What is the Soul??

[Marco19]

I'm not sure that there is a proper definition of spirit in Vedic scripture. Certain characteristics are provided. Spirit (Brahman) is itself the qualities of Knowledge (consciousness and complete awareness), (eternal) existence and Bliss (love).

Soul is made of this. It is like a microcosm of Brahman. But although it is mentioned a lot, it is never defined. I'm not entirely sure it can be put into human words and understood properly.

Mind is a material thing. It belongs to the body and dies with the body. It is different from consciousness. The mind is where experiences are processed (to put it very simply). Consciousness is simply awareness. It's the difference between actually being aware of things and being in a state of deep sleep or non-existence (complete lack of awareness of anything). Consciousness is something that can exist in a neutral condition and can expand or mature. That's what life does; makes it expand. All our experiences cause consciousness to expand, which we generally call becoming more aware of life or reality. This is something that we believe carries over lifetimes until we reach a state of enlightenment, which is the ultimate state of consciousness; complete awareness.

Hello Madhuri

Are you saying that spirit and soul, in fact, is the same entity but belong to different "space",
since spirit belongs to macrocosm, and soul to microcosm.

If the mind is material, and as you said:

Consciousness is something that can exist in a neutral condition and can expand or mature.

then is consciousness part of our soul?

Thanks in advance

 

[Penumbra]

Then biology could bring back life in a dead body.

When does life ever come back to a dead body?

 

[atanu]

When does life ever come back to a dead body?

Oh sorry. I thought biology could.

 

[cataway]

you should think of the spirit as if it were electricity................because thats what it is

 

[Penumbra]

I haven't seen any arguments or pieces of evidence that suggests a soul exists or explains something that is not currently explainable by biology, so it doesn't factor into my worldview in any regard other than a fairly undefined hypothesis.

Then biology could bring back life in a dead body.

When does life ever come back to a dead body?

Oh sorry. I thought biology could.

atanu I'm not sure what you're talking about.

Are you talking about non-living things becoming living things, or are you talking about dead things coming back to life, or ?

 

[atanu]

Hello Madhuri

Are you saying that spirit and soul, in fact, is the same entity but belong to different "space",
since spirit belongs to macrocosm, and soul to microcosm.

If the mind is material, and as you said:

then is consciousness part of our soul?

Thanks in advance

Allow me to put in a reference

Soul and its Destiny

 

[YmirGF]

I should probably point out for t sake of honesty that I am not a follower of any religion, but neither would I particularly term myself atheist or agnostic. I am, however, very interested in all forms of religion and spirituality, and I'm currently engaged in a project which requires some rather unusual research. Basically, whatever religion, spiritual path or belief system you subscribe to, I would dearly like to know your answer to this question :

Well, if you are looking for non-standard answers, I'm certainly your man. I'm such a sucker for these kinds of threads...

What, in your opinion (or that of your faith) IS the soul, spirit, chi, prana, (insert your non-physical lifeforce of choice here).

I intensely dislike the term "soul" due to the religious baggage the term has accrued. However, in those terms, the "soul" is the individual entity. This is a being composed of energy. Energy is action and as such, the entity's most notable quality is that it is in state of perpetual change. This is NOT change, racing towards some imagined perfection, it is simply its nature. This personified energy knows itself to be, or is self-aware and is expanding that definition continuously.

What does it do?

Though this could be a loaded statement, it is primarily a creator, as it is relentlessly putting ideas in actually, in effect turning thought into perceivable reality for others, like itself, to observe.

Where does it come from?

To be honest, even the entity for all its knowledge and insight is uncertain of its origin. It just knows it, and others like it, exist. There are fanciful tales, but it would serve no purpose to try to explain them here. In the most literal sense, it really is the stuff of legends...

Where does it reside?

Primarily, it is not physically focused. Only a small portion of it available focus is required to operate the form of a human animal, for example.

Do all living tings possess it, or just humans?

Everything is composed of energy, both sentient and non-sentient. To paraphrase a comment from one amusing author, "Even a nail has consciousness, however minute. Now, I'm not suggesting that you try to strike up a conversation with a nail, but in its elementary state it is aware that it exists, even if it isn't aware of what it is."

Is it possible to be human and not possess a soul?

