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servant101
Member



Joined: 2010/11/11
Posts: 13


 What is the distinction between soul and spirit?

Hello

Wondering if anyone is knowledgeable enough to draw the biblical distinction between soul and spirit?

 2011/2/23 22:16Profile
KingJimmy
Member



Joined: 2003/5/8
Posts: 4419
Charlotte, NC

 Re: What is the distinction between soul and spirit?

My understanding of the subject, though I know of no overt Scripture that teaches it, is that your soul is your "inner man." Your spirit would be that part of you, that communicates with God, and has access to the general spiritual side of the world. Your body would be that part of you that access to the physical world. So, think of your spirit and your body as accessing two different parts of the world (spiritual/physical) and communicating all of that to your soul.

Does that make sense to you?


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Jimmy H

 2011/2/23 22:27Profile
A-Run
Member



Joined: 2008/9/8
Posts: 56
India

 Re: What is the distinction between soul and spirit?

I have written the below sometime back. I hope this helps- I am open to correction on this.

Soulish/Unspiritual Christians

1Corinthians2: 14
Our soul consists of our emotion, will, feelings and reason- these are good things that we possess. We may want to do so many things by our reason/emotions/feelings, but that is not how God wants us to live. God wants us to live a life of dependence on Him alone. Using our reason/will/emotions/feelings are not sinful as such, but they should be always in submission to the Holy Spirit otherwise we will be only dependant on our own faculties. If we are soulish, we will pray only when we feel like praying and not always as our Lord commanded us to (Luke18: 1). Everything then is based on what we feel or what our logic tells us so and not what the Spirit says. The question in spiritual life is not whether the thing is good or bad- but whether is it from the Holy Spirit?

Matthew16: 23-25: Jesus turned and said to Peter, Get thee behind me Satan: thou art an offense unto me, you are not minding the things that are of God but those that are of men.

Peter wanted to do good to Jesus, but Jesus rebuked him saying: Get behind me, Satan! Why? Peter spoke from his feelings/emotions/reason and he did not understand the purpose of Christ Himself. Of course if we had been there with Jesus on that occasion, most probably we would have said the same thing, because none of us would have wanted Jesus to die a shameful death on the cross. But for that purpose Jesus came and Peter was opposing it.

The soulish are afraid of the Cross-in their lives- they cannot submit their minds/reason/emotion to the working of the Holy Spirit. The Cross will cut through our reason and emotions and the soulish are afraid of that. They cannot submit their wills to the Cross, which the Holy Spirit always wants to lead us into.
Jesus said if we take His yoke and learn humility we will FIND Rest to our souls (Matthew 11:29)

The soulish may not necessarily be living in the flesh like the carnal people, but nonetheless they are not a living of faith-, which is dependency upon God.

The Lord wants us to have a sanctified soul, where our emotions/wills/feelings are under the control of the Holy Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is temperance (Galatians 5: 23), and therefore our soul will have to be controlled by the Holy Spirit.
______________________________________

Spiritual Christians

Romans8: 4-14, 1Corinthians3: 1; 2: 4, 5 and 15.

This is the highest level, which a Christian ought to live in. As we have seen before:
a. Soulish Christians live in the soul (mind/emotions/feelings/reason).

Now, Spiritual Christians live in the Spirit (Romans8: 9).

The spiritual people are led by the Holy Spirit. They are utterly dependant on God’s Spirit for everything as they see themselves incapable of doing anything for God (2Corinthians3: 5). Their own intellect/flesh is surrendered to the Holy Spirit always. They seek to obey what the Holy Spirit/Word tells them to do even if it is contrary to their logic. Jesus sent His Spirit down to us so that He may guide, lead and empower us.

Galatians5: 16 – “Walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill the lust/desires of your flesh.”
How do you walk/live in the Spirit? By:
a. The power the Holy Spirit gives us.
b. The guidance/leading of the Holy Spirit.

How do you know that you are walking in the Spirit? The answer is very simple- when you see that you are not fulfilling the lusts of your flesh! We may not understand the doctrine of walking in the Spirit- but if we experience it in not satisfying/fulfilling the lusts of our flesh it is a wonderful thing.

Romans8: 13- “…through the Spirit…mortify the deeds of the body and ye shall live.”

#The Way of the Spirit is closely linked to- The Way of the Cross.
To walk in the Spirit, you need to daily follow the way to death to your self. The Holy Spirit always led Jesus to the Cross (Hebrews9: 14) and He wants to do the same to us too. We must put to death the deeds of the body through the Holy Spirit and this happens when we willingly submit ourselves to Him. If you don’t hate & deny yourselves you will never come to living a life in the Spirit.

We can only experience the power of Christ’s resurrection is by dying to ourselves (Philippians3: 10). Only when we submit ourselves to death that God can give us resurrection- the mighty power and newness in life.

2Corinthians4: 10- “Always bearing in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.”

Death should be constantly at work within us and the Holy Spirit will work in us and transform us into the likeness of Jesus (2 Corinthians3: 18).

#The Way of the Spirit is also the Way of Humility (Matthew11: 29).

#The Way of the Spirit is also the Way of Honesty. The Holy Spirit wants to bring truth in our inward parts and into every par of our life (2Corinthians4: 2-3).

