Few Christian doctrines challenge the Seventh-day Adventist theological framework more profoundly than the doctrine of the soul’s immortality. Ellen G. White, whom the SDA Church regards as “divinely inspired” and a corrector of “inaccurate interpretations of the Bible,” claimed that this doctrine, along with “Sunday sacredness,” are the two primary deceptions the Devil uses to lead people to perdition “at lightning speed.” But what does the Bible actually teach about this issue, and how have Christians historically understood the claim that the human soul is immortal?
The Historical Usage of the Phrase
Understanding the historical usage of a phrase can provide valuable insight into what a group intends by it. This principle applies here as well. In his 2nd-century work Against Heresies, Irenaeus of Lyons addressed numerous heresies infiltrating the Christian church, particularly those propagated by the Gnostics. Among these was the denial of the real, physical nature of Jesus’ human body. For the Gnostics, the material world was wholly corrupt and evil, while only the immaterial was considered pure, righteous, and holy. Therefore, they concluded, that Jesus couldn’t have had real human flesh otherwise He would have been tainted. It is within this context that Irenaeus responds, in part, by saying:
“The Lord has taught with very great fullness, that souls not only continue to exist, not by passing from body to body, but that they preserve the same form [in their separate state] as the body had to which they were adapted, and that they remember the deeds which they did in this state of existence, and from which they have now ceased—in that narrative which is recorded respecting the rich man and that Lazarus who found repose in the bosom of Abraham [Luke 16].…But if any persons at this point maintain that those souls, which only began a little while ago to exist, cannot endure for any length of time; but that they must, on the one hand, either be unborn, in order that they may be immortal, or if they have had a beginning in the way of generation, that they should die with the body itself—let them learn that God alone, who is Lord of all, is without beginning and without end, being truly and for ever the same, and always remaining the same unchangeable Being.
But all things which proceed from Him, whatsoever have been made, and are made, do indeed receive their own beginning of generation, and on this account are inferior to Him who formed them, inasmuch as they are not unbegotten. Nevertheless they endure, and extend their existence into a long series of ages in accordance with the will of God their Creator; so that He grants them that they should be thus formed at the beginning, and that they should so exist afterwards.”
Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies
This quote highlights two key points:
- The earliest Christians actively defended the immortal nature of the human soul against heretics.
- They based their arguments on scripture, as exemplified by Irenaeus’s interpretation of the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus in Luke 16.
To understand Irenaeus’s argument, it’s essential to grasp the claims he was opposing. Some Gnostics asserted that for the human soul to be immortal, it must either be unborn or perish alongside the body. They argued that if this were not the case, it would elevate humans to the same status as God, who is inherently immortal.
Irenaeus countered this by citing Luke 16, where Jesus teaches that the soul retains conscious experience after death. He also emphasized the categorical difference between God and humans: God has neither beginning nor end, whereas the sustained existence of the human soul depends entirely on God’s will and power. Irenaeus addressed the claim that believing in the soul’s immortality equates to elevating humanity to divinity, demonstrating that such an interpretation misunderstands the nature of “immortal.”
Interestingly, the SDA Church has echoed some of the arguments the Gnostics used in this context, particularly the claim that belief in the soul’s immortality elevates humans with God. This reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of what “immortal” means in this theological framework. “Immortal” is really speaking to God sustaining the soul from the point of its inception onward.
A couple of centuries following Irenaeus’s controversy with the Gnostics, more heresies reared their heads—this time over Christology and the nature of Jesus Christ. This led to the formulation of the Athanasian Creed which stood as a public testimony of the Christian church against Arias and the Arians. In the creed we read, “for just as one human is both rational soul and flesh, so too the one Christ is both God and human.”
Which means that also tied to the doctrine of the souls immortality is the belief that the soul is rational, not simply a resultant life force of the combination of the breath with the body (as the Adventist Church teaches). Where in scripture is the Athanasian Creed and the early Christian church getting this from?
The Biblical Case
Genesis 2:7 is one of the central texts that the Seventh-day Adventist Church appeals to for their belief about the nature of the soul.
