Turn Every Page: the Human Soul

The ancients spoke frequently and easily about the soul. Plato discussed it at length, and Aristotle devoted an entire work, the De Anima, to a detailed analysis of it. “Belief in the soul has an ancient history. Its oldest mention, perhaps, can be found in the hieroglyphics carved on the walls of the burial chamber of Unis, pharaoh in the Fifth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom of Egypt, dating back to about 2315 BC.” Alan Lightman, The Transcendent Brain (Pantheon 2023), at 20. So why don’t we talk about it today except in esoteric discussions of philosophy and theology?

For Plato and Aristotle, the soul referred to the animating principle of a body, including basic functions like life and growth, as well as higher functions like intellection and the ability to act virtuously. For Aristotle in particular, the soul had a unique relationship with the body in which it resided. The soul is what made a thing what it is—a dog, a rock, a human—and that thing’s matter or body made the thing this particular dog, rock, or human. For humans, this connection to the body is essential. As one modern philosopher has written, “The soul is a moment; it bears an essential relation to the body and is founded on the body that it enlivens and determines and in which it is expressed. Human beings are animated bodies, not enmattered spirits.” Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (Cambridge 1999), 26.

If the soul is so consequential to who we are—so much that it defines us as humans—why does it seem forgotten? Great leaders have recognized the place of the soul: “Leaders in every field, [Teddy] Roosevelt later wrote, ‘need more than anything else to know human nature, to know the needs of the human soul; and they will find this nature and these needs set forth as nowhere else by the great imaginative writers, whether of prose or poetry.’” Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership in Turbulent Times, at 25. The soul was also the basis for leaders’ virtuous action. “To sustain moral courage, a leader must tend to the soul as well as to the mind.” Robert Kethledge, Lead Yourself First: Inspiring Leadership Through Solitude, at 153. Knowing that we have souls allows us to have a proper perspective about the world and our place in it. “To understand that we have souls, is to feel our separation from things visible, our independence of them, our distinct existence in ourselves, our individuality, our power of acting for ourselves this way or that way, our accountableness for what we do.” John Henry Newman, “The Immortality of the Soul.”

For many modern thinkers, it is too much to “feel our separation from things visible” or to believe there are distinct “needs of the human soul.” Alan Lightman, a materialist, has an interesting book out this year called The Transcendent Brain where he tries to explain spiritual experiences from a materialist viewpoint. He allows that there could be a place for what he calls “spirituality,” but it’s a realm he’s ultimately uncomfortable with. Even after Lightman describes what, to him, is a spiritual experience of nature—a long account of seeing ospreys take off season after season and his connection to them—he falls back on a material explanation of the phenomenon.

My thesis is that spirituality is a spandrel. The desire for connection and belonging, to nature and to other people; the feeling of being part of something larger than ourselves; the appreciation of beauty; the experience of awe; and the creative transcendent experience—all, I claim, are by-products of other traits that had evolutionary benefit. The first four of these need little explanation. The creative transcendent experience is a name I give to that exhilarating, soaring sensation when we produce something new in the world, discover something new, find ourselves in a state of pure seeing. Painters, musicians, dancers, novelists, scientists, and all of us have experienced the creative transcendent. (The Transcendent Brain, 126)

Lightman does distinguish the distinctly human activity of the soul. That is, inanimate objects cannot have these experiences, and dogs and other non-rational animals do not experience “the creative transcendent.” There is something unique about humans, even for Lightman’s materialism. “I suggest that the driving forces for the emergence of spirituality are both biological and psychological: a primal affinity for nature, a fundamental need for cooperation, and a means of coping with the knowledge of our impending death. Some of these forces can be found in nonhuman animals, of course, but the full experience of spirituality may require the higher intelligence of Homo sapiens.” (The Transcendent Brain, 126)

I find Lightman’s conclusions unconvincing and his materialism unfulfilling: “Sometimes, I wish I believed in the soul. But I've got mathematics.” (The Transcendent Brain, 41) The human soul is a marvel, and I think we should take time to ponder what it is that makes us unique, not only as human, but as this particular human in this particular time and place.

One way to tap into that collective wisdom is through books. For Teddy Roosevelt (above), books were a way to understand human nature and “the needs of the human soul.” One of the best places to read about the human soul is in the Psalms, which contain about every emotion and movement of the soul one can think of. Certainly, some of my favorite works of literature shed light on the needs and desires of the soul as well: Les Miserables (Hugo), The End of the Affair (Greene), etc. These works tap into something deep about the human condition. And even if we have not experienced the same things as the characters in them (and we probably haven’t), they provide a kind of mirror to us as humans.

We have three December birthdays in my house and it’s a good time to think about the soul—why we exist, for sure, but also whether we are living a full human life. Let’s try to capture what it means to be fully alive in the coming year and start by recognizing the beauty and depth of the human soul. “Nothing discernible to the eye of the spirit is more brilliant or obscure than man; nothing is more formidable, complex, mysterious, and infinite. There is a prospect greater than the sea, and it is the sky; there is a prospect greater than the sky, and it is the human soul.” Hugo, Les Miserables (Penguin 2012), 208.

Remember to turn every page. Enjoy your weekend. Please let me know whether you need anything.

Best,

Aaron