Neo soul is a term coined by music industry entrepreneur Kedar Massenburg during the late 1990s to market and describe a style of music that emerged from soul and contemporary R&B.^[1] Heavily based in soul music, neo soul is distinguished by a less conventional sound than its contemporary R&B counterpart,^[1][2] with incorporated elements ranging from jazz, funk, and hip hop to pop, fusion, and African music. It has been noted by music writers for its classicist influences, conscious-driven lyrics, and strong female presence.

Developed in the United States and United Kingdom during the 1980s and early 1990s as a soul "revival" movement,^[2][3] neo soul emerged into the mainstream with the commercial and critical breakthroughs of several neo soul artists during the 1990s, as it was marketed as an alternative to the producer-driven, digitally approached R&B of the time.^[4] Since its initial mainstream popularity and impact on the sound of contemporary R&B, it has been expanded and diversified musically through the works of both American and international artists.^[5] According to Mark Anthony Neal, "neo-soul and its various incarnations has helped to redefine the boundaries and contours of black pop".^[6]

Etymology[link]

As a term, neo soul was coined by Kedar Massenburg of Motown Records in the late 1990s as a marketing category following the commercial breakthroughs of artists such as D'Angelo, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill, and Maxwell.^[1] The commercial breakthrough of D'Angelo's debut album Brown Sugar (1995) has been regarded by several writers and music critics as inspiration behind the term's coinage.^[1][3][4] While some artists have ignored the label, others have received the designation with controversy, viewing that it can be seen as contrived by music audiences and implies that soul music had ended at some point in time.^[4] In a 2002 interview for Billboard, Massenburg expressed his view on the backlash and intentions of marketing the neo soul term, stating:

[A] lot people don't like the term, because they don't want this music to be looked at as a genre. Because, when you classify music, it becomes a fad, which tends to go away. But soul music is soul music. There's nothing really new under the sun. But, in terms of marketing today, there's the need to categorize music for consumers so they know what they're getting. So, for lack of a different term, I coined neo-soul.^[4]

—Kedar Massenburg

In a 2010 article for PopMatters, music writer Tyler Lewis elaborated on the term in retrospect, stating "The term 'neo-soul' has been the subject of intense debate ever since Kedar Massenburg coined it as a way to market Erykah Badu's Baduizm 13 years ago. Given the way black music has been named by (usually) outsiders ever since the blues, the reaction to the name by artists who ostensibly fit into the 'neo-soul' category represents a wonderful example of black self-determination in an industry that is still defiantly wedded to narrow definitions and images of black folks".^[7] Jason Anderson of CBC News compares the etymology of "neo soul" to that of "new wave" and comments, "As imperfect as the term may be, neo-soul is still an effective tag to describe the mix of chic modernity and time-honoured tradition that distinguished the genre's best examples. Neo-soul artists tried to look both backward and forward, acting in the belief that a continuum might exist".^[8]

Characteristics[link]

"Something to Hold on To" noicon Produced by musical group Sa-Ra, Bilal's 2003 song "Something to Hold on To" contains yearning lyrics about love and chiming piano in its groove-based sound.[9][10] Problems listening to this file? See media help.

Despite some ambivalence from artists, the term ultimately received widespread use by music critics and writers who wrote about artists and albums associated with the musical style.^[4][11] African American studies professor Mark Anthony Neal has described neo soul as "everything from avant-garde R&B to organic soul... a product of trying to develop something outside of the norm in R&B".^[12] According to music writers, the genre's works are mostly album-oriented and distinguished by its musicianship and production, incorporating "organic" elements of classic soul music with the use of live instrumentation, in contrast to the more single-oriented, hip hop-based, and producer-driven sampling approach of contemporary R&B.^[4][5][13] In her book Musical Rhythm in the Age of Digital Reproduction, music author Anne Danielson writes that neo soul toward the end of the 1990s exhibited a musical development that was part of "a remarkable increase in musicians' experimentation with and manipulation of grooves at the microrhythmic level - that is, the level in played music that is usually understood in terms of phrasing and timing."^[14]

Noting that most of the genre's artists are singer-songwriters, writers have viewed neo soul artists' lyrical content of as more "conscious-driven" and having a broader range than most other R&B artists.^[2][4][13] Allmusic calls it "roughly analogous to contemporary R&B".^[15] Dimitri Ehrlich of Vibe comments that neo soul artists "emphasize a mix of elegant, jazz-tinged R&B and subdued hip hop, with a highly idiosyncratic, deeply personal approach to love and politics".^[2] Music writers have noted that neo soul artists are predominantly female, which contrasts the marginalized presence of women in mainstream hip hop and R&B.^[16] Jason Anderson of CBC News calls neo soul a "sinuous, sly yet unabashedly earnest" alternative and "kind of haven for listeners turned off by the hedonism of mainstream hip-hop and club jams."^[8]

