Soul Notes

 The Nature of the Soul

All religious teachings acknowledge existence of the soul. In fact, the two themes, common to all of the worlds religions are: 1) the belief in a Supreme deity and, 2) the continuation of the soul after death.

The soul is different from the spirit. All living creatures have a spirit, which is the electro-magnetic energy within us. It can be measured and tested and sometimes observed, even photographed. Imagine your body as a lamp chord and your spirit as the electricity running through it. Without the electricity the lamp chord is as useless as the body is with out the energy of the spirit. And, since it is a form of energy, our basic physics explains that it can never be destroyed; changed, yes; destroyed---never. That makes it eternal.

So at this point, as a living breathing human, with a spirit, you and your cat have a lot in common. The cat also possesses this electro-magnetic energy. Like you it can be measured. Like you, it regulates your cat's heartbeat, effects thought process in the brain, and transfers images across the optic nerve to the brain to produce sight, along with dozens of other little things that are on-going within living organisms. But, we are different from our cat, aren't we? We have the ability to reason. We have the option of choosing an action based on values, either learned or innate. Many people, unfortunately, act on instinct and very crude learned responses, like the cat. But we all have the ability to form concepts and to reason, whether or not we use it fully. That is what separates us from the other animals.

Christianity, Judaism, and Islamic writings refer to the first humans being created by God "in God's image" or "breathed him of My spirit". In other words, we have something of God within each of us. There is something about us that is just like God. Clearly it is not physical. God has no need for the physical characteristics of the human body so, we can immediately eliminate pretty or ugly; tall or short; fat or thin; young or old; male or female; and skin color; and culture; and anything else that has to do with us physically.

And, the soul has nothing to do with our physical bodies. It is the essence of the human spirit. It is the embodiment of knowledge; the vessel of emotion; and the keeper of the eternal cosmic truths that reside within us. It is the "image" and the "breath" of God within us. When a soul is added to the human spirit, that spirit now has the very essence of God-like characteristics. Since all human spirits are enhanced with a soul, it is safe to interchange the concepts at the human level. Since the Spirit of God is endowed with the ultimate knowledge of the universes, then when we speak of the "spirit of God" we are also referring to a soul of the highest level of perfection, and to which our own souls are seeking attainment.

It is the soul that knows the difference between right and wrong under God's rules, not man's. It is the soul that reacts as the "conscience" when a cosmic rule of God has been violated.

For sake of brevity let us use "cosmic rules" to mean the combination of all cosmic laws and cosmic truths. Let us also make a distinction between cosmic laws and cosmic truths as follows:

"Cosmic laws" refers to the forces, energies, and relationships between objects within the physical universe(s). Examples of the cosmic laws would include: the law of gravity; the laws of motion; atomic structure; and, the speed of light.

"Cosmic truths" refers to the divine universal maxims that order and dictate the spiritual relationships between spirits and, between spirits and God. Examples of the cosmic truths would include: a single supreme Spirit as the Creator of all universes; the repeated emergence of the soul to attain godly qualities; spiritual rules of right and wrong that guide the soul in a physical world; and, the soul's innate desire toward oneness with God.

One of the difficulties we face when dealing with cosmic rules is the desire to interpret those rules to fit our current situation and understanding of the world around us. We must realize that these cosmic rules are unchanging and are valid through all times and through all universes, and that our own small achievements and ambitions as a race of intelligent beings has no more influence on the accuracy of these cosmic rules than the various IQ levels of a class of 10th grade physics students would have on the validity and accuracy of Newton's Second Law of Motion. Our perceptions and, therefore, our intellectual understanding is always changing, but the cosmic rules do not.

It is very important that you fully understand that the cosmic rules are static, unchanging, and permanent. In reality, the physical universes are in constant change around us. Our cells are changing, our knowledge base is changing, global temperature is changing, new planets were recently discovered in the Orion constellation, the solar system is expanding without bounds, to name but a few of the areas affected by these cosmic laws and truths. But, these changes have to be viewed in the snapshot of a human lifetime and in relation to man's total existence and awareness of them. While our universes and all things within are in perpetual motion, the cosmic rules that govern them are permanent and unchanging. They may appear to be unchanging to you, because you observed them over such a short time span.

Whether they are in the Ten Commandments given to Moses or the Suras set forth by Muhammad, or the disciplines provided by Buddha, or the beatitudes taught by Jesus, God's rules are fairly simple and clear and cover every human endeavor or activity in which you can be involved.

The cosmic truths are unaffected by time, or by style, or by technology, or by tribal custom, or by understanding. They were there from the beginning and they were correct from the start. It is unfortunate that we even need manmade laws, but we do. Since each human being has been programmed with the knowledge of right and wrong, through the introduction of the soul, then it is natural to wonder, why don't we all act the way we should toward one another? If we know an action is wrong, according to a cosmic rule, why do we go ahead and do it?

To answer that, we need to breakdown the human being into three distinct parts: 1) the body, 2) the soul/spirit and, 3) the personality.

The body is the physical package that interacts with a physical world. It consists of all of the physiological parts and physical functions of a human being including the brain, sensory functions and the neurological processes of the brain.

The soul is the substance of spirit. It is imparted to the human spirit, bringing with it the "image of God"; the totality of knowledge of all cosmic truth; it is an eternal, non-destructible force of energy that precedes and survives the limited existence of a given human body, but uses the body to experience, first hand, such characteristics of God as love, compassion, humility, and charity.

