Hebrew Definitions

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By William Robert West

1. Nehphesh/soul-life: It is used to describe all living beings.

Animal, birds, reptiles and insects have this same nehphesh [soul-life] that a person has. Sea creatures and birds [Genesis 1:20] and every living creature that moves in water or on land [Genesis 1:21]. Every beast, bird and insect with soul-life [nehphesh].

"Man became a living being" Genesis 2:7. See Genesis 2:19; 9:4; 9:10; 9:12; 9:15-16. Note: The word "soul" as it is used in today's English [an immortal no substance part of a person that can never die] is not the meaning of nehphesh.

2. Nshahmah: Is also used to describe all living being/breath of life: All living things that breathes [Used 24 times].

Man "Breathed into his nostrils the BREATH of life" Genesis 2:7; 1 Kings 17:17; Job 27:3.

Man and animals have the same nshahmah [breath of life-spirit].

"All in whose nostrils was the BREATH [nshahmah] of the spirit of life, of all that was on the dry land, died" Genesis 7:22. All living being, man and animals

"But of the cities of these peoples, that Jehovah your God gives you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that BREATHS [nshahmah]" Deuteronomy 20:16. All living being, man and animals

"So Joshua smote all the land, the hill-country, and the South, and the lowland, and the slopes, and all their kings: he left none remaining, but he utterly destroyed all that BREATHED [nshahmah]" Joshua 10:40. All living being, man and animals

"And they smote all the souls that were therein with the edge of the sword, utterly destroying them; there were none left that BREATHED [nshahmah]" Joshua 11:11. All living being, man and animals

Also, Joshua 11:14; 1 Kings 15:29; Job 34:14; Psalms 150:6

1. Genesis 2:7 "Breathed into his nostrils the BREATH [nshahmah] of life"
2. Genesis 7:22 "All in whose nostrils was the BREATH [nshahmah] of life" All living being, man and animals
3. Deuteronomy 20:16 "Saved alive nothing that BREATHED [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals
4. Joshua 10:40 "Utterly destroyed all that BREATHED [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals
5. Joshua 11:11 "There was not any left to BREATHE [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals

6. Joshua 11:14 "Neither left they any to BREATHE [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals
7. 2 Samuel 22:16 "At the BLAST [nshahmah] of the breath of his nostrils"
8. 1 Kings 15:29 "Left not to Jeroboam any that BREATHED [nshahmah]"
9. 1 Kings 17:17 "There was no BREATH [nshahmah] left in him"
10. Job 4:9 "By the BLAST [nshahmah] of God they perish"
11. Job 26:4 "And whose SPIRIT [nshahmah] came from thee?"
12. Job 27:3 "While my BREATH [nshahmah] is in me"
13. Job 32:8 "The INSPIRATION [nshahmah] of the Almighty"
14. Job 33:4 "And the BREATH [nshahmah] of the Almighty" In Job 32:8 and 33:4 why did they translate one "inspiration" and the other "breath"?
15. Job 34:14 "He gather unto himself his spirit and his BREATH [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals
16. Job 37:10 "By the BREATH [nshahmah] of God frost is given"
17. Psalms 18:15 "At the BLAST [nshahmah] of the breath of your nostrils"
18. Psalms 150:6 "Everything that has BREATH [nshahmah]" All living being, man and animals
19. Proverbs 20:27 "The SPIRIT [nshahmah] of man"
20. Isaiah 2:22 "Man, whose BREATH [nshahmah] is in his nostrils"
21. Isaiah 30:33 "The BREATH [nshahmah] of the Lord"
22. Isaiah 42:5 "He that gives BREATH [nshahmah]"
23. Isaiah 57:16 "And the SOULS [nshahmah] which he made"
24. Daniel 19:17 "Neither is there BREATH [nshahmah] left in me"

Not one of the 24 times nshahmah is used does it say anything about a part of a person that is immortal.

[3] Ruach/spirit-breath: Is also used to describe all living beings.

"I am bringing the flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the breath [ruach] of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish" [Genesis 6:17].

All flesh, birds, cattle, beasts, and every creeping thing - all have the same spirit [ruach] as man [Genesis 7:22].

Man and beasts [Ecclesiastes 3:19].

Man [Ecclesiastes 12:5-7; Psalms 104:29]. See Genesis 6:17; 7:15; 54:27; Job 4:9.

Ruach is translated nine ways in the King James Version. All nine words that ruach is translated into have meaning that are completely different and were completely different in 1611.