According to music writer Peter Shapiro, the term itself refers to a musical style that obtains its influence from more classical styles, and bohemian musicians seeking a soul revival, while setting themselves apart from the more contemporary sounds of their mainstream R&B counterparts.^[1] In a 1998 article on neo soul, Time journalist Christopher John Farley wrote that neo soul artists such as Lauryn Hill, D'Angelo, and Maxwell "share a willingness to challenge musical orthodoxy".^[13] In citing Tony! Toni! Tone! as progenitors of the genre, Tony Green of Vibe has viewed that the group pioneered the "digital-analog hybrid sound" of neo soul and "dramatically refreshed the digitalized wasteland that was R&B in the late '80s".^[17] Neo soul artists during the 1990s were heavily inspired by the eclectic sound and mellow instrumentation of Gil Scott-Heron's and Brian Jackson's collaborative work in the 1970s.^[18] All About Jazz has cited Jackson as "one of the early architects" of the sound and his early work with Scott-Heron as "an inspirational and musical Rosetta stone for the neo-soul movement".^[19]

History[link]

1980s–1990s: Origins and breakthrough[link]

Neo soul's musical development occurred during the 1980s through to the early 1990s with the work of musical acts such as Prince, Tony! Toni! Toné!, Terrence Trent D'Arby, Joi,^[20] and Mint Condition, whose music deviated from the conventions of most contemporary R&B at the time.^{[2][4][13][17]} Tony! Toni! Toné!-member Raphael Saadiq later embarked on a solo career and produced various works of other neo soul artists.^[21] Influential to neo soul, UK act Sade achieved success in the 1980s with music that featured a sophisti-pop style, incorporating elements of soul, pop, smooth jazz, and quiet storm.^[22][23] The band was part of a new wave of British R&B-oriented artists during the late-1980s and early 1990s that also included Soul II Soul, Caron Wheeler, The Brand New Heavies, Jamiroquai, and Lisa Stansfield.^[24] Allmusic's Alex Henderson writes that, "Many of the British artists who emerged during that period had a neo-soul outlook and were able to blend influences from different eras".^[24] Other British progenitors of the neo soul movement at the time included Young Disciples and Omar Lye-Fook,^[25] the latter of whom has been cited as "the father of British neo-soul" and an influence on many later neo soul artists.^[26] During the early to mid 1990s, the neo soul movement continued to grow with releases by Zhané, Groove Theory, Joi, Tony Rich, and Me'Shell NdegéOcello.^{[11][27][28][29]} Christopher John Farley writes that, "before there was a name for it, Prince had been carrying a torch for neo soul for decades, refusing to make R&B that played by the rules or fit into comfortable formats. In the mid-'90s, he was suddenly joined by a host of other soul artists who also wanted to break boundaries".^[30]

Although she disputes the term, Erykah Badu has been dubbed "the first lady of neo soul" and "the queen of neo-soul".^{[31][32][33][34]}

The success of Tony! Toni! Toné!'s 1993 album Sons of Soul has been viewed as a precursor to the soul music revival in the mid 1990s.^[35][36] In a 1997 article for the Los Angeles Times, music journalist Cheo Hodari Coker cited the album as having "largely sparked the soul music revival that has opened the door for a new generation of singers who build on the tradition of Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder".^[35] Allmusic editor Leo Stanley wrote that by the release of Tony! Toni! Toné!'s follow-up album House of Music in 1996, "their influence was beginning to be apparent, as younger soul singer/songwriters like Tony Rich and Maxwell began reaching the R&B charts. Like Tony! Toni! Toné!, Rich and Maxwell relied on traditional soul and R&B values of songwriting and live performances, discarding the synth-heavy productions of the late '80s and early '90s".^[36] Malcolm Venable of Vibe cites the early work of hip hop group The Roots, who used live instrumentation, as a precursor to neo soul's commercial breakthrough in the mid 1990s.^[37]

Music writers have credited the breakthroughs of D'Angelo's Brown Sugar (1995), Erykah Badu's Baduizm (1997), Maxwell's Urban Hang Suite (1996), and Lauryn Hill's The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (1998) with shaping and raising the neo soul movement to commercial visibility into the late 1990s.^{[1][11][15][38][39][40]} According to Farley, D'Angelo's album "gives a nod to the past, [...] mints his own sound, with golden humming keyboards and sensual vocals and unhurried melodies [...] His songs were polished without being slick and smart without being pretentious", while Badu "brought an iconoclastic spirit to soul music, with her towering Afrocentric headwraps, incense candles, and quirky lyrics".^[30] Baduizm sold nearly three million copies and won Badu two Grammy Awards.^[34] Hill's debut featured her singing and rapping, with deeply personal lyrics,^[30] and was one of neo soul's primary successes,^[11] achieving massive sales, critical acclaim, and five Grammy Awards.^[41] Subsequently, other female neo soul artists broke through with their debut albums, including Macy Gray, Angie Stone, and Jill Scott.^[15][21] The 1997 film Love Jones capitalized on neo soul's success at the time with its soundtrack album, which impacted the Billboard charts and featured artists such as Hill, Maxwell, The Brand New Heavies, Me'Shell NdegéOcello, Groove Theory, and Dionne Farris.^[42][43]

