Spirit and Soul

Hebrews 4:12

The word is the divider of soul and spirit, bone and marrow The spirit and soul of a man are so closely related that it is a matter of major contention in anthropology whether man is a tripartite being or just made up of body and soul.

All human actions are products of the human spirit while the life giving principle that makes man a living being is the soul. While the soul is in a sense called spirit in the NT term pneuma, (pneumatics and pneumonia) the spirit of a man is not just the breath but also the controlling principle that determines human action. This is where man is different from animals. Whilst human emotions are expressions of the soul, the will—which determines choices and reasoning—is seated in the human spirit.

The soul is the life principle whilst the spirit is the living principle. The soul is the man alive whilst the spirit makes the man a personality—a responsible being.

When the soul departs from the body, it returns to God with the spirit to give account of its stewardship on earth. The body returns to dust. God issues life and so it returns to him, whilst the real man, the spirit, stands before God for accountability.

The word of God, divides the spirit and soul—the word of God divides even that which seems inseparable. What makes man a sinner is not the life that God issued which made him a living being, but the human spirit that carries in it the responsibility for choice. Sin is a personal act prompted by the human spirit. Sin is not a product of the soul for even animals have souls yet they don’t sin. What makes sin a sin is the guilt which seats in the human spirit When the word of comes, it pierces through to the separation of the life giving deposit of God and the defiled spirit of the man. It deals with the corrupted hopes of the man. It is the word that cuts down the sinner and brings him on his knees and makes him to cry out ‘depart from me, I am a man of iniquity’. The word cuts off the ignorance of a man’s...