The personality is the observable presentation by the human body of the interaction of the soul and the sensory input received and processed by the brain. The brain is much, much more than a soft tissue computer. We can now see that the brain is the site of contact between the physical world and the metaphysical world; between the normal and the paranormal. The mind, although not a separate part of the human makeup, is nevertheless very distinct. It is not a separate part, as it exists only because the soul and the body exist. Without the soul, or without the body (brain) there would be no mind.

The soul interacts with the sensory perceptions of the body, via the brain. The product of this interaction is the mind. It is fed by spiritual knowledge and world knowledge. The totality of spiritual input from the soul mixes with the stored and sensory knowledge available to the brain and, as these reservoirs of spiritual and bodily knowledge come together to be analyzed, the result is an action of the body that we see as personality. Therefore, the mind consists of spiritual consciousness, provided by the soul, and temporal consciousness, provided by the sensory perception of the world around us.

The personality, is the "action command" to the body resulting from this interaction of spiritual knowledge from the soul, and the worldly knowledge, stored and received by the brain. If the sensitivity of the mind is inclined toward the soul, the personality reaction will be more godlike in such areas as compassion, love, charity, and humility. On the other hand, a sensitivity of the mind dominated by worldly input, would bring about a personality that places a higher value on worldly goals and activities. This is one reason that people are so different and react in so many different ways to similar events. And, that is why we must be awakened to the existence and importance of our soul.

The soul is a separate entity that enters the human spirit, not the formative cells and not any particular part of the physical body. There is absolutely no religious doctrine or information that would have us believe that the soul enters the physical cells at the moment of conception, test tube or uteral; nothing. Nothing in a Bible or other religious writing confirms that a soul is in an embryo or a fetus. If you believe in such a thing, you made it up, or were convinced by someone else that made it up. Furthermore, such a belief does not stand the test of why God would choose to place a soul into the embryonic cells of a test tube, to be frozen, and then abandoned or orphaned by its parents, and left to deteriorate or be destroyed by the cryogenic keepers. Or why would a soul enter an unborn fetus to grow and develop only to become a "still birth"? What possible purpose would that serve to God or to the soul? You know that the answer is, none-what-so-ever!

A soul is sexless, and ageless. There is no "baby soul" or "old man soul". A soul becomes a part of the spirit of a particular human being for a specific purpose, either to accommodate its own growth toward godlike perfection, or to assist another soul in such development. [All of this is more clearly explained in my upcoming book "Paths of the Soul"] All of our souls are traveling along this path toward godliness, but we are at different places on that path. Our souls are here to learn and to help each other. It is only when the worldly side of our intellect; our ego, greed, arrogance, intolerance, and the like, become dominant, that our personalities produce pain and suffering, grief and conflict, despair, and hopelessness on the lives of other humans.

The only variations between souls is the degree at which they have attained closeness to their Creator; where they are specifically located in their cosmic journey to one-ness with God. Their closeness, or distance from God, is the only real difference between them, yet each soul maintains its individuality.

So, we can now see that the death of a little child that was so innocent to worldly influences, can not be equated to the return to God of a small and innocent little soul. There are no such things as small and innocent little souls. Small or large, black or white, old or young, ugly or pretty, formed or deformed, are all descriptions of a body and have absolutely nothing to do with a soul.

Why then, did this small child die so young? Why would a loving God allow a child to be born, only to die a few days later, or a few weeks later, or maybe at the very start of its outward personality development? Many grieving parents and loved ones have asked that question and most have never have received a good answer.

Think for a minute of the things said here about the soul, the answer is there. Souls have one purpose, to reunite with God---that's all. Souls posses the cosmic truths that can interact with the sensory inputs, with the result being displayed as personality. Souls interact with other souls continuously providing support, setting up challenges, comforting, and testing, as they collectively move along the path toward one-ness with God. And, so it is with the soul of the small child.

Through an unselfish act, to gain nothing for itself, the soul of the child is present within the small body for the purpose of interacting with other souls. The mistaken focus is on the humanity of the small child. The correct focus is on the soul of another. It could be a parent, both parents, another relative, a family friend, someone that was affected by the death; someone whose soul learned something that could only be learned by the experience of that child's death; someone whose soul interacted with the unselfish act of the child's soul and moved one more step up the pathway toward godliness.

The churches fail to comprehend that there is something marvelous going on in this cycle of life and death. Souls are learning, developing helping each other, and moving toward their Creator. Understanding that the brief life of the child was part of a plan that aided one or more souls in their journey to return to their God, certainly adds a new level of comfort to a parent at the time of such loss.

No death is accidental. No death is premature. No death is unplanned. The exact time, date, and method of the death of every single living human body, in the past present and future is known ahead of time by the soul that occupies that body. The age, sex, location, occupation, ethnic affiliation, religious denomination, wealth, popularity, social status, ad infinitum have no consequence to the death planned for the body, planned by that body's soul.

Our souls are the gift of God, described by the earliest writers as His own breath into our bodies. It is our connection to the cosmic rules and our full understanding of why we are here. Each of us must concentrate our thoughts toward recognizing our souls, and take time to quietly listen to the communication occurring between our own soul and its Creator. We must view every other human being as a soul, created by God in the same manner and for the same purpose, realizing that only our souls are eternal and that regardless of worldly religious affiliation, we are all on a singular path to reuniting with God.