others. This is true at the level between individuals. However, there can be other spiritual meaning at other levels.
So let's consider this law at the level of inside an individual like between the soul and the spirit. When making a decision or conclusion -- we are not to be in agreement or eat what our
fleshy soul suggest but rather eat or live by what our inner spirit says. In another word to breath in the revelation of the Holy Spirit that gives life to the blood where the soul resides. Not the other way around in eating what the senses of the body gives to the soul and take that as our source of life or breath.
Let's continue with Paul's thoughts where he says in 1Cor 2:10 that it is the spirit of man which “
searches all things” in its quest to know the mind of God and His plan. Some translation capitalizes the first "Spirit" word in that text to denote God's Spirit. But God's Spirit doesn't need to search God's Spirit to know the truth for it already knows all things...whereas it is the spirit of man that inquires of the Spirit of God.
So Paul makes this distinction in the next verse. 1 Corinthians 2:11 says,
11
For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God.God reveals all things to the spirit of man for it is capable of understanding spiritual things. It is the mind of the spirit of man alone that can receive revelation from above without rejecting it as foulishness as the soul does. Whereas the mind of the soul is really the foul(moron) as it thinks of itself both spiritual and intellectually enlighten.
In 1cor 2:12,13 Paul talks about the "
spirit of the world" vs the "
spirit of who is from God". The "
spirit of the world" is different from the spirit inside of man for Paul does not contrast this with the soul. But rather there's a world spirit that teaches us knowledge by "
combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words" that doesn't come from God. Basically, the "
spirit of the world" is the wrong spirit that causes us to seek knowledge from another source other than the Holy Spirit. Even a believer, especially a young in faith, is prone to do so. When it does, it is certainly the mind of its soul doing this and not the mind of its spirit.
Paul conclude with 1Cor 2:14-16
14 "
But a natural [soulish]
man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised [anakrino]
. 15 But he who is spiritual [the new man]
appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no man. 16 For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ."
The mind of the soul -- the carnal mind -- is not capable of accepting revelation directly from the Spirit of God for it is foolishness to him. Because the soul ..."cannot understand them". I don't believe the sanctified soul will be able also. It is NOT the job or position of the soul to understand the things of God because it is not equipped or created to do so. Revelation from above must be “
spiritually appraised” by the spirit of man. The Greek word used is anakrino that means “
to examine, judge, investigate, interrogate, to sift through a series of things in order to distinguish.”
As Paul said earlier in v.10 it is the spirit of man (not the soul) that examine the revelation from the Holy Spirit, for it is the only “I” or mind capable of making sense of it for the "I" from the soul will pronounce it as foolishness. The thing the soul must do is to submit to the spirit of man.
So the mind of our spirit (or our spiritual man or the second "I") has the ability to understand all things and yet our spirit cannot be appraised by our soul (the soulish man or our first "I").
Paul concludes in v. 16 with a reference to Isaiah 40:14, which says,
14
With whom did He consult and who gave Him understanding? And who taught Him in the path of justice and taught Him knowledge, and informed Him of the way of understanding?God needs no counselor to help Him understand truth or knowledge. So since the new creature in us within our spirit have the mind of Christ, will understand what God says who is the Source of all truth. It's not the mind of the soul that is going to teach the mind of our spirit spiritual truth.
So to rap things up, the mind of the soul(the first "I") because it cannot understand spiritual matters (1cor 2:14) leads us to war against the law of God; whereas the mind of our spirit(the second "I") leads us to agree with the law (Romans 7:22).
It does seem that the soul or being is what is at stake. The body is the temple of the soul and spirit.
Scriptures says the body is the temple of the Holy spirit. I've never heard that it is the temple of the soul and spirit. We can view the body is the outer court of the temple. The soul is the holy place and the spirit is the Most Holy Place.