According to music journalist Greg Kot, musical collective Soulquarians, consisting of such artists as D'Angelo, The Roots, Erykah Badu, Bilal, Mos Def, Common, James Poyser, and Q-Tip, contributed significantly to the neo soul movement during the late 1990s to the early 2000s with its members' "organic soul, natural R&B, boho-rap".^[44] The collective developed through the production work of The Roots' drummer and producer Questlove.^[37] Following a minor decline in its hype, neo soul's mainstream popularity increased in the late 1990s with the successes of Hill, Maxwell, Eric Benét, Raphael Saadiq, and Les Nubians.^[11] It impacted more mainstream-oriented R&B radio, while influencing contemporary R&B acts, such as R. Kelly and Aaliyah,^[30] to incorporate some of its textural and lyrical elements.^[11] In his song "When a Woman's Fed Up" (1998), R&B recording artist R. Kelly incorporated a more soul-based sound and referenced Erykah Badu's 1997 song "Tyrone" in the lyrics.^[11]

2000s: Apex and mainstream decline[link]

A production of the Soulquarians,^[44] D'Angelo's acclaimed 2000 album Voodoo has been viewed by writers as a masterpiece and peak of the neo soul genre.^{[8][45][46][47]} Ben Ratliff of The New York Times called the album "the succes d'estime that proves the force of this new music: it is a largely unslick, stubbornly idiosyncratic and genuinely great album that has already produced two hit singles".^[5] By the time of her second album Mama's Gun (2000), Erykah Badu had been dubbed by writers as "the queen of neo-soul".^[34] She has said of the honorific title, "I hated that because what if I don’t do that anymore? What if I change? Then that puts me in a penitentiary."^[34] Subsequently, other neo soul artists attained success in the early 2000s, including Bilal, Musiq Soulchild, India.Arie, and Alicia Keys, who broke through to broader popularity with her debut album Songs in A Minor (2001).^[2][15][48] Hip hop artists such as The Roots and Common, associated with the Soulquarians,^[44] released albums that incorporated neo soul, Phrenology (2002) and Electric Circus (2003).^[21]

Raheem DeVaughn performs socially-conscious and love-themed songs, and has been compared to Donny Hathaway and Marvin Gaye.^[49][50]

However, the 2000s decade later saw a decline in output by neo soul recording artists,^[7][51] with many of them failing to make a commercial impact and previous successes not releasing a follow-up album.^[42] Erykah Badu's commercial viability decreased as each of her releases following her debut Baduizm departed further from that album's music.^[8] Lauryn Hill followed-up her 1998 debut, considered the best-selling neo soul album, with the 2002 live album MTV Unplugged No. 2.0, a combative, confessional work in which she expresses her misgivings about fame.^[8] Melena Ryzik of The New York Times wrote in a retrospect of that "era of left-of-center black singer-songwriters", stating "many of them struggled to keep their creative momentum, conflicted about their early mainstream success."^[34] Producer and Soulquarians member Questlove elaborated on the artists' regression from the mainstream, saying "I think most of us went through our psychosomatic, quasi-self-saboteur stage. Once we got that first taste of success, I think just the pressure of reacting got to all of us. Some of us released some of the craziest records of our career."^[34] Other artists such as D'Angelo and Lauryn Hill went on indefinite hiatus from the music scene.^[8][34] Music writer Tyler Lewis of PopMatters attributed the decline to "the downside of [the] rejection of the term ['neo soul']", writing that:

[T]he industry, which already has a hard time with unapologetic and complicated black artists, had no idea what to do with all these enormously talented individuals who rejected entire marketing campaigns designed to 'break' them to the record-buying public. As such, albums were shelved or delayed or retooled and artists were dropped from major labels and forced to go it alone, making the first decade of the 21st century the least "soulful"—however you define it—decade for the industry itself in… well, decades.^[7]

—Tyler Lewis

The Boston Globe's Renée Graham wrote of the artists' ambivalence towards the term in a 2003 article on neo soul's standing, "Despite its critical success, if neo-soul had an initial failing, it was the media-created label itself - a term that the artists, whom it was meant to represent, generally rejected".^[42]

In a 2003 interview, music publicist John Constanza said that "The neo-soul movement is still there, but it's been underground, and it's trying to get the attention of the mainstream again".^[42] Mark Edward Nero of About.com stated, "In general, neo-soul has remained almost exclusive to R&B outlets such as urban radio and Black Entertainment Television [...] the majority of neo-soul artists have yet to crossover to mainstream American music listeners, partially because the music's sound generally focuses on artist expression, rather than popular appeal".^[52] During the mid-2000s, emerging artists such as Heather Headley, Anthony David, J Davey, Eric Roberson, and Ledisi signed to independent soul labels and received exposure through independent retailers, neo soul-oriented web sites, college and public radio stations, city club venues, cable networks such as Music Choice and BET J, and publishing deals as writers and producers for major label-recording artists.^[53] Erykah Badu and Maxwell returned from their respective hiatuses and released well-received albums, her New Amerykah albums and his 2009 album BLACKsummers'night, and they subsequently toured together.^[8][54][55]

2010s[link]

The more popular neo soul artists in recent years have included John Legend, Anthony Hamilton, Jill Scott, Maxwell, Chrisette Michele, Leela James, and Raheem DeVaughn.^[21][52] DeVaughn has described himself as an "R&B Hippy Neo-Soul Rock Star", viewing it as a reference to his eclectic musical style.^[49] In its 2010 issue on critical moments in popular music, Spin cited D'Angelo's Voodoo and its success as a turning point for neo soul, stating "D'Angelo's pastiche of funk, carnal ache, and high-minded, Afrocentric rhetoric stands as neo-soul's crowning achievement. So unsurpassable that it'd be eight years before we'd hear from Erykah Badu and Maxwell again, while Hill and D'Angelo remain missing. But Alicia Keys, John Legend, and Cee-Lo picked up D's mantle and ran with it".^[51]

