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Do animals have souls?

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tonychanyt

tonychanyt

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Yes, Douay-Rheims Bible, Gen 9:

16 And the bow shall be in the clouds, and I shall see it, and shall remember the everlasting covenant, that was made between God and every living soul of all flesh which is upon the earth.
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The word for "soul" is H5315, נָ֫פֶשׁ, nephesh. It appears 754 times. NASB translated it as soul (238), life (146), person (68).

Brown-Driver-Briggs:

that which breathes, the breathing substance or being
נפשׁ is used for life itself 171 t., of animals Proverbs 12:10, and of man Genesis 44:30
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Aramaic Bible in Plain English, Prov 12:

10 The righteous one is aware of the soul of his animal, and the evil withhold their compassions.
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Do animals possess nephesh-souls?

Yes.

Do animals have spirits?

I think so.

Do pets go to heaven?

I doubt it.

Do animals have personalities?

Yes. By personality, I mean memory, emotion, intelligence, volition, and consciousness. I would put it on a continuum. Lower animals have less personality, and higher animals have more. Humans are the ultimate in this continuum.
 
Sabertooth

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If "soul" means mind, will & emotions, Balaam's donkey spoke from [her?] own perspective.
That satisfies that definition of a soul...
 
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Clare73

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Jonaitis said:
Yes, animals are conscious, that's the most evident aspect of the Spirit/Soul.
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But they do not think abstractly, which is only by spirit.
They operate from natural instinct.

The spirit and the soul do not appear to be the same thing (Heb 4:12).

The soul is the locus of temporal animal (human) life, and the spirit is the locus of eternal (divine) life.
 
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Jonaitis

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Clare73 said:
But they do not think abstractly, which is only by spirit.
They operate from natural instinct.

The spirit and the soul do not appear to be the same thing (Heb 4:12).

The soul is the locus of temporal animal (human) life, and the spirit is the locus of eternal (divine) life.
Click to expand...
If there were a division between the two, based on the text you referenced, then the argument would be reversed. "Soul" in that verse is psuché (where we get the English word 'psyche') which often refers to personal identity or mind. So it would be the "soul" that thinks abstractly, not the spirit. Furthermore, there are many texts that say that animals have spirits (Ecclesiastes 3:21) using the word "ruach", the same word used for God's Spirit. So animals have a higher level of existence on the same level with us.

However, animals do think, it is a bit naive to suggest that they are naturally mechanical. We can see different levels of intelligence among various species on this planet. Some animals show profound rational thinking under challenging circumstances.
 
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Clare73

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Jonaitis said:
If there were a division between the two, based on the text you referenced, then the argument would be reversed. "Soul" in that verse is psuché (where we get the English word 'psyche') which often refers to personal identity or mind. So it would be the "soul" that thinks abstractly, not the spirit. Furthermore, there are many texts that say that animals have spirits (Ecclesiastes 3:21) using the word "ruach", the same word used for God's Spirit. So animals have a higher level of existence on the same level with us.
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Ecclesiastes is Solomon's sermon of repentance (7:23-26, 11:9, 12:13-14), the reflections of an old man, most of whose life was meaningless because he had not himself relied on God and sinned away his wisdom (Proverbs), as Samson sinned away his strength.

The NT presents spirits as immortal, living forever.
The NT presents no part of an animal as immortal, living forever.
 
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Jonaitis

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Clare73 said:
Ecclesiastes is Solomon's sermon of repentane (7:23-26, 11:9, 12:13-14), the reflections of an old man, most of whose life was meaningless because he had not himself relied on God and sinned away his wisdom (Proverbs), as Samson sinned away his strength.

The NT presents spirits as immortal, living forever.
The NT presents no part of an animal as immortal, living forever.
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I believe this complicates it. Even in the LXX of the Old Testament, Ecclesiastes 3:21 uses the Greek "pneuma" for animal, the same used throughout the NT when discussing the spirit.

While there are no direct example of animals being discussed as immortal, as that is not a necessary point of discussion in the New Testament document, we can still cross reference it throughout the whole Scriptures.
 
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Ain't Zwinglian

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Clare73 said:
I believe the NT illumines the OT, that the NT is the OT revealed, while the OT is the NT concealed.
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I never heard this hermeneutical rule articulated in this fashion....after pondering and mentally parsing for a moment or two..... two thumbs up.
 
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KevinT

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tonychanyt said:
Do animals possess nephesh-souls? Yes.
Do animals have spirits? -- I think so.
Do pets go to heaven? -- I doubt it.
Do animals have personalities? -- Yes. By personality, I mean memory, emotion, intelligence, volition, and consciousness. I would put it on a continuum. Lower animals have less personality, and higher animals have more. Humans are the ultimate in this continuum.
Click to expand...

I can't think of anywhere in the Bible that says that humans are fundamentally different from animals. In the beginning, Man was created to rule over (care for) animals. And I think all would agree that we have higher intelligence. But angels have higher intelligence than us, and that doesn't set our value to zero. It does say that mankind is allowed to eat animals, which puts a hierarchy in place. Wikipedia has an interesting write up on a similar topic: Christianity and animal rights.

So I feel that animals do have souls as humans do. But then I don't believe in an eternal soul that is separate from our physical existence.

KT
 
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