The mind should be distinguished from the brain. The brain itself has no consciousness. The mind is seated in the brain. It has consciousness. So when the Apostle says to be transformed by the renewing of your minds, what is he referring to as the mind? Not the brain. He's referring to the soul and spirit. The mind is the combination of both.
I think you are in the right path thinking that the brain is different from the "mind". As I noted above, I'm incline to think with the reasons giving above that the brain is also part of the mind of the body which differ from the mind of our soul. Then I don't believe that the mind of our spirit is seated in our physical brain. I believe that the mind of our spirit is invisible and has no form because it is spiritual in nature like our heavenly Father.
What I think Paul meant in Rom 12:2 by saying "
but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind" that he's referring to the mind of the soul. As I don't think it is the renewing of our body mind especially in the sympathetic or parasympathetic level which is mostly imperceptable to our soulish mind. Nor do I think Paul meant the renewing of our spirit mind as this mind has the mind of Christ that needs no renewing as it is already perfect and does not sin.
As you noted at the beginning of our discussion, the soul is in sanctification. To me body, soul, and spirit denotes the order of things God created us to live. The body is to be in submission to our soul, and our soul is to be in submission to our spirit. It is the soul that sins Ezk 18:4. And it is the soul that needs to die. So this might mean we are transformed as the mind of our soul is being sanctified by submitting (==form of death) to the mind of our spirit. The soul needs to stop usurping the position of our spirit. The soul have an important job; but that does not include to understand spiritual things and make the decision. It is the spirit job to do that. To me the sanctification of the soul is putting it back to its proper position as it was intended by God.
But the rest of the physical body also greatly influences the mind. If we were brains only like a computer, we'd have no cravings for food, friends, family, lusts and passions. The human body is a major part of what makes us human.
I agree
And being made in the image of God, we can be sure that God has a divine body and it is an important part of what makes Him who He is.
I view Gen 1:27 "
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them". There's no reference that this means He has a divine body like us. The text qualify that we resemble Him in the dimension that He made us Male and Female. God is also Male(Jehovah) and Female(the Lord Almighty [Chadday, that comes from the root chad that means breast]). I believe Adam was both male and female before the female was taken out of him and then became seperate but also in one flesh.
I think Ellen White also says God has no body. I think the bible says the same. Having a body pertains to earthly creatures not celestials. Despite God and angels can manifest themselves with a physical body when they appear to man; this doesn't mean they have a body. However Jesus, who came on earth as a man was in actuality the union of man with the seed of God starting from conception. Which Jesus set the pattern of the new creation in us that is also a conception of the union of earthly being with the seed of God.
Not that For example, Christ in His glorified body had scars that could be touched, a mouth that spoke and ate food, eyes that saw both physically and supernaturally, a face that smiled, etc.
Monks and stoics have attempted to purify the flesh by mortifying the body but in the atonement of Christ, the body is sanctified. This doesn't mean we have holy flesh but rather that the noble aspects of our physical being, our passions, emotions, desires and appetites are sanctified by the blood of Christ and His ministry in the Holy Place. And so sanctification involves all three aspects of our being, body soul and spirit which are a mysterious, unique, valuable unit.
Christ's body wasn't glorified until the resurrection. He proved to the disciples that he wasn't just a spirit as the Sudducenes doctrines believed in that. Christ resurrected body had "flesh and bones" (Luke 24:39). However, Jesus was not limited by physical matter. Jesus could appear and disappear at will. In symbolic language, He "changed clothing" (Ezekiel 44:17-19) from linen to woolen and back to linen. The Priests that could enter the Most Holy Place and stand before God wore linen. But when leaving that chamber his linen clothing needed to be put aside and change his clothing to wool so to minister to the people. So prophetically this shows what body we will have at post-resurrection. Jesus demonstrated this as he appear in flesh & bones (symbolically He change into his wool clothing) and disappear into being spirit (He put "his linen back on").
I think the concept of holy flesh comes from man's false view of trying to purify the soul or make the soul spiritual thinking it can bring the soul and its body to perfection before the resurrection.