We must now extend the limits of our survey, for Old and New Testaments have

points of teaching that should be considered together. Happily there is no need to

demonstrate that the N.T. equivalent for ruach is the Greek word pneuma, and so we

shall, without further explanation, quote either word.  Let us look at some of the

statements of Scripture as to the spirit of man:--

Each passage quoted demands separate study, and all we can do at the moment is to

draw attention to certain obvious facts, viz., that "spirit" is spoken of as part of a "whole"

man; that spirit is "in him" and "formed within him"; that at death the spirit returns to

God Who gave it, and in resurrection the spirits of just men are made perfect. A

disembodied spirit is entirely outside the scriptural account of the condition of man.

The spirit of man is associated with mind, courage, anger, knowledge. We read that

Esau's wives were "a grief of mind" to Isaac and Rebecca. Could anyone be found who

would demand the translation, "grief of breath"? So with Prov. 29: 11; Ezek. 11: 5;

20: 32.

Paul makes use of the fact that man has a "spirit in him" which is connected with

conscience and inner knowledge: "For what man knoweth the things of man, save the

spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit

of God" (I Cor. 2: 11).

We purposely refrain from including such passages as Rom. 8: 16, "The Spirit

. . . . . beareth witness with our spirit", for these refer not to man by nature but under

grace and in possession of a new nature called "spirit", which is quite another subject.

All that we hope to have accomplished is to have drawn attention to the fact that the

belief that man does not put on immortality until resurrection, and the repudiation of the

doctrine of the immortality of the soul, do not necessitate the denial that man has "a spirit

in him", and that both by creation and by destiny he is far removed from the brute

creation, and indeed is "for a little lower than the angels".