Indeed it is. We call them corpses... or Democrats, if American. :biglaugh::sorry1:

Ok, so that's a whole bunch of questions, but I'll be extremely grateful to anyone who can be bothered to take the time to answer. Thankyou in advance, all the best, Vulpageist.

Anytime. My soapbox is a nice new brand that is easy to setup and take down. :run:

 

[atanu]

atanu I'm not sure what you're talking about.

Are you talking about non-living things becoming living things, or are you talking about dead things coming back to life, or ?

Penumbra, can you distinguish between "I am Penumbra, this body-brain" from "I am"?

If you could meditate and hold on to "I am" awareness, you would be fearless, sorrow less, and immortal. The "I am" awareness pervades all ego-beings but multitude of ego-s do not see the general.

We have experience of death of brain-mind beings. Have we any experience of death of awareness of existence? No.

Do not throw this away, my friend.

 

[FearGod]

I should probably point out for t sake of honesty that I am not a follower of any religion, but neither would I particularly term myself atheist or agnostic. I am, however, very interested in all forms of religion and spirituality, and I'm currently engaged in a project which requires some rather unusual research. Basically, whatever religion, spiritual path or belief system you subscribe to, I would dearly like to know your answer to this question :
What, in your opinion (or that of your faith) IS the soul, spirit, chi, prana, (insert your non-physical lifeforce of choice here). What does it do? Where does it come from? Where does it reside? Do all living tings possess it, or just humans? Is it possible to be human and not possess a soul?

Ok, so that's a whole bunch of questions, but I'll be extremely grateful to anyone who can be bothered to take the time to answer. Thankyou in advance, all the best, Vulpageist.

The best model i think to understand the differences between soul and body is the car and how it moves.

Now we will imagine the car's body as the human body.

The car needs a driver to move it by going straight,stop,left,right,going slower..etc

Our body also needs a driver to direct our body to move and to make decisions.

Let me stop at this point to show some examples and how our body works.

We got input informations to our brains to be recognized by our souls.(unknown method)

Those informations are received by our central processor unit (Brain)

Eyes : helping our soul to see things
Nose : helping our soul to smell things
Skin : helping our soul to sense things
Ear : helping our soul to recognize sounds
Tongue : helping our soul to taste things

Giving some examples how our souls react to the received informations.

Lets imagine we start to drink a cup of tea sweetened with one spoon sugar.

Your tongue through the nerves (wires) will send informations to your brain which will be recognized by your soul by unknown method.

Lets now imagine that we start to drink a cup of tea sweetened with 6 spoons of sugar.

Informations will be sent to your brain which will be recognized by your soul.
The right decision your soul will made according to the received information is to stop drinking the tea.

You can sort many other examples for how informations received and how our souls react.


The spirit is unknown from religion perspective so i can't make guesses here for what is spirit which is different than our soul.

They are asking thee concerning the Spirit. Say: The Spirit is by command of my Lord, and of knowledge ye have been vouchsafed but little. (17:85)

 

[Penumbra]

Penumbra, can you distinguish between "I am Penumbra, this body-brain" from "I am"?

If you could meditate and hold on to "I am" awareness, you would be fearless, sorrow less, and immortal. The "I am" awareness pervades all ego-beings but multitude of ego-s do not see the general.

We have experience of death of brain-mind beings. Have we any experience of death of awareness of existence? No.

Do not throw this away, my friend.

I can understand why you'd naturally view your own culture's religion as the most accurate and would like to proselytize it, but that's not a convincing argument for the existence of a soul that survives death. That's a faith-based proposal.

 

[atanu]

I can understand why you'd naturally view your own culture's religion as the most accurate and would like to proselytize it, but that's not a convincing argument for the existence of a soul that survives death. That's a faith-based proposal.

There is no attempt to proselytize. There is an appeal to ponder and contemplate.

Have we ever seen death of "I am"? This, if answered from the state of "I am Penumbra, this brain-body", the answer will not be correct. We are the seers of the brain-body and not the other way around.

I have just planted a seed.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

It's a convenient, catch-all label that people use to fill-in for any number of vague, mystical concepts which help people psychologically and emotionally deal with the fear of the certainty of death.

 

[Kemble]

Then biology could bring back life in a dead body.

Welcome to the world of resuscitation.

