AN INTEGRATION OF
BIBLICAL ANTHROPOLOGY AND NEUROPSYCHOLOGY
AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR
CHRISTIAN EDUCATION AND DISCIPLESHIP
BY
MICHAEL RUSSELL, D.Min.
© 2002
There are two ways we can distort God’s role
in the ministry of Christian education.
The first is to discount it, and to see Christian growth
as simply a natural process.
The second is to make it a magical thing,
demanding that God work against all natural processes
and intervene in spectacular ways.
It is far better, and far more biblical, to realize that
God works through natural means in a supernatural way.
– Lawrence Richards, 1975
Introduction
The purpose of the present work is to present an integration of the biblical depiction of human experience with the present understanding of the human brain that may then be used to inform and facilitate education and discipleship within the local church.
While efforts to integrate Christian theology and psychology are not new, attempts to reconcile the findings of the neurosciences with the teaching of the Bible concerning human nature are relatively recent. The present study differs from the majority of integrative writings: although numerous attempts have been made in the past to integrate secular psychology and Christian theology, such efforts typically were aimed at integrating a particular theory or school of psychological thought with the data of the Bible. Frequently, however, a theory that originated with secular psychologists is imposed upon the Bible: the theory assumed to be true is then supported by carefully adduced verses and passages.
This work differs from previous writings in significant ways.
First, the desire here is to reconcile special revelation with general revelation: that aspect of biblical anthropology which is concerned with the human constitution is to be embedded in the neurological facts known at this time. Stated differently, this paper seeks to infuse human physical existence with the individual’s immaterial experience.
Second, no actual theory or “school” of psychology, drawn from either the Bible or any other source, is offered: the purpose here is to explain how the biblical picture of human nature can be synthesized with the physical nature of the brain. This study develops a model of biblical anthropology that is independent of secular theories, philosophy, metaphysics, or neuropsychology.
Third, the discoveries and information gained from neurology are subsumed under the authoritative revelation of Scripture. Neuropsychology serves only to suggest how God might accomplish His work in His children; it does not explain the content of the mind, heart, or soul.
Finally, this work parts ways with other writings in that it does not seek to address any specific problem or struggle with which Christians often are faced. In contrast, a general approach to education and discipleship is presented which can then be adapted to specific situations and needs.
Goals
There are two major goals which the paper endeavors to accomplish. The first is to correlate the teachings of the Bible concerning the immaterial dimension of man with current information pertaining to the workings of the human brain. This necessitates an examination of the various aspects of man that are discussed in the Bible, and this biblical explanation is then placed within a neuropsychological framework.
The second major objective is to develop an approach to Christian education and discipleship which is informed by the resulting model of the human constitution. The educational model is the more practical and, perhaps, more important of the two, but had to be shown to be consistent with the approach modeled in the Bible. It is not enough to demonstrate that an approach to Christian education and discipleship is in agreement with the general revelation of the neurosciences; the neuroscience needed to be evaluated by the special revelation of the Bible. This necessitated the reconciliation of special and general revelation concerning human nature.
Assumptions
Five theological and one neuropsychological assumptions were made in this study. The theological assumptions pertained to the Bible, biblical psychology, anthropology, the Holy Spirit, and sanctification; the neurological assumption concerned the validity of the science.
1. It was assumed that the Bible was given by inspiration of God, and that inspiration extended equally and fully to all parts of the writings as they appeared in the original manuscripts. Consequently, the whole Bible in the originals is without error; it was also assumed that the standard, evangelical Bible as it exists today has been faithfully preserved and is free from error in all that it states. It was assumed that all of Scripture was designed for the believer’s practical instruction.
2. It was assumed that the Scriptures contain a biblical anthropology and that this depiction and explanation of human nature could be discovered.
3. It was assumed that God created Adam and placed within him the imago Dei, that this image is present in every person, and that the image in believers is being renewed to the likeness of Jesus Christ in His humanity. It was assumed that God did not use evolution to create Adam but created him in a moment of time as explained in Scripture.
4. It was assumed that every Christian is indwelt by the Holy Spirit; there is no such thing as a Christian who is not indwelt by the Holy Spirit.
5. It was assumed that God is at work in every believer to conform them to the image of Jesus Christ. It also was further assumed that sanctification is a work of the Holy Spirit with Whom the believer cooperates by yielding to and facilitating His work.
6. Regarding research on the structure and workings of the human brain, it was assumed that neurology is a credible scientific endeavor, permitted by and even encouraged in the Scriptures, and findings related to the transmission of neural messages in the brain is reasonably factual. Neurology, which is not inspired by Greek myths or untested academic speculations, is based on observation and repeatable, verifiable research conducted on human beings.
Scope and Limitations
There were numerous limitations imposed upon the present work. Since the purpose of the paper was restricted to exploring the implications of an integration of biblical anthropology and neuropsychology for discipleship and Christian education, several aspects of biblical anthropology were not developed fully. Only those facets of biblical anthropology involved in learning and discipleship are explored.
Although a worthwhile and enlightening study, an examination of the relationship between neuropsychology and demon possession was not undertaken. This was due largely to the writer’s belief that Christians cannot be demon possessed (although they certainly may be oppressed). This paper chiefly is confined to intrinsic influences and activities within the immaterial dimension of the believer.
Since it is assumed that the human is a sinner by imputation, inheritance, and choice, the origin and universality of sin is not developed fully. The related teaching concerning a person’s inability to gain merit in the eyes of God apart from His saving grace also resided beyond the purview of the paper.
Neuropsychology is an enormous field and growing larger daily: because of that fact, numerous dimensions of the human brain were not included in the paper or mentioned only in passing. Brain architecture, including the various components of the human brain – such as the cerebellum, cerebral cortex, limbic system, and ventricles – were not discussed in detail. Considerable issues such as consciousness were also neglected. Only those areas of the brain which are directly involved in learning and discipleship were investigated.
Neurological theories of motivation, apart from identifying basic precipitators of neural activity in the brain, were not considered. Similarly, neurochemistry – the chemical elements required for normal thought processes – were not discussed. This restriction included a consideration of specific neuronal activities and neurotransmitters and their functions within the brain.
The peripheral nervous system was not examined; only the central nervous system was explored. Even here, discussion pertaining to the central nervous system was limited to specific and activities in the brain.
The origin, “evolution,” and nature of consciousness was not developed fully, including the present-day metaphysical interest in quantum mechanics and its possible connection to consciousness.
Overview
Chapter One, which serves as a brief review of the various approaches to developing a psychology or anthropology, distinguishes between general revelation, special revelation, and efforts to combine the two sources of data. It also differentiates between biblical psychology and anthropology, which is limited strictly to the special revelation of the Bible, and Christian psychology and anthropology, which is governed by special revelation but also incorporates what can be learned from general revelation. General revelation, and the neurosciences in particular, is held to be more supportive than complementary to special revelation: neurology, in this case, does not compete with biblical psychology but rather describes the “how” and “where” of God’s working in people. The Bible alone explains the “why” and offers a description of what should be the content and nature of human psychology and anthropology.
Chapter Two presents a novel approach to biblical psychology that stresses the unity, or monistic nature, of human beings. It explores the various aspects of human constitution and offers a model which does justice to the different manifestations of the immaterial while emphasizing the unity of the person.
Chapter Three provides an overview of how the brain works and suggests how God works in and through the physical brain to accomplish His purposes. It describes neural communication, the development of schemas, and briefly looks at the mind-brain connection. The synthesis of special and general revelations offers possible ways in which God superintends and directs neural communication and the development of neural networks to accomplish His work in sanctification.
Chapter Four begins with an overview of the traditional approach to secular education as well as Christian education and discipleship, examining their foundations and discovering why they have not been as effective as hoped. A theory of brain-based learning is described and demonstrated to be consistent with the approach utilized and modeled by Jesus Christ in His training of His disciples. Finally, the conditions for and twelve principles of brain-based learning and teaching are outlined and applied to Christian education and discipleship.
Chapter Five contains concluding remarks, including a heuristic application of the model developed in the paper to the life of Jesus Christ during His earthly ministry. It also includes comments on how and why Christian counseling, in all its various forms, is used by God to help others.
Chapter One
THE INTEGRATION OF PSYCHOLOGY AND THEOLOGY:
PROPOSED, OPPOSED, AND DISPOSED
This chapter explores the various aspects three closely-related approaches to the study of human nature: (1) those approaches which are derived from general revelation alone, hereafter referred to as extra-biblical (which are not contrary or antagonistic to Christian principles) or secular psychology (which are) ; (2) those which are based solely on the special revelation of the Bible, referred to as biblical psychology, and (3) those which draw from both general and special revelation, herein called Christian psychology.
To restate the distinction, extra-biblical and secular approaches are limited to what can be discovered only from the sciences, biblical psychology is confined to the data that may be adduced from the Bible, and Christian psychology utilizes what may be known from special revelation – the Bible – but also incorporates the current state of knowledge gleaned from general revelation. In Christian psychology as the term is used here, priority is always given to what may be known from the Bible: its truths are unchanging, while the conclusions gleaned from general revelation – such as the neurosciences – are less enduring. The use of such distinguishing terms is not strictly descriptive and does not imply exclusion of all properties of the other terms: e.g., a “biblical psychology” most certainly will be Christian, and Christian psychology must be biblical.
