That means it's right
own soul
And rule the body

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Signs of the presence of the spirit are what is connected with God - love, conscience, faith, justice, truth, sacrifice, courage, valor - for which a person goes to death. (IMHO)

Hello Victor! To be honest, just like you, I barely distinguish between spirit and soul. But I think there is a difference, I am inclined to believe that the soul is something personal, private, and the spirit is brought inside a person from the outside, stimulated by something. They say, for example, the spirit of the winner, but the soul of the winner can only be said on a personal level ... I write confusingly, because I myself did not fully understand ...

The soul is what is associated with earthly life, which then dies, material attachments, entertainments, addictions. The soul can be big, but the spirit is miserable, weak, unable to defend itself and its principles, follow the lead of the soul and body. For example, I want to take revenge on someone, to do evil, but I will do good. Like Christ - He was crucified, and he them - Father! Do not blame them for sin - they do not know what they are doing. And he could scold them and curse them with the last words. His spirit overpowered his weak body and soul.

The soul is mortal, but the spirit is not? Many believe in the immortality of the soul. Is giving up the spirit and giving one's soul to God not the same thing? Is it not from "breathing" this and that? Do not know.

People personally told me when they were in clinical death, they watched themselves from the side, behind their dead body and fussed around doctors and friends, heard their conversations.

The soul is mortal, in the sense that everything connected with the material (and this is the soul) disappears with death. For example, shopping, talking about everyday problems, washing dishes, cleaning the room, eating in the refrigerator and thinking about it, driving a car, watching entertainment programs and even writing poetry about any insignificant nonsense.

Probably, Vadim, probably... Is it just that the soul stands without awareness of personality, without memory? Although... it's better to erase other memory... And start from scratch...

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You have no part with the earth, you heavenly. You are the image of God; look for your prototype. For like tends to like: water flows into the sea, dust returns to the earth, birds with birds, and beasts with beasts, and cattle with cattle, and fish with fish, and a man with a man like himself, that is, good with good and evil with evil is found and everything is looking for someone like him. Seek also the One Whom you are like, and strive towards Him, like a fire on high. There is your peace; you won't find peace here. Go around the whole world, you will not find anything that would satisfy you. You, my soul, will not find peace here in this world. All the beauty of this world is a perishable substance, vanity, dust, earth - everything of value in it. You are an immaterial, immortal spirit; you have no rest in them. The spirit does not rest in matter, but the spirit finds rest in the Spirit. Heaven and all the world will not satisfy you, for there is no likeness between you and the light. Turn to your Creator, Who created you in His own image. In Him alone you will find your peace, as in your center.

The spirit is immortal, therefore it is quenched not by corruptible and mortal matter, but by the living and immortal Divinity. So a poor person, having lost the Source of living water - God, digs muddy wells in creatures and seeks coolness for his soul from them! But dig, dig, poor soul, as much as you want these wells - you will not quench your thirst from them, you will still thirst more and more. Do you know where to find living water? Hear, here the living Source calls to Himself: Whoever is thirsty, come to Me and drink (); and again: Whoever drinks the water that I will give him will never be thirsty; but the water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water springing up into eternal life (). From this Source the soul draws, and cools down, and gets drunk, and rejoices so that it no longer thirsts forever.

The question of the immortality of the soul is perhaps the most main question worldview. This is how F. M. Dostoevsky considered him, and this is how we consider him. For Dostoevsky, immortality is “the stronghold of faith in man, to which the solution of all the questions that have tormented mankind is reduced”; “the highest idea on earth is only one, it is precisely the idea of ​​the immortality of the human soul, for all the other “higher” ideas of life that a person can be alive, only follow from it alone.”

For those yearning for faith in Versilov's God, God is immortality. And this is very understandable. After all, if there is an area of ​​the spirit - the soul of an individual, then this almost solves the question of the existence of a spiritual being in general. If there is immortality, then there is and.

At the same time, the idea of ​​immortality is the main prerequisite for the practical activity of people. “Either immortality, or anthropophagy, cannibalism, devouring each other,” – this is how Dostoevsky puts the question. And he's right. It is impossible to live without believing in the soul.

In “Homo sapiens” by S. Pshibyshevsky there is a terrible dialogue between Grodsky and Falk, two “non-believers” who stopped before the question: should they live and how to live:

Grodsky: Falk, do you believe in the soul?

Falk: No, I don't. No I dont know. I don't believe in anything. What do you think of "her"?

Grodsky: About whom?

Falk: About her.

Grodsky: I don't believe it, but I'm scared.

The meaning of this horror-filled conversation is clear: even these nihilists are so thirsty for the existence of the soul and God in order to “lay their lives on Him” that the very word “soul” is pronounced with reverent horror and fear. They desire, they want to think of her; they are afraid to think that it is, and even more terrible to admit that it is not. They “expired” their body, took everything they could from it. And now the question arises: where to go next? From the point of view of their former worldview, the answer is clear: "go to death." But the thought stops: “what if there is a soul”? After all, then you can live, then the purpose and meaning of life is revealed. You can’t die just like that, you will have to carry forever the soul that has been destroyed, sold to the body. This consciousness is joyful, painful and terrible.

You need to choose one of two things: either, having lived through all the pleasures, having experienced everything that a life of a drunken, narcotic person can give, rather kill yourself, not recovering from a hangover, or believe in immortality, in this “terrible soul”. Let's say it more clearly: a person knows two motives-impulses that allow him to bear the "burden of life." One motive is life for oneself, for those nervous, drunken sensations that are given in the "life cup". This is how Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov lives, who has stood on his voluptuousness like on a stone; many people live like this, because of a dull, passionate attachment to the sensations of life, they accept the world before they find its moral meaning, or even without any meaning, without a higher idea, held in this life by the “power of Karamazov’s meanness.”

Only selfish people without wings, with a narrow philistine soul, can live to see the day when the immature soul abandons the worn-out body. They can exist only because they do not live, but move from day to day and, unworthy of life, do not feel it and do not create it. And not living, they do not die, but, imperceptible, leave this life. And those with “wings”, if they live by “the power of Karamazov’s meanness”, drink from the goblet with despair, uncontrollably, and when the wine does not intoxicate, unable to bear the hangover, they break the goblet on the floor.

So, on the one hand, there is immortality, which means a tense spiritual life, on the other, the dull vegetative life of people, neither warm nor cold, leading to suicide.

There is another type of people: they live by a social-altruistic instinct. The leitmotif of their life is “necessity”, usefulness for mankind in its mournful path to happiness, the struggle for the harmony of all human life. But this motif is strong only next to the idea of ​​the soul and its immortality. Only then can a person participate in the creation of common happiness, when he is sure that he, his "I", will sing the "hosanna" of the future harmony of the world and triumph with palm trees victory - personal immortality, and even more so when he is sure that the happiness of all mankind will not dissipate like smoke in the future.

If there is no certainty that the spiritual wealth of humanity is eternal, because “souls – the carriers of wealth” are also eternal, then love for humanity is impossible. Is it possible to love a person when there is not even a greasy spot left of all mankind in the future, and is it possible to love the world when in the future it will turn into an icicle with all souls and ideas?

Without faith in immortality, man's bonds with the earth become thinner and eventually break. Dostoevsky's suicidal atheist came to the conclusion that "living like an animal is disgusting, abnormal and not enough for a person," i.e., tired of it. But the question arises: what, then, can keep a godless person in this world? He does not believe in God and immortality, and outside of this faith there are no moral principles of life. "The power of Karamazov's baseness", the animal fear of death or the animal thirst for life has fizzled out. She can't help but breathe. So what now? Now suicide is inevitable.

“The irresistible conviction that the life of mankind is, in essence, the same moment as my own, and that tomorrow, upon reaching “harmony” (if we only believe that this dream is achievable), humanity will turn into the same zero as and I, by the power of the inert laws of nature, and even after so much suffering endured in achieving this dream, this thought completely outrages my spirit; me even the love of humanity.”

