Book Review: On the Soul and Its Origin by Augustine of Hippo
Eric Lui shares with us a review of "On the Soul and Its Origin" by Augustine of Hippo. His true name is Aurelius Augustinus and he lived from 354 to 430 AD in a little town in Algeria.
Augustine benefited from a pious upbringing by his mother Monica. However, he did not come to faith till he was in his early thirties and spoke of his sinful past in Confessions. In 391 AD, he was ordained as a presbyter and then as a bishop in the church of Hippo Regius in Algeria.
In this book, Augustine writes about the soul. The concept of the soul dates back to the ancient Greeks and beyond. They used the word “ensouled” to represent someone who is “alive”, which indicates that the earliest western philosophical view of the soul was what gives a body its life.
Structure of the book
The book comprises four long letters that pertain to books written by a new convert, Vincentius Victor. These books gave Victor’s personal views of the soul and its origin.
The first letter was addressed to a fellow monk, Renatus, to thank him for forwarding the two books written by Victor. In response to the contents of the books, Augustine gave a lengthy scriptural view of the soul and, at the same time, pointed out the young believer’s self-conceit, ignorance and immaturity in understanding the scriptures.
In the second letter, addressed to a presbyter named Peter, Augustine also pointed out the various errors in the books which are very serious and advised him to persuade Victor to amend these errors. The last two letters were addressed to Victor himself. He pointed out the doctrinal errors in his books.
Augustine’s understanding of the soul
From what is written in these four letters, let me summarise what is Augustine’s understanding of the soul.
Firstly, he believes that the soul is what animates the body, based on his reading of Genesis 2:7—“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.”
Secondly, he believes that the soul is incorporeal as compared to the corporeal body. It is the soul that takes on the image of God, and not the body, based on the reading of Colossians 3:10 which says, “and have put on the new self (or inner man), which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of the Creator”. After the Fall, our soul is corrupted by sin and bears a very distorted image of God.
To distinguish between the functions of the soul and the body, he differentiates between the sensations of the body and the sensibilities of the soul. The former is what the brain senses from the nervous system. The latter refers to our emotions, empathy, sense of justice and injustice, understanding and reasoning. It is also the soul that communicates with God, as the Psalmist prays, “Consider and answer me, O Lord my God; light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death.” (Ps 13:3) Here, “my eyes” are not the bodily eyes but the “eyes” of the soul.
Furthermore, in Romans 8:16, we are told that “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,” and in verse 15, “you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry. ‘Abba! Father!'” In this case, the Holy Spirit directly communicates with our soul to reveal to us that we are the children of God.
The soul is also the seat of our thoughts. While we are exhorted to “love God with our whole heart”, it is not the portion of our physical heart behind our ribs that is asked to love God, but the soul where of the power of our thoughts originates.
There is also the will that originates from the soul. We claim that we have a free will that allows us to make our own decisions. Yet we do not know the limitations of our will. He cited the example of Apostle Peter, who claimed that he was willing to lay down his life for the Lord. He was no doubt sincere in his willingness; nor was he treacherous to the Lord when he made that promise. But his will was entirely ignorant of its own powers. Therefore, he who had discovered his Master to be the Son of God, was entirely ignorant of the power of his own will.
Finally, Augustine distinguishes something called the spirit from the soul, for he reads in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 that Apostle Paul mentioned “your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” He believes that the spirit is the faculty by which we reason and understand, and it resides in the soul. Also, in Ephesians 4:23, Paul says “and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds.” which means nothing more than the mind. But the word ‘spirit’ in the Bible can also mean the soul in a general sense, as in John 19:30 “he [Jesus] said, ‘It is finished,’ and he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.”
Augustine’s understanding of the origin of the soul
There are two schools of thought in this book: One is that God breaths into every new born baby a new soul, which was what Victor claims, except that he committed a theological error in saying the breath comes out from God’s own nature. The other, which was the traditional view, is that the soul is propagated from our first parents, just as the case of our body.
Augustine declares his ignorance on how our soul came to us in our mother’s womb. Scripture is silent on this subject, but he is certain that, whichever mode the soul comes to be united with our body, it is a gift of God, just as the body is a gift from God. It is better to claim ignorance than to postulate something that is contrary to what is in the Scripture. For him, it is more excellent to know that the flesh will rise again and live forevermore, than to learn whatever learned men can teach us about our body and our soul.
There are several scriptural passages which seem to give a hint in support of either of these two theories. The first is Genesis 2:23, wherein Adam declared that “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.” God created Eve as a living soul out of the rib taken from Adam. It was not mentioned that He breathed into her to become a living soul. So, bone and flesh would denote the whole living creature of Eve, including the soul, which seems to confirm the theory of propagation. But, while the scripture is silent, we cannot assume that God did not breath into Eve to make her a living creature.
Another passage is 2 Kings 4:34. “Then he [Elisha] went up and lay on the child, putting his mouth on his mouth, his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands. And as he stretched himself upon him, the flesh of the child became warm.” This passage seems to support the theory of God breathing into each human being to give it a soul. But Augustine disputes this to be the truth, as the prophet did not really cause the child to live again by breathing into him, but procured God’s love for the child in doing what he did.
Yet another passage is Isaiah 42:5, which says, “Thus say God the LORD… who gives breath to the people on it and spirit to those who walk in it.” This verse seems to support the theory of God breathing afresh to each individual as distinct acts of creation. Augustine countered this argument by quoting 1 Corinthians 15:38, “But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed it own body.” which clearly implies that grain springs from grain, and grass from grass, from the seed, each after its kind. God did not personally give each grain its stalk. So, the verse in Isaiah does not preclude propagation as the means by which God give the breath (which can also be translated as spirit) to each individual.
In conclusion, we should not seek more than what God chose to reveal to us concerning the origin of our soul. “The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.” (Deut 29:29)