In essence, this chapter investigates the viability, necessity, and nature of attempts by various Christian scholars to integrate extra-biblical psychology and biblical psychology; at the same time, it examines objections raised by opponents of such efforts. Ultimately, a qualitatively different type of resolution is suggested. The model presented here is a biblical anthropology resting upon and reconciled with neuropsychology: while the neurosciences may explain the dynamics of biblical anthropology, it does not compete with it at a metaphysical level. As used here, biblical anthropology is restricted to the immaterial aspect of the human constitution, i.e., the spirit and soul.
Whether or not integration is appropriate has a direct bearing on Christian education and discipleship. The source of data and resulting conceptualization of Christian psychology are determinative in developing a theory or philosophy of Christian education and discipleship that grows out of and is consistent with the Bible’s teachings on human nature. Any system of Christian education and discipleship, which has as its goal the facilitation of the spiritual transformation of Christians into the likeness of Christ, must be based upon a Christian understanding of the nature of the human person. The nature of the student or disciple dictates the content and form of instruction (1 Cor 3.1-2, Heb 5.11-14).
The chapter begins with an explanation of the importance of a thorough, scientifically tenable, Christian anthropology as an underlying, guiding principle in Christian education and, especially, Christian discipleship within the local church. It continues with a brief overview of the historic relationship between psychology and theology, and includes a synopsis of the antagonism that has existed for decades between proponents and opponents of integration. The historical synopsis is followed by an alternative approach that serves as the raison d'être of the present model of Christian education and discipleship.
Rationale
For the purposes of this paper, all arguments and justifications for the reconciliation of neuroscience and biblical anthropology were reduced to two: such efforts were viewed as being either heuristic or pragmatic. Heurism examines the subject for the sake of inspiring further exploration of the subject matter, while pragmatism finds value in such study only as a means to accomplish a specific task more effectively. The legitimacy of engaging in a heuristic or purely academic approach is open to question, but research and study simply for the sake of acquiring more knowledge or inspiring more research is not the goal of this work. The approach taken here is motivated by the practical implications and applications that might be drawn from a harmonization of neuropsychology and biblical anthropology.
The demonstration of the viability of a Christian anthropology – or, more accurately, a Christian neuropsychology derived from general revelation and interpreted by the Bible – is viewed as a theologically demanded precursor to any attempt at reconciliation. An approach to learning which is consistent with the present-day understanding of how the human brain learns must first be shown to be consistent with biblical teaching regarding human nature. All truth may be God’s truth, but the observations and conclusions drawn from the tentative truths of general revelation must be weighed against the definite truths of special revelation; thus, the development of a biblical anthropology preceded and took precedence over what may be known of human nature from the sciences of the brain. Nothing from neuropsychology – or any other source – is included if it cannot be demonstrated to be compatible with the teachings of the Bible.
The development of a neurologically-grounded Christian anthropology has importance beyond serving as a theoretical foundation for education and discipleship. Brain-based learning, i.e., the manner in which the brain assimilates and accommodates new information, must be understood by those in teaching positions in the local church. As will be shown, an awareness of a Christian anthropology that incorporates what is known from extra-biblical research regarding the brain and the process of learning is necessary for Christian educators if they are to present Bible-based content in a brain-based learning format. Speaking of the corresponding need for a drastic change in the approach of secular institutions to education, Geoffrey and Renate Caine stress the importance for teachers to comprehend neuropsychology in order to participate more effectively in the educational process: “The task, then, is for educators to deeply understand the way in which the brain learns.” Understanding how the brain learns, they argue, is vital for teachers if they are to create lessons and activities that yield not merely an accumulation of facts, but an application of the material reflected in changes in behavior. All teachers possess a theory of teaching and learning which must be evaluated by information on how the brain actually learns.
Similarly, the application of a neurologically-explained Christian anthropology will require significant changes for most churches with regard to their philosophy of ministry and approach to Christian education and discipleship. It will necessitate an abandonment of the traditional approach to “doing” church and Sunday School that has been predominantly based on secular psychology’s approach to education.
Given the radical change that a neurologically-informed approach to Christian education and discipleship would require, it is necessary to prove that brain-based learning is not only allowed by the Bible, but is implicitly taught and modeled in the Scriptures. For Christian education to be truly Christian, it must be thoroughly and consistently based upon the verifiable truths which God has provided through both general and special revelation. Ultimately, the practice of Christian education must adhere to and build upon those truths.
More than twenty-five years ago, Christian educator Lawrence Richards voiced concerns over the church’s secular approach to education. After drawing attention to the complex and multifaceted nature of human personality, he remarked that
. . . in our culture we have picked out one element and given it peculiar priority. That element is belief. Somehow all our educational efforts seem to hinge on the idea that if we change belief, we change the personality in every respect. We also assume that to change belief we need only to provide new information.
In developing what he described as a theology of Christian education, Richards stressed the failure of the old model of teaching and learning, calling for an approach that is more consistent with the model implied and reflected in the Bible:
Change strategy 1 (the formal schooling approach) is not adequate to effect changes across the total personality, tending instead to produce isolated rather than operating beliefs. Change strategy 2 (a nonformal learning approach) does a better job of producing whole-person growth and change, for it deals with all personality elements (affect, behaviors, values, perceptions, etc.) at the same time that it deals with belief (e.g., content). [emphases his]
Richards, as he surveyed the state of education in evangelical churches, was concerned with the final outcome of Christian education. It appeared that Christ’s modern-day disciples were not known by their love for one another (Jn 13.34), but rather by their knowledge of the Greek words for love and the specific usages and definitions of each!
In arguing for a return to a biblical model of Christian education, he wrote:
We must be ready to abandon our dependence on precedents established in a secular educational system which is not concerned with likeness but with information, and to design a unique educational process rooted in Scripture’s concern for the nurture of life. In that new design, the roles of the teacher and of learner must be harmonized with need for a model who, through shared learning experience, can “make disciples.”
The educational system in the United States, if not most of the Western world, has been and still is guided by a model that is behaviorally ineffective due to its failure to comprehend the manner in which the brain earns. “Schooling has gone off the rails because it tends to equate knowledge about the world with direct knowledge of the world,” according to Caine and Caine (emphases theirs). This confusion, the authors contend, has been responsible for the ineffectiveness of public schools. It is not unreasonable, by extension, to assume that this explanation also accounts for the significant gap between what Christians know and what they actually do with such knowledge. Caine and Caine continue:
The standard model treats the stuff to be learned as separate and detached from the person doing the learning. Brain research shows that to be largely wrong. As people learn about the world in meaningful ways, the learning changes them. They are changed psychologically, and they are changed physiologically . . . They are literally reshaped and reformed.
Being “reshaped and reformed” echoes the outworking of the command that Jesus Christ gave to His church through the evangelist Matthew shortly before His ascension. Christ directed His disciples to “go therefore and make disciples of all the nations” (Mt 28.19); Paul described the experience of being a disciple as being “transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Rom 12.2). To effectively work toward the fulfillment of the Great Commission, it is imperative that the church reject the traditional, secular model of education and return to the model implied and exemplified in the New Testament, which is brain-based discipleship and Christian education.
Richards continued his call for drastic changes by questioning what was actually being accomplished in Christian education versus what needed to be achieved. He also located the problem in the church’s adoption of the secular model of education:
Christian education must be designed for the whole person, not for a single dimension of his personality. For this reason we must begin to challenge what we have done and are doing in Christian education. We must begin to raise the question of whether we are communicating life . . . or isolated beliefs. We must ask whether or not our acceptance of secular school structures as the context for the communication of faith may not actually hinder Christian growth. By attempting to teach faith in “school” settings we perhaps have inadvertently given learners the impression that biblical truth is for the mind only, divorced from doing, and that learning God’s Word is a separate and distinct intellectual activity for the young! [emphases his]
The value of a brain-based, Christian understanding of human nature and its application to Christian education is to be found in its effectiveness: rather than providing Christians with information which is typically isolated from subsequent behavior, a neurologically-based, Christian philosophy of education offers an increased probability of creating environments wherein the Holy Spirit can work to change lives. Transformation of character into the likeness of Jesus Christ is the proper goal of Christian education and discipleship: knowledge of God, not about God, is what is required.
Eschewing the information model of Christian education, Richards added that the biblical model is “concerned with the progressive transformation of the believer toward the character, values, motives, attitudes, and understandings of God Himself.” He added, “Strikingly, it seems that when we adopted from our culture the formal school approach to nurture, we in fact set up the conditions under which discipling and growth in likeness are least likely to take place!” One of the goals of the Christian neuropsychology presented here is to move the church away from an informational model of education and to return the Body of Christ to a transformational and relational approach to discipleship.
Historical Overview
For more than two millennia, psychology and theology coexisted as related disciplines, with the former a minor subject in an environment dominated by Christian theology and, to a lesser extent, philosophy. Until the last century, psychology had been regarded as a subordinate area of study to be considered under the heading of either philosophy or religion. Judaism and Christianity were important contributors to the discussion, and the essence of the nature of the human person was largely determined or (at least) profoundly influenced by theological pronouncements which went largely unchallenged by others. Benner observed that
Long before psychology developed as a separate discipline from philosophy, Christianity was actively involved in the study, development, and understanding of psychology. Such work is to be found in the theological study of the soul, an important topic in theology since earliest times.
