Perhaps you know of the Chimera, no, not the mythical beasty kind, but the human kind, created when one of a pair of twins, whilst still in the womb, absorbs or subsumes the other.
Anyway, my question to the theological types:
When does a new life recieve it’s soul, and in the cases above, would the chimera have two souls…?
When you build a trap, you’re supposed to camoflage it just a bit. My mother is a twin. It is a well -researched and documented fact that the first born, even minutes apart, is the dominant of the two. I grew up watching this. My mother was the second born, and always submissive to her sister. This has nothing to do with your fishing expedition - on purpose.
Since I’m an agnostic and a sceptic to boot, I would suggest that what is called soul is just a warm fuzzy label for what is otherwise known as ego, the “me” part of me. Assuming that I’m even partially right, one body = one ego. I’ve not encountered any description of the word soul that doesn’t imply singularity with discrete boundaries and edges. I don’t think a two-for-one deal is within the realm of possibility. But hey, I’m not a religious person, so what do I know?
We think of the soul as the form of our consciousness thingy and its driving will, which is subjective and personal. Does the chimera battle against an antagonistic will over what colour to wear in her first day on the job ? Nay. There is a singular stream of consciousness, hence only one soul is perceived. This way, we can eschew theology elegantly.
I’ve always figured a soul is emergent- a person’s nature, or perhaps God’s memory of that person (if there’s any difference). I don’t believe in mystical soul-stuff that is seperate from the body and mind, that is ‘put’ in a body at a specific point, so I don’t think the question really applies to me all that well.
Well . . . Saint Thomas Aquinas´ reckoning of the “ensoulment” is outlined in his commentary on Peter Lombard (In Sent. IV.31.2) Aquinas states that the soul enters the body of a male foetus after forty days, and the body of a female foetus after 48 days. The article in question is: Paul E. Sigmund, ´Law and politics´, in: “The Cambridge companion to Aquinas”, Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump (eds.) (Cambridge, etc., 1993) 217-231, at 227 with note 44.
But, in his Commentary to the Liber Sententiarum of Petrus Lombardus [the Scriptum de Sententiis] at III.3.5.2 conclusio he seems to agree with Aristole, that the soul takes 40 days for the male and 80 days for the female.
It is my understanding (though my memory could be faulty) that most chimeras occur before 40 days in development.
from a poetic point of view, the soul enters the body the day the creature opens its eyes.
also, when the child first eats an ice cream sandwich or goes down a slide in the play ground is when the human soul seems to at least enjoy itself, who knows when it first becomes present?
Man get’s soul at the instant of his creation - ie: conception…
I need the input of some real hellfire and brimstone fanatics - not these wishy-washy apologetics with their namby-pamby, “Oh I believe in God but the bible’s a bit er, you know, er, made up an’ all.”
Storm the pulpit, I want to see the spittle fly and the veins pop.
Some humans have anthromorphic souls, fantom-lymbs of things like tails or wings; this is because their spirit but not their body has merged with another species.
It is possible to purge what you’ve merged with, spiritually, but it is a deep loss, not to be done foolishly, but only rarely out of good reason.
I’ve been trying to figure out what Thoth said to me… about one body having two ghosts. Your subject just reminded me of something else…
*Quote)
“Yes. I told you before you said it.”
What is the main thing I should value and focus upon?
“Trust. Trust deep. Trust invincible. Trust in what is true. Trust in the most important and deep things that you’ve ever known. Trust them forever. Do not forget or turn upon any of them. Do not cut yourself. Do not derange yourself. Do not loose sigh of yourself for bad reason. Do not crush yourself. Do not despise yourself. Do not ignore yourself. In you, you are a vessel. The job of the ego is to protect and praise the finest treasures within the vessel. Later, when the vessel is spilled, and all treasures are returned to their source, the ego is free to wonder, and the individual splits off from the truth held. The truth becomes full and complete, as it re-enters the source. The ego becomes free, powerless and needless. This is what happens when individuality splits off from things obtained. This is the process of death. Each body has two ghosts. 1: the individual. 2: the universe. When they split, the individual is rarely ever seen by anyone, but the universe is still seen by everything capable of knowing. Forms of power change and split. Some things become completely full. Some things become completely empty. Resurrection is when the individual ghost is re-filled with graft, which both limits and empowers its existence. Death is when things split apart, and separate. Now you know the secret of the two ghosts connecting to become one body. The all and the individual. Tell others.”
Death?
“Nothing is lost. It is deeply changed. That is what it is.”
Had a think about this Xunzian, this may just have been the church being practical: No point telling people that their little baby that just died so soon after its birth had a soul yet. Perhaps the 40-80 day gap was to give the infants a little leeway for survival.