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  • From: furuli AT online.no
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [b-hebrew] Re: Nefesh mot
  • Date: Sat, 23 Aug 2003 15:27:57 +0200

Dear Michael,

A view that the OT tells about, or implies that man has an immortal soul is anachronistic. Such a view extrapolates into the OT a modern religious belief that was inherited from the Greeks. Even the Babylonians who believed in a Netherworld where the dead were alive, do not connect this life after death with NAPI$TU (the Akkadian cognate to NEPE$). It is correct, as Liz writes that NEPE$ was connected with the blood. We must be very careful not to press Hebrew idiom, and this can be illustrated with NEPE$ and DFM. In Leviticus 17:11 it is said that NEPE$ is *in* the blood, but in verse 14 it is said that NEPE$ *is* the blood. For modern persons this should indicate a difference, because something cannot both be *in* a fluid and at the same time "be" that very fluid. Such a difference was not always necessary for the Hebrew mind because roots such as NP$ could have a broader scope than many modern words, and different viewpoints could be used as well. We can say that we *have* life and at the same time say that we *are* alive. Depending on whether the side of the concept NEPE$ that a writer wanted to make visible was the physical creature or the life of that creature, he could use BE or not use that preposition. Taking this into account, we realize that not even 1 Kings 17:20,21 is evidence for a soul that is separated from, and lives apart from the body.


Best regards

Rolf Furuli




J. Sprinkle wrote:

for he does not possess
a NEPHESH, but he is a
NEPHESH.... NEPHESH in
OT does not often (I'm
tempted to say never)
mean "soul" as opposed
to body.

This may be true in Gen. 2:7. But I think we're
approaching the idea in Gen. 35:18:

VAY'HI B'TZET NAFSHAH...

"So it was as her life departed..."

This account seems to objectify Rachel's NEPHESH from
some other essential part of her being, ...perhaps her
body. But then her body is still her. And her
NEPHESH something else. See what I mean? I'm not
saying that the doctrine of the *immortal soul* is
taught here in Genesis, but that NEPHESH is an
immaterial part of the human creature, ...I think
we're at least given a hint in this passage.

B'RAKHOT,
-- Michael Millier




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