The writings of Tertullian in the Third Century and Gregory of Nyssa in the Fourth represented early efforts of the Christian community to provide an understanding of the nature of the person as revealed in the pages of Scripture. Before the emergence of psychology as an independent branch of learning, biblical psychology perhaps reached its zenith in the 1855 publication of A System of Biblical Psychology by Franz Delitzsch. The powerful influence of Christianity in shaping the Western world’s view of the nature of the person, however, soon was to be not only challenged but essentially brought to an abrupt end.
As stated previously, extra-biblical or secular psychology as a separate discipline is relatively new. Championed by metaphysically-biased scientists such as Sigmund Freud and others, the field of psychology stepped forth from the shadows of theology and philosophy and emerged as a cultural force during the last half of the nineteenth century. Since that time, psychology’s importance in Western culture can hardly be exaggerated; sadly but predictably, it has had a similarly profound effect on the church. Carter and Narramore stated that, “With the possible exception of the theory of evolution in biology, psychology has already had a greater impact on the church than any other scientific discipline.”
The last half of the twentieth century saw psychology at first infiltrate and then practically dominate the life of the Christian church in the United States. A brief period of justification for the incorporation of various threads of extra-biblical psychology into the fabric of historic Christianity, for which numerous Christian psychologists argued, was quickly followed by a veritable flood of workshops, seminars, software programs, magazine articles, books, and graduate degrees designed to “enlighten” Christianity about the benefits and insights of extra-biblical – and even secular – psychology. In addition to their considerable influence on biblical anthropology, Christian psychologists all-but replaced Christian theologians as the authoritative voice for matters of faith and practice, and the place of extra-biblical psychology appeared to be firmly established by the end of the millennium. The tragic shift was complete: whereas Christianity had previously impacted psychology, the upstart psychology was now impacting, influencing and even changing Christianity.
Integration Proposed
An important book proposing the reasonableness and necessity of integration was 1979’s The Integration of Psychology and Theology, which provided both a classification and a justification for attempts at integration. Since the book helped in determining the form and substance of many subsequent attempts at integration, as well as providing basic presuppositions supporting such efforts, it is considered here in some detail as representative of the proponents of integration.
A key, foundational belief espoused in the book was “the unity of truth,” by which was meant, “all truth is God’s truth, wherever it is found.” A corollary assumption grew from the first: “If all truth is God’s truth, there is a basic unity between all disciplines.” These two presuppositions cleared the way for the investigation and frequent acceptance of psychological theories and “truths,” and their incorporation into Christian ministry and doctrine. In what was tantamount to the elevation of the doctrinal and epistemological value of general revelation to that of special revelation, the proponents argued that since
God is the author of all truth, we need not be afraid to examine what might appear to be competing truth claims. If God is the author of all truth, we are not dealing with ultimately different sources of truth. And if issues such as personal adjustment, motivation, determinism, and the handling of negative emotions are not common to both psychology and theology, then we have in view either a truncated gospel or a very narrow psychology.
This approach, named the “Integrates Model” by the authors, was their preferred approach to any effort to combine psychology and theology. Crucial to the model was the belief that psychology and theology were potentially complementary comrades rather than competitors or enemies; additionally, it emphasized the almost-equal value of the two disciplines. Basing their rationale on God as the Provider of general revelation as well as special revelation, they concluded, “there is ultimately only one set of explanatory hypotheses.” For them, the influence of psychology and theology was justifiably reciprocal.
The work and words of J. Harold Ellens, a prominent figure during the nascent years of attempts to integrate psychology and theology, reflected some of the basic beliefs of the adherents of the “Integrates Model”:
The real issue in the quest for Christian responsibility in the helping professions is the search for a method and model of doing Theology from a psychological perspective and doing Psychology from a theological perspective . . .
In the realm of psychological practice, the first principle of being Christian is not that it conforms to our Theology but that it is the most superbly sound psychotherapy possible. To be a Christian therapist requires first of all that I be a thoroughly effective therapist [emphases his].
Ellens was only one of the many proponents of integration who, although differing in methodology and extent, found the adaptation of psychological “discoveries” to biblical truth to be a necessary undertaking for the effectiveness of ministry and discipleship.
Gary Collins, professor at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, sought to develop a psychological model for Christians and non-Christians alike that was based on the Bible. He stated, for example, that his “new approach to counseling would propose that a person is abnormal if he is alienated from God.” (Implied in such a statement is that those who are not alienated, i.e., are in fellowship with God, are not abnormal – an optimistic, if not realistic, position.) Over time, however, Collins moved more toward the center of the integrationist movement and employed psychology as a lens through which the Bible and Christian life could be more effectively understood, applied, and lived.
Others promoting or practicing the “Integrates Model” included James Dobson, Norman Wright, John White, Sandra Wilson, Dan Allender, Gary Smalley, Larry Crabb, Paul Tournier, Kirk Farnsworth, Henry Cloud, and John Townsend.
The authors identified two other approaches: the “Of Model” and the “Parallels Model.” The former maintained that there was considerable overlap or common ground between psychology and theology, thereby tending to lose the distinction of Christian truth and reduce theology to a religious psychology.
The “Of Model,” Carter and Narramore said, rested upon “humanistic, mystical, and/or naturalistic assumptions” and maintained that “psychology and religion have a great deal in common and can be of great benefit to one another when there is open exchange between the two realms.” Theological terms and doctrines were redefined and modified to reflect a psychological Christianity:
The supernatural and revelational aspects of Scripture are rejected in favor of an approach that looks for the psychology of Scripture . . . It takes a cookie-cutter approach in which the theories of psychology are pressed onto the dough of Scripture. The dough that fits within the cutter is retained while whatever falls outside is rejected . . . It reduces Scripture (or religion) to psychology and robs it of its revelational and supernatural content.
Advocates of the “Of Model,” according to Carter and Narramore, included John Sanford and Seward Hiltner.
The “Parallels Model,” as the name implied, saw psychology and theology as parallel disciplines which either existed as distinct areas of study with no significant intersection, or addressed the same issues and data but employed different terminology. In the first case, there was no integration since the disciplines had no common ground; in the second, the concepts were identical but described by different terms.
The “Parallels Model”is rooted in the belief that Christianity and psychology are not intrinsically related. Each exists in it own sphere. Psychology is scientific while Christianity is personal (or social). Both Christianity and psychology can be embraced without fear of conflict since they operate in different spheres. Where we do find areas of relationship and overlap, we view these more as interesting parallels than as indicators of a deeper (or broader) unifying set of truths that could conceivably embrace both disciplines.
Among those whom the authors regarded as proponents of the “Parallels Model” were Malcolm Jeeves, Paul Clement, and Clyde Narramore. This was an unfair characterization of some in the group. As demonstrated in a later chapter, Jeeves – as well as David Myers, Warren Brown, Nancey Murphey, and others who might have been labeled as holding to a “Parallels Model” – was actually proposing a model of Christian psychology qualitatively different from anything imagined by Carter and Narramore.
Integration Opposed
There has been considerable opposition to efforts to integrate psychology and theology, opposition that ostensibly grew out of a concern for the purity of the faith and the integrity of the Word of God. One of the more recognizable and caustic critics has been John F. MacArthur, Jr., the president of The Master’s Seminary and Professor of Pastoral Ministries there.
Of chief concern for MacArthur and others was the “neo-gnostic” influence of psychology on the purity of the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ. The gospel, they argued, in its broadest sense includes not only eternal salvation but also temporal salvation, i.e., that which is commonly referred to as sanctification. Despite his at-times vitriolic polemics, MacArthur (and others) felt as though he was doing battle against the most virulent, insidious attack of Satan on the church in his lifetime:
The stampede to embrace the doctrines of secular psychology may be the most serious threat to the life of the church today. These doctrines are a mass of human ideas that Satan has placed in the church as though they were powerful life-changing truths from God. Most psychologists epitomize neo-gnosticism, claiming to have secret knowledge for solving people’s real problems. Some of them even claim to perform a therapeutic technique they call “Christian counseling” when, in reality, they are using secular theory with biblical references tacked on to treat spiritual problems.
MacArthur maintained that no one, counselor or not, can lift another person above the level of spiritual maturity which they have attained; therefore, the definitive qualification for helpers is Christlikeness. “True psychology (i.e., ‘the study of the soul’) can be done only by Christians,” he added, “since only Christians have the resources for understanding and transforming the soul.”
In his vehement opposition to integration, MacArthur identified what for him was a critical point that summarized the differences between proponents and opponents of integration: the issue of the sufficiency of the Scriptures.
Like theistic evolution, Christian psychology is an attempt to harmonize two inherently contradictory systems of thought. Modern psychology and the Bible cannot be blended without serious compromise to or utter abandonment of the principle of Scripture’s sufficiency . . .
People who mix psychology with divine resources and sell the mixture as a spiritual elixir should not be encouraged. Their methodology amounts to a tacit admission that what God has given in Christ is not adequate to meet the deepest needs of troubled lives.
Other opponents voiced similar objections with more grace and mercy than MacArthur but ended up being no less obdurate in their conclusions and, at times, overstating the positions of the proponents of integration. Paul Vitz, in a consideration of the so-called Third Wave of psychology, i.e., humanistic psychology, described it as “The Cult of Self-Worship” in the subtitle to his book. Even though some opponents were guilty of ignorance or deliberate distortion of the positions of integrationists, the generalized observations and broad criticisms leveled by critics such as Vitz ultimately proved to be timely and valuable correctives to the undiscerning acceptance of secular theories of psychology.
