African Plume

“The Spiritual Dangers of “Spirit Versus Soul” Theology” Watchman Nee’s rigid trichotomy system is fraught with serious problems—and those problems are far from merely academic. When this tripartite view of human nature is turned into a method of spiritual guidance, it can profoundly distort the way Christians think about reason, emotion, revelation, discernment, and obedience. The believer is taught to imagine the inner person as a three-storey spiritual building: 1. the body occupies the ground floor, 2. the soul lives somewhere in the middle, 3. and the spirit enjoys privileged access to the penthouse where God supposedly communicates directly. The soul becomes the suspicious department. The mind, emotions, personality, and will are all treated as potentially obstructive. The spirit, meanwhile, is presented as the superior internal faculty through which divine knowledge supposedly arrives. The result is a theology that encourages Christians to distrust their God-given faculties whil...

“Do the Trichotomist Proof Texts Actually Prove Trichotomy?” By Akin Ojumu The elaborate tripartite view of human nature popularized by Watchman Nee rests primarily upon a handful of biblical passages. The most frequently cited are 1 Thessalonians 5:23, Hebrews 4:12, and Genesis 2:7. These passages certainly use the words body, soul, and spirit. But using biblical vocabulary is not the same thing as proving a theological system. Wielding vowels and consonants together to form words does not validate the body-soul-spirit human anthropologic speculation. The real question is not whether those words appear in Scripture. The question is whether Scripture assigns them the rigid definitions, exclusive functions, and separate operations demanded by Watchman Nee–style trichotomy. Scripture most certainly does not. The strongest argument for trichotomy remains:  1 Thessalonians 5:23 “Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kep...

“Where Did Trichotomy Come From?” The phrase “I am a spirit, who has a soul, and lives in a body” is a popular teaching in many Christian religious systems on the tripartite nature of human beings. It highlights that the true inner self is spiritual, distinct from the mental-emotional mind and the physical shell.  The technical term for it is trichotomy.  In Christian anthropology, trichotomy is the belief that the human person consists of three distinguishable components: 1. Body — the material or physical dimension 2. Soul — commonly assigned the intellect, emotions, personality, and will 3. Spirit — commonly described as the faculty through which a person communicates with God Trichotomy is generally contrasted with dichotomy, which understands the human being as consisting of a material body and an immaterial inner person.  From the dichotomist perspective, soul and spirit are overlapping biblical descriptions of the same immaterial dimension rather than two independe...

By Akin Ojumu During a Q&A session at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, a woman from the audience stepped up to the microphone to ask Pastor John MacArthur a question. You could sense her apprehension almost immediately. The paper from which she read was visibly shaking. Her voice trembled. She was clearly uneasy about what she was about to ask. Nevertheless, she gathered her courage and pressed on. And the question she asked is, I believe, one that sits silently in the hearts of countless confused, intimidated, and spiritually battered Christians around the world—people who have been abused, manipulated, controlled, and sometimes terrorized by pastors who have grossly exaggerated the scope of pastoral authority. Her question was simple: “How much authority does a pastor actually have over the people he shepherds?” The answer she received may come as a shock to Christians who have been conditioned to regard their Pastors as spiritual monarchs. It is certainly not th...