It is impossible to love immortal, absurd, vulgar humanity, which exists senselessly. To love people, you need faith in the soul and immortality; without this, love for people is incomprehensible and impossible. Otherwise - again anthropophagy. This conclusion is illustrated by Falk's example, which we pointed out above. He combined both motives of life: the search for some sensations and work for the sake of "common happiness", for the sake of the great harmony of the future. And in the end, a cry breaks out from him: “Give me a soul, or both my “drunkenness” of life and my love for humanity are cursed. She was a lie. I invented this love in order to hide from the gaze of death, which looks into my eyes, in order to kill the torment in myself, to see in myself only an earthworm who will die tomorrow. Give me a soul to love people not out of despair, but for immortality and for the sake of immortality.

So the soul is needed. But is it possible to prove her immortality?

We believe that two paths are mainly possible here: the path of mystical experience and the so-called moral proof of immortality.

The truth of the existence of the human spirit is revealed by the experience of the Christian life. But this proof is convincing only for those who live the spiritual life so deeply that they feel in their soul the breath of the Living God.

The moral argument boils down to the following proposition: "We want immortality, so it exists." Here are the words of F. M. Dostoevsky, in which it is: “Without the conviction of one’s immortality, a person’s ties with the earth break off, become thinner, rotten, and the loss of the higher meaning of life, felt at least in the form of unconscious longing, undoubtedly leads to suicide ". But from here comes the opposite moralizing: “If the belief in immortality is so necessary for human existence, then, therefore, it is the normal state of mankind, and if so, then the immortality of the human soul itself undoubtedly exists.”

This proof seems deep, but it is obvious that its persuasiveness is not logical. Is it possible to find another type of evidence?

Personally, we simply believe in the soul, accepting it as a Divine breath, as a particle of God, embedded in a person during his creation. For our readers, we dare to point out another interesting way of proving immortality, designed for those who do not believe, moreover, do not want to know any laws other than matter and its evolution.

“It will be about immortality. Does our soul live and will it live? The question is important and not at all idle. Remember how sharply the "ensign" Gololobov puts it in Artsybashev's story. He says: “Every person is obliged to think about his death, because every person must die. No one can be indifferent to such a terrible thing as death. The position of every man is the position of one sentenced to death penalty. Death is unnatural and violence... I don't want to die, but I will. This is both violent and unnatural. It would be a beautiful phrase if it were not so in reality. But it is so, and therefore it is no longer a phrase, but a fact.

“Isn’t it terrible, really,” the doctor echoes him, “we all live and then die, so why should I then, not to mention our worries, sorrows and joys, and even our ideals? Here Bazarov said that the burdock will grow, but in fact, even worse: and this is unknown. Maybe the burdock will not grow, but simply nothing will happen. Tomorrow all who knew me will die; my papers, handed over to the archive, will be eaten by rats, or they will be burned, and everything will be over. Nobody will remember me. How many millions of people existed before me, and where are they? Here I am walking on dust, and this dust is saturated with the remains of those people who were just as self-confident as I was and thought that it was very important that they live.

Here the light burned - and it is not there! Ashes remained; maybe you can light it again, but it won’t be the same. What was on fire will no longer be! I won't be! Is it really ... Well, of course! Everything will be: trees, and people, and feelings - many pleasant feelings, love and all that - but I will not be. I won't even look at it. I won't even know if it's all there or not!

That is, not even that “I won’t know”, but simply I won’t be at all! Just? No, it's not easy, but terribly cruel and senseless! Why then did I live, tried, considered this good, and then bad, thought that I was smarter than others? Still I won't be. And the worms will eat me. They will eat for a long time, and I will lie motionless. They will eat, swarm, white, slippery. Let them burn me. This is terrible too! Why did I live? And I will die soon. Maybe I'll die tomorrow? Now? After all, it is so simple: the head will ache in the most innocent way, and then everything gets worse, worse and death. After all, I myself know that it is simple, I know how and why it is, but, meanwhile, I can’t stop and warn! I will die. Maybe tomorrow; maybe now. What's the point, who needs? No, I'm afraid, I'm afraid!

Yes, this is terrible, and one cannot help but think about it, everyone is obliged to think about death - or rather about immortality - in order to live and create.

Perhaps the best method for proving immortality is moral. Perhaps what is needed here is not the logic of a scientist, but prophecy, the inspiration of those prophets who wandered in sheepskins and goatskins, and which the whole world was not worthy of(), in whose speeches - the strength of the spirit, which already sufficiently proves eternal immortality; but since you want proofs from the realm of pure knowledge, I yield.

I don't want to trap you. You are not gathered here to listen to a sermon, and if I presented this to you unexpectedly, then I could be accused of having laid a trap for you. I wouldn't want to deserve such a reproach. I think that indeed many of my listeners would not be willing to come here if they were invited to attend the sermon. I hasten to reassure you on this score by explaining in what sense I will have to talk about immortality here and from what source I will draw evidence for this.

I want to speak as a naturalist and a free philosopher, and I warn you that I will be just a referent reporting the conclusions of Sabatier, Jemmy, Schiller, etc.

Do not think that I hope to indisputably convince everyone of the dogma of immortality. No. My task is more modest: I want to achieve recognition that we have no right to deny it. My only intention - and it is quite legitimate - is to investigate whether the idea of ​​personal immortality is indeed contradictory in the scientific data; Is it really true that modern advances in knowledge are digging deeper and deeper the inevitable grave for the human being, and is it really only naive and ignorant people who tend to believe that outside this earthly existence there can be another and that the corporeal does not at all entail the inevitable death of the personality.

To those who suggest that the acquisition of human knowledge has destroyed the doctrine of immortality, I find it necessary to note that in thus intending to rely on science, expressing a supposedly scientific opinion, they offend science. They say: “Science does not allow believing in immortality. Science proves that everything dies, everything decomposes into its main parts, nothing lasts forever. Science denies the possibility of immortality. The latter is incompatible with scientific data.”

In the words of Sabatier: “Science does not refute immortality; she has no way to either disprove it or prove it. Immortality is a question that is only just entering the field of science, and therefore cannot be proven scientifically” (Sabatier). I affirm that science is moving towards the recognition of an immortal spirit, but when it will come to this I do not know.

Since ancient times, thinking humanity has been trying to solve the question of whether a person is immortal, whether he will exist as a conscious person after visible bodily death, or whether his soul is a myth, something that does not really exist; and there were two opposite directions in the solution of this problem. One came from the belief that a person has a special beginning - the spirit - which not only distinguishes him from the rest of the living world (quantitative ratio), but also elevates him above him (qualitative ratio). This spirit is not subject to destruction, since even after the death of the body it retains an independent existence; he is eternal, as his Creator is eternal.

Another direction was based on a completely opposite idea, namely that a person is only quantitatively, but not qualitatively different from other living beings; that there is no Divine principle in him; that it is a combination of material elements that are destroyed from the body; that there is no other life than earthly, therefore people should be called not to abstinence, not to perfection, but to make the most of all earthly blessings without any worries about tomorrow. We will eat and drink, because in the morning we will die().

Vogt's reasoning differs in the same character: “Physiology positively and decisively denies the separate existence of the soul. The soul does not enter the womb, like an evil spirit in the possessed, but it is the fruit of the development of the brain, just as muscular activity is the fruit of the development of the muscles, and excretions are the fruit of the development of the glands.

It seemed that humanity was on the eve of a crisis of worldview. The answer was clear to him: the soul is dead, dead, man must leave the pedestal on which he stood as the ruler of the world, significantly different from animated nature in his mind and freedom. The connection with the sky was broken, because the sky, in his opinion, is empty, there is no God there. It was a tragic moment. But it is not given to people to remove paint from the entire horizon with a sponge: it is not for them to kill God.

The drunken years of naked materialism have passed, and now we are confronted with a situation opposite to Buchner's: the soul exists and it is immortal, because in essence there is no matter. And that's how thunder struck in broad daylight: Dubois-Reymond's Ignoramus et ignorabimus. “We don’t know and we won’t know” is the new principle.