Carter and Narramore offered a characterization of the opponents of integration:
Christians operating from an Against view not only hold firmly to their belief in one source of truth, they also see other truth claims and their working out in therapy and society as potentially dangerous to mental and emotional health. Just as secular Against authors are concerned with the potentially negative effects of religion on a person’s psyche, so Christian Against authors are concerned about the possible negative influence of psychology.
In summarizing and evaluating the “Against Model” of integration, the authors found very little that could be considered positive and no practical value to the opponents’ position. They concluded:
By way of evaluation, we see no advantages to the Against model. Although some may think that the rhetoric of the secular and sacred camps serves to balance each other’s perspective, the truth is that they rarely if ever listen to one another. The oppositional stance inherent in both of these views does not allow proponents to step out of their own perspective to understand the suppositions, methodology, and reasoning of those holding other views. The Against model is a rigid, defensive way of looking at things that does not allow for stimulation, clarification, and integration.
A second disadvantage of the Against model is its limited epistemology. Secular proponents see no place for revelation and Christian proponents see little place for general revelation and common grace . . .
A final weakness of the Against model is found especially in the Christian version. Although it is not a necessary corollary of the sacred Against model, it seems that most proponents of this model hold a relatively superficial view of sin . . . Although theologically they may know better, their writings imply that a person’s problems can generally be traced to doing, saying, or thinking the wrong things. Thus therapy essentially becomes telling the counselee what the Bible says and how he or she should respond.
Integration Disposed
The enduring struggle between proponents and opponents of integration may be reduced to a single question: Which discipline, psychology or theology, is to be in subordinate service to the other? Some proponents maintained that the task of integration was the harmonization of two equal, parallel disciplines: both were enriched by the observations of the other. Other proponents argued that special revelation (Scripture) is superior to general revelation (psychology), but stopped short of confessing that Scripture is sufficient by itself. Opponents, too, were gathered into at least two camps: the first allowed that psychology may have discovered legitimate dimensions of the person, but found the general revelation offered by psychology to be superfluous given the sufficiency of the Bible. Similarly, a second oppositional group believed in the sufficiency of Scripture but perceived psychology not as a neutral-but-unnecessary observer, but as an insidious, gnostic influence on the Church.
At the level at which the war over integration was being waged, all factions could claim some legitimacy to their opinions. The position of this paper, however, is that the question of integration has been misstated from its inception: the resolution of the imagined conflict is to be found at a different level of dialogue. If integration were neither proposed nor opposed but instead disposed, the difficulties and criticisms leveled by all camps could be dismissed as irrelevant to the proper statement of the issue. Once such a disposition is accomplished, it then becomes possible to demonstrate that a Scripturally-derived, Christian psychology is not only consistent with neuropsychology, but that such an understanding of the human person could then be applied to the critical obligations of Christian education and discipleship. The only desirable or tenable contribution from general revelation in this matter are those neurological insights into how Scripture can be employed to equip believers to do that which God intends for them to do (1 Tim 3.16-17, Eph 2.10).
To endeavor to dispose of the integration of psychology and theology is not to advocate doing away with such efforts but, as one dictionary has defined “dispose,” it is to propose that the two be “put in a particular or suitable place.” A basic goal of the present paper is to put psychology, in particular, in its place: like secular archaeology, geology, or geography, a psychology springing from the study of general revelation – and specifically neuropsychology – can be utilized to inform the church in her efforts to disciple and educate Christians.
As with all knowledge gained through general revelation, however, such information has to be critically and carefully evaluated through the lens of special revelation. That having been said, an accurate, neurological understanding of the nature of human beings can greatly enhance the effectiveness of the church, while at the same time all but eliminate the need for forcing the square-pegged theories of secular psychology into the perfectly round holes of biblical anthropology.
To employ a computer analogy, the on-going argument between Christian proponents and Christian opponents of integration has been an argument about software, i.e., which is the better program to employ or how biblical software could be “updated” by newer, psychological versions. The approach taken here, however, does not seek to compare or harmonize software from general revelation with the software of special revelation. Instead, this view accepts the accuracy and sufficiency of the software of special revelation, i.e., the brain, but continues on to explore what general revelation explains about the nature of the hardware (the physical person). Always, however, the software of special revelation interprets and limits the explanations that general revelation offers concerning the hardware
A handful of Christian psychologists has taken up the challenge to investigate the implications of modern neuropsychology for the historical anthropological doctrines and positions of the church. They have found themselves in a position similar to that of Plato and Aristotle, who defended the soul against the reductionistic efforts of Democritus. Among the modern-day defenders of the soul is Arthur Custance, one of the early psychologically oriented Christian writers to consider the ramifications of brain research on the Christian faith. Describing the prevalent opposing philosophy of the day, i.e., reductionism (which regards the human person and soul to be nothing but an organism reducible to physics and chemistry), he wrote:
Man has been held to be essentially an electrochemical machine. . . . Mind is merely an extension of the mechanism of the brain and entirely dependent upon it. Such a view is by definition monistic: the brain acts upon the mind, which is a mere extension of itself, but the mind has no power to act upon the brain [emphasis his].
Custance rejected such a reductionistic approach to the person and chided science for having ignored “a whole area of reality in their search for power over the forces of nature.” His solution, which cannot be faulted, is to once again embrace the Scriptures:
We seem to be left with no alternative but to turn to biblical revelation, a remarkable account which has carried untold millions who were guided by it through the most severe testings imaginable with an absolute assurance of survival in peace and joy on the other side of the grave.
Now metaphysical speculation is the search for understanding by the use of reason alone without the help of revelation, whereas theology is the application of philosophy to religious experience by the use of reason but with the help of revelation. If this added source of data is allowed, we may perhaps usefully take a second look at what biblical theology has been saying for centuries on the mind/brain or soul/body relationship [emphasis his].
Custance seems to reflect a Thomistic approach to knowledge (“understand in order to believe”) rather than an Augustinian one (“believe in order to understand”), and the limitations of neuroscience during his day allowed him to embrace a theoretical dualism of mind-brain or soul-body. Subsequent developments in neuroscience, however, soon challenged the viability of such a dichotomous understanding of the person. Jeeves reported that “. . . the general thrust of a massive amount of research in neuroscience and neuropsychology points increasingly to the tightening of the link between mind and brain.” With Brown, Jeeves challenged the notion of a soul that existed apart from the body.
. . . the strong influence of neurobiological processes on our personal, social, and even spiritual lives, at the very least forces us to consider the embodiment of soulish human functioning. . . . Thus, a neuroscience perspective strongly questions a separate, non-material agency for the soul by which certain domains of human experience can remain unaffected by changes in brain function. . . . Soul (mind) is physiologically embodied. . . .
The unity of the body-mind-soul is clear in clinical neuropsychological phenomena such as the moral and religious breakdown in some individuals with Alzheimer’s disease, or the hyper-religiosity of some individuals with temporal lobe epilepsy, or spiritual depression secondary to physical disorders. Thus, the subjective experiences of soul and spirit rest deeply in the functions of the physical brain which abide by physical/biological laws.
Their belief in the ontological unity of the person is reflected in the statement, “We are souls; we don’t have souls.”
The viability of a dualistic view of the person (the immaterial existing and functioning independently of the material) has begun to be questioned by the secular scientific community. The ultimate evidence for Christians, of course, must come from the Bible, but even as previous scientific advances caused theologians to reexamine traditional positions, so the nature of humanity needs to be reconsidered by Christian thinkers in light of neurological research. The first half of this paper attempts to accomplish such a reconsideration.
A correct Christian anthropology has ministerial value apart from its application to Christian education and discipleship. How Christians understand themselves, the relationship of soul and brain, and the process of sanctification is crucial in fulfilling the second part of the Great Commandment, i.e., to love one another. Jeeves relates the following description of the ravages of Alzheimer’s dementia upon aging and previously mature, dedicated Christians:
As the disease progresses three distinguishable stages are evident. First is forgetfulness, second comes confusion, and finally dementia. In the final stage, psychotic-like delusions and hallucinations occur. The suffering patient may then manifest not only psychological consequences but also dramatic changes in spiritual awareness. Subjective appreciation of their relationship with God may be severely compromised. Detailed studies of devout Christians in the terminal stages of Alzheimer’s show that they are frequently deeply troubled about their relationship with God. They feel personally responsible for falling away from their close walk of discipleship, they may violate the commands of their nurses, and they may describe bizarre sexual disturbances. They may believe that they have committed sins that have provoked God’s wrath. In due course, they lose all interest in their daily devotions and prayer. They are, as the psalmist has portrayed, often crying out from the depths of chaos. With the neural changes of which we have considerable knowledge, there are psychological consequences, which in turn affect spiritual awareness.
A proper, Christian understanding of the nature of the human person is vital in such cases for at least two reasons: one, people suffering from Alzheimer’s might never come to such painful conclusions were they taught differently about spiritual experience and the interaction of the spirit and the soul; two, and more certainly, those seeking to alleviate the suffering of such patients would have a better understanding of what is actually occurring and be able to encourage and support accordingly. “Faced with psychological disorders such as depression and schizophrenia,” David Myers and Jeeves cautioned, “Christians had therefore best respond not with simplistic snap judgments (as Job’s friends did in response to his misery) but with compassion and understanding.”
