that the woman' s soul was made from the soul ofthe man, is that the text does not
BookX
On the origin of human souls
The idea that the woman 's soul was made out of the man 's
1, 1. Now, to be sure, the unfolding of the story seems to require that we should discuss the sin of the first man; but because scripture related how the flesh of the woman was made, while saying nothing about her soul, this has made us much more intent on looking into this matter with greater thoroughness, to see how, if at all, we may be able to refute those who believe that a person's soul, like flesh from flesh, is made by the parents, with a transfusion of the seeds of each thing into the children. What induces them, you see, to take up such a position is this: they say that God made one soul, which he blew into the face of the man whom he had fashioned from the dust, so that from that one soul might be created the souls of all other human beings, just as the flesh of every human being derives from that man's flesh, since Adam was first formed, and then Eve. And about him, indeed, we are told where he got his body from and where his soul—his body, that is to say, from the dust of the earth, his soul from the puffof God; whereas when we are told of her being made from his side, it does not say that God likewise animated or "ensouled" her with a puff. So it looks as if each part of her, flesh and soul, was derived from the one who had already been "ensouled."
It should either have kept quiet, you see—so their argument runs—about the man ' s soul too, so that as best we could we shouId understand, or at the very least believe, that it was given him by God; or else, ifthe reason scripture did not keep quiet about this was to stop us assuming that the man's soul like his flesh was made from the earth, it should also not have kept quiet about the woman's soul, to stop its being thought to be derived by transmission from his, ifthat is not true. Accordingly, they say, it is precisely because it is true that her soul as well was propagated from the man, that there is no mention of God puffing it into her face.
2. This line of argument is easily countered. lf the reason, you see, they think that the woman' s soul was made from the soul of the man, is that the text does not say that God puffed into the woman's face, why do they believe that the woman
BookX 399 was "ensouled" from the man, when the text does not say that either? Hence if God makes all the souls ofhuman beings when they are born as he made that first soul, then scripture kept quiet about the others because it could reasonably be understood that what is recorded as being done with the first one also applies to the rest.
So granting, for the sake of argument, that we had to be given some guidance in this matter through this passage of scripture: if something different was done in the woman's case which had not been done in the man's, namely that her soul should be derived from his "ensouled" flesh and not as with her husband, body from one source, soul from another, scripture should definitely not have kept quiet about the fact that it was now being done in a different way, or we would naturally assume that it was being done exactly as we had already learned it was done in his case.
Accordingly, because the author did not say that the woman's soul was made from the soul of the man, it is more appropriate to believe that he thereby wished to advise us not to assume anything different in this case from what we knew about the man's soul; that is, that the woman was given hers in the same manner. What particularly supports this conclusion is that the most obviously suitable occasion for saying that her soul derived from his, apart from the moment when she was formed, would have been when Adam said, This now bone out of my bones and fleshfrom myflesh (Gn 2:23). With how much greater love and appreciation would he have added, "and soul from my soul" ! None of this, however, is enough for us to say that such a great problem as this has already been solved, so that we may hold any particular one of these answers to be clearly and definitely the right one.
Recapitulation of what has been said in the previous books on the origin of the soul
2, 3. What therefore we first have to see is whether this book of holy scripture, carefully gone through from its starting point, allows us to have any doubts on the matter; then maybe we will have the right to inquire, either which opinion is the more to be preferred, or else what method we ought to follow ifthis turns out to be altogether uncertain. lt is quite certain, you see, that on the sixth day God made man to his image, where it also says, male andfemale he made them (Gn 1 :27). We took the first of these two points, where the image of God is mentioned, to refer to the soul, the second about the distinction of sex to refer to the flesh.1
The editors here simply refer us back to Books V1 and V11. 1 think 1 can be a little more precise, and helpful, than that. The whole topic, for one thing, was first broached in Book 111,22,33-34; for another, very little indeed is said about it in Book V1, apart from the introductory chapter, 1,1-2. The whole of Book V11, certainly, is devoted to the question, and airs a great many possibilities; for what may be called his final solution, see there 24,35—28,42.