See also[link]

• African-American music
• Category: Neo soul singers
• Soul music

References[link]

External links[link]

• Neo soul at the Open Directory Project
• Out of a Rut and Into a New Groove — The New York Times
• Afrofuturism and Post-Soul Possibility in Black Popular Music — African American Review
• Maxwell and the Soul of Neo Soul — PopMatters

Look up neo- in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Neo is a prefix from the ancient Greek word for young, neos (νέος), which is derived from the Proto-Indo European word for new, néwos.

Neo may refer to:

• Neo (The Matrix), the protagonist of the Matrix franchise
• Neo (Marvel Comics species), a fictional race of superhumans
• Neo (constructed language), a constructed language created by Arturo Alfandari
• Neo (magazine), the UK's anime, manga and Asian film magazine
• Neo (object-relational toolset), a programming framework
• Neo (keyboard), a portable keyboard by AlphaSmart
• Neo (keyboard layout), an ergonomic keyboard layout
• Neo (Hungarian band), a Hungarian group
• Neo (Italian band), a prog-jazz group
• Neo (UK band) a post-punk band
• Neo, Vietnam, a town in Bac Giang Province, Vietnam
• Neo 1973, smartphone running Openmoko software
• Neo Rauch (born 1960), German artist
• Neo Saiba 彩羽 ネオ (Saiba Neo^?) a character from Digimon Adventure V-Tamer 01\
• Neo, the Hokkien/Teochew form of the Chinese family name Liang
• Proton Satria Neo, a car brand
• August Neo (1908–1982), Estonian wrestler

NEO may refer to:

• Near-Earth object, a Solar System object whose orbit brings it into close proximity with the Earth
• New Engine Option, a fuel-efficient option for the Airbus A320 family
• New European Order, a neo-fascist Europe-wide alliance set up in 1951 to promote Pan-European nationalism
• New economic order, NEOs: a social segmentation
• Nissan Ecology Oriented or NEO VVL, an automobile variable valve timing technology
• Non-combatant evacuation operation, an operation conducted to evacuate a country's civilians from another country
• Revised NEO Personality Inventory, a psychometric instrument
• N.E.O., a Lithuanian band
• NEO, software products based on Sun Microsystems' Project Distributed Objects Everywhere
• NEO, a character from Digimon Next
• .NEO, the file extension for computer images in the NeoChrome format
• NEO, a laptop manufacturing company in the Philippines

See also[link]

• Ne-Yo, American pop and R&B singer-songwriter
• All pages beginning with "Neo"
• All pages beginning with "NEO"

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

The soul – in many traditional spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions – is the incorporeal and immortal essence of a person, living thing, or object.^[1] Some religions teach that all biological organisms have souls, and others further still that even non-biological entities (such as rivers and mountains) possess souls. This latter belief is called animism.^[2] Anima mundi and the Dharmic Ātman are concepts of a "world soul." Some religious thinkers, such as Thomas Aquinas, attribute souls to all organisms but teach that only human souls are immortal.^[3]

Soul can function as a synonym for spirit, mind or self;^[4] scientific works, in particular, often consider 'soul' as a synonym for 'mind'^{[citation needed]}.

Linguistic aspects[link]

Etymology[link]

The Modern English word soul derived from Old English sáwol, sáwel, first attested to in the 8th century poem Beowulf v. 2820 and in the Vespasian Psalter 77.50, and is cognate with other Germanic and Baltic terms for the same idea, including Gothic saiwala, Old High German sêula, sêla, Old Saxon sêola, Old Low Franconian sêla, sîla, Old Norse sála as well as Lithuanian siela. Further etymology of the Germanic word is uncertain. A more recent suggestion^[5] connects it with a root for "binding", Germanic *sailian (OE sēlian, OHG seilen), related to the notion of being "bound" in death, and the practice of ritually binding or restraining the corpse of the deceased in the grave to prevent his or her return as a ghost.

The word is probably an adaptation by early missionaries—particularly Ulfilas, apostle to the Goths during the 4th century—of a native Germanic concept, which was a translation of Greek ψυχή psychē "life, spirit, consciousness".

The Greek word is derived from a verb "to cool, to blow" and hence refers to the vital breath, the animating principle in humans and other animals, as opposed to σῶμα (soma) meaning "body". It could refer to a ghost or spirit of the dead in Homer, and to a more philosophical notion of an immortal and immaterial essence left over at death since Pindar. Latin anima figured as a translation of ψυχή since Terence. Psychē occurs juxtaposed to σῶμα e.g. in Matthew 10:28:

— καὶ μὴ φοβεῖσθε ἀπὸ τῶν ἀποκτεννόντων τὸ σῶμα, τὴν δὲ ψυχὴν μὴ δυναμένων ἀποκτεῖναι·

φοβεῖσθε δὲ μᾶλλον τὸν δυνάμενον καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ σῶμα ἀπολέσαι ἐν γεέννῃ.