The course of Alzheimer’s – as well as other diseases such as epilepsy, schizophrenia, and depression – provides a compelling illustration of the light that the general revelation of neuropsychology can shine on the nature of human spiritual experience. The neuropsychology derived from general revelation, which is subject to errant researchers and scientists, must always be shown to be in harmony with the inerrant and infallible special revelation of the Bible. If, however, neuropsychology can be shown to pass the test of being consistent with the Bible, then it can be employed as a valuable tool in ministry.
Therefore, the disposition of psychology in general and neuropsychology in particular is to render it a subordinate, supportive discipline that may be utilized to illuminate, elaborate, and explain the teaching of the Bible. Rather than compete with Scripture for content, however, it must be shown to be in agreement with and shed light on the reasons for the approach to Christian education and discipleship found in the Bible, especially the New Testament.
Chapter Two
A MODEL OF HUMAN NATURE
DERIVED FROM SPECIAL REVELATION
“What is man that You take thought of him?” – Ps 8.4
In developing a biblical, brain-based approach to Christian education and discipleship, there is no question more important than that of the psalmist: what, ultimately, is man? To be wrong about the constitution and dynamic of the human person is to lay a foundation which will not facilitate the efforts of the would-be educator or discipler and will fail to support and sustain genuine Christian growth. The purpose of the present chapter, therefore, is to present a model of human nature as revealed in the Bible. The model explains the biblical teaching of the monistic nature of the human being while accounting for the immaterial aspects of the person.
The Unity of the Human Being
Conceptualizing the original intent of human existence as an indivisible unity rather than a partitioned entity may at first seem to fly in the face of the teaching of the Bible, especially the New Testament. As Erickson notes, the popular discussion concerning the constitution of the human person recently has focused on whether the individual is bipartite, comprised of body and soul, or tripartite, consisting of body, soul, and spirit; the bipartite approach regards soul and spirit to be indistinguishable while the tripartite perspective sees soul and spirit as distinct.
In developing an approach to Christian education and discipleship, however, the key argument is not between dichotomy and trichotomy, but is rather a statement of functional unity as opposed to divisible, segregated components. Practically speaking, the church’s partitioned conceptualization of human nature has been functionally schismatic, resulting in an approach to Christian education and discipleship that has tended to target only one dimension of the person. The focus has been upon the immaterial part – and particularly the mind – of the individual, treating the person as though the mind exists in isolation from the material aspect, i.e., the body. Such a distinction has contributed to the generally ineffective approach of the present-day church to Christian education and discipleship. Richards concluded that
. . . what we seem to be discovering is that the formal school setting itself defines certain relationships and certain kinds of sharing (of ideas, not feelings) as appropriate, and thus rules out the kinds of relationships which are significant for discipling! . . . As long as teachers and learners perceive themselves to be in school, they will not develop the kinds of relationships or the kinds of sharing which are important for discipling!
Despite the educational difficulties to which a partitioned anthropology has contributed, the popular divisibility debate continues: Are human beings dichotomous, consisting of body and soul? Or are they trichotomous, made up of body, soul and spirit? Scriptures have been employed to support both sides of the debate, making it even more important to determine what the Bible actually says about human nature in general and, in particular, the immaterial experiences of a person. Since such a partitioning of human nature (if found to be biblical) would have a significant impact on Christian education and discipleship, the matter must be examined closely. It will be discovered, however, that what the Bible teaches is that God did not design or intend humans to be partitioned, that such divisions are a result of the Fall, and that partitions are not a reflection of God’s original creation or intention for human beings.
The divisive impact of the Fall on human nature appears to have been largely overlooked by most contemporary theologians. Thus, Ryrie speaks for many in evangelicalism when he describes a human being as a “bipartite unity,” as though this arrangement reflected God’s original and ultimate intent for the human race. Ryrie states,
That man is bipartite in nature is undebatable. Man is a material and nonmaterial entity, the two aspects being distinguishable. Physical death is described as the separation of body and spirit (James 2.26). . . . Man is made up of two substances, material and immaterial. Each consists of a variety within. The many facets of the material and the many facets of the immaterial join to make up the whole of each person. Man is rich diversity in unity.
There are many verses that appear to teach divisions in the person; only a few will be examined here. A pre-Fall difference between a person’s soulish and spiritual natures seems to be indicated by Gen 2.7, which states that “the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” If the difference were actual and not merely apparent, this would prove to be a determinative verse since it describes God’s original design for the human race. But Keil and Delitzsch argued that no distinction can be made between soul and spirit on the basis of this verse, adding that the human soul is unique from the souls of all other creatures in that it is a product of the direct action of God.
Moses’ instructions to the Israelites in Deu 4.29 and 6.5 to love God with all their heart, soul, and strength also would appear to support divisions within the human constitution. In commenting on the verses, however, many scholars see the Old Testament statement as a figure of speech which refers to the whole person rather than a treatise on parts of the person: it is viewed as “a specific Deuteronomic expression, implying the devotion of the whole being to God.” (It is difficult to imagine, if these were separate components in the person, how one might love God with their heart but not their soul.) Rather than teaching partitions, these verses (and others) support the unity (or monism) of the person.
In Mt 22, Christ echoes Moses: “You shall love the LORD your God will all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind” (v. 37). Gaebelein explains that from “the viewpoint of biblical anthropology, ‘heart,’ ‘soul,’ and ‘mind’ (v. 37) are not mutually exclusive but overlapping categories, together demanding our love for God to come from our whole person, our every faculty and capacity.” Nicoll agrees, adding that “the clauses referring to heart, soul, and mind are to be taken cumulatively, as meaning love to the uttermost degree, with all that is within us.”
About reading partitioning into Lk 1.46-47 – “And Mary said: ‘My soul exalts the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior.’” – Robertson cautions:
One need not press unduly the difference between “soul” (psuche) . . . and “spirit” here. Bruce calls them synonyms in parallel clauses. Vincent argues that the soul is the principle of individuality while the spirit is the point of contact between God and mankind. It is doubtful, however, if the trichotomous theory of mankind (body, soul and spirit) is to be insisted on. It is certain that we have an inner spiritual nature for which various words are used.
Myers and Jeeves, reflecting on the presentation of basic human nature in the Old Testament, explain that “in the Hebrew view, we do not have nephesh (a soul), we are nephesh (living beings).” The simplicity of their statement should not be allowed to obfuscate its importance: they are declaring that the human soul is not distinguishable or even capable of existence apart from the body. Their position is that the notion of a separate, “disembodied soul” is not found in the Bible.
Murphey corrects the overstatement of Myers and Jeeves by introducing the biblical fact of temporary disembodiment. Quoting Robinson, she supports indivisible monism:
“ . . . the Hebrew idea of personality is that of an animated body, not (like the Greek) that of an incarnated soul.” . . . [Robinson] argues that the psychological terminology and ideas of the New Testament are largely continuous with the Old Testament in conceiving of the person as a unity rather than dualistically. However, he also says that the most important advance in the New Testament is the belief that the essential personality (whether called the psyche or the pneuma) survives bodily death. This soul or spirit may be temporarily disembodied, but it is not complete without the body, and its continued existence after bodily death is dependent upon God rather than a natural endowment of the soul.
Green, who also argues strongly for a monistic understanding of human nature, prefaces his statements by noting that “on the whole, Scripture is unconcerned with speculative questions about the nature of humanity, and tends toward a narrative presentation of its anthropology which does not allow for easy division of its concerns into topics.” Nevertheless, concerning the human person as a unity rather than an amalgamation of components, he states:
Popular Christianity has tended to assume anthropological duality, and some streams of biblical scholarship have contended for it, usually by insisting that the New Testament materials are dualistic in their understanding of the human person.
With respect to that biblical evidence, it is important methodologically to cultivate an awareness of the possibility that readers of Scripture have been led to various forms of anthropological dualism by, first, overlooking the possibility that biblical authors have employed conceptual and/or rhetorical distinctions as heuristic devices for speaking of what is in fact indivisible.
Green offers the following conclusions regarding the monistic nature of an individual:
(1) the New Testament is not as dualistic as the traditions of Christian theology and biblical interpretation have taught us to think, though enough conceptual glossolalia exists among New Testament witnesses for us to see how a dualist reading of human nature has developed among Christians; (2) nonetheless, the dominant view of the human person in the New Testament is that of ontological monism, with such notions as “escape from the body” or “disembodied soul” falling outside the parameters of New Testament thought. . .
Morey, in addressing the question of eternal punishment, disagrees with Green’s denial of a “disembodied soul” or spirit. “Instead of describing man as passing into nonexistence,” he says, “the Old Testament states that man becomes a disembodied spirit. The usage of the word ‘rephaim’ irrefutably establishes this truth.” He goes on to explain that
. . . when the body dies, man enters a new kind of existence and experience . . . once man dies, he too becomes a disembodied supradimensional energy being and is capable of thought and speech without need of a body.
Natural immortality, which views man as an autonomous and independent immortal being through some kind of innate power [is erroneous]. Man is always and absolutely dependent upon the Creator for this life as well as for the next life. Man should never be viewed as independent or autonomous. Life in this world and the next must always be viewed as a gift from God.
Importantly, Morey does not stop with an argument for partitions but continues on to make a determinative point: human partitions are abnormal, an unintended condition caused by the Fall.