We can conclude that the Holy Spirit always seeks to deliver us from living:
a. A Carnal life, which is a slave to the flesh.
b. A Soulish life, which is an emotional life centered on self.

Therefore, the Spirit-filled life is:
1. Living by the power of the Holy Spirit
2. Living by the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
3. Living a life of self-denial.
4. Living a humble life.
5. Living a life free of hypocrisy and pretence.

…Then we can experience the beauty of the life of Jesus in us (2Corinthians 3: 12-18).


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Arun

 2011/2/24 0:42Profile
Giggles
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Joined: 2009/12/12
Posts: 592


 Re:

Popular question that has come up before. Perhaps browse here in your study:

http://www.google.com/cse?cx=007465431020570466359%3Adn1_kpmeho4&ie=UTF-8&q=soul+spirit+distinction&siteurl=www.google.com%2Fcse%2Fhome%3Fcx%3D007465431020570466359%253Adn1_kpmeho4


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Paul

 2011/2/24 0:52Profile
AbideinHim
Member



Joined: 2006/11/26
Posts: 5185
Louisiana

 Re:

Watchman Nee has some excellent teaching on spirit, soul, and body.

How can we possibly be led by the Spirit of God without knowing the difference between spirit and soul? It is the Word of God that divides spirit and soul. The spiritual man lives and walks by the spirit. A soulish man is one whose mind, will, and emotions are his basis of living, and a carnal man is one who allows his body to be in control of his being.

The spirit of man is "the candle of the Lord". The Spirit of man is regenerated and receives new life when one is born again. God communicates to us through our spirit.

The soul of man is the human personality, it is the mind, will, and emotions. A spiritual man is one whose spirit is in ascendancy over his soul. The soul is the vehicle in which the spirit finds an outlet to communicate with others.

In a born again man, the spirit has already been saved, the soul is in the process of being saved, and the body will one day in the future be glorified.

Mike


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Mike

 2011/2/24 8:03Profile
twayneb
Member



Joined: 2009/4/5
Posts: 2256
Joplin, Missouri

 Re: What is the distinction between soul and spirit?

Part of our problem with understanding this distinction has to do with how we use language. "Soul" and "spirit" have a wide range of meaning that often overlaps in our usage of the terms.

Gen. 2 tells us that God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul. God formed the body and then infused it with the spirit. You are a spiritual being or I might better say it that you are a spirit being. In the same way that God breathed the spirit of Adam into him, you are a spirit who lives or dwells in a physical body. When the spirit was breathed into the body, Adam became a living soul. The body is marvelously designed to house the spirit.

We generally think of the spirit as the eternal part of us, the part of us by which we commune with God. We worship in spirit and in truth. It is also the part of us that is made new, regenerated at the rebirth. Your body and soul are not born again at salvation. It is your spirit that is born again and made truly righteous.

We generally think of the soul as the part of us by which we commune with ourselves. It is our thinking, feeling, and choosing capacity. The Bible says that we often battle the flesh. This is obviously not speaking of battling the physical body specifically, but we understand that we are battling our mind, our will, our emotions,and our own desire to choose and be in charge. This, I believe, is the soul. It is not born again at salvation but must be renewed according to Hebrews 12:2.

Our spirit and soul are so intertwined that in practice we have little ability do distinguish between the two. Scripture tells us that the word of God is quick or alive and powerful and sharp enough to divide between soul and spirit. It is the entrance of this word, be it the written word or that spoken to us by the dealings of the Holy Spirit, that can cut to the core and reveal to us what is really going on in our lives.


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Travis

 2011/2/24 18:03Profile









 Re: Soul and Spirit

The difference between soul and spirit is as follows:

Spirit- The thinking, rational part of man

From the spirit of man comes the ability to discern good from evil, right from wrong, better from worse, and all “voluntary” actions. From the spirit of man through the Spirit of God comes our ability to seek out the things of God, which things though they may seem soulish to the natural man, are among the highest of rationality.


Soul- The feeling, irrational part of man

From the soul of man comes the ability to sorrow, sigh, and smile etc. Yet these things are irrational, they are not based on an exercising of intellect, but are deemed “involuntary” based on what one feels at the moment. IE Did you ever see the smile of a naturally unhappy person, it is a pathetic sight, because their intellect cannot force their face to do that which only emotion can do. From the soul comes the “if it feels good, do it” mentality.


As you should be able to tell, our soul is where our sin nature resides, and this is what leads us into sin. As you should also be able to tell, our spirit is where the new birth takes place which gives us that which is needed to battle that which comes from our soul. In a man who has not been born again, he has enough rationale to know a certain amount of good from evil, and in many cases knows enough to seek out God, but his soul overcomes and gets in the way. In a sense, the soul is the “strong man” that must first be tied up before man can actually KNOW God.


Heb 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.


OJ

 2011/2/26 10:15
hoohoou
Member



Joined: 2009/12/11
Posts: 212
Texas

 Re: What is the distinction between soul and spirit?

Someone already mentioned it but Watchman Nee in the Spiritual Man has a great explanation of it. The book changed my life and I don't say that lightly.

Another good source is Zac Poonen. Without hearing his teaching I'm not sure I would have had the foundation to really understand what Nee was saying.


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Matt Smith

 2011/2/26 10:45Profile





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