1. WIND "You did blow with your WIND [ruach]" [Genesis 8:1; Psalms 1:4, Exodus 15:10].
2. BREATH "By the BREATH [ruach] of his mouth" [Genesis 6:17; Psalms 104:29, Job 15:30].
3. SPIRIT "The SPIRIT [ruach] ofjealousy came" [Genesis 1:2; 41:8, Numbers 5:14; 5:30].
4. BLAST "BLASH [ruach] of your nostrils" [2 Kings 19:7, Exodus 15:8].
5. AIR "That no AIR [ruach] can come between them" [Job 41:16; 41:8].
6. MIND "A fool utters all his MIND [ruach]" [Genesis 26:35, Proverbs 29:11].
7. COURAGE "Neither did there remain any more COURAGE [ruach] in them" [Joshua 5:1].
8. COOL "Walking in the garden in the COOL [ruach] of the day" [Genesis 3:8].
9. ANGER "Their ANGER [ruach] was abated" [Judges 8:3].

1. Ruach is translated WIND [ruach - spirit] Translated wind about 84 times in the King James Version. Wind, breath, blast and air about one third of about 389 times ruach is used in the Old Testament.

"God made a WIND [ruach - spirit] to pass over" [Genesis 8:1]. "Like the chaff, which the WIND [ruach - spirit] drives" [Psalms 1:4]. "You did blow with your WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Exodus 15:10]. "Clouds and WIND [ruach - spirit] without rain" [Proverbs 25:14]. "My escape from the WINDY [ruach - spirit] storm" [Psalms 55:8]. "A WHIRLWIND [ruach - spirit] came out of the north" [Ezekiel 1:4]. "A destroying WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Jeremiah 51:1]. "A strong WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Job 8:2].

"An horrible TEMPEST [ruach - spirit]" [Psalms 11:6].

"You shall scatter in the WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Ezekiel 5:2]. "An east WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Exodus 10:13].

"A mighty strong west WIND [ruach - spirit]" [Exodus 10:19].

2. Ruach is translated BREATH [ruach - spirit]. "By the BREATH [ruach - spirit] of his mouth" [Job 15:30].

"All in whose nostrils was the BREATH [ruach - spirit] of life" [Genesis 7:22].

"To destroy all flesh in which is the BREATH [ruach - spirit] of life" [Genesis 6:17].

"So they went into the ark to Noah, by twos of all flesh in which was the BREATH [ruach - spirit] of life" [Genesis 7:15].

"No BREATH [ruach - spirit] in them" [Jeremiah 10:14]. Why not, "No SPIRIT [ruach - spirit] in them" or "Takes away their SPIRIT [ruach - spirit]" [Psalms 104:29]? How did the translators know when the same word was wind, breath, spirit, blast, air, mind, courage, cool, or anger? HOW ARE THOSE WHO READ THEIR TRANSLATION TO KNOW THAT THESE ARE ALL THE SAME WORD IN THE HEBREW?

"Every goldsmith...his molten images are deceitful, and there is no BREATH [ruach - spirit] in them" [Jeremiah 51:17].

"Takes away their BREATH [ruach - spirit]" [Psalms 104:29].

"As one dies so dies the other; indeed, they all have the same BREATH [ruach - spirit] and there is no advantage for man over beast" [Ecclesiastes 3:19].

(3) Ruach is translated SPIRIT [ruach].

• "And the SPIRIT [ruach] shall return unto God" [Ecclesiastes 12:7].
• "And the SPIRIT [ruach] of the beast that goes downward" [Ecclesiastes 3:21].
• "SPIRIT [ruach] of God" [Genesis 1:2].
• "The SPIRIT [ruach] of jealousy came" [Numbers 5:30].
• "Because he had another SPIRIT [ruach]" [Numbers 14:24].
• "The SPIRIT [ruach] entered into me" [Ezekiel 2:2; 3:24].
• No SPIRIT [ruach] in them [Joshua 5:1].
• "And a new SPIRIT [ruach] will I put within you" [Ezekiel 36:26].
• "God hardened his SPIRIT [ruach]" [Deuteronomy 2:30].
• "Anguish of SPIRIT [ruach]" [Exodus 6:9].
• "SPIRIT [ruach] of wisdom" [Exodus 28:3].
• "Joshua...was filled with the SPIRIT [ruach] of wisdom" [Deuteronomy 34:9].
• "Sorrowful SPIRIT [ruach]" [2 Samuel 1:15].
• "Why is your SPIRIT [ruach] so sad" [1 Kings 21:5].
• "SPIRIT [ruach] was troubled" [Genesis 41:8].
• "A lying SPIRIT [ruach]" [1 Kings 22:23].
• "The sacrifices of God are a broken SPIRIT [ruach]" [Psalms 51:7].
• "Hasty of SPIRIT [ruach]" [Proverbs 14.29].
• "An haughty SPIRIT [ruach]" [Proverbs 16:18].
• "An humble SPIRIT [ruach]" [Proverbs 16:19].