While it is natural for angels to exist as spiritual entities, it is not natural for man to do so. Thus, man’s death is not normal but a terrible ripping apart of what was never intended to be separated. The spiritual and physical sides of man are separated by death. And his existence as a spiritual entity alone is unnatural. This is why the resurrection is necessary. Man was created as a physical-spiritual being and must ultimately be reconstituted in the same way. Death is an unnatural event and man’s subsequent disembodied state is an unnatural existence which only the resurrection will remedy.
Erickson stresses material and immaterial divisions of the person while allowing for unity: “. . . the biblical teaching on the nature of the human does not rule out the possibility of some type of compound character, or at least some sort of divisibility, within the human makeup.” He opts for a position he labels “conditional unity:”
According to this view, the normal state of a human is as a materialized unitary being. . . . This monistic condition can, however, be broken down, and at death it is, so that the immaterial aspect of the human lives on even as the material decomposes. At the resurrection, however, there will be a return to a material or bodily condition.
By so arguing for a “conditional unity,” Erickson makes the question of divisions presently and practically moot. His chief contribution to this discussion is the observation that prior to death the human person is functionally a unity, not a bipartite or tripartite being who functions at various times from different aspects of his or her personality.
The position assumed in this paper is a modification of the argument set forth by Morey as informed by the observations of the other writers. The human being is meant to be an indivisible unity, originally designed by God to function in the wholeness described by Green. The Fall, however, has created a situation – physical death – that necessitates an intermediate state of temporary divisibility or “conditional unity.” Given that partitions are a consequence of the Fall, it is imperative for Christian educators and disciplers to view human nature – and its functioning – as a unity. The soul and spirit certainly have unique descriptions and apparently individual attributes, but it is the interconnectedness and interdependence of the two – and especially the effect of the human spirit upon the soul – which generates the nature of the human person. Whether humans are dichotomous or trichotomous, therefore, is not the vital issue: the important point is the unity which constitutes the human being, created by the complex relationship which exists between all of the various metaphysical capacities. The existence of divisible aspects is a consequence of the Fall and should not be built upon or reinforced through traditional approaches to Christian education and discipleship.
Even though humans were not originally intended to be comprised of divisible material and immaterial aspects, there now exists distinguishable qualities within human nature: even a cursory reading of the Bible reveals an immaterial dimension to human existence. What is not as readily apparent is that the immaterial is as dependent upon the material as the material is upon the immaterial, and that even such transcendent capacities as heart, mind, spirit, and soul are – in this lifetime – inseparable from a person’s physical existence. Human nature and experience are embedded in human physicality: the human body without the spirit is dead (Jas 2.26); the human spirit without the body is an aberration. Human existence either requires a body of some kind, whether psuchikos or pneumatikos (1 Cor 15.44) , or depends upon God’s sustaining activity during the intermediate state following death. Anderson notes:
What provides assurance of continuity of the self through death and resurrection is not an immortal soul but the granting of immortality to the mortal human person as a body/soul unity, as having already taken place on our behalf through the resurrection of Christ. . . . When Scripture does affirm the stability and continuity of the self through death and resurrection, the basis is not that of an indestructible soul but the guarantee of the Spirit of God . . .
The failure to recognize that spirit, soul, and body – while not identical – were designed to be inseparable has led to much confusion. Reification has resulted in a sub-biblical notion of human nature: God gave Adam a spirit, but it was not a separate component given to the soul that He had created from the dust of the earth (Gen 2.7). God gave life to Adam, even as all human beings are given life, but when the person dies the life does not continue on in some independent, autonomous manner. The soul or spirit is sustained by God awaiting the resurrection of the body.
The argument for the innate unity of human beings recognizes that the Scriptures use a variety of terms to describe human nature. Jeeves sets the tone for the present paper’s study of the embedded, embodied nature of the person when he states that there are:
. . . two generalizations that can be made about the New Testament picture of man. First, like the Old Testament, it emphasizes the unity of man. Man is a psycho-physical or somato-psychic unity. Moreover, he is a unity in this present earthly life, and he will be a unity in some new form in the new heavens and the new earth to which he looks forward. However, being a unity does not mean that one cannot usefully distinguish between aspects of his nature – of his physical and psychological make-up.
The following cohesive, biblical model of the human person’s soul, heart and mind demonstrates that there is no need, as well as nothing to be gained, by viewing the human person as dichotomous or trichotomous, bipartite or tripartite, in this life. That the Bible speaks descriptively of such aspects is without question; to fashion such descriptions into categories or dimensions of human existence, however, is to be guilty of reification and to see entities that do not exist. In fact, an indivisible, embodied understanding of human immaterial nature is more consistent with the overall presentation of the person throughout the Bible and certainly with God’s original intent for humanity. “Christians who today embrace a monistic [or, as conceptualized here, embodied] account of humanity,” notes Green, “may do so as persons assured that this position actually places them more centrally within the biblical material than has usually been granted over the past two millennia.”
The purpose of the immediately following discussion is to present a model of human nature that has been drawn from and limited to the revealed word of God as contained in the Bible. An exhaustive treatment of such a critical subject was beyond the scope of this paper, although the results of such research provided the foundation for this model of biblical psychology. Once described, the model derived from biblical data will then be embedded or infused into a neurological understanding of human existence.
The Immaterial Constitution of Humans
In his gospel, Mark records our Lord’s summary of the greatest commandment:
The foremost is, “Hear, O Israel! The LORD our God is one Lord; and 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.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ – 12.29-31
In repeating a standard Jewish declaration of His day, Jesus uses figurative language to declare that the totality of a person’s being is to be involved in loving God: heart, soul, mind, and strength are not an exposition about a human’s immaterial components, but are rather meant to be an all-inclusive command regarding the extent of our worship and love. His words will provide the structure for the following discussion of the various aspects of human experience and human constitution. The embedded, embodied model of human nature presented here may be summarized as follows:
1. A human is not an incarnate soul and does not possess a soul, but simply is a soul;
2. The soul is embedded in and dependent on a body, whether soulish or spiritual;
3. The Fall has necessitated a future, intermediate, disembodied state that is sustained by God;
4. The human soul is a function of, dependent upon, and inseparable from the human body;
5. The human heart is a function of, dependent upon, and inseparable from the human soul;
6. The human mind is a function of, dependent upon, and inseparable from the human heart, and
7. The human spirit is given by God and in this lifetime is inseparable from the human being.
In other words, the immaterial experiences of human nature – soul, heart, and mind – do not exist as quantifiable or extractable entities within the human body, i.e., the brain. The soul consists of the entirety of all human capacities and functions, including the body; thus the statement that people do not have souls but are souls. The heart and mind, however, do not seem to be all encompassing: each is a particular constellation of activities and attributes that exist in the soul, and specifically in the brain. All that is in the mind also exists within the heart and soul; all that is within the heart is also found within the soul. There are some properties of soul, however, that are not described as being functions of the heart or mind. The human immaterial nature, therefore, is distributed throughout the soul and cannot be isolated or compartmentalized.
The following diagrams illustrate the relationship between the aspects of humanity’s immaterial nature.
[Figures and Diagrams not available on this blog.]
In Figure 2.1, the soul is depicted as the basic, all-encompassing description of human material and immaterial existence. Qualities and properties of the soul include, but are not limited to, the life principle in a person; the maintenance and regulation of bodily functions such as breathing, heart rate, appetite, and body temperature; the capacity to relate to God, and personality or personhood. The soul also includes everything attributed to the heart and mind.
(The relationship of the human soul and the human spirit is such that the two cannot, in this lifetime, be distinguished: the human spirit, as the source of physical life and energy, invigorates and shapes the soul; conversely, the human soul has a reciprocal effect upon the human spirit. The soul and spirit exist in human beings in a bottom-up and top-down connection: each affects and is affected by the other. Strictly speaking, the personality is a product of the spirit. [See below])
The study of the soul is the study of the psyche: the word psychology is, simply defined, soul (psyche) science (logos). The origin and development of the meanings of psyche warrant some consideration. Harder noted that psyche
. . . has three areas of meaning: (a) psyche in the sense of the impersonal basis of life, life itself; (b) the inward part of man; (c) an independent soul, in contrast to the body . . .
(a) In ancient Gk. literature, the soul is conceived as combined with the body. When it leaves the body, the body loses its life (Homer, Od. 14, 426) . . . Thus the soul can simply stand for life . . .
(b) psyche can refer to the inward part of man, his personality. Thus the soul can be equivalent to the person (Eur., OC 499) . . . If man is anything at all, he is soul (Plato, Alcibiades 1, 130a) . . . The actual power of the soul is seen first of all in the movement which it imparts to the body in which it lives (Plato, Laws 873a-b) . . . The soul is the seat of perception, of desire and pleasure, and of enjoyment (Aesch., Persae 841) . . . The properties of the soul are movement, observation, perception, and above all incorporeality (Aristotle, De Anima 405 b 11). Thus the soul can be assessed morally, according to its powers . . . The essential characteristic of the soul consists in the fact that it is in movement, that it can set itself in motion (Plato, Phaedrus 245e). Among all animate beings, man is the one in whom the deity has implanted the most powerful soul (Xenophon, Memorabilia 1, 9, 14) . . . The most important thing, however, as Socrates teaches (Plato, Apology 30b), is to cultivate or take care of . . . the soul, rather than wealth or happiness . . .
