For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. ~ Hebrews 4:12
A theological topic about which many Christians get confused concerns how our created beings are divided. Two dominant views exist, dichotomic and trichotomic. A biblical dichotomist view of humankind states that a person exists with the two distinct parts of a body and soul. A biblical trichotomist view of humankind says that a person exists with three separate parts: a body, soul, and spirit. Some may consider that it does not matter because they find both in the Bible. This post determines there is valuable import that the proper view of Scripture’s interpretation on anthropology is the dichotomist view.
First, one must understand trichotomy and why it is not correct. As stated above, the trichotomist view of humanity believes a person can be understood as comprising a body, soul, and spirit. The two primary passages cited are Hebrews 4:12 and 1 Thessalonians 5:23. When read individually, these verses seem plain-speaking. Briefly, there are some problems with analysis: 1) use of similar meaning words together for emphasis, and 2) Scripture uses spirit and soul interchangeably. If one were to take the trichotomist’s position, when one analyzes Mark 12:30, one must determine that Jesus describes a person’s being as having four parts. Winston Smith addresses this position historically, “This threefold theory is an old one, with roots more in Greek philosophy than biblical exegesis. Many Greek philosophers believed that spirit and body were of such a disparate nature that they could only meaningfully interact through a third intermediary substance. In other words, they believed the soul functions as a sort of middle ground for the spirit and body” (Winston Smith, The Journal of Biblical Counseling18, no. 3, (2000): 22). Those who hold this view see the soul/spirit distinction as thoughts and feelings categorized in the soul area and sinful transgressions classified as spiritual matters. Again, as Smith puts it thusly, “As many counselors try to cut this Gordian knot, a troubling pattern emerges: the spiritual category increasingly loses significance and becomes functionally subordinate to body and soul” (Smith, 23).
Next, the dichotomist’s view of God’s Word more accurately describes a human consisting only of body and soul. Some theologians, philosophers, and biblical counselors term this dogma as the “duplex-unity view” (Smith, 22), or “dualistic holism” (John W. Cooper, “The Current Body-Soul Debate: A Case for Dualistic Holism,” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 13, no.2 (2009): 32). Many describe the dichotomist view differently because the imago Dei in humanity naturally makes a person-being complex. However, the fundamental biblical principle explains that God created humankind with a distinction between the body (outer man) and the soul (inner man). Smith defines the “inner man” as “the level of thoughts, desires, will, emotions, and other ‘psychological’ activity we may ascribe to man, as well as his ‘spirit.’ The multifaceted nature of the inner man is usually encapsulated in the term ‘heart’ (1 Sam. 25:36; 2 Sam. 6:16; 1 Kings 3:12; Ps. 4:7; 33:11).” He then defines the “outer man” as “the actions and words that can be observed. The outer man consists of the physical self subject to decay (2 Cor. 4;16), and carries out the desires of the inner man through its ‘members’ (Rom. 6:13), ‘mouth’ (Luke 6:45), ‘feet’ (Prov. 1:16), or ‘hands’ (Prov. 12:14)” (Smith, 23). One other facet of the dichotomist view is that each part is not understood as distinctly separate. Rather, the Bible stresses their “ultimate unity” (Smith, 23), or “holistically whole” (Cooper, 35-36).
Definitively, since the Bible teaches the dichotomist view of humanity, there are several implications to infer. First, the “heart” distinction of the soul-spirit-mind separates humanity from beasts. John Calvin noted in his discussion of the interchangeability of Scripture’s use of “soul” and “spirit” that “the nimbleness of the human mind in searching out heaven and earth and the secrets of nature, and when all ages have been compassed by its understanding and memory, in arranging each thing in its proper order, and in inferring future events from past, clearly shows that there lies hidden in man something separate from the body” (John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion 1.15.2, 185). Next, God communicates with the whole person—body and soul. Whenever one searches Scripture and reads when God’s Word comes down to a person, it is always the whole person. Then, one must recognize that God created humans to function with the body influencing the soul and the soul influencing the body. Beeke and Smalley opine, “Recognition of the functional unity of the human constitution allows for the great mutual influence that body and soul have upon each other. Brain injuries, sickness, hormonal changes, and other physical conditions affect our thinking and emotions;” they continue, “From the other side, our mental beliefs influence our attitudes and feelings, which in turn influence our physical health” (Joel R. Beeke, Paul M. Smalley, Systematic Theology: Man and Christ: 2, 234). Although one understands that the soul and body are connected, Scripture allows the “how” they are related to remain a mystery. Charles Hodge communicates, “It is better to admit these simple facts of consciousness and of experience, and to confess that, while they prove an intimate and vital union between the mind and body, they do not enable us to comprehend the nature of that union, than to have recourse to arbitrary and fanciful theories which deny these facts, because we cannot explain them” (Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology: Anthropology:2, 45). Finally, Scripture teaches that sin affects the whole person—body and soul. Morton Smith states, “The problem with man lies in his inability to interpret both the areas of general revelation and special revelation properly;” he continues, “This is nowhere more seen than in the interpretations of the modern sinful man of himself in the area of psychology” (Morton Smith, Systematic Theology: Volume One, 244). In conclusion, one must understand God’s purpose of redeeming the whole person (Exo. 6:6, Gal. 4:5). Humanity was created to worship God (John 4:24). Because of a person’s need to worship something, one may do so rightly in worshipping God or wrongly in worshipping something else. However, as Smith puts it plainly, “This comprehensive understanding of the spiritual makes it impossible to neatly separate the spiritual from the physical and the psychological” (W. Smith, 24). In other words, in caring for souls, one must point them to Christ, who came not to redeem one-third or half of their being. No. Christ came to rescue a person from their fallen nature as it permeates the way one thinks/feels and physically deteriorates. As Cooper says in his own words, “Christ, the Second Adam, took on our mortal human nature, body, and soul, to redeem, restore, and glorify it. Our eternal destiny is to be immortal, resurrected, bodily persons on the new earth, not disembodied souls in heaven” (Cooper, 36)
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