When God formed from the elements of earth a body, He “breathed” the “breath of life” into the nostrils of Adam’s lifeless body, and there resulted man the “living being” (Genesis 2:7). This “breath of life” is “the breath of the Almighty” that gives life (Job 33:4).…
When God formed the human being from the elements of the earth, all the organs were present: the heart, lungs, kidneys, liver, spleen, brain, etc.—all perfect, but lifeless. Then God breathed into this lifeless matter the breath of life, and man “became a living being.” The scriptural equation is straightforward: the dust of the ground (earth’s elements) + the breath of life = a living being, or living soul. The union of earth’s elements with the breath of life resulted in a living being, or soul. This “breath of life” is not limited to people. Every living creature possesses it. The Bible, for example, attributes the breath of life to both those animals that went into Noah’s ark and those that did not (Gen. 7:15, 22).
Seventh-day Adventists Believe, pg. 93
This is to say that they claim the human soul is simply the resultant life force that permeates a living creature that possess both a physical body and breathes oxygen—which would include all of the animal creation. The soul in this view is not in any way rational in this view.
However, the Hebrew grammar in Genesis 2:7 actually proves the rationality and immortality of the soul. John Gill points this out in his Genesis commentary where he notes:
And breathed into his nostrils the breath of life;
which in that way entered into his body, and quickened it, which before was a lifeless lump of clay, though beautifully shapen: it is in the plural number, the “breath of lives” (l), including the vegetative, sensitive, and rational life of man. And this was produced not with his body, as the souls of brutes were, and was produced by the breath of God, as theirs were not; nor theirs out of the earth, as his body was: and these two different productions show the different nature of the soul and body of man, the one is material and mortal, the other immaterial and immortal: and man became a living soul; or a living man, not only capable of performing the functions of the animal life, of eating, drinking, walking, &c. but of thinking, reasoning, and discoursing as a rational creature.
John Gill, Commentary on the Book of Genesis, 2:7
Gill observes that the phrase “breath of life,” when applied to humans, is uniquely expressed in the plural form, suggesting a multifaceted nature to the “breath of life” in humans compared to other animals that also possess it. The Genesis account highlights this distinction by emphasizing that, unlike other creatures, God personally breathed the breath of life into man, underscoring humanity’s unique role as bearers of God’s image. As God is a rational Being, humans, as His image-bearers, are endowed with the unique ability to engage in higher reasoning and meaningful discourse as rational beings.
While the SDA Church is correct in noting that the phrase “breath of life” applies to other creatures, they overlook the distinctiveness of how humanity received this gift and the Hebrew grammar’s implication of multiple components being imparted to humans when they were endowed with the “breath of life.”
Daniel 2
In the book of Daniel, we observe King Nebuchadnezzar experiencing profound distress in his spirit while his body remained inactive and at rest, as depicted in Daniel 2:1. This instance challenges the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s assertion that the “spirit” is universally synonymous with the “breath of life.” The king’s torment occurred not in his breath but in his spirit, indicating a distinction between the spirit and the life-giving breath. The narrative makes it clear that while Nebuchadnezzar’s body was at rest, his spirit remained active, experiencing emotional and psychological distress.
A similar distinction is drawn in the case of Daniel, particularly in Daniel 7:1, where it is stated that Daniel had a vision and subsequent spiritual experience. In Daniel 7:15-16, the experience is explicitly described as occurring in Daniel’s spirit. This further supports the idea that the spirit is not merely a passive, life-sustaining force, but an active and conscious entity that can experience emotional and intellectual states independent of the body.
The Hebrew expressions “my spirit within me” and “in my head” in these passages present a vivid image of the dichotomy between body and spirit. The spirit is described as being contained within the body, with the body serving as a sheath and the spirit functioning like a sword within it. This metaphor of the body as a sheath and the spirit as a sword encapsulates the duality between the material and immaterial aspects of human existence. This imagery mirrors the distinction that Paul outlines in 2 Corinthians 5, where he describes the body as a temporary dwelling for the spirit, further emphasizing the separation and distinct roles of body and spirit in the human experience.
Thus, these passages highlight the complexity of the relationship between body and spirit, demonstrating that the spirit is not simply the breath of life, but a rational and conscious entity capable of experiencing emotions and thoughts independently of the physical body.
To hear this broken down further, watch here.
