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Christian View of the Body
In August 1992, Helena Christensen and Michael Hutchence, founder and lead singer of INXS, were walking late at night on a street in Copenhagen after drinking heavily when he refused to move for a taxi. The taxi driver then assaulted him, causing him to fall backwards and hit his head on the roadway. Hutchence suffered a fractured skull in the altercation. Hutchence did not immediately seek medical assistance for the injury, instead waiting several days before seeing a doctor. As a result, his fractured skull left him with an almost complete loss of the sense of smell and significant loss of taste. This injury led to periods of depression and increased levels of aggression; he had not fully recovered after two weeks in a Copenhagen hospital. According to INXS bandmate Beers, Hutchence brandished a knife and threatened to kill him during the 1993 recording of Full Moon, Dirty Hearts on the isle of Capri. Beers recalled, “Over those six weeks, Michael threatened or physically confronted nearly every member of the band.”
On September 13, 1848, a 25-year-old railroad foreman named Phineas Gage was injured in a horrific accident. While using an iron rod to tamp explosive powder into a hole, the powder ignited and sent the 43-inch long rod hurtling upward. The rod pierced through Gage’s cheek, passing though the frontal lobe of his brain before exiting the top of his skull and landing approximately 80 feet away…[In attending physician Dr.] Harlow’s descriptions of Gage after the accident, he suggests that Gage would often make plans but fail to carry them out and that many of his friends described his personality as greatly changed, to the point that they felt he was “no longer Gage.”…Gage died in 1860 following a series of epileptic seizures, just 12 and a half years after his accident.
Ben Price, 48, of Morris, Illinois, had battled the coronavirus for 16 days before his death by suicide. The dad-of-two was treated in hospital for four days after having problems with his lungs. Yet, his wife Jennifer says he came home a “different man” and would pace around the house talking to himself. And it wasn’t even in his normal tone of voice. It was a very different tone. “He was very scared. He just kept repeating, ‘I’m sorry, I’m just so scared.’ She insists Ben would still be alive today if it had not been for the killer respiratory disease – which has been linked with mental health problems in a minority of patients.
What is going on in these situations? It is obvious that injury to the body and brain of an individual can alter their personality. For those who believe that all we are is the physical, this is, pardon the pun, a no-brainer. But what about those who believe that humans are made up of body and soul, that there is an immaterial part to us, variably called spirit or soul? If personality is a function of the soul, why does bodily trauma affect it?
Scripture Affirms That Humans are Body and Soul
James 2:26 says, “For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead” (ESV). This is why when a person dies their soul is separated from their body and we can describe the soul going to heaven or hell. The soul continues to function, outside the body. But notice what Paul says about this existence for the Christian:
2 Corinthians 5:1–4, [1] For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. [2] For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, [3] if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. [4] For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. (ESV)
The question is, how do the two parts function together? It is apparent from the examples of brain trauma I mentioned that the personality of such injured people can change with the injury. Why?
God made us a body/soul people.
Our souls must function through our bodies. If the body is impaired, the soul is also.
So what does this mean for us?
When the Body Gets Sick So Does the Soul
- When the brain’s chemistry gets “off” from fatigue, lack of sleep, trauma or inherited deficiencies, you may expect to experience depression, or anxiety, or obsessive-compulsivity, or any number of other mental illnesses.
- Treating the body will treat the soul.
When the Soul Gets Sick So Does the Body
- S. Senator was in the Capital Building on January 6 when rioters invaded. Days later he became anxious, irritable with those around him. He was suffering post-traumatic stress syndrome. The trauma he experienced, the fear he felt as he huddled in the Capital Building as people were outside trying to get in, brandishing weapons, etc. was stuck in his memory and affected his body, causing panic attacks.
- Proverbs 13:12 “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”
Spiritual Health Is to Some Degree Dependent on Physical Health
- Take care of your health: 1 Timothy 4:8 TLV. For physical exercise has some benefit; but godliness is beneficial for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the one to come. 1 Timothy 4:8, for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. (ESV)
- DON’T do drugs, don’t smoke, don’t drink excessively, don’t fail to get enough sleep, don’t remain inactive or be a couch potato. DO things do that lead to physical health.
About the Author Randall Johnson
A full-time pastor since 1979, Randall originally graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary (ThM) in 1979 and from Reformed Theological Seminary (DMin) in 1998. He is married with four grown children and a pile of epic grandchildren.
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