Now, this account of the origin of man is fitted to exclude certain dualistic views of his nature with which the religion of revelation had to con- tend. ' It directly contradicts the doctrine of the pre-existence of the soul' (Schultz, OT Theology, li. 252, Clark, Edin. 1892). Whether, indeed, the formation of man's frame and the inbreathing of his life be taken as successive or simultaneous moments in the process of his creation, the de- scription is exactly litted to exclude that priority of the soul which was necessary to tlie transmigra- tion taught by Oriental religions, or, to the pre- existence theory of the Greek schools. There is here no postponement or degradation of the earthly frame in favour of the soul, as if the soul were the man, and the bodj' were only the prison-house into which he was sent, or the husk in which for a time he was concealed. According to this account, the synthesis of two factors, alike honourable, constitutes the man.
That neither the familiar antithesis, soul and body, nor any other pair of expressions by which wo commonly render the dual elements in human nature, should occur in this locus rlassicus, is a fact which lielps to fix attention on tlie real chaiaetcr of the earlier OT descriptions of man. The fact is not explained merely by the absence of an.alysis. Rather is it characteristic of these Scriptures to assort the solidarity of man's constitution — that he is of one piece, and not composed of separate or indejiendent parts. This assertion is essential to the theology of the Bible — to its discovery of human sin, and of Divine salvation. In a way not per- ceived by many believers in its doctrines, this idea of the unity of man's nature hinds into consistency
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PSYCHOLOGY
PSYCHOLOGY
165
the Scri[>ture .locount of liis Creation, the story of his I'all, the character of Kedemption, and all the luadiug features in the workinj; out of his actual recovery, from his Eegeueration to his Resurrection.
Later Scriptures suggest a more definite and sepa,- rate idea of tho body. In Job 4'" we have t-'rr'B? ' houses of clay,' imitated perhaps in 2 Co 5' v iizl- 7«io5 . . . oUla Toi" ^r<c7j^ol•5 ; also in Dn 7" ' grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body ' (.ij"i; sheath), 2 P 1* ToO aK-tjuiixaTos fiou. In the OT Apocrypha the pre-exibtence idea is, once at least, suggested. Wis -i». » < a good soul fell to my lot, and being good . . . came into a body undehled.'* The >iT uses freely the Greek duality, which has become the modern one, ' soul and body ' ; and though the OT ' Hesh and soul ' does not occur in the ST, 'body and spirit' can take its place. Then, in the progress of redemption, it at last appears that the discrepancy between the two is resolved, when the redeemed Tri'cD/ia shall put on aS/ia weviiaTiKbv {I Co 15"), ' a spiritual body,' which is by no means the same as a 'bodiless spirit ' (see BODY).
ii. Let us now pass on to the biblical treatment of sin anil salvation, and show how these atl'ect the various elements of human nature as more specifi- cally distinguished through them, especially the terms 'Hesh,' 'soul,' and 'spirit.'
Flesh. — Besides the more obvious literal mean- ings of this term already discussed in a separate article, it acquires a psychological importance when we ask whether its general OT sense is morally unfavourable, and what is the origin and force of the peculiar meaning it has in St. Paul, as the
i)rinciple, or a seat of the princijile, of sin in man. 'Vom the first application of 'licsli' to fallen man (Gn 6') there is nothing in the OT which identifies it with the principle of evil. ' Not a single pas- sage can be adduced wherein bdsdr is used to denote man's sensuous nature as the seat of an opposition against his spirit and of a bias towards sin ' (.Miiller, ChrUtian Doct. of Sin, i. 32.3). It is true that ' Hesh ' is used for human kind in contrast to higher beings and to God (e.q. Gn 6', Ps 78'"), and, so used, brings out his frailty and finitude. It is true also that ' tlesh ' as a constituent of human nature means the perishable, animal, sensuous, and even sensual element of it {e.g. Ec 5', Is 40") ; but which of these ideas is prominent in any passage must be learned from its connexion and context. It is further true that in its meaning of ' natural kinship' there is often an implied contrast with something better — 'Israel after the flesh' (1 Co 10"). But the conclusive proof that nothing of moral depreciation is necessarily implied in this use of ' Hesh,' is its application to Christ as designat- ing His human in contrast with His Divine nature. ' The woril was made flesh ' (6 \l)-/oi aap^ iyinfro, Jn 1"). 'Who was m.inifest in the flesh, justified in the spirit ' (1 Ti 3") ; ' made of the seed of David according to the flesh, declared to be the Son of Ood with power, according to the spirit' (Ro I"). But in the Pauline EpisUes a Bpocilic meaning of the term emerges. In certain well-known pas.sages it denotes the principle which resists the Divine law, as contrasted with the ' mind ' consenting to the law tliat it is good, and which, even in the re- cenerate, makes war against ' the spirit.' Here we have a very marked ethical significance given to the term ' flesh.' Nor is it the only term of its kind used to denominate the evil jirinciple in man's nature as now under sin. ' The old man,' ' the body of sin,' 'the body of the Hesh,' 'the law in the members,' ' our members which are upon earth,' are kindred expressions, more or less closely denoting the same thing, although ' the Hesh,' in its counter- poise to 'the mind' and to 'the sjiirit' respec- tively, is the leading expression (Ko 7'^ 8", Gal a"). * Compare ib, Qt^ ^Bxfrot ykf r«u« ^ufuru 'i't/x^'.