Luke 16:19-31
The SDA Church’s assertion has long been that the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus is a parable that isn’t in any way telling us anything about the nature of the human experience in the afterlife. As Ellen G. White states in her commentary on Luke 16:19, which the SDA Church upholds as “divinely inspired”:
In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Christ shows that in this life men decide their eternal destiny. During probationary time the grace of God is offered to every soul. But if men waste their opportunities in self-pleasing, they cut themselves off from everlasting life. No after-probation will be granted them. By their own choice they have fixed an impassable gulf between them and their God.
This parable draws a contrast between the rich who have not made God their dependence, and the poor who have made God their dependence. Christ shows that the time is coming when the position of the two classes will be reversed. Those who are poor in this world’s goods, yet who trust in God and are patient in suffering, will one day be exalted above those who now hold the highest positions the world can give but who have not surrendered their life to God.
Ellen G. White, Christ Object Lessons, pg. 260 (COL 260.1)
This interpretation suggests that the text is merely teaching a general principle: rejecting God’s grace in this life results in losing eternal life. It allegedly contrasts the wealthy, who have not made God their sole reliance, with the poor, who have.
While we have addressed this issue in greater detail here, it is important to note that parables use imagery to convey specific truths. Interpreting this story as a parable requires explaining what the fire, torment, and conscious experience after physical death symbolize. Moreover, it implies that Jesus employed depictions of unreal scenarios—such as conscious, rational experience after death—to teach a lesson about the dangers of wealth.
We strongly disagree with their belief that this is only a parable, and there are compelling reasons for such. If the text is not simply a parable, it can easily be deduced that the soul of a human experiences consciousness apart from the human body supporting both the rationalist and immortality of the human soul.
Luke 1:39-44
In conjunction with their teaching about the nature of the “breath of life” and the soul, the SDA Church also teaches that one does not become a “living soul” until the point of birth and separation from the mother as a distinct unit of life. As they write in their exposition of their beliefs:
As we have already mentioned, in the Old Testament “soul” is a translation of the Hebrew nephesh. In Genesis 2:7 it denotes humans as a living being after the breath of life entered into a physical body formed from the elements of the earth. Similarly, a new soul comes into existence whenever a child is born, each “soul” being a new unit of life uniquely different and separate from other similar units. This quality of individuality in each living being, which constitutes it a unique entity, seems to be the idea emphasized by the Hebrew term nephesh. When used in this sense, nephesh is not a part of the person; it is the person and, in many instances, is translated “person.
Seventh-day Adventists Believe, pg. 96
Luke 1:39-44 provides a clear challenge to the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s understanding of the nature of the soul. In this passage, the Scriptures describe how John the Baptist “leapt” for joy in his mother’s womb at the proclamation of the gospel and was filled with the Holy Spirit from the womb (Luke 1:15). This indicates that John, even before birth, was capable of a rational and emotional response, something that only living, conscious beings can do.
It further implies that the soul is not merely the result of the union of body and breath, as the SDA Church teaches. Since the human lungs do not begin to develop until around the tenth week of pregnancy, the soul must be an intrinsic part of the person that exists prior to the full development of physical systems like respiration. This challenges the notion that the soul is solely a product of bodily processes and underscores the soul’s separate, rational, and immortal nature.
Matthew 10:28
When teaching about the fear of persecution, Jesus instructed His followers not to fear those who can only kill the body but cannot harm the soul. Instead, He emphasized fearing God, who has the authority to destroy both body and soul in Hell. This teaching demonstrates that Jesus affirmed the inability of one human to destroy the soul of another. If it were possible to kill both body and soul simultaneously, His warning would be meaningless. Therefore, this directly challenges the Adventist understanding of the soul, revealing it to be inconsistent with Jesus’s teachings.
Seventh-day Adventist pioneer, Uriah Smith, seeking to combat these claims in the early days of the SDA movement, wrote:
For whatever it may teach concerning the intermediate state [Matthew 10:28], it is most positively against the doctrine of eternal misery, and the consequent immortality of the soul. It teaches that God can destroy the soul in hell; and there is no force in our Lord’s warning unless we understand it to affirm that he will thus destroy the souls of the wicked. We never could with any propriety be warned to fear a person because he could do that which he never designed to do, and never would do. We are to fear the civil magistrate to such a degree, at least, as not to offend against the laws, because he has power to put those laws into execution, and visit upon us merited punishment; but our fear is to rest not simply upon the fact that he has power to do this, but upon the certainty that he will do it if we are guilty of crime. Otherwise there could be no cause of fear, and no ground for any exhortation to fear.