Yes, natural science has made great strides, to some extent it has turned the world upside down, but it cannot take on the overly responsible task of building an integral, strictly scientific worldview, because the essence of world existence, the mystery of life, is as unsolved for it as it was before.

What is life? - asked the "new" inquisitive minds and answered: - Natural science does not know. What is the purpose of life and where does everything go? Science cannot answer this.

Can it at least be asserted that apart from matter there is no other being? It turns out that this question remains unanswered. Science deals only with experience, with positive facts. But no self-respecting naturalist will want to say anything definite about what goes beyond the limits of experimental observation. This kind of speech, if only they come from an adherent positive knowledge, serve only as an insult to science.

From that day began the collapse of many "semi-axioms" of knowledge. “In the field of science in the future, many superstitions and axioms will still fall and be destroyed,” I said some time ago. At the same time, I had to write about the destruction of one of them - the axiom “Ex nihilo nihil” (“Nothing comes from nothing”). How solid is this idea? Perhaps, and even undoubtedly, it is indisputable, but we put into it a content that is not in it.

Take, for example, parthenogenesis. Do you know what it is? In the animal world, this is a birth without the participation of the male principle. The ovum is fertilized, becomes capable of creating life through irritation with its chemical, electrical reagents. These reagents completely replace the masculine principle, since, apparently, the spermatozoon plays only the role of an irritant. In this way silkworms, echinoderms, etc., bred “virginally”.

If someone told you about this fact, you would probably answer: “No, this is absurd, without a husband, birth is impossible. Now "familyless" conception, parthenogenesis is a recognized fact, but when 110 years ago de Castellet first told the famous Remur about his discovery of virgin reproduction in the silkworm, he only smiled. “Ex nihilo nihil,” and de Castellet immediately repented of the absurdity of his thought and began to justify his “mistake.” However, here he was mistaken, and we are forced to admit that this formula is only partly true.

Consider another axiom: "Everything that has a beginning has an end." At first glance, it seems that it has no exceptions, but wouldn't it be necessary to limit it too? However, let's take a closer look at this. Can science say that it does not know a single exception to this rule, because there are many things in nature, the beginning of which we have not observed and the end of which we will not see either. By analogy, we can conclude that these phenomena are subject to the law of death and destruction. But the question is not this, but whether it is possible to talk about it positively, remaining on a strictly scientific basis. But what if these phenomena in themselves carry the ability to be eternally reborn, eternally renewed, so to speak, eternally younger? It turns out that this is so, and the proof of this is the facts.

Let's start with unorganized matter. A rock salt crystal, which is an individuality of a very clear nature: a certain geometric shape, the ratio of its constituent molecules, optical, thermal, electrical, magnetic and Chemical properties etc. The grouping of the component parts of this crystal was quite distinctly individualized. Suppose that the components in it will be excluded and replaced, as they are excluded, by other components identical to the first; let us suppose that such a substitution in a very small amount occurs slowly, gradually, progressively, so that the elements introduced at a given moment will always be in the minority relative to those standing before them.

It obviously follows from this that the characteristic shape of a crystal, its position, relation to neighboring crystals, functions, dynamic state, its properties will generally remain the same. Consequently, the progressive replacement of elements did not violate the dynamic individuality, the regrouping of elements, the totality of forces and their actions, they remained unchanged. And if this progressive replacement does not stop and will continue for an indefinite time, the crystal as an individual can, in my opinion, be considered as having the property of permanent existence and - one might even say - the property of immortality. The immortality of this crystal, according to our hypothesis, is due to the incessant gradual renewal of its constituent parts by constant rebirth, which is a kind of protective evolution (Sabatier). But this immortality is relative and incomplete.

There was a time when only inorganic matter of the type of primary plasma existed. Plasma is extremely complex, even the most complex of all compounds known to us. But although its constituent parts are extremely numerous, yet it is not a simple mixture, but chemical compound, known as the chemical molecular complex, that is, it is the mutual attraction of various molecules between which there is such a bond that turns their entire set into one. Albumin is the main and active component plasma. This complex has all the properties of life; it is precisely in him that the phenomena of assimilation, transformation, nourishment, destruction, etc., take place with such energy, which form the necessary elements that make up life. Consequently, it makes it possible for life, which has become deaf and slow in rough matter, to manifest itself here with amazing expressiveness, to be eternally renewed, supporting its immortality.

Plasma is immortal due to the constancy of that dynamic totality, which is the result of the combination of its constituent material elements, since these latter, although they are not permanent in themselves, can, upon their exit from the combination, be replaced by others; due to the harmonious and balanced combination of forces for which it serves as the center and place of action; and also because of her creative, regenerating, renewing power, which enables her to find the vital elements everywhere, group them and make them penetrate into her constituent aggregates. For while the constituent elements of plasma very easily lose their individuality, entering into new combinations, it has a significant creative and restorative power, with which it is able to protect itself from this destruction, immediately correcting it with an irresistible desire, an energetic will directed towards the preservation of life. . This is a skilled restorer. Thus, the germ plasm is capable of eternal rebirth and constant freshness.

There were other theories of immortality, for example, from the position of the dominant role of the brain. “Thought is the basic function of the brain,” said the old materialism. We will also proceed from this position.

“I ask you to recognize with me,” writes Professor of Philosophy at Harvard University W. James, “the great psychophysiological formula: thought is a function of the brain. Now the question is, does this doctrine logically force us to reject the belief in immortality? Does it force every sane person to sacrifice hopes for the afterlife because he considers it his duty to accept all the consequences of scientific truth? I must show you that a fatal conclusion is not necessary, as is usually imagined, and that even if our mental life, as it appears to us, represents in strict accuracy the function of a brain subject to death, it still does not it follows that life cannot continue even after brain death; I want to show that, on the contrary, it is quite possible.”

Thought is a function of the brain, so be it, but the question is what function? The brain can be regarded either as the producing cause of thought, or as one of the conditions for the manifestation outside of that thought that already exists independently of the brain. The supposed impossibility of continuing life comes from looking too superficially at the admitted fact of functional dependency. As soon as we take a closer look at this concept of functional dependence and ask ourselves, for example, how many types of functional dependence can there be, we will immediately notice that at least one of its types does not in the least exclude an afterlife. The fatal conclusion of the physiologist comes from the fact that he unfoundedly accepts only one kind of functional dependence, and then considers this kind to be the only possible one.

When a physiologist, who believes that his science shatters all hope of immortality, asserts: "Thought is a function of the brain," he looks at the fact in exactly the same way as when he says: "Steam is the function of a kettle, light is an action." electric current, force is a function of the movement of the waterfall. In the latter cases, various material objects have a function that creates or generates given actions, and such a function of them should be called a productive, or producing function. "That's exactly how the brain must act," thinks the physiologist.

But in the world of physical nature, such a productive function is not the only kind of function known to us. We also know the permissive or liberating function; in addition, we also have a transmissive or transmitting function. The valves of an organ, for example, have only a transmitting function: they open various pipes in succession and release air from the bellows in various ways. The voices of the various trumpets are formed by waves of air vibrating as they exit. But air is not generated in the organ. The organ itself, taken separately from the bellows, is only an apparatus that releases air in parts in a special organic form.

Science cannot regard thought as the result of the productive function of the brain. And that's why. One can speak of a productive function only where it is absolutely clear and distinct, i.e. it will be shown quite scientifically how one thing, the previous one, gives birth to another, the next one. There should not be a single, even the smallest "X" -a. When science uses the word "function" it means only a series of gradual changes observed in a certain sequence. Is this the case in our example?

“If we are talking about science in its positive sense, then by the word “function” we can mean nothing more than just appropriate changes. When brain activity changes known direction, consciousness changes accordingly: when the occipital lobes of the brain work, consciousness sees objects; when the lower frontal part of the brain works, the consciousness names objects to itself; when the work of the brain stops, the consciousness falls asleep, etc.

In rigorous science we can only write down the simple fact of a relation. And any opinion about the method of the origin of a fact, either through its creation or a simple transmission, is only an additional hypothesis, moreover, a metaphysical hypothesis, since we cannot form ourselves any concept of the particulars in either case ”(W. James).

