Richard wrote,
<< I found John Burgeson's take on the creation of soul very interesting:
_Perhaps, just perhaps, the creation of
humans-in-the-image-of-God did not take place as an event -- but as a
process. If one allows that it may be a process, rather than an
event-at-a-moment-of-time, then that process may well have started prior
to both Neandertal and Homo-sapiens_
However I have an objection to this line of reasoning since its implications
are
not very comforting. The special, instantaneous creation of the soul is
absolutely necessary, doctrinally speaking. Without it, Christ's death and
resurrection are pointless, since the meaning of sin and specifically,
original
sin, as Christian tradition has envisaged it for the past two millennia,
becomes
redundant. 'A process' of original sin is completely alien to Christian
theology
and Tielhard's ideas are more in line with patheism than Christianity.
>>
I don't want to get into the "soul-spirit" idea in the NT, but in the OT,
every fish, animal, and bird has a "living soul", nephesh hayah (Gen 1:21,
30, et al) the same thing which Adam becomes in 2:7. It is not unique to
mankind.
I think you can accept Burgy's idea, which I rather like myself; but think of
the personal revelation of God to the first human beings as being the more
essential defining difference between humans and animals (as well, of course,
as the delegation of the cultural mandate or blessing to humans in 1:26-8)
and the point after which the first sin is committed, i.e., original sin.
Best wishes,
Paul
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