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

It's a convenient, catch-all label that people use to fill-in for any number of vague, mystical concepts which help people psychologically and emotionally deal with the fear of the certainty of death.

Well, I was with you up to "mystical concepts." For some, their concept of the soul might help them deal with death, but I don't believe it applies to all.

And actually, some concepts of the soul are not at all vague, and many may not be mystical, either. I'll just go along with "soul" being "a convenient, catch-all label." Not unlike "God." Or "Human."

 

[Penumbra]

There is no attempt to proselytize. There is an appeal to ponder and contemplate.

Have we ever seen death of "I am"? This, if answered from the state of "I am Penumbra, this brain-body", the answer will not be correct. We are the seers of the brain-body and not the other way around.

I see the temporary death of it every time I go to sleep.

My father saw the longer temporary death of it when he was in a coma for weeks and had no subjective experience of consciousness or memory of anything.

I have just planted a seed.

What seed is that? I've been familiar with many religious traditions of India for years.

 

[atanu]

I see the temporary death of it every time I go to sleep.

My father saw the longer temporary death of it when he was in a coma for weeks and had no subjective experience of consciousness or memory of anything.

What seed is that? I've been familiar with many religious traditions of India for years.

My Pranam to you. I hope you understand.

The temporary deaths are the vanishing of the thinking mind upon which the 3 d model that we consider reality is dependent.

Buddha means the one who never slumbers. Rudra, in Hinduism, is the same. It means that the Rudra is the being who is the Seer of the deep sleep. That is the soul.

Our mind, being attached to phenomena has forgotten the source of the phenomena, which is the homogeneous blissful ground of the deep sleep, wherein mind seems to know nothing since there is no contrast in it.

Seed just means a clue to remembrance.

 

[atanu]

It's a convenient, catch-all label that people use to fill-in for any number of vague, mystical concepts which help people psychologically and emotionally deal with the fear of the certainty of death.

It is not actually. It has layered meaning.

At one level, the waking time body-brain complex is called a soul. Then, in dream also, the dreamer, made of light-shadow body is soul. In deep sleep the one who sleeps and knows nothing is also soul.

In short, the one who breathes and says "I" is the soul.

But, actually soul is that which is the Seer of the subject and object of all these three states and which has a singular existence distinct from the three states of waking, dreaming, and sleeping.

It is said that one who has seen the seer is one without a second.

Sorry, for the rambling.

 

[FearGod]

I can understand why you'd naturally view your own culture's religion as the most accurate and would like to proselytize it, but that's not a convincing argument for the existence of a soul that survives death. That's a faith-based proposal.

No i don't think it's proselytizing but the existace of the soul is a reality.

irreligious people tend to refuse such fact for one reason and which is that the soul is a religious term.

Your brain , eyes , ears , tongue and all parts of your body is working for your soul.

i had already explained it in my previous post.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

It is not actually. It has layered meaning.

At one level, the waking time body-brain complex is called a soul. Then, in dream also, the dreamer, made of light-shadow body is soul. In deep sleep the one who sleeps and knows nothing is also soul.

In short, the one who breathes and says "I" is the soul.

But, actually soul is that which is the Seer of the subject and object of all these three states and which has a singular existence distinct from the three states of waking, dreaming, and sleeping.

It is said that one who has seen the seer is one without a second.

Sorry, for the rambling.

Right, like I said - a convenient, catch-all label that people use to fill-in for any number of vague, mystical concepts which help people psychologically and emotionally deal with the fear of the certainty of death.

 

[atanu]

It is not actually. It has layered meaning.

At one level, the waking time body-brain complex is called a soul. Then, in dream also, the dreamer, made of light-shadow body is soul. In deep sleep the one who sleeps and knows nothing is also soul.

In short, the one who breathes and says "I" is the soul.

But, actually soul is that which is the Seer of the subject and object of all these three states and which has a singular existence distinct from the three states of waking, dreaming, and sleeping.

It is said that one who has seen the seer is one without a second.

Sorry, for the rambling.

Right, like I said - a convenient, catch-all label that people use to fill-in for any number of vague, mystical concepts which help people psychologically and emotionally deal with the fear of the certainty of death.

Right. However, it does not matter a bit what you think. Some entity does breathe and assert "I". Such an entity is called a 'Person' or soul. Such an entity is called purusha in Sanskrit.