Vulgate: et nolite timere eos qui occidunt corpus animam autem non possunt occidere sed potius eum timete qui potest et animam et corpus perdere in gehennam.

Authorized King James Version (KJV) "And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell."

In the Septuagint (LXX), ψυχή translates Hebrew נפש nephesh, meaning "life, vital breath", which is in English variously translated as "soul, self, life, creature, person, appetite, mind, living being, desire, emotion, passion"; e.g. in Genesis 1:20:

— וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֔ים יִשְׁרְצ֣וּ הַמַּ֔יִם שֶׁ֖רֶץ נֶ֣פֶשׁ חַיָּ֑ה

LXX καὶ εἶπεν ὁ θεός ἐξαγαγέτω τὰ ὕδατα ἑρπετὰ ψυχῶν ζωσῶν.

Vulgate Creavitque Deus cete grandia, et omnem animam viventem atque motabilem.

KJV "And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth."

Paul of Tarsus used ψυχή and πνεῦμα specifically to distinguish between the Jewish notions of נפש nephesh and רוח ruah (spirit) (also in LXX, e.g. Genesis 1:2 וְר֣וּחַאֱלֹהִ֔ים = πνεῦμα θεοῦ = spiritus Dei = "the Spirit of God").

Semantics[link]

Although the terms soul and spirit are sometimes used interchangeably, soul may denote a more worldly and less transcendent aspect of a person.^[6] According to psychologist James Hillman, soul has an affinity for negative thoughts and images, whereas spirit seeks to rise above the entanglements of life and death.^[7] The words soul and psyche can also be treated synonymously, although psyche has more physical connotations, whereas soul is connected more closely to spirituality and religion.^[8]

Philosophical views[link]

The Ancient Greeks used the same word for 'alive' as for 'ensouled', indicating that the earliest surviving western philosophical view believed that the soul was that which gave the body life. The soul was considered the incorporeal or spiritual 'breath' which animates (from the Latin, anima, cf. animal) the living organism.

Francis M. Cornford quotes Pindar in saying that the soul sleeps while the limbs are active, but when one is sleeping, the soul is active and reveals in many a dream "an award of joy or sorrow drawing near".^[9]

Erwin Rohde writes that the early pre-Pythagorean belief was that the soul had no life when it departed from the body, and retired into Hades with no hope of returning to a body.^[10]

It has been argued that a strict line of causality fails to explain certain phenomenon within human experience such as free will, which have at times been attributed to the soul. (See also: Determinism and free will)

Socrates and Plato[link]

Plato, drawing on the words of his teacher Socrates, considered the soul the essence of a person, being that which decides how we behave. He considered this essence to be an incorporeal, eternal occupant of our being. As bodies die, the soul is continually reborn in subsequent bodies. The Platonic soul comprises three parts:

1. the logos, or logistikon (mind, nous, or reason)
2. the thymos, or thumetikon (emotion, or spiritedness, or masculine)
3. the eros, or epithumetikon (appetitive, or desire, or feminine)

Each of these has a function in a balanced, level and peaceful soul.

Aristotle[link]

Aristotle defined the soul or psyche (ψυχή) as the first actuality of a naturally organized body,^[11] but argued against its having a separate existence from the physical body. In Aristotle's view, the primary activity of a living thing constitutes its soul; for example, the soul of an eye, if it were an independent organism, would be seeing (its purpose or final cause).

The various faculties of the soul or psyche, such as nutrition, sensation, movement, and so forth, when exercised, constitute the "second" actuality, or fulfillment, of the capacity to be alive. A good example is someone who falls asleep, as opposed to someone who falls dead; the former actuality can wake up and go about their life, while the second actuality can no longer do so. Aristotle identified three hierarchical levels of living things: plants, animals, and people, for which groups he identified three corresponding levels of soul, or biological activity: the nutritive activity of growth, sustenance and reproduction which all life shares; the self-willed motive activity and sensory faculties, which only animals and people have in common; and finally reason, of which people alone are capable. Aristotle treats of the soul in his work, De Anima (On the Soul). Aristotle concludes, in the fifth chapter of the third book of this work, that the human active intellect is immortal.^[12]

Avicenna and Ibn al-Nafis[link]

Following Aristotle, the Persian Muslim philosopher-physician, Avicenna (Ibn Sina) and Arab philosopher Ibn al-Nafis, further elaborated on the Aristotelian understanding of the soul and developed their own theories on the soul. They both made a distinction between the soul and the spirit, and in particular, the Avicennian doctrine on the nature of the soul was influential among the Scholastics. Some of Avicenna's views on the soul included the idea that the immortality of the soul is a consequence of its nature, and not a purpose for it to fulfill. In his theory of "The Ten Intellects", he viewed the human soul as the tenth and final intellect.

