On Tue, 6 Jun 1995 09:18:41 -0500 you wrote:
>SJ>There is nothing special about man, except he is in the image of
>God. I believe that God carried out similar "forming from the dust of
>the ground" (Gen 2:7) for all the major groups.
>
>BH>It seems to me that being made in the image of God makes _all_ the
>difference. Physically man bears considerable resemblance to other
>creatures -- either by design which directs an evolutionary process
>overseen by God, or by more direct design -- but what makes _all_ the
>difference is that God gave man His Spirit when He made man (Gen 2:7: Then
>the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his
>nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being)
>
>It says nothing about God's "Spirit". It simply says that God gave man
>the "breath of life", which all animals have (Gn 6:17; 7:15,22).
BH>Ah, but that's the point(part of it anyway): The breath of life is
mentioned immediately when man is created. It is an integral part of
creating man. It is only menitoned incidentally later on.
Agreed. But that may be only because man's creation is given in
greater detail?
BH>I don't have my Strong's here, but I believe the same Hebrew word
is used in both cases (N'shamah pr something like that) and it can
mean either physical breath or spirit.
No. The Heb. word for "breath" is "" and for "spirit" is "".
BH>In the case of making man it seems to be intimately connected with
his creation in Gen 2:7, where later on in Gen 6 and 7 it probably
only means that air-breathing animals came to the ark or were wiped
out by the flood.
Yes, but included in the "air-breathing animals" was also man! The
Bible's point is that in the Flood God extinguished the "breath of
life" that he gave all "air-breathing animals" (Gn 7:22 All in whose
nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land,
died.)
BH>Further support for this interpretation comes from the New
Testament in Jn 20:22: And when He had said this, He breathed on them
and said "Receive the Holy Spirit."
There is no doubt that in later books of the Bible, there is the
development of the concept of the spirit, and that in these later
books, "breath", "wind" and "spirit" became to some extent,
synonymous. However, in *Genesis* they were not synonymous.
>BH>True, the other animals were formed from the dust of the ground.
But the second part of the above verse, "and breathed into his
nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living being" applies
to _man_, not the animals.
SJ>The Bible actually says that *all* animals have God's "breath of
>life", not only man.
Debatable.
Sorry Bill, but this is *not* "debatable". It is a Biblical
fact, that is ascertainable by simple exegesis.
>BH>I believe it's quite significant that the Hebrew word used for
>breath here can also mean spirit.
>
SJ>I am not sure that this is true.
BH>Look it up in Strong's
OK. Here it is from my Quickverse Strong's dictionary:
Gn 1:2 "Spirit":
7307. ruwach, roo'-akh; from H7306; wind; by resemblance breath, i.e.
a sensible (or even violent) exhalation; fig. life, anger,
unsubstantiality; by extens. a region of the sky; by resemblance
spirit, but only of a rational being (includ. its expression and
functions):--air, anger, blast, breath, X cool, courage, mind, X
quarter, X side, spirit ([-ual]), tempest, X vain, ([whirl-]) wind