(c) The Homeric epics speak not only of the departure of the soul, i.e. the loss of life, but they also know something of an abode of souls. In this there is no attempt at a speculative or theoretical understanding of the soul in contradistinction to the body. Rather, we see the effect of the parapsychological experiences which were common among people of ancient times.
The appearances of psyche in the NT can be reduced to one of three categories: as referring to life, to persons, or to the metaphysical part of mankind. Most important for the purpose of developing a biblical psychology is the use of psyche to refer to the metaphysical dimension of mankind. This is its most frequent meaning and, rather than describing an actual manifestation of mankind, is used more as a collective noun that includes all of mankind’s metaphysical nature.
Like the Greek psyche, the Hebrew word nepesh, which is commonly translated as soul in the Old Testament, probably had the original meaning of “to breathe.” The activities of nepesh includes one’s hunger for food, the spiritual appetites, cravings for other people (including love), and will. “Since personal existence by its very nature involves drives, appetites, desires, will, nepesh denotes the ‘life’ of an individual.” In the Septuagint psyche is found more than 900 times and is usually used for nepesh.
The human soul includes the heart, mind, will, conscience, desires, and commitments; it does not include the human spirit, although the two are inexorably connected. Within mankind’s soul is to be found the image of God; it is in the soul that salvation and sanctification occur. The human soul is indivisible: without the presence of every manifestation, there is no soul: there is no such thing as a heartless or mindless soul. While the distinct functions of the human soul can be identified, they cannot be compartmentalized.
In summary, the word soul is used throughout the Bible to describe the essence of the human creature. At times it is used as a figure of speech, representing either a part or the entirety of a persons; on some occasions it stands for the life of a person, and it is sometimes employed in the phrase heart and soul to strengthen the force of a passage. Whenever soul refers to mankind’s metaphysical nature, it speaks of the deepest, most intimate, most essential part of that nature. None of the uses stands in isolation: when soul is used to describe a person’s life, it is simultaneously commenting on the whole of human character. Biblically, to speak of a person’s soul is to reveal that which makes them uniquely human. The soul is a broad, general term referring to the totality of mankind’s metaphysical nature. Soul is the essence of the human that is animated by and houses the life principle, is intimately related to God (or has the potential for such relationship), and is synonymous with an individual’s personality or personhood.
The Human Heart
Various functions and qualities of the human heart as described in the Bible are listed in Figure 2.2. The diffuse line surrounding the brief list of the heart illustrates that the human heart is not distinct from the soul although it is limited to a particular area of the soul, i.e., the brain. The abilities and capacities of the human heart also are attributed to the soul, which logically follows since the heart is thoroughly enmeshed and infused in the soul. To speak of the heart, therefore, is to also speak of the soul in which the heart is found.
The study of biblical psychology is to a large extent a study of the Scriptural concept of the heart. Throughout the Bible, the condition of a mankind’s heart is determinative in the nature of a person’s relationships with God, others, and self. The words translated heart in the Old and New testaments are the Hebrew leb and the Greek kardia, respectively. Specific uses of leb include the mind, inclinations, resolutions, determinations of the will, conscience, moral character, the seat of the appetites, the seat of emotions and passions, and the source of courage. Kardia is described as “the seat of physical, spiritual and mental life . . . as center and source of physical life . . . [and] the center and source of the whole inner life . . .” Specifically, heart refers to
the faculty of thought, of the thoughts themselves, of understanding, as the organ of natural and spiritual enlightenment . . . of the will and its decisions . . . of moral decisions, the moral life, of vices and virtues . . . of the emotions, wishes and desires . . . esp. also of love . . . of disposition . . . the human heart as the dwelling-place of heavenly powers and beings.
Regarding the Old Testament usage, Sorg observed that
Leb is the seat of man’s spiritual and intellectual life, the inner nature of man . . . the heart is the seat of emotions . . . of the understanding and knowledge, of rational forces and powers . . . as well as fantasies and visions . . . But folly and evil thoughts also operate in the heart. . . . The will originates in the heart, also the carefully weighed intention . . . and the decision which is ready to be put into effect.
Sorg summarized the NT writings on the heart:
. . . it more frequently denotes the seat of intellectual and spiritual life, the inner life in opposition to external appearance . . . The heart stands for man’s ego. It is simply the person (“the hidden person of the heart”, 1 Pet. 3:4). . . . The heart is that in man which is addressed by God . . .
Sin marks, dominates and spoils not only the physical manifestations of natural man, not only his thinking and willing, feeling and striving as individual elements, but also their source, man’s innermost being, his heart . . . Man without God lives under the power of sin, which has taken up its abode in his heart and from this vantage point enslaves the whole man.
God alone can reveal the things hidden in the heart of man (1 Cor. 4:5), examine them (Rom. 8:27) and test them (1 Thess. 2:4). . . . Just as the heart is the seat of faithlessness, it is also the seat of faith . . . conversion takes place in the heart and is thus a matter of the whole man . . .God bears his witness to man by sending into his heart the Spirit of his Son . . . When this Spirit takes up his dwelling in the heart, man is no longer a slave to sin, but a son and heir of God . . .
The heart of man, however, is the place not only where God arouses and creates faith. Here faith proves its reality in obedience and patience . . . Here the word of God is kept . . . Here the peace of Christ begins its rule . . . God’s grace strengthens and establishes the heart . . . The NT describes a heart directed unreservedly to God as a “pure heart” . . . This purity of heart is based solely on the fact that the blood of Christ cleanses it . . . and Christ dwells in it by faith . . .
That the heart is the major component of mankind’s soul is a clear teaching of the Old Testament also supported in the New. It has the capacity to relate to God (and is commanded to do so), contains both good and bad qualities, is the origin of emotions, and at times engages in emotional reasoning. The term is sometimes employed as a figure of speech, and also is host to a specialized group of activities which are called the mind.
The Human Mind
The capacities of the human mind are dispersed throughout the heart and soul. When the mind is described in the Bible, therefore, it is not an independent or isolated aspect of a person which is identified but rather a constellation of activities distributed throughout the heart. The mind, recognized only by its operations, is disseminated in the heart, which in turn is located in the brain of the soul, which is the person. All human immaterial aspects are embedded in and dependent upon the physical dimension, i.e., the body and, specifically, the brain of the human person. As will be demonstrated, this does not mean that human immaterial existence can be reduced to manifestations or properties of the brain; it is to say that human immaterial existence is embedded in and dependent on the brain.
It is important to remember, in the ensuing discussion of the mind, that what is being discussed is a specialized dimension of the heart. It must also be kept in mind that many of the activities of the mind are at the same time attributed to mankind’s heart. This is not a contradiction but merely reflects the interrelatedness of the mind and the heart, as well as the subjugation of the former to the latter: the mind is a property or produce of the heart.
The most general, nonspecific word in the New Testament for mind is the Greek word nous. It is used most frequently to describe the functions or functioning of the mind in general, including all its abilities. This does not preclude a narrower meaning for the word, but those meanings are captured and developed more precisely by other words employed by the New Testament writers. Nous, therefore, is the most inclusive term to describe the mind in all its various functions and capacities. Luke writes that Christ “opened their minds [nous] to understand the Scriptures” (Lk 24.45), which is likely a reference to all the abilities of the mind.
The word nous is also found in Rom 7.25, where Paul writes that “on the one hand I myself with my mind [nous] am serving the law of God, but on the other with my flesh the law of sin.” Later, he exhorts the Romans and all believers to “not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your nous” (Rom 12.2). In each verse, Paul is referring to the mind in its totality and is not singling out specific functions such as conscience, will, knowledge, memory, or determination. A slightly different use of nous may be found in 1 Cor 2.16 and Eph 4.17, where the word seems to refer not so much to the organ of thought but rather to the manner in which we think.
The Bible depicts the mind as (1) the seat of conscience, (2) the instrument of cognition which creates and recalls memories, and (3) the derivation of the will. It also portrays the mind as (4) capable of making suppositions, (5) considering information, (6) achieving spiritual understanding, (7) acquiring knowledge, and (8) focusing attention. Relevant functions are considered in the following discussion.
The purpose of the conscience is to assess and judge: it evaluates thoughts, feelings, or conduct as being either good or bad, moral or immoral, sufficient or insufficient, commendable or reprehensible, comforting or condemning. That the conscience is a fallible standard by which to evaluate one’s behavior is clear from various passages in the New Testament. Concerning this Brown noted that
Pierce contends that the term was an everyday Gk. word which in general had the morally bad negative sense of the pain that we feel when we do something wrong. Pierce suggests that the term came into the NT via the Corinthian church, where conscience was used as a catchword . . . This explains the absence of the term in the OT and the gospels and its widespread use in the Corinthian correspondence and later epistles. The Corinthians were appealing to conscience to justify their attitudes in the various burning issues of the day, in particular the practice of eating meat that had been offered to idols. Because some claimed that they could do this with a clear conscience, they argued that the practice was permissible. Paul condemns the idea that conscience alone is an invariable and infallible guide . . . A person may have a clear conscience because it is dead or inadequately educated. There are other factors in deciding the rightness and wrongness of actions . . . A clear conscience is no guarantee of being right . . . It serves as a sort of moral double-check on our actions. It operates largely on the basis of experience. It needs to be educated and carefully tended. But as such, it is very important . . .