While he was imprisoned, Avicenna wrote his famous "Floating Man" thought experiment to demonstrate human self-awareness and the substantiality of the soul. He told his readers to imagine themselves suspended in the air, isolated from all sensations, which includes no sensory contact with even their own bodies. He argues that, in this scenario, one would still have self-consciousness. He thus concludes that the idea of the self is not logically dependent on any physical thing, and that the soul should not be seen in relative terms, but as a primary given, a substance. This argument was later refined and simplified by René Descartes in epistemic terms when he stated: "I can abstract from the supposition of all external things, but not from the supposition of my own consciousness."^[13]

Avicenna generally supported Aristotle's idea of the soul originating from the heart, whereas Ibn al-Nafis rejected this idea and instead argued that the soul "is related to the entirety and not to one or a few organs". He further criticized Aristotle's idea that every unique soul requires the existence of a unique source, in this case the heart. Ibn al-Nafis concluded that "the soul is related primarily neither to the spirit nor to any organ, but rather to the entire matter whose temperament is prepared to receive that soul" and he defined the soul as nothing other than "what a human indicates by saying 'I'".^[14]

Thomas Aquinas[link]

Following Aristotle and Avicenna, St. Thomas Aquinas understood the soul to be the first actuality of the living body. Consequent to this, he distinguished three orders of life: plants, which feed and grow; animals, which add sensation to the operations of plants; and humans, which add intellect to the operations of animals.

Concerning the human soul, his epistemological theory required that, since the knower becomes what he knows^[15] the soul was definitely not corporeal: for, if it were corporeal when it knew what some corporeal thing was, that thing would come to be within it. Therefore, the soul had an operation which did not rely on a bodily organ and therefore the soul could subsist without the body. Furthermore, since the rational soul of human beings was a subsistent form and not something made up of matter and form, it could not be destroyed in any natural process.^[16] The full argument for the immortality of the soul and Thomas's elaboration of Aristotelian theory is found in Question 75 of the Summa Theologica.

Immanuel Kant[link]

In his discussions of rational psychology Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) identified the soul as the "I" in the strictest sense and that the existence of inner experience can neither be proved nor disproved. "We cannot prove a priori the immateriality of the soul, but rather only so much: that all properties and actions of the soul cannot be cognized from materiality." It is from the "I", or soul, that Kant proposes transcendental rationalization, but cautions that such rationalization can only determine the limits of knowledge if it is to remain practical.^[17]

James Hillman[link]

Contemporary psychology is defined as the study of mental processes and behavior. However, the word "psychology" literally means "study of the soul",^[18] and psychologist James Hillman, the founder of archetypal psychology, has been credited with "restoring 'soul' to its psychological sense."^[19] Although the words soul and spirit are often viewed as synonyms, Hillman argues that they can refer to antagonistic components of a person. Summarizing Hillman's views, author and psychotherapist Thomas Moore associates spirit with "afterlife, cosmic issues, idealistic values and hopes, and universal truths", while placing soul "in the thick of things: in the repressed, in the shadow, in the messes of life, in illness, and in the pain and confusion of love."^[20] Hillman believes that religion—especially monotheism and monastic faiths—and humanistic psychology have tended to the spirit, often at the unfortunate expense of soul.^[6] This happens, Moore says, because to transcend the "lowly conditions of the soul ... is to lose touch with the soul, and a split-off spirituality, with no influence from the soul, readily falls into extremes of literalism and destructive fanaticism."^[21]

Hillman's archetypal psychology is in many ways an attempt to tend to the oft-neglected soul, which Hillman views as the "self-sustaining and imagining substrate" upon which consciousness rests, and "which makes meaning possible, [deepens] events into experiences, is communicated in love, and has a religious concern" as well as "a special relation with death."^[22] Departing from the Cartesian dualism "between outer tangible reality and inner states of mind," Hillman takes the Neoplatonic stance^[23] that there is a "third, middle position" in which soul resides.^[24] Archetypal psychology acknowledges this third position by attuning to, and often accepting, the archetypes, dreams, myths, and even psychopathologies through which soul, in Hillman's view, expresses itself.

Philosophy of mind[link]

For a contemporary understanding of the soul/mind and the problem concerning its connection to the brain/body, consider the rejection of Descartes' mind/body dualism by Gilbert Ryle's ghost-in-the-machine argument,^{[clarification needed]} the tenuous unassailability of Richard Swinburne's argument for the soul,^{[clarification needed]} and the advances, which have been made in neuroscience and which are steadily uncovering the truth/falsity^[vague] of the concept of an independent soul/mind. The philosophies of mind and of personal identity also contribute to a contemporary understanding of the mind. The contemporary approach does not so much attack the existence of an independent soul as render the concept less relevant. The advances in neuroscience mainly serve to support the mind/brain identity hypothesis, showing the extent of the correlation between mental states and physical-brain states. The notion of soul has less explanatory power in a western world-view which prefers the empirical explanations involving observable and locatable elements of the brain. Even so, there remain considerable objections to simple-identity theory. Notably, philosophers such as Thomas Nagel and David Chalmers have argued that the correlation between physical-brain states and mental states is not strong enough to support identity theory. Nagel (1974) argues that no amount of physical data is sufficient to provide the "what it is like" of first-person experience, and Chalmers (1996) argues for an "explanatory gap" between functions of the brain and phenomenal experience. On the whole, brain/mind identity theory does poorly in accounting for mental phenomena of qualia and intentionality. While neuroscience has done much to illuminate the functioning of the brain, much of subjective experience remains mysterious.