Thus, only one thing can be asserted scientifically: a certain brain process is followed by a certain impression, a certain state of consciousness. But is it possible, standing on scientific grounds, to say that it is precisely the brain that generates consciousness, that consciousness exists only in so far as there is a brain?

But then, to what time should the emergence of consciousness be attributed? And how to imagine its very appearance? Where exactly is the preceding and following, which are necessarily required by exact science? “Ask for any indication as to the exact process of the birth of a thought, and science admits that it is powerless to answer you. It cannot shed even the slightest light on this subject, it cannot give you the slightest guess or conjecture. She doesn’t even have a bad metaphor or pun on this. "Ignoramus et ignorabimus" is what most physiologists will say in this case in the words of one of them.

“The appearance of consciousness in the brain,” they will answer, as the late professor of physiology in Berlin once answered, “is an absolute world riddle, something so paradoxical and abnormal that in this phenomenon one can see a stumbling block for nature, which in that almost contradicts to herself. Regarding the mode of formation of steam in a kettle, we have certain concepts on which we build assumptions, since the variable parts are physically homogeneous, and we can easily imagine that here we are talking only about modified molecular movements. But during the formation of consciousness in the brain, the variable terms are heterogeneous in nature, and within our mind this phenomenon is as great a miracle as if we said that thought is generated spontaneously or created from nothing ”(W. James).

Thus, the brain is only an accumulator of thought, nothing more. But we know that an accumulator is matter, a substance, an apparatus, an organ capable of receiving from outside and collecting, accumulating certain forces, substances, products, in order to use them later more or less slowly and under certain conditions. The accumulator does not create, it only accumulates what it receives from outside.

I will give examples to illustrate this definition.

A simple spring is an accumulator of force and motion: when it is stretched, it collects and stores the force expended in tensioning it, and then can return it again, quickly or slowly, depending on the conditions under which it returns to its original state. The clock spring is a well-known and a prime example of this fact: it collects and stores the elastic force imparted to it at a certain time by the hand of the one who winds it up, and, thanks to the mechanism used to lower it, returns the movement accumulated by it over a more or less long period of time. If the descent of the spring occurred suddenly, and not distributed over a long period of time, then the force returns quickly and all at once.

Water vapor and liquids in general, reduced to a vapor state, are also accumulators of heat and motion, because they contain in a latent state the accumulated heat imparted to them by the hearth and used to evaporate them. Since this heat has a mechanical equivalent, the steam is at the same time an accumulator of motion. Thickening, i.e. turning back into liquid state, steam can return heat either in the form of heat, or in the form of motion.

Electricity can also be accumulated on extensive metal surfaces, such as on the cylinders of electrical machines, or on electric capacitors in the proper sense, or in batteries, where it is collected and condensed, due to the combination of lead with oxygen in water, and then released due to decomposition. lead oxide.

There is one substance in plants that plays a remarkable role as a carbon accumulator: this is chlorophyll, which, extracting carbon from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere - a combination of carbon and oxygen - accumulates it in the plant in the form of fiber, wood, starch, etc. This carbon, carried away by plant juices, it is deposited in various parts of the plant. But at the same time, chlorophyll serves as an accumulator of heat and sunlight, because, while performing its transformative work, it absorbs solar heat in order to then release it as fuel for our stoves.

Of course, I have not given here all the examples of accumulation that the field of scientific research presents to us.

So, to put it simply, we imagine the matter of the brain as a kind of phonogram, on which the melody of our thoughts, volitional moods, and feelings is recorded. Our thoughts are not born from the brain: they are transferred from outside. These are elements, or ready-made psychological waves, transmitted to us by the world (here we are talking about sensations) or other spiritual consciousnesses (more complex psychological waves).

Now let us ask: what kind of force is that which has left its furrows on the phonogram of the soul?

The capacitor stores electricity; there may also be electricity in a magnet with a slightly changed characteristic, and so on. And here, obviously, some new force is at work. It doesn't matter what we call it, but, apparently, here even a naturalist cannot find a better name than the previous one - spirit. In essence, it is difficult to name otherwise than the word "spirit" and the force that organized the protoplasm.

“All revealed life is a clear expression of the spirit: it is its fruit and result. This is precisely the spirit, that is, the ability to know the ultimate goal, or the will, aimed at realizing it by more suitable and chosen means. It is the spirit, as yet unconscious, which is everywhere in nature, which has brought about the organization of protoplasm; matter common to all living beings; the real environment where life manifests itself; the physical basis of life. It is precisely to the spirit that protoplasm owes that wondrous organization that enabled it to accumulate world life, universal and invisible life, life scattered in nature, and, consequently, also to be an accumulator of the spirit itself. This, again, is none other than the spirit, i.e., the will, directed towards the realization of the ultimate goal, controls that amazing mechanism by which the cell, dividing, breaking up into parts, forms a set of initially identical cells, and then differentiated and grouped according to their desire to form organs. Again, the spirit reached the construction of this eternally surprising building, which received the name of a plant, tree, animal or plant organism ”(Sabatier).

Indeed, what is matter itself? "It's something very spiritual," says one scientist. Based on a purely natural-scientific point of view, we can say that in essence it does not exist. Take any complex object, such as a pound weight. What properties are real in it? Weight? But weight is the expression of the law of gravitation, the expression of a certain relation between the planets. A pud on another planet would weigh less. In the center of the earth, he will lose his weight completely. Color? But it exists for our eyes, and nothing more. If our eyes were more perfect, we would see moving waves of light ether, so that the weight would melt before our eyes, turn into a system of "movements".

“Matter is the form taken by the spirit for the realization of the ultimate goal. Matter is spirit made tangible for the manifestation of the accumulation and organization of psychological force, for the progressive development of the soul and moral personality. Destroy matter, and the spirit will remain in a latent, imperceptible form, in a state of diffusion. With the help of matter, it is manifested, accumulated, organized. Therefore, matter is the form taken by the spirit for its own accumulation and organization. And so the spirit, thought, living in the world, created the brain as its own organ. It is an axiom that a function creates an organ, not an organ a function.

But now the question is again. Let the consciousness ("soul") only be recorded in the brain, as in a phonogram. Does it follow that she will live forever?

Is it possible to say that the brain is destroyed, the phonogram falls apart, and the melody disappears? Does the soul die with the brain, even if it is considered to be closely related to the brain in its nature and essence? The answer to this question will become clearer when it becomes clear what life is and what an organism is, what it means to die.

“The life on earth of any organism, as experimental science determines, is a certain kind of correlation of it with the environment, or, in other words, the adaptation of the organism to the world around it. The external world influences the organism either positively or negatively; if the latter perceives the first kind of influence and counteracts the second, he will live.

“Life,” wrote Spencer, “is a continuous adjustment of internal relations to external ones. Thus, organisms strive to establish a state of balance with the external environment. The ultimate goal of all life's actions, if we consider them not separately, but in totality, is to balance known external processes through known internal ones.

The better the organism is adapted to its environment, that is, the more successfully it can respond to all influences on it from external forces, the longer and calmer its life will be. If it were possible to establish such a ratio in which the life of the organism would be constantly in a state of equilibrium, the organism would be immortal. Even Spencer recognizes this position. “A complete and perfect ratio,” he says, “will be a perfect life. If there were such changes in the environment, to which the organism has already adapted to meet, and these changes would always affect it in the same way, then there would be eternal life and eternal understanding.

So, life is a relationship with a known environment. Where the ratio is balanced, there is life; where there is no balance, death occurs. In relation to the organism itself, it means that its balance is disturbed and can no longer withstand the destruction of a certain connection between its constituent elements. In relation to nature, the death of an individual organism means only a new redistribution of the relationships between known forces and matter, since science recognizes the indestructibility of everything that exists. Actually, there is no death as a complete annihilation of being and cannot be: matter is not destroyed, and energy does not die.