The three principal New Testament words which are translated as “will” are boulomai, thelo, and thelema. As is the case with its two synonyms, the meaning of boulomai must be determined according to the context of the passage in which it is found. According to the New Testament, mankind has the ability to choose, desire, determine, intend, wish, purpose, and resolve; mankind’s ability to do these things is a function of the will. Equally important is the fact that the human will is affected by sin so that people cannot do what they wish or refrain from doing that which they do not desire.
One of the most important functions of the mind is to think or reason. Five Greek words are found in Scripture which describe mankind’s ability to judge and draw conclusions based on appearances. These words are dokeo, phaino, nomizo, hegeomai, and oiomai
[Dokeo] refers to the subjective judgment, which may or may not conform to the fact . . . [while phaino] refers to the actual external appearance, generally correct, but possibly deceptive . . .
[Hegeomai] and [nomizo] denote a belief resting not on one’s inner feeling or sentiment, but on the due consideration of external grounds, and the weighing and comparing of facts. [Dokeo] and [oiomai] on the other hand, describe a subjective judgment growing out of inclination or a view of facts in their relation to us. [Hegeomai] denotes a more deliberate and careful judgment than [nomizo]; [oiomai] a subjective judgment which has feeling rather than thought ([dokeo]) for its ground.
Another group of five Greek words refer to the mind’s ability to contemplate or deliberate things: analogizomai, enthumeomai, katanoeo, sunesis, and hegeomai. Analogizomai, occurring only once in the Bible (Heb 12.3), is a neutral activity which means to ponder. A slightly stronger word, enthumeomai means to bring to mind or deliberate, while katanoeo means to consider carefully or attentively, to perceive or understand. Sunesis and hegeomai reflect the deepest levels of consideration and understanding. Sunesis refers to a precise, careful apprehension of the nature of things; it is the critical faculty of how to evaluate anything which is encountered. Hegeomai refers to a consideration which is based on external facts and comes as a result of careful deliberation. It is the strongest and most frequently used by New Testament writers of the five words under this heading.
Three Greek words capture mankind’s ability to acquire spiritual understanding. Suniemi alludes to knowledge that is gained through the five senses and frequently involves moral or religious conduct. It was employed frequently by Jesus in matters of spiritual comprehension. Noeo, which is derived from the word nous, also depicts mankind’s capacity for spiritual understanding. Unlike suniemi, however, it generally refers to such comprehension apart from or independent of the senses. The final word illustrating mankind’s spiritual comprehension is dianoia, which connotes a thinking through, a mature thought process, and a reflective exercise of the heart. This capacity for thought can be either good (Mt 22.37) or bad (Eph 2.3). It is sometimes used to refer to the faculty that is renewed and enlightened by the Holy Spirit (Eph 1.18, Heb 8.10, 1 Jn 5.20).
Two words dominate the landscape of the New Testament with regard to mankind’s ability to know or learn: eido and ginosko are used over 800 times by the NT authors with reference to knowing and learning. Schutz highlighted their importance:
The words of the ginosko group . . . embrace the whole gamut of knowledge from knowing things to knowing persons. When this process results in an item or body of knowledge which may serve as a basis for further thought and action oida [eido] . . . to know, is used in parallel to the perf. of ginosko. Both contain the implication of certainty based on experience.
Eido or oida usually refers to what is known intuitively rather than through the senses and is generally not descriptive of first-hand knowledge. Eido sometimes infers a full knowledge in contrast to the progressive knowledge which is connoted in ginosko. The necessity of a connection between the person and the fact is even more clear in the word ginosko:
Phrases such as “know God’s decree” (Romans 1:32), “know the law” (Rom. 7:1), “know his will” (Rom. 2:18; Acts 22:14), do not imply a merely theoretical knowledge, but the recognition that it applies to man individually and demands his obedience. . . . [Paul] considered that the knowledge of God necessarily included proper glorification and gratitude. Hence, the heathen who rejected God reduced this knowledge to mere intellectual activity, and what they considered wisdom was in fact nothing but folly (Rom 1:22 f.). . . . knowledge in the NT involves the ready will of the man who receives it. Through disobedience, ingratitude and prevarication he can fail to appropriate it. . . . Knowledge in the sense of recognition is thus always linked with the practical behaviour of the one who knows and has to do with his way of life (Col. 1:9 f.) which should bring credit to the one known.
There are, however, passages where ginosko implies theological and theoretical knowledge . . . But even the knowledge of theological truths, e.g. of a particular teaching about baptism, has as its object obedience which expresses itself in life (Rom. 6:6). The express purpose of such knowledge mentioned is that “we might no longer be enslaved to sin.”
Schutz also commented on the progressive nature of the knowledge depicted by this word: “With ginosko there is always the implication of grasping the full reality and nature of the object under consideration. It is thus distinguished from mere opinion (dokeo) . . . which may grasp the object half-correctly, inadequately or even falsely.” One of the words included in the ginosko group is epiginosko, where the prefix intensifies the meaning of the word. It refers to clear, exact knowledge that powerfully influences the person in possession of it.
Two words of critical importance describe mankind’s ability to decide and invest psychologically in people or things. Logizomai, which is frequently translated “reckon” in the New Testament, and phroneo, which depicts the ability to direct thinking in a certain way, are significant in the formation of a biblical psychology. The former means “to put together with one’s mind, to count, to occupy oneself with reckonings or calculations . . . to reckon.” This capacity is even more apparent in the word phroneo, which means to set the mind on or to think in a certain manner. It implies “not only thinking but also the affections, will, or moral consideration . . . In the Scripture it is applied most commonly to the actions of the will and affections.”
Goetzmann, after demonstrating that the verb “acquires its proper meaning only from its immediate grammatical context,” continued his discussion regarding the importance of the word for Christian living:
It follows that, although the vb. as such has no particular content, there can nevertheless be no such thing as neutral thinking. Man is always aiming at something. Striving and endeavour are part of his nature. He must seek to possess, and one must be committed. This is the idea behind phronema, which occurs only in Rom. 8 and which is well translated by “setting the mind on” (cf. RXV). In the context of this chapter, which describes the new life in Christ as a life in the Spirit of God, Paul testifies that a man’s mind is set on certain things, and that what these are depends on whether one is in “the flesh” or in “the Spirit” . . . This passage makes it abundantly clear that the way he thinks is intimately related to the way he lives, whether in Christ, in the Spirit and by faith, or alternatively in the flesh, in sin and in spiritual death. A man’s thinking and striving cannot be seen in isolation from the overall direction of his life; the latter will be reflected in the aims which he sets himself.
This close inter-relationship between life and thought is echoed by the wide range of meanings attaching to phroneo. It expresses not merely an activity of the intellect, but also a movement of the will; it is both interest and decision at the same time.
The Spirit in the Human Being
The human spirit (and, for the believer, the Holy Spirit) is present everywhere in the mind, heart, and soul of the person. It is the spirit within a person which gives life, animates, reacts to external stimuli, and very often initiates thoughts, feelings, and behaviors within a person. If the soul may be likened to the wiring of a trillion-plus network of circuitry, then the spirit is that which provides energy or force, and makes all activity possible. Even as the wiring needs the current to accomplish any manner of work, and the current finds conveyance through the wires, so the soul depends upon the spirit for innervation and the spirit requires the soul for expression. In addition, the soul is acted upon and affected by the spirit, and the spirit is acted upon and affected by the soul. It is their interdependence and inseparable relationship that give rise to the two being used almost interchangeably at times in the Bible and described as having almost identical qualities. In short, the body without the spirit is dead and the spirit without the body is impotent to express itself.
It is the hypothesis of this paper that it is the spirit of a person that gives to each individual their unique personality. This is drawn from the nature of the hypostatic union: in becoming fully human – that is, assuming a soulish body – Jesus Christ nevertheless retained that personality which He possessed from all eternity. It was His divine Spirit, not his soul, that formed and determined His personality. In the same manner, it is the human spirit which determines the personality of the individual, even though the intimate interactions with the sinful, soulish body inevitably influence and limit the expression of the personality.
All human beings, barring significant neurological damage, begin with roughly the same brain, and the individual human spirit determines characteristics such as temperament, intelligence, and physical abilities. It is the human spirit’s interaction and cooperation with the Holy Spirit that results in sanctification. It is this intimate, enmeshed, indivisible nature of human experience that requires a wholistic approach to Christian education and discipleship. To attempt to influence just one facet of a person, e.g., the mind, is to ignore the intradependent reality of human existence. Such an approach results in the situation described by Richards:
The concept that all the dimensions of personality are linked is one that we would of course want to accept. The idea that we can change the equilibrium of the system, and cause change (growth, learning, or whatever one might want to term it), is, on the face of it, both reasonable and certain. Dissonance (the feeling of being out of harmony) is something that does seem to exist in us and something that is a cause for change.
But the assumption that attack on a single system element will produce desire change is not reasonable, nor certain! There are too many intervening variables. There are too many ways to isolate or modify the impact of isolated changes. . . . Intervention at a single point is more likely to lead to isolation of taught beliefs from the operating beliefs which actually function with other system elements in daily life.
Richards goes on to describe the all-too-familiar outcome of such a narrow approach to education and discipleship: Christians engaging in a variety of maneuverings designed escape personal application of a teaching or truth, thereby restoring a sense of balance in their emotional lives and resisting change. Because the whole person has not been involved in the learning process, change either does not occur or is negligible.
About Me
- Michael Russell
- Continuing to learn from and think a lot about Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