Religious views[link]

Ancient Near East[link]

In the ancient Egyptian religion, an individual was believed to be made up of various elements, some physical and some spiritual. See the article Egyptian soul for more details.^{[citation needed]}

Similar ideas are found in ancient Assyrian and Babylonian religion. Kuttamuwa, an 8th century BC royal official from Sam'al, ordered an inscribed stele erected upon his death. The inscription requested that his mourners commemorate his life and his afterlife with feasts "for my soul that is in this stele". It is one of the earliest references to a soul as a separate entity from the body. The 800-pound (360 kg) basalt stele is 3 ft (0.91 m) tall and 2 ft (0.61 m) wide. It was uncovered in the third season of excavations by the Neubauer Expedition of the Oriental Institute in Chicago, Illinois.^[25]

Bahá'í[link]

The Bahá'í Faith affirms that "the soul is a sign of God, a heavenly gem whose reality the most learned of men hath failed to grasp, and whose mystery no mind, however acute, can ever hope to unravel.^[26] Bahá'u'lláh stated that the soul not only continues to live after the physical death of the human body, but is, in fact, immortal.^[27] Heaven can be seen partly as the soul's state of nearness to God; and hell as a state of remoteness from God. Each state follows as a natural consequence of individual efforts, or the lack thereof, to develop spiritually.^[28] Bahá'u'lláh taught that individuals have no existence prior to their life here on earth and the soul's evolution is always towards God and away from the material world.^[28]

Brahma Kumaris[link]

In Brahma Kumaris, souls, called atmas, are believed to be an infinitesimal point of spiritual light residing in the forehead of the bodies they occupy.^{[citation needed]}

Buddhism[link]

Buddhism teaches that all things are in a constant state of flux: all is changing, and no permanent state exists by itself.^[29][30] This applies to human beings as much as to anything else in the cosmos. Thus, a human being has no permanent self.^[31][32] According to this doctrine of anatta (Pāli; Sanskrit: anātman) – "no-self" or "no soul" – the words "I" or "me" do not refer to any fixed thing. They are simply convenient terms that allow us to refer to an ever-changing entity.^[33]

The anatta doctrine is not a kind of materialism. Buddhism does not deny the existence of "immaterial" entities, and it (at least traditionally) distinguishes bodily states from mental states.^[34] Thus, the conventional translation of anatta as "no-soul"^[35] can be confusing. If the word "soul" simply refers to an incorporeal component in living things that can continue after death, then Buddhism does not deny the existence of the soul.^[36] Instead, Buddhism denies the existence of a permanent entity that remains constant behind the changing corporeal and incorporeal components of a living being. Just as the body changes from moment to moment, so thoughts come and go. And there is no permanent, underlying mind that experiences these thoughts, as in Cartesianism; rather, conscious mental states simply arise and perish with no "thinker" behind them.^[37] When the body dies, the incorporeal mental processes continue and are reborn in a new body.^[36] Because the mental processes are constantly changing, the being that is reborn is neither entirely different than, nor exactly the same as, the being that died.^[38] However, the new being is continuous with the being that died – in the same way that the "you" of this moment is continuous with the "you" of a moment before, despite the fact that you are constantly changing.^[39]

Buddhist teaching holds that a notion of a permanent, abiding self is a delusion that is one of the causes of human conflict on the emotional, social, and political levels.^[40][41] They add that an understanding of anatta provides an accurate description of the human condition, and that this understanding allows us to pacify our mundane desires.

Various schools of Buddhism have differing ideas about what continues after death.^[42] The Yogacara school in Mahayana Buddhism said there are Store consciousness which continue to exist after death.^[43] In some schools, particularly Tibetan Buddhism, the view is that there are three minds: very subtle mind, which does not disintegrate in death; subtle mind, which disintegrates in death and which is "dreaming mind" or "unconscious mind"; and gross mind, which does not exist when one is sleeping. Therefore, gross mind less permanent than subtle mind, which does not exist in death. Very subtle mind, however, does continue, and when it "catches on", or coincides with phenomena, again, a new subtle mind emerges, with its own personality/assumptions/habits, and that entity experiences karma in the current continuum.

Plants were said to be non-sentient (無情),^[44] but Buddhist monks should avoid cutting or burning trees, because some sentient beings rely on them.^[45] Some Mahayana monks said non-sentient beings such as plants and stones have buddha-nature.^[46][47] Some buddhists said about plants or divisible consciousnesses^{[clarification needed]}.^[48]

Certain modern Buddhists, particularly in Western countries, reject—or at least take an agnostic stance toward—the concept of rebirth or reincarnation, which they view as incompatible with the concept of anatta. Stephen Batchelor discusses this issue in his book, Buddhism Without Beliefs. Others point to research that has been conducted at the University of Virginia as proof that some people are reborn.^[49]

Judaism[link]

The Hebrew terms נפש nephesh (literally "living being"), רוח ruach (literally "wind"), נשמה neshama (literally "breath"), חיה chaya (literally "life") and יחידה yechidah (literally "singularity") are used to describe the soul or spirit. In modern Judaism the soul is believed to be given by God to a person by his/her first breath, as mentioned in Genesis, "And the LORD God formed man [of] the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being." (Genesis 2:7). From this statement, the rabbinical interpretation is often that human embryos do not have souls, though the orthodox often oppose abortion as a form of birth control. Judaism relates the quality of one's soul to one's performance of mitzvot and reaching higher levels of understanding, and thus closeness to God. A person with such closeness is called a tzadik. Judaism also has a concept of purity of body and soul, which requires avoidance of "unclean" things. Such practices mentioned in the Torah include the keeping of kashrut and daily bathing (tevilah) in a mikveh. In biblical times, it was believed that "impurity" was something that could be spread by touching, and unclean people were temporarily separated from the group. Though Jewish theology does not agree on the nature of an afterlife, the soul is said to "return to God" after death.