4. Ruach is translated BLAST [ruach - spirit] [2 Kings 19:7]. "BLAST [ruach - spirit] of your nostrils" [Exodus 15:8].
5. Ruach is translated AIR [ruach - spirit]. "That no AIR [ruach - spirit] can come between them" [Job 41:16; 41:8].
6. Ruach is translated MIND [ruach - spirit] [Genesis 26:35]. "A fool utters all his MIND [ruach - spirit]" [Proverbs 29:11].

7. Ruach is translated COURAGE [ruach - spirit]. "Neither did there remain any more COURAGE [ruach - spirit] in them" [Joshua 2:11].
8. Ruach is translated COOL [ruach]. "Walking in the garden in the COOL [ruach - spirit] of the day" [Genesis 3:8].
9. Ruach is translated ANGER [ruach - spirit]. "Their ANGER [ruach - spirit] was abated" [Judges 8:3].

Why did the translators translate the word "ruach" into "spirit" in one place and "blast" or "wind" in others? THE MEANING OF "SPIRIT" AS IT WAS USED IN 1611 AND TODAY (AN IMMORTALITY NO SUBSTANCE SOMETHING IN A PERSON) IS NOT A THIRTY-FIRST COUSIN TO "WIND" OR "BREATH," YET THE TRANSLATORS, AT WILL, TRANSLATED THE SAME WORD INTO TWO THINGS THAT ARE WORLDS APART. IF THE SAME WORD HAD TWO MEANINGS THAT WERE WORLDS APART, HOW COULD THE HEBREW PEOPLE KNOW WHEN IT WAS ONE AND WHEN IT WAS THE OTHER? HOW COULD THE TRANSLATORS KNOW? THEY COULD NOT. They had to put their theology into the Bible even if they could not be consistent. How can anyone reading the Kings James Version know anger, cool, courage, air, mind, breath, wind, blast and spirit are the same thing? Most English reader today would not know that "wind" and "spirit" are indiscriminately translated from the same word and almost without exception today's reader would understand "spirit" to be an immortal soul, but would never understand "wind" to be an immortal soul. Those who do not read Hebrew are misled by such indiscriminately translations.

Summary:

NEHPHESH, NSHAHMAH AND RUACH ARE SOMETHING THAT BOTH A PERSON AND AN ANIMAL HAVE IN COMMON AND ARE SOMETHING THAT CAN AND DOES DIE.

Both an animal and a man ARE a soul, a living being of this earth. Neither animals nor a person HAS a soul, an immortal inter part that cannot die and will live after the death of the animal or person it is in. Different characteristics of a person, not different parts of a person that can live without each other, but a person looked at from different points of view.

1. BODY: Flesh and blood
2. SOUL: A living being: the body + the breath of life
3. SPIRIT: The body of dust + the breath of life (spirit - ruach) = a living soul
4. MIND: If the intellectual part of a person is his mind, does the "soul" as it is used in today's theology have its own mind? Does the soul have any thoughts that our mind does not have? If not, according to today's theology, the only part of a person that will be in Heaven will have no thoughts.
5. HEART: The most commonly used characteristic of a person. [Genesis 6:5; Judges; 16:15, 17, 18, 20; Matthew 5:8; Luke 12:34; Romans 10:10; Hebrews 3:10]. The heart is used in the place of the mind for the thing that the mind does, not the part of the body that pumps blood. [Matthew 13:15; 15:19; Mark 7:19; Luke 6:45; 9:47; Acts 8:21; 8:37; 28:27; Romans 10:9; 10:10; 1 Corinthians 2:9; 7:37; Hebrews 3:10; 4:12; 1 John 3:20-21]. Has not the things said about the heart been transferred to the soul by those who believe the soul is immortal?

SOUL [PSUKEE] IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

Psukee is used 106 times and is the only word translated soul in the New Testament (translated soul only 58 of the 106 times it is used in the King James Version) and is the same word in Greek as nehphesh is in Hebrew. Both can and do die. "Lose his LIFE" Matthew 10:39. "Save a SOUL from death" James 5:20. "To save LIFE or to destroy it." In Old English, soul, like ghost and charity, might have been a good translation then, but not today. Most of the times nehphesh and psukee are translated "soul," even those who believe a person is two beings in one have to admit it is referring to the earthly person, or life, or being; but today the English word "soul" has come to mean an inter unseen part of a person, which will live after the person is dead. THEREFORE, WHEN THOSE WHO DO NOT KNOW THIS READ THE BIBLE, THEY ARE MISLED WHEN PSUKEE IS TRANSLATED "SOUL." No word in the Bible means "an immortal inter part of a person that cannot die."