“Death cannot be spoken of in the generally accepted sense, as the unconditional absence of life. Immortality alone exists in general and serves as an inalienable property of what is in nature. Death must not be confused with destruction. What is created, that is, matter and force, and what can be imagined separately from one another only purely speculatively - all this, from the point of view of science, is indestructible. But, if the elements are indestructible, the same cannot be said about the relations of connection between them, on which their groupings, connections, form depend. These combinations, these methods of grouping, these forms can and do change in reality, which explains the manifestations of the exchange of elements, their placement, combination and decomposition, which constitute so many changes and transformations in the animal world. The destruction of this connection between the elements of matter or energy is death.

But now let's try to move on to thought and consciousness. Here again there are elements of consciousness and their well-known correlation with the environment. The environment in the closest sense is the matter of the brain. It is natural to consider the elements of consciousness as indestructible, like any other elements. If the material elements are indestructible, then, obviously, the spiritual elements of a person, his soul, are not subject to destruction; and it, like forces and matter, has the full opportunity to enter into other connections and connections, to establish relationships with another environment, different from the one in which it was hitherto.

From this we can draw a further conclusion: it is natural to think that the elements of consciousness will tend to come into closer relation with their kindred elements, or will gravitate toward drawing closer to spiritual consciousnesses. This striving will be the striving of the soul for isolation from the elements of the body into a separate immortal existence.

“Immortality” is nothing else than the striving of the soul to get out of the conditions that it outgrows as it develops, and enter into contact with environments closer to it – spiritual. And here there is nothing unnatural and strange, and impossible, because in nature one can observe either only material relationships (for example, in chemistry), or both material and spiritual ones together (in human body). Why, one may ask, cannot there be a correlation between the spiritual and the spiritual?

True, for us, who live under certain material conditions, this new relationship seems, if not impossible, then at least extremely incomprehensible. However, the incomprehensibility for us of some object or phenomenon is too insufficient a motive for its denial. Obviously, going beyond the intelligible does not mean going beyond the limits of the possible. “To go beyond what we call nature does not mean to go beyond any environment. Nature, the natural environment, is only a part of everything that surrounds us. There is still a vast area, real and natural, although many people claim that they have nothing to do with it. The mental and moral world is unknown to the plant, but it is real. Nor can it be said that it is unnatural for the plant, although it can be said that, from the point of view of the plant world, it is supernatural.

Everything is natural or supernatural depending on the situation. Man is supernatural for the mineral. supernatural to humans. When mineral substances are assimilated by the plant and elevated by it to the organic world, no violation of the laws of nature occurs. They simply enter into a relationship with a larger environment, which until then was supernatural for them, but now has become quite natural. When the life-giving Spirit of God embraces the heart of a person, there is again no violation of the laws of nature. It is only, as it were, a new transition, like the transition of the inorganic into the organic.

We repeat, it is much more natural for the human spirit to be in relationship with the spiritual environment than with the material one. Oil does not mix with water, because their natures are too different, but on the other hand, as soon as two electric batteries are connected by a wire, an electric current immediately begins to flow. A person of good habits will feel disgusting in the company of people of opposite ethical principles, and vice versa: a bad person will feel uncomfortable in a circle of people alien to him. What is most characteristic of an object is most natural to it.

“Ratio in all cases is a gift of the environment. The natural environment gives people their natural abilities, the spiritual environment gives them their spiritual abilities. It is quite natural for the spiritual environment to replenish spiritual abilities and it would be quite unnatural for the natural environment. The latter is contrary to both the natural law of biogenesis and the moral law, because the finite cannot contain the infinite, and, finally, the spiritual law, by virtue of which flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God()».

But even this is not enough. There are known facts when an organism entered into a relationship with a new environment, not only not characteristic of its nature, but even completely alien. If new relationships with an environment unusual for a material body are possible, then it seems decidedly incomprehensible why new relationships with a kindred environment are impossible for spiritual matter, for the human soul.

“Evolutionists tell us that under the influence of the environment, some aquatic animals have adapted to life on earth. As a result, while breathing normally with gills, they, as a reward for their constant efforts, breathe heavenly air; efforts made from generation to generation gradually acquire the property of breathing with the lungs. In a young organism, according to the old type, the gills still remain, as, for example, in tadpoles, but, as adulthood approaches, real lungs appear. The gills gradually transfer their task to a more developed organ, and they themselves atrophy and disappear, so that breathing in adults is performed exclusively with the help of the lungs. We do not claim that these observations are completely conclusive, but can people who recognize their reliability deny their analogy with spiritual life and not recognize the scientific nature of the teachings of religion?

about the transformation of the human soul?

Can an evolutionist, who admits the rebirth of a frog under the influence of constant communication with a new environment, deny the possibility of the soul acquiring the ability to pray, this wondrous breath of a new creature, with its constant contact with the atmosphere surrounding God? Is this transition from the earthly to the heavenly more mysterious than the transition from life in water to life on earth? Should evolution stop at organic forms? .

But let us leave aside these abstract theories and return to the question of whether death for the soul does not consist precisely in the fact that it parted with its "here environment" - the brain, its matter, and whether it can find for itself a different form of being - create for itself another battery?

Our soul, its life, becomes independent of two factors: connection with the world of sensations, with the material provided by the sense organs, and with the matter of the brain. Let us ask ourselves first of all: how closely is the life of the soul connected with the external world, with the sense organs and sensations? This relationship is far from absolute.

Proof of this, for example, life in a dream. Imagine a hermetically sealed room where light does not penetrate and sounds do not reach, and you will see pictures of a light, visual nature in a dream. What does it mean? That the brain can live independently of the influx of new experiences. He already has his own life, stored up, consisting of what he has already acquired. If it were possible to completely stop the access of sensations to it, maintaining the nutrition of the brain to a certain extent, then a person would live in a dream, and this life, in essence, would be hardly less real than our everyday life.

Consequently, the spiritual life of a person, his thought, creativity, etc., could continue even if his brain were "liberated" from the external world and its sensations. Is it now possible to free thought from the brain? Yes, it's possible. Now we can imagine that the human soul, together with a temporary battery - the brain - has or creates another, more complex battery that lives after the first one has died. The phonogram became dilapidated, but while it was getting old, the thought created another phonogram for itself - more complicated and thinner.

Take a capacitor or a magnet. How many factors, or rather "facts of observation" are here! It would be a mistake to say that we have two "facts" here: the metal of the capacitor, electricity or iron, and magnetism. No. According to a well-known theory, electricity creates for itself something third in a capacitor or magnet - an electric field.

This kind of "third" is also in man. Consciousness, accumulating in the brain, creates or has its own environment here - a phonogram in a phonogram. This environment is the soul. She is eternal.

So, let's group the arguments. We must not forget that the soul is a “group”, and not the sum of thoughts, feelings, etc. We know that the chainworm (tapeworm) consists of a series of, in essence, completely independent links: if you separate one,

other parts will neither feel nor recognize. But in a more complex organism, all parts are inextricably linked. The organism is something tightly linked in its elements, and the life of one cell resonates in all, the disease of one in one degree or another is the disease of the whole organism.

The soul is the body. Everything is connected here. Take away part of the brain - "I" is aware of itself as "I". The soul will not lose the sum of its spiritual content and will quickly replenish the lost parts of the brain for the whole ideas preserved. Damage to part of the brain a certain amount cells - does not change consciousness, does not even change its composition, does not take away anything from the sum of its spiritual wealth, so that, obviously, the content of each brain cell, so to speak, is connected and repeated in other cells and lives in them. But if so, then, freed from the brain, the psychic elements must live together - in a group.

How does this happen? We will answer. The dynamic group, the complex of thoughts, feelings, etc., is strong as long as it is connected with the brain, but only for now. In the brain, it obviously has its own form, its shell is not of such a tactile nature as the matter of the brain. If the life of thought were identical with the life of the brain, then language would be the only form of communication of thought. The brain cannot "protrude" from itself, and thought, if it is in the brain, must first give a signal to the organ of speech or gesture, so that the word or symbol will convey the thought to another.