Uriah Smith, Man’s Nature and Destiny, pg. 95 (MND 95.5)
Smith’s argument against the soul’s immortality posits that the term “destroy” in this passage signifies the end of existence, akin to how killing ceases the functions of the body. It further asserts that misinterpreting the Greek word psuche (soul/life) has led to misconceptions about the soul’s immortality. Instead, he argues that psuche merely refers to life that can be lost and later restored at the resurrection, rather than an immortal, conscious soul.
However, even if annihilationism is assumed, this interpretation fails to address the distinction Jesus made between the soul and the body. If the soul were simply the life force resulting from the combination of body and breath, then it would follow that humans could destroy the soul by killing the body. This contradicts the clear dichotomy presented in Jesus’s teaching.
Philippians 1:21-23
In Philippians 1:21-23, Paul explicitly contrasts living in the body with departing to be with Christ. The word depart (Greek: analysai) suggests a continuation of existence in another state, implying that Paul expects to remain consciously with Christ after death, even though his body is dead. His assertion that it is “better by far” to depart and be with Christ indicates a personal, conscious experience immediately after death. If death merely resulted in unconsciousness or nonexistence until the resurrection, Paul would have no reason to describe it as preferable to continuing his ministry. This implies the soul’s ability to maintain rational and relational functions apart from the body.
Furthermore, in Philippians 1:22, he contrasts “living in the body” with “departing and being with Christ,” implying a dualistic view of human existence: one tied to the body and the other distinct from it. This supports the idea that the soul is immortal and can exist independently, capable of rationality and communion with Christ even without the physical body.
All of this aligns with Paul’s broader theology, which consistently describes a conscious existence with the Lord immediately after death.
2 Corinthians 5:1-10
Paul uses the metaphor of the “earthly tent” (the body) and contrasts it with an eternal “house” (heavenly dwelling) prepared by God. This suggests a duality where the destruction of the body does not mean the cessation of existence. Instead, believers possess a lasting, immortal aspect (the soul) that persists beyond physical death (2 Corinthians 5:1).
His longing for the “heavenly dwelling” reflects an expectation of personal continuity beyond death. The groaning indicates an awareness of a greater, eternal reality, implying that the soul retains rational awareness and anticipation, even in the intermediate state (2 Corinthians 5:2). The language of being “unclothed” and “clothed” points to a transition rather than an end. Paul anticipates that mortality will give way to an eternal, immortal existence, indicating that the soul persists rationally and consciously even when the body is absent (2 Corinthians 5:4).
In the flow of this context, he also states that the Holy Spirit is given to believers as a guarantee of eternal life, emphasizing that believers’ existence transcends physical death (2 Corinthians 5:5). The believer could not be said to presently possess eternal life if, when they die, they cease all conscious experience (1 John 5:13). It would mean their union with Christ through the Spirit would cease until the resurrection where it would then reunite.
Paul then explicitly states that to be “away from the body” is to be “at home with the Lord.” This affirms that the soul exists independently of the body and remains in conscious communion with Christ after death (2 Corinthians 5:8).
These are not the sort of things we would expect to see if Paul didn’t believe in the dual nature of humanity and the rational, immortality of the human soul.
Conclusion
The doctrine of the soul’s immortality and rationality is deeply rooted in both Scripture and the historical understanding of the Christian faith. From the writings of early church fathers like Irenaeus of Lyons to the biblical exegesis of key passages such as Genesis 2:7, Luke 16, Matthew 10:28, Philippians 1, and 2 Corinthians 5, a consistent theological narrative emerges: the human soul is distinct, rational, and endures beyond physical death.
The arguments presented by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, while earnest in their attempt to uphold a particular interpretation of Scripture, often fail to account for the theological nuances and grammatical details found in the biblical text. The teachings of Jesus, Paul, and the broader Christian tradition affirm a dualistic understanding of human nature, where the soul retains its capacity for rational thought and relational communion with God apart from the body.
This understanding is not only a matter of theological precision but also a reflection of the hope and assurance offered to believers—that life with Christ continues beyond the grave, unbroken by the temporary separation of body and soul. Far from being a human invention or a misunderstanding, the doctrine of the soul’s immortality stands as a testament to the sustaining power of God and the unique dignity of humanity as His image-bearers.
