Recovering Evangelicals #7 Soul and Afterlife: Bible also gives a human perspective
Before we look at what the Bible has to say about the soul, we take a look at how the Biblical authors obtained their scientific understanding on things in general.
Luke first introduces his understanding of “phenomenological science” — the science of their day — and then goes through several examples of science reflected in the Bible, and the human origins of that thinking.
- the sun orbiting a flat Earth
- a solid dome above the earth, holding back a cosmic ocean
- the creation of the first humans
- the invention of agriculture, music, metallurgy, and languages
- human infertility always being a problem with the woman
- God “doing” the weather by kicking over pails of water, opening closets full of lightning, and blowing across the land
Some of these examples are still held to varying degrees by Christians today … simply because they’re found on the pages of the Bible.
Then, we look at how the Biblical authors saw the soul as residing in the chest … in the heart, kidneys, and liver … and how they seem to have come to this way of thinking because of the surrounding ancient Near Eastern culture.
Some listeners might resist the idea of scripture being so heavily influenced by human (even pagan!) thinking. But one would think that if God was micromanaging the writing of those texts, he would have corrected the authors on these and other ideas. Luke then takes us through several reasons why God might have chosen to use this process for giving us the Bible.
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