When Paul says, “Your spirits are alive because of righteousness” (Romans 8:10), he apparently means “alive to God,” but he doesn’t imply that our spirits were completely “dead” before, only that they were living out of fellowship with God and were dead in that sense. In the same way, we as whole persons were “dead” in “trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1), but we were made alive to God, and we now must consider ourselves “dead to sin and alive to God” (Romans 6:11). Here the word “soul” clearly refers to the part of a person that exists after death. It cannot mean “person” or “life,” for it would not make sense to speak of those who “kill the body but cannot kill the person,” or who “kill the body but cannot kill the life,” unless there is some aspect of the person that lives on after the body is dead. Furthermore, when Jesus talks about “soul and body” he seems to be clearly talking about the entire person even though he does not mention “spirit” as a separate component. The word “soul” seems to stand for the entire nonphysical part of man. Christians have a “spiritual perception” or inner awareness of the presence of God experienced in worship and in prayer. At this deep inward level we can also at times feel spiritually troubled, or depressed, or perhaps have a sense of the presence of hostile demonic forces. Often this perception is distinct from our conscious, rational thought processes. As we discussed above, Paul realizes that at times his spirit prays but his mind does not understand (1 Corinthians 14:14). Paul certainly distinguishes a person who is “natural” ( psychikos, “soul-ish”) from one that is “spiritual” ( pneumatikos, “spiritual”) in 1 Corinthians 2:14–3:4. But in this context “spiritual” seems to mean “influenced by the Holy Spirit,” since the entire passage is talking about the work of the Holy Spirit in revealing truth to believers. But the passage doesn’t imply that Christians have a spirit and non-Christians don’t, or that the spirit of a Christian is alive and the spirit of a non-Christian isn’t. Paul isn’t talking about different parts of man at all, but about being influenced by the Holy Spirit. Paul appears to make a distinction between his spirit and his mind Clearly, the Bible makes a distinction between our physical bodies and a soul or spirit. Now let’s look at why dichotomists believe the Bible considers the soul and spirit to be the same thing. 5 reasons the soul and spirit are synonymous

Some trichotomists argue that both humans and animals have souls, and that the presence of a spirit is what makes us different from animals. For Students Pursue a deeper knowledge of God through self-paced college- and seminary-level online courses in Old and New Testament studies, theology, biblical Greek, and more.

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Others argue that “spirit” is not a separate part of man, but simply another term for “soul,” and that both terms are used interchangeably in Scripture to talk about the immaterial part of man that lives on after our bodies die. The view that man is made up of two parts (body and soul/spirit) is called dichotomy. Those who hold this view often agree that Scripture uses the word spirit (Hebrew “ rûach”, and Greek “ pneuma”) more frequently when referring to our relationship to God, but such usage (they say) is not uniform, and the word soul is also used in all the ways that spirit can be used. This is the most-widely held scholarly view on the soul and spirit. Later, we’ll look in more detail at the reasons why many scholars believe spirit and soul are synonymous. One part: the body Since dichotomy and trichotomy are more common views in the evangelical church today, let’s look at each one in detail.

Similarly, James says that “the body apart from the spirit is dead” (James 2:26), but mentions nothing about a separate soul. And when Paul speaks of growth in personal holiness, he approves the woman who is concerned with “how to be holy in body and spirit” (1 Corinthians 7:34), and he suggests that this covers the whole of the person’s life. He’s even more explicit in 2 Corinthians 7:1: “let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, and make holiness perfect in the fear of God.” Cleansing ourselves from defilement of the “soul” or of the “spirit” covers the whole immaterial side of our existence (see also Romans 8:10, 1 Corinthians 5:3, and Colossians 2:5). 4. The “soul” can sin or the “spirit” can sin. to the church of the firstborn, whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the Judge of all, to the spirits of the righteous made perfect . . .” —Hebrews 12:23 Many non-Christian philosophers challenge the idea of a soul or spirit, arguing that humans have no immaterial existence. Perhaps partially in response to this, some evangelical theologians hesitate to affirm dichotomy in human existence, instead arguing for monism, affirming that the Bible views man as a single unified part. The Bible talks about unbelievers having a spirit that is obviously alive but is in rebellion against God—whether Sihon, King of Heshbon (Deuteronomy 2:30: the Lord “hardened his spirit”), or Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 5:20: “his spirit was hardened so that he dealt proudly”), or the unfaithful people of Israel (Psalm 78:8: their “spirit was not faithful to God”). Clearly, Christians aren’t the only ones who have spirits. Seeing the soul and spirit as synonymous terms for our complete immaterial being reminds us that Christian growth includes all aspects of our lives. We are continually to “cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, and make holiness perfect in the fear of God” (2 Corinthians 7:1). We are to be “increasing in the knowledge of God” (Colossians 1:10), and our emotions and desires are to conform increasingly to the “desires of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:17), including an increase in godly emotions such as peace, joy, love, and so forth (Galatians 5:22).By itself, the phrase “your spirit and soul and body” is inconclusive. Other passages of Scripture pile up synonyms for emphasis, and that could be what Paul is doing here. For example, Jesus says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind” (Matthew 22:37). Is Jesus indicating that the soul is different from the mind or the heart? This problem is even greater in Mark 12:30: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.” When scholars assemble everything the Bible says about the soul and spirit, there’s still some room for interpretation. The three main schools of thought come down to how many “parts” humans are made of: Three parts: Body, soul, and spirit This view is called monism. According to monism, the scriptural terms soul and spirit are just other expressions for the “person” himself, or for the person’s “life.” Most evangelical theologians don’t hold this view because so many scriptural texts seem to affirm that our souls or spirits live on after our bodies die: Additionally, people who have died and gone to heaven or hell are referred to as either “spirits” (such as in Hebrews 12:23 and 1 Peter 3:19) or “souls” (such as in Revelation 6:9 and Revelation 20:4). 2. When people die, Scripture says either that the “soul” departs or the “spirit” departs. The functions of knowing, perceiving, and thinking are also said to be done by our spirits. For instance, Mark speaks of Jesus “perceiving [Greek “ epiginōskō”, ‘knowing’] in his spirit” (Mark 2:8). When the Holy Spirit “bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Romans 8:16), our spirits receive and understand that witness, which is certainly a function of knowing something. In fact, our spirits seem to know our thoughts quite deeply, for Paul asks, “What person knows a man’s thoughts except the spirit of the man which is in him?” (1 Corinthians 2:11). (See also Isaiah 29:24, which speaks of those who now “err in spirit” but “will come to understanding.”)

Verses such as 1 Peter 1:22 and Revelation 18:14 seem to imply that our souls can sin. Those who hold to trichotomy will usually agree that the “soul” can sin since they think that the soul includes the intellect, the emotions, and the will. It’s not just one part of us (the spirit) that has been made alive in Christ. We are a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). We should think of the soul and spirit as the same thingIf we hold to a view of dichotomy that upholds the overall unity of man, it will be much easier to avoid the error of depreciating the value of our intellects, emotions, or physical bodies. We don’t have to think of our bodies as inherently evil or unimportant. There is a continual interaction between our body and our spirit, and they affect each other: “A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a downcast spirit dries up the bones” (Proverbs 17:22). When Stephen was dying, he knew he would immediately pass into the presence of the Lord, for he prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” (Acts 7:59). When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained.” —Revelation 6:9