But we have facts of the activity of thought at a distance, facts of the action of will on will through space. Ponder this fact, and you will come to the conclusion that the spirit, having another environment than the brain, according to the properties of this subtle dynamic, and not the material environment, can act outside, like waves, a form of movement, a force.

Combining both thoughts, we come to the following conclusion. Since the brain is only an external phonogram of our “spiritual” melody, and for this melody there is already another form of incarnation, the death of the brain is not the death of the soul; and since the elements of the spirit are connected into groups of the soul, then, being expressed apart from the brain, they will exist not as elements, but as a group, as a "soul" - a personal consciousness.

I will illustrate this with an example, while giving it the meaning of a poetic image, and not a scientific argument. There are stories about electric balls, for example: "A blue ball - a spark of a large thundercloud slid along the mast, fell down, radiating a blue glow, and suddenly burst into a group of sparks." How to determine the nature of this phenomenon?

The ball is, obviously, a capacitor of electricity, but a capacitor is not of the same matter in which we are accustomed to think of a capacitor. This is a capacitor of a structure unknown to us, thinner than a ball, an electric machine, or even a ball of a thundercloud. I would like to say that there is no actual matter here, but the power of electricity is embodied in its pure form.

Now let's move on to the soul. We see that each cell of consciousness is released together with all the others in the group and in the atmosphere of that ethereal environment that stands between the brain and consciousness. And this means that the soul is released in the group in the form of a "blue ball of the ethereal medium." Our last words are, of course, in the nature of a poetic metaphor.

Translating the above into the language of this article, we come to a modest conclusion: thought has, in addition to the brain, a second accumulator - the soul. This new accumulator must also consist of what we call the matter of the human soul, not absolutely spiritual, but freer, lighter, more coordinated, more harmonious than ordinary matter.

Where does it start from? Since this accumulator must be the result of mental action, it can be organized exactly where the psychic accumulator center is located, i.e., in the place where the personality is located, in a word, in the nerve centers. This is where at least the germ of a new organism should be formed.

Such a view does not in the least contradict observation. Because if the eye of the observer cannot detect the presence inside the brain of this new organism, thin, light, tender, then, in any case, the facts give us the right to guess, if we are not sure that tangible weighty matter is permeated with impalpable and weightless matter. . And in the condenser, we cannot establish a medium common between the metal and the “power”.

“I would compare an immortal personality, whose highest manifestations are suppressed and muffled by a spoiled and decaying organism, with an insect chrysalis, under the motionless and inflexible shell of which a new muscular apparatus is already formed, doomed for some time to immobility; organs of new senses, the activity of which is as yet imperceptible and gross; a new food apparatus that has not yet begun to function; new system respiratory organs, which can turn around and act only imperfectly.

The old and primary organism has almost completely changed and collapsed, and another has taken its place, but the manifestations of this latter are suppressed and doomed to silence. Meanwhile, the organic life of the perfect insect is here in all its strength and is just waiting for the moment to manifest itself. And it will really manifest itself as soon as the remnants of the former organism are destroyed and the restrictive, obstructive shell is torn and discarded.

In the same way, an immortal personality could, on the day of the death of the body, throw off its decrepit, worn-out shell in order to enter with its new and more perfect organism into the free and bright radiance of ethereal life. This analogy does not strike me as a stretch; and in it you can find some elements of the answer to the question we have raised, the solution of which is extremely difficult, since on the path leading to it we are positively deprived of light and are forced to use only modest contemplation ”(Sabatier).

So far we have argued that it is permissible to free thought from the brain. Let us now add: this liberation must be regarded as a fact. Not only everyday life, but even science has recognized the facts of the interaction of two or more personalities, regardless of the conditions of space and even time.

Who does not know cases when close person in spirit, so to speak, he learns that a misfortune has happened to a dear, close person, sometimes thousands of miles away from him, and he learns at the very moment when it happened. Not so long ago, the famous astronomer K. Flammarion began to collect information about all such phenomena. The facts recorded by him, translated into Russian, were later published in the Bulletin of Foreign Literature.

If we attach serious importance to these facts, then they undoubtedly prove our theses, but we will refrain from referring to them.

Take even the well-known fact that for many people before, when the blood has deteriorated, digestion is disturbed, when the nervous system is forced to work under the worst conditions, after numbness and even mental disorder, awakening occurs, the thought clears up and comes to life, and clear speeches expressing surprisingly highly moral thoughts. Or the fact that a person before death suddenly, at one moment, experiences the whole past. Rate it.

“This rapid transition to light from darkness, to order from disorder, to activity from its complete decline, while organic and living conditions of the brain must have become worse rather than improved, because the fading is spreading further and death is approaching, this transition can only be explained with great difficulty. It can be assumed that at this moment the spiritual organism begins to separate from its ties with the earthly organism and retains with it only a part of the relations necessary for its manifestation.

This is where we end our essay. We have tried all the time to keep within the realm of facts and data given by experimental science. We have never cited one or another provision of quotations from Holy Scripture and we think that this will not lose the case, but, on the contrary, will win, since the thought of any prejudice is eliminated.

It seems that even from those brief and fragmentary thoughts set forth in the cited lecture, one can come to the conclusion that natural science not only does not deny the possibility of immortality, but rather assumes it. In any case, the thirst for life and the aversion to death observed in all living beings are not something random, rented, but, on the contrary, are full of deep meaning. The vital principle, or spirit, is infinite already because the world is infinite, the universe is infinite.

From the earth, from this small planet, lost in the infinite universe, a person sees the sun, which, with its life-giving and beneficial rays, develops and strengthens life on earth both in animal and in vegetable. Man invents telescopes and with their help discovers new endless worlds of the universe, numerous planetary systems like our solar system. The universe of worlds is boundless and boundless. And these worlds are the embodiment of life. endless.

Above we said that the spirit is infinite already because the universe is infinite. Now let's say: the universe itself is infinite because the life spirit, the bearer of which it is, is infinite.

The universe is infinite, but not by itself: matter cannot be an independent being. For matter exists only insofar as certain forces are manifested in it. Even inorganic matter, and that has certain forces, or rather, obeys them. So, a stone - an object of inorganic matter - being placed in favorable conditions, itself begins to move, for example, under the action of the law of gravity. And therefore, even behind inanimate, inert matter, living forces are hidden. The material world is the product of living forces that work harmoniously in the universe. And the soulless word "law of nature" presupposes precisely these forces of the universe.

The "laws of nature", the "forces of the universe", on which the life of the world rests, can no longer, in essence, stand in causal dependence in relation to matter. They must depend on another principle, infinite not in its multiplicity, but precisely in unity, on the creative, eternal principle. The Eternal Spirit is the beginning of the world and its infinity. Times will pass. Some worlds will give way to others. Extinguish life on our planet. And only the Spirit will live forever.

And so we affirm that the law of conservation of energy is, in essence, a lie, if we do not recognize the immortality of the soul.

Morozov spent 20 years in the Shlisselburg fortress. This is twenty years of vigorous work of thought. And now, let's say he died, and his thought was not written down or transmitted. Where did the amount of energy that went to the work of his brain from thought go? After all, purely physically, a huge mass of energy was spent on his thought. He died, and burdock grew out of his brain, like from the brain of Bazarov? Matter did not disappear and was transformed. What about thought, energy? It has disappeared, but does this mean that the energy disappears into nowhere?

No, we believe that souls are eternal, and consciousness, that dynamic group that is called the soul, freed from the brain, grows and lives. This is a requirement of evolution.

The earth needed many thousands of years to lay down solid foundations from vapors and incandescence, so that plant and animal life could develop on them, so that, little by little, from the weakest, barely visible rudiments of vital individuality in some zoospore, personality developed, individuality in other higher organisms, so that on the sixth day man finally appears - the crown of creation, the highest, so far, his word is the most complete individuality. With the advent of man, the highest individual, mind and thought arose on earth in their real meaning and with all the extraordinarily great, bad and good consequences. In man, the development of the individual has reached its climax or, more correctly, the highest point (for the climax presupposes a reverse movement after that - downward development, for which in this case we have not the slightest scientific basis) the development of the individual, characteristic feature which are all its incorporeal features, that is, what is called the soul.