1. "For those who sought the Child's life [soul - psukee]" Matthew 2:20.

2. "But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul [soul - psukee] and body" Matthew 10:28.
3. "And he who has lost his life [soul - psukee] for My sake shall find it" ("soul" in King James Version) Matthew 10:39, also Matthew 16:25, Mark 8:35
4. "And to give His life [soul - psukee] a ransom for many" Matthew 20:28.
5. "To save a life [soul - psukee], or destroy it" Luke 6:9.
6. "And I lay down my life [soul - psukee] for the sheep" John 10:15.
7. "Men who have risked their lives [soul - psukee] for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ" Acts 15:26.
8. "And they are seeking my life [soul - psukee]" Romans 11:3.
9. "Will save his soul [soul - psukee] from death" James 5:20.

Which one is it? A mortal being that can die, or an immortal being that cannot die? If there were a part of a person called "soul" that is immortal and cannot die, it is strange that both the Old Testament and the New Testament repeatedly speak of the death of this soul that cannot die.

Psukee is translated "soul" and "life" interchangeably, and sometimes in the same verse. See Matthew 16:25-26 where the same word is inconsistently translated two times "soul," and two times "life" in the King James Version; but corrected in the American Standard Version and most other versions where all four times the same word is translated "life." "In exchange for his life." The parallel passage in Luke 9:25 says, "and lose or forfeit his own self" American Standard Version. "Yet lose...his very self" New International Version. "Lose...themselves" New Revised Standard Version. Human language could not be any clearer that Christ is speaking of the whole of a person, and not just some internal unseen part of a person. If the immortal soul doctrine were true, a person could not lose his soul if his soul can never die. Those who say a person has a soul that is immortal and cannot die make the Bible contradict itself, for the Bible says repeatedly that the nehphesh [Old Testament] psukee [New Testament] can die and never says a person has a part that is called "soul" that is immortal. Christ "laid down His LIFE [psukee - life or soul] for us, and we ought to lay down our LIVES [psukee - life or soul] for the brethren" 1 John 3:16. "To give His LIFE [psukee - life or soul] a ransom for many" Matthew 20:28.

1. If the SOUL [psukee] cannot die, Christ could not have "laid down His LIFE" [psukee] or "give His LIFE" [psukee], and we could not "lay down our LIVES" [soul - psukee].
2. If the psukee [LIFE or soul] could not die, Christ did not die. He could not have been raised from the dead for He was never dead.
3. If the psukee [LIFE - soul] cannot die, God is telling us to do that which we cannot do "lay down our LIVES [soul - psukee] for the brethren."

James 5:20 "Shall save a SOUL [psukee - life or soul] FROM DEATH" King James Version.

James 5:20 "Will save HIM [psukee - life or soul] FROM DEATH" New International Version. If a person has a "SOUL" that cannot die, how can it be saved from death?

PSUKEE: A MORTAL BEING? OR AN IMMORTAL BEING?

Psukee is translated life, strength, us, he, heart, heartily, you, and mind. These all have a reference to this life and not to a soul that has no substance. How could the same word mean a mortal being some of the time and an immortal inter part of a mortal being some of the time? How would the translators know when it was one and when it was the other?

Psukee [life] is the natural life from Adam. It is the physical life common to all living creatures and is never said to be eternal. All living creatures [animals, fish, man] by natural birth have psukee [life] from birth to death. It is never coupled with the adjective eternal or everlasting.

THE ONLY WORD THAT IS TRANSLATED SOUL IN THE NEW TESTAMENT IS TRANSLATED SOUL ONLY ABOUT ONE-HALF OF THE TIMES IT IS USED.

Zoee [life] [Wigram, Page 339 - Strong's word 2227, 'Zoopoico...make alive, give life, quicken'] is a gift of life from Christ to those that believe, the life He gives only to those who are His. No one is born with it and the lost never have it. It refers the eternal life given by Christ in all but about ten of about one hundred thirty times it is used. "The first man Adam become a living soul (psukee - living being). The last Adam became a life-giving spirit" [1 Corinthians 15:45]. Only those who are born again have zoee [life] in Christ. See Zoee life in chapter two, Life or Death.

PASSAGES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT THAT HAS "PSUKEE" IN IT

The many words the translators used to translate "psukee" are nouns or pronouns and refer to (1) God (2) or to man (3) or to an animal, not to an immortal no subject part of God, a person or an animal. The person or animal is sometimes dying and is sometimes dead. This one word, which is a common noun, is translated into many nouns, changed into a proper noun and often is changed to a pronoun, then translated by many pronouns just as "nehphesh" is in the Old Testament. The different translations do not agree on when it should be a noun or when it should be a pronoun.

Soul - How nehphesh and psukee are translated in nine different version and in different verses.

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