) • h
O. T. chai
N. T.
cient to impart life ti) Jairus' daughter, fc and to Lazarus, though four days dead., The theme of the Apostle John is Life. k He writes his Gospel that men may believe that Jesus is the Christ and that, believ- , ing, they may have life in His name. He begins his first chapter in harmony with 1 this theme, for he says, In Him was Life. The First Epistle begins with the declara- tion that the Life was manifested and we " have seen it; and he closes the Epistle with the climax, ' ' This is the True God ^ and Eternal L i f e ." Life, therefore, is associated with God J L the Father and the Son, and Death with Satan who wields its power. II. LIFE, WHERE . IS IT? In the preceding chapter, we have seen that sin involves death. But what is r death? For definitions we seek the dic- tionary. The first one found gives this: • "Death—extinction of life; entire loss of vitality; mortality; decease; demise; de- parture from this world; separation of the scul from the b o d y ." The first definition [» and the last are such as suit our need—< » "extinction of l i f e ," "separation of the soul from the b o d y ." Were these defini- • tions to find expression in Hebrew, the same word would be used in both, thus: "extinction of nephesh" and "separation of nephesh from the body.'' However the • Scriptures would not use the term ' ' ex- t i n c t i o n" with reference to nephesh, for f)the continued existence of the soul, albeit this is also the life of the flesh, is clearly seen. » Thus f ar then, with the exception just noted, our common English speech and the Scripture usages of words are equally agreed, that death is the absence of life, ^ the forfeiture of life, the laying down or H pouring out of life. It is of vast import- I aiice, then, to know what life-is. Our English word is used in a great variety I f of ways—we speak of life as an abstrac- tion or a principle, or a force; we speak of it as something inherent in the creature; wo speak of it as revealing character or we speak of it as the record of one's daily acts. The languages in which our Bible was written were not so poor in their vocabu- laries as to require such stress to be put upon a single word for the expression of this great ar.ray of ideas. There are three principal words in the Old Testament translated " l i f e , " and these three correspond with three principal words in the New Testament translated " l i f e . "' This may be shown more clearly thus:
zoo —general term for life. The only word ever used for eternal life. " I n Him was l i f e ," etc. psuche—Soul or life. In the latter sense it is the vital part of earthly living beings, even ani- mals. It is not the equivalent of spirit
nephesh
even when translated soul, but seems never to be divorced from spirit, yomayim bios —the earthly life, e. g., long life, this world's good, etc. In looking, then, for the word which ex- presses that life which is given up at death, we find the word nephesh in the Old Testament and psuche in the New. We find that these two words are translated both soul and life. The former use is the more common, for soul appears as the trans- lation of nephesh in 456 passages, while life is the translation in 99. Similarly, in the New Testament, psuche is translated soul in 57 passages and life in 41. With few exceptions, a possessive is used in con- nection with these words whether they be translated soul or life, e. g.: A man's soul, etc. Just here, though the subject is not vital to the present discussion, we must turn aside to the consideration of man's tri-une nature as clearly revealed in the Word of God. In Genesis 2:7, is given an account of the creation of man-—"And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground (his body), and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (his spirit); and mau became a living soul (his soul)."' Dr. An- drew Murray says that '''The spirit is the seat of our God—consciousness; the soul of our self-consciousness; the body of our world—consciousness. In the spirit, God dwells; in the soul self; in the body sense."' Were man to live as it was: designed that he should live, his spiritual nature would dominate his soul and that the body. But his fellowship with God depended upon a condition of unbroken obedience. When man sinned, he chose a life in which soul and body became confederate as against the domination of the spirit, and man be- came " f l e s h " in the Pauline sense of the term. " F o r they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the spirit the things of the spirit. For the mind of the flesh is death; but the mind of the spirit is life and peace; because the mind of the flesh is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be: and
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