The beginnings, prototypes of these abilities, as is known, are also found in lower animals: in ciliates, monads, zoospores, amoebas, they reach significant development in higher animals, but the last, highest word of this development is the individual, certainly individual, human soul. We have nothing to do with the soul of animals, which sometimes even expresses itself with astonishing intensity, for we must speak only about the highest, about what is already there, which, therefore, is subject to further development. And this further development from a lower form by a jump to a higher one, bypassing the middle one, we cannot in any way allow, without contradicting the general course of the development of being in its entire thousand-year sequence. Nothing higher than the human soul has been produced to this day, and in its essence such a soul, as has been said, must certainly be individual.

Now tell me for yourself: is it possible that the creation, constantly developing, with labor and extraordinary efforts, working out on the basis of immutable laws the highest form - the soul of man - immediately breaks off this "individual", the destruction of that, the creation of which took so much effort and time? After all, always and everywhere, nature has preserved, saved the highest of the developed forms of being in order to go further from it, and here, on the highest form, suddenly, for no reason, it deviates from this law that has been observed for thousands of years and mortifies it!

One of two things: either all earthly existence is nothing but madness, irony, soap bubble(but then why the eternal, undoubted, inexorable, mathematically precise laws of the universe? Why all this environment of strict logic? To swindle someone, for some important, triumphal legal procession into the stupidest nothingness?), or vice versa, if the laws - no joke, if life is really logical and development in a certain direction is its essence, then recognize the death of the individual soul of a person, i.e. the highest individual, the uttermost impossibility, the complete denial of the rest of life, all the undoubted laws of being, some incredible, causeless leap in a direction completely opposite to the whole movement of being! But, having recognized the impossibility of the death of the soul - which will be absolutely correct - leave it, by virtue of the preservation of once developed, improved forms, further development, t. e. afterlife...

1. The time has come to tell mankind about the ways of its progress. This is a very, important event for humanity, although it does not always correctly assess what is important for itself. But We, the Brothers of Humanity, never tire of repeating what, in Our opinion, can be beneficial for people. Many generations of people have tried to unravel the mystery of the meaning of life. Man is arranged in such a way that he must, as it were, give birth anew to what has already been comprehended by other people. It depends on the fact that each person is at his own level of consciousness. The time has come to reveal many secrets of Being, which were available only to the Initiates, only to a narrow circle of people. This is not a one-time process. One century is very short for Infinity, although it includes several generations of people. Old and transitional forms are swept aside, obsolete. The process is fast - surgical. Through destruction, catastrophes, breakdowns in consciousness, through torment comes the upliftment of the spirit. As if through a crucible, the spirit passes to enter the next step. Fire purifies, fire liberates, fire educates. We need free, strong spirits capable of creativity and selflessness. Only by changing everything, discarding the unnecessary, the Truth crystallizes. Truth is in motion, in development.
Development is in change. Stagnation is alien to the Cosmos. A spirit that has passed through incarnations, through centuries, strengthened itself by the fire of suffering - that's what is needed. That is the meaning, the purpose of evolution.
Agni Yoga. Modern stage. Chernivtsi, 1994 From October 24, 1992
Recording from the High Source - Olga Morgunova

Edges of Agni Yoga, 1972 517. (Sept. 2). Novosibirsk, "Algim", 1998 All the true religions of the world and the Secret Teaching, hidden both in them and in various other forms given in different centuries and to different peoples, contained an indication of the future and attached special importance to it. Life itself exists for the sake of the future, into whose orbit the whole Universe is directed. If the future is taken away from people, then the meaning of their existence disappears. The future can be realized both distant and near, that is, consciousness can penetrate both the near and the very distant future. The further it is from the present, the more possibilities of evolution it contains. But in order to confidently move into this future and bring its possibilities closer, one must know them and imagine clearly the distant goal and everything that is destined for humanity in it. They ask how you can know. Answer: The Far Worlds, on which the evolution of their humanity has outpaced the earthly by many steps, will be a living example of what one must strive for and what forms life can take. Communication with the Far Worlds is possible. The Brothers of Humanity visited them more than once. The Hierarchy of Light has its Representatives on the Distant Stars, and interstellar communication is an established fact. The Great [...] Moved to another, higher planet in order to establish a closer and closer connection with the Earth and continue His Service to the people of your planet. There are many secrets in the Cosmos, many secrets in the life of an Arhat.

AND LOOK WITH THE EYES OF THE HEART

The Spirit is immortal, the Earth is the School,
its mission - to carry,
and Service - in the dense world,
in the Subtle World... Look!

And look with the eyes of the heart
where the wisdom of the spirit lives...
And in thoughts, in feelings -
change our lives in the right way ...
Vladislav Stadolnik 1.5.2011

The attainment of the spirit is so great when the fires are transmuted. The law of transmutation entails every striving. As an eternal teacher, the spirit intensifies all possibilities. Fiery transmutation not only affirms the subordination of the lower to the higher, but extracts the highest striving from the essence of the spirit. Therefore, when the spirit decides, verily, to renounce accretions, then it opens the way of transmutation. Therefore, students must remember that transmutation is appointed only when the spirit has conquered the self. The ego of selfhood is the originator of all gray accumulations, therefore, when the manifestation of selfishness so eclipses the spirit, it can be argued that the fire of transmutation cannot touch it. So let everyone remember.
When the Mother of Agni Yoga embraced the whole world with her heart and enclosed the whole evolution in the "Cup", then all the most intense fires were affirmed as cosmic action. Therefore, Our Mother of Agni Yoga brings the Cosmic Right to the Earth. Yes Yes Yes! I see how hearts burn with love for the revealed sacrament. Yes Yes Yes! Thus, the joy of Existence lives in the heart. Thus, let us strive towards the revealed Light.
The Teaching of Living Ethics: Infinity, part 2, 521

You walk along the commanded path,
Who stepped on it, left its mark,
To help future Light Seekers.
Even though it seems to be untrodden,
Do not be afraid to go to Dali Far,
The road has already been paved for you.
Protect the Light Army on the way,
The direction will be indicated by the Dawn Ray,
You will find by that path what you seek.
Regret will never show
What left friends, home,
That path will be the Kingdom of God.
All your friends follow you
And your relatives will go on their way,
In your footsteps, they will enter the Kingdom of Light.
The Light Army will increase.
Tatiana Svetlaya Poetry.ru
Mother Rosseushka 01/30/2010

Are the spirit and soul of man immortal? Life after death

We begin our analysis of the biblical doctrine of death by looking at the process of man's creation:

“And the Lord God created man from dust of the earth and blown in the face his breath of life and became a man a living soul» (Gen. 2:7, see also Zach. 12:1).

In my opinion, this is a key point, and if you understand it, then everything else will become clear. Presenting this text schematically, we get the following equation:

Dust terrestrial(body, chemical elements of the Earth) + breath God (spirit, gift of life) = living soul(living person).

To maintain immortality in people, the Lord planted in Eden "tree of Life" (Gen. 2:9). At the same time, God made a covenant with Adam and Eve (cf. Os. 6:7), according to which people were not supposed to eat the fruit of another important tree in the garden "knowledge of good and evil" (Gen. 2:9.17) under fear of losing eternal life:

“And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, You shall eat from every tree in the garden, but you shall not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day that you eat from it, you will die» (Gen. 2:16.17).

But our ancestors were deceived by the promises of Satan to become like the gods, and know good and evil(cm. Gen. 3:5), believed his deceit: "Not, not die" (Gen. 3:4) and violated the covenant with the Creator. After the fall, God, as He had warned, made man mortal , denying him access to tree of life :

“And he drove out Adam, and set up in the east by the garden of Eden the Cherubim and the flaming sword turning to guard the way to tree of life» (Gen. 3:24).

