Do We Have a Soul?
Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman
Chris Huntley
4.8 • 745 Ratings
🗓️ 16 April 2024
⏱️ 51 minutes
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Summary
Most people think that everyone has a soul that is resident in the body. The vast majority of Christians believe the soul lives on after the body dies. But ironically the vast majority of people -- even devoted readers of the Bible -- have never noticed what the biblical writers actually say about it.
In this episode we look at views of the soul found in the Hebrew Bible, the teachings of Jesus, and the rest of the New Testament. Is it the standard Christian view? Do the biblical writers think the soul can live on without the body? If not, what would salvation and eternal life be? Tune in to find out!
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Fear of the state of one's immortal soul is a very real and present concern for a lot of Christians. |
| 0:06.0 | Given the choice between eternal paradise in heaven or eternal torment in hell, I certainly know which I'd pick. |
| 0:12.0 | But is this understanding of the soul as an eternal, immortal part of a person original to the Bible? |
| 0:18.0 | Would it be a belief that early Christians even recognized, and was there a |
| 0:21.8 | similar belief in the rest of the Greco-Roman world? Join us this week on Misquoting Jesus to find out. |
| 0:30.9 | Welcome to Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman. The only show, where a six-time, New York Times best-selling author and world-renowned |
| 0:39.0 | Bible scholar, uncovers the many fascinating, little-known facts about the New Testament, |
| 0:44.3 | the historical Jesus, and the rise of Christianity. I'm your host, Megan Lewis. Let's begin. |
| 0:52.6 | The fear of one's immortal soul spending eternity in hell has been a compelling force |
| 0:57.3 | behind personal conversion, converting other people, and staying within Christianity for a very |
| 1:02.3 | long time. As with many other things, belief around the soul has changed over the millennia. |
| 1:07.9 | So this week, we're going to find out what the Bible actually says about the |
| 1:11.3 | soul. But before we get to that, but good morning. How are you doing today? I'm doing well. My |
| 1:16.1 | body and my soul are just fine. That's always good to know. Yeah. How about you? How's your soul today? |
| 1:23.7 | Seems pretty good. Yeah. Body and soul doing pretty well, all present and correct as far as I know. |
| 1:29.5 | Okay. Well, you know, you look like you're good chipper self, so okay, inside and outside. |
| 1:36.2 | Now, you told me before we started that you are currently getting your AC fixed or you will be getting your AC fixed today. |
| 1:42.2 | And we had ours replaced last fall because it suddenly just stopped working. |
| 1:48.0 | And this is possibly going to seem like a weird question to many people. |
| 1:51.2 | But as a British person, it's always at the forefront of my mind. |
| 1:54.7 | So I wanted to ask, what is your ideal climate? |
| 1:58.5 | Yeah. |
... |
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