That is, a person has lost eternal life. Look closely, in Gen. 3:19 The Bible shows the reverse process of creation. After the fall, people began to die, turning back into the grave to dust from which they were formed. And their breath of life received from God (cf. Gen. 2:7), after death began to return to the Creator:

"Return dust in the ground what he was; and the spirit returned to God who gave it" (Eccl. 12:7, see also Acts. 7:59 , Onion. 23:46 , Ps. 103:29.30).

Thus, after death, the “spark” of life given to man by God returns back to the Creator. So now our equation will look like:

Soul alive(living person) - breath God (spirit, gift life) = dust of the earth(body decaying to dust).

As can be seen from the text of Eccl. 12:7, the soul of a person after death does not burn in hell, does not bliss in paradise, but his body is in the earth, and his spirit ( breath of life) is with God. This means that the Lord simply keeps the mind and memory of a person, which, together with the spirit of life after the resurrection they will return to the body restored from the ashes (we will consider this in detail in the following chapters):

“Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I I will open your graves and bring you out, My people, from your tombs... and I will put my spirit in you, and you will live… and you will know that I, the Lord, have said it and done it, says the Lord.” (Ezek. 37:12,14).

Therefore, in the entire Bible there is no description of the posthumous wakefulness of souls either in hell or in paradise, which we will analyze later. phrase immortal soul absent from all of Scripture. And this despite the fact that the words soul and spirit are used in the Bible more than 1300 (!) times (in the Russian Synodal translation). At the same time, the concept of "dead soul" is present in the Old Testament Scriptures. Look at the text forbidding a priest to touch dead bodies:

"Priest ... to no deceased he shouldn't start." (A lion. 21:10,11, see also Number 6:6).

Here instead of the word dead the original phrase is dead soul - Greek. ψυχη τετελευτηκυια, Heb. נפֶש מות which means a dead person. From these biblical texts we see that the dead soul is dead man is the opposite living soul(see above Gen. 2:7)T. e. to a living person. The mortality of the soul, that is, of the whole person, is expressed in the Bible by another well-known phrase:

« Soul sinner, she will die» (Ezek. 18:20, see also Number 23:10 , Jesus Nav. 2:14 , Jacob. 5:20 , Deut. 27:25 , 2 Kings 14:7).

It is worth noting that the two words spirit and soul, despite their close semantic meaning, are still different, therefore, in some texts of the Bible they are listed.

Look, the last of the texts cited mentions spirit, body and soul, that is, all three elements of the equation that we gave above. Unfortunately, today the concepts soul and spirit have practically merged and are mostly perceived by the incorporeal reasonable substance of a person. However, in the Bible these words have a different meaning. Word soul(נפֶש - Heb., ψυχη - Greek) in the Holy Scriptures basically means: A) a person, B) his life, C) a human person - character, mind. Such a variety of meanings of one word can be explained by the peculiarity of the Hebrew language. The Hebrew of the Bible has about 8,000 words. In total, the language of the Jews of that time consisted of approximately 20,000-30,000 words. For comparison: Oxford Dictionary in English contains 240,000 commonly used words and phrases, Dahl's dictionary consists of 200,000 words, and modern Hebrew, according to some experts, has 80,000 words.

A) “There were all of us on the ship two hundred and seventy-six shower» (Acts. 27:37 , Rome. 13:1, see also 1 Par. 5:21 , Ezek. 18:4,20 , Ezek. 27:13 , Number 15:31 , Number 23:10 , 1 Pet. 3:20).

B) “There is no greater love than if someone puts my soul for my friends" (In. 15:13, see also Onion. 6:9 , 1 In. 3:16 , Onion. 12:20 , Acts. 20:10 , Is. 53:12 , Ref. 4:19 , 1 King. 23:15 , 1 King. 24:12 , 3 Kings 19:10 , Rome. 11:3 , Matt. 2:20).

Jesus himself gave his soul for us, that is, his human life “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and give soul His for the redemption of many" (Matt. 20:28, see also Mar. 10:45).

V) “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls» (Matt. 11:29, see also Acts. 15:24 , 1 Pet. 1:22 , Ps. 138:14 , Ref. 23:9 , Job. 3:20 , 4 Kings 4:27).

Word spirit(- Heb., πνευμα - Greek) in relation to a person means mainly A) the breath of life from God, B) life, C) a human person, including under the influence of God's Spirit:

A) “Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I I will enter the spirit in you, and you shall live" (Is. 37:5, see also Eccl. 12:7 , Is. 42:5 , Acts. 7:59 , Onion. 8:55 , Onion. 23:46).

B) "Goes out spirit him, and he returns to his own land: in that day all his thoughts perish.” (Ps. 145:4, see also Court. 15:19 , Job. 27:3 , Ps. 30:6 , 1 Cor. 5:5 , In. 12:25 , Onion. 17:33 , Jacob. 1:21 , Matt. 26:41 , In. 6:63).

V) “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and spirit right update inside of me" (Ps. 50:12, see also Ps. 50:19 , Job. 15:13 , Is. 54:6 , Ezek. 13:3 , Ezek. 21:7 , Dan. 4:5 , Dan. 13:45 , Agg. 1:14 , Eccl. 2:26 , Mal. 2:15,16 , 1 Cor. 14:14,15 , 1 Cor. 6:16.17 , Number 16:22 , Number 27:16 , Heb. 12:9).

The concept in the Bible sincerity is used mainly in the description of the human essence of people, and spirituality- predominantly Divine (under the influence of God Spirit):

“The spiritual body is sown, the spiritual body is raised. There is a spiritual body, there is a spiritual body. Thus it is written: the first man Adam became a living soul; and the last Adam is a life-giving spirit. But not spiritual before, but mental, then spiritual» (1 Cor. 15:44-46).

"We proclaim not from human wisdom learned words, but learned from the Holy Spirit, thinking spiritual with spiritual. The soulful person does not accept that from Spirit God's, because he considers it foolishness; and cannot understand, because this must be judged spiritually» (1 Cor. 2:13,14).

"V Lately scoffers will appear, doing their own ungodly lusts. These are people… soulless, spiritless» (Jude. 18.19, see also Jacob. 3:15).

The most important mission of Jesus is to teach people and help them in this life to maintain purity among the “corrupted” world of today, so that our character will be prepared for the future eternal existence and at the Great Judgment our spirit and soul were saved for immortal life in the new body:

"To spirit was saved in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Cor. 5:5).

"Loving soul (a life with all sorts of delights body. - Approx. auth.) my ruin her (for eternal life. - Approx. Aut.) ; but the one who hates my soul in this world(giving priority spiritual before the carnal. - Approx. auth.) keep her forever» (In. 12:25)

"And the very God of peace sanctify you in all your fullness, and your spirit and soul and body be preserved in all its integrity without blemish at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ"(per sins person. At first, sacrificial animals died for the sins of people. But they were only types of the true substitutionary sacrifice, the Son of God. Jesus, being both God and man, died for the repentant sins people. The Bible says that Christ conquered hell and death: “Death is swallowed up in victory. Death! where is your pity? hell! where is your victory? (1 Cor. 15:54.55, see also 1 Cor. 15:26 , Os. 13:14). That is, Jesus gave people the opportunity to receive again immortality. On the day of the Great Judgment after the Second Coming of Christ, all people will be resurrected: some - for eternal life, others - in order to die again, but now second eternal death. Jesus described the event as follows:

"The dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and , having heard, come to life. Everything those in the tombs will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who did good will go out in the resurrection of life and those who did evil in resurrection of condemnation» (In. 5:25,28,29, see also open 1:7).

That is, people doing evil will come to life, but then they will be betrayed second death(more on this later):

“The fearful and the unfaithful, and the vile, and the murderers, and the fornicators, and the sorcerers, and the idolaters, and all the liars, will have their fate in the lake burning with fire and brimstone. This is the second death» (open 21:8).

But resurrected people doing good, will not be harmed by second death, since Jesus already died for their sins with this “second death” in order to grant them immortality after the resurrection:

"Above them second death has no power" (open 20:6).) proclaims the immortality of righteous people after the upcoming resurrection. Now let's figure out what hell This is what the Bible says about Jesus' victory over hell: "Hell! where is your victory? (

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