Kabbalah and other mystic traditions go into greater detail into the nature of the soul. Kabbalah separates the soul into five elements, corresponding to the five worlds:

1. Nephesh, related to natural instinct.
2. Ruach, related to emotion and morality.
3. Neshamah, related to intellect and the awareness of God.
4. Chaya, considered a part of God, as it were.
5. Yechidah, also termed the pintele Yid (the "essential [inner] Jew"). This aspect is essentially one with G‑d.

Kabbalah furthermore proposed a concept of reincarnation, the gilgul. (See also nefesh habehamit the "animal soul").

Christianity[link]

Soul carried to Heaven by William Bouguereau

Most Christians understand the soul as an ontological reality distinct from, yet integrally connected with, the body. Its characteristics are described in moral, spiritual, and philosophical terms. According to a common Christian eschatology, when people die, their souls will be judged by God and determined to spend an eternity in Heaven or in Hell. Though all branches of Christianity –Catholics, Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox, Evangelical or mainline Protestants – teach that Jesus Christ plays a decisive role in the salvation process, the specifics of that role and the part played by individual persons or ecclesiastical rituals and relationships, is a matter of wide diversity in official church teaching, theological speculation and popular practice. Some Christians believe that if one has not repented of one's sins and trusted in Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour, one will go to Hell and suffer eternal damnation or eternal separation from God. Variations also exist on this theme, e.g. some which hold that the unrighteous soul will be destroyed instead of suffering eternally (Annihilationism). Believers will inherit eternal life in Heaven and enjoy eternal fellowship with God. There is also a belief that babies (including the unborn) and those with cognitive or mental impairments who have died will be received into Heaven on the basis of God's grace through the sacrifice of Jesus. And there are beliefs in universal salvation and Christian conditionalism.

Soul at inception of life[link]

Among Christians, there is uncertainty regarding whether human embryos have souls, and at what point between conception and birth the fetus acquires a soul and consciousness. This uncertainty is the general reasoning behind many Christians' belief that abortion should not be legal.^[50][51][52]

Roman Catholic beliefs[link]

The present Catechism of the Catholic Church defines the soul as "the innermost aspect of humans, that which is of greatest value in them, that by which they are most especially in God's image: 'soul' signifies the spiritual principle in man."^[53] All souls living and dead will be judged by Jesus Christ when he comes back to earth. The souls of those who die unrepentant of serious sins, or in conscious rejection of God, will at judgment day be forever in a state called Hell^{[citation needed]}. The Catholic Church teaches that the existence of each individual soul is dependent wholly upon God: "The doctrine of the faith affirms that the spiritual and immortal soul is created immediately by God."^[54]

Orthodox Christian beliefs[link]

Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox views are somewhat similar, in essence, to Roman Catholic views although different in specifics. Orthodox Christians believe that after death, the soul is judged individually by God, and then sent to either Abraham's Bosom (temporary paradise) or Hades/Hell (temporary torture).^{[citation needed]} At the Last Judgment, God judges all people who have ever lived. Those that know the Spirit of God, because of the sacrifice of Jesus, go to Heaven (permanent paradise) whilst the damned experience the Lake of Fire (permanent torture). The Orthodox Church does not teach that Purgatory exists.

Protestant beliefs[link]

Depiction of the soul on a 17th century tombstone at the cemetery of the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow

Protestants generally believe in the soul's existence, but fall into two major camps about what this means in terms of an afterlife. Some, following Calvin,^[55] believe in the immortality of the soul and conscious existence after death, while others, following Luther,^[56] believe in the mortality of the soul and unconscious "sleep" until the resurrection of the dead.^[57]

Other Christians reject the idea of the immortality of the soul, citing the Apostles' Creed's reference to the "resurrection of the body" (the Greek word for body is soma σωμα, which implies the whole person, not sarx σαρξ, the term for flesh or corpse). They consider the soul to be the life force, which ends in death and will be restored in the resurrection.^{[citation needed]} Theologian Frederick Buechner sums up this position in his 1973 book Whistling in the Dark: "...we go to our graves as dead as a doornail and are given our lives back again by God (i.e., resurrected) just as we were given them by God in the first place. "^{[citation needed]}

Christadelphian beliefs[link]

Christadelphians believe that we are all created out of the dust of the earth and became living souls once we received the breath of life based on the Genesis 2 account of humanity's creation. Adam was said to have become a living soul. His body did not contain a soul, rather his body (made from dust) plus the breath of life together were called a soul, in other words a living being. They believe that we are mortal and when we die our breath leaves our body, and our bodies return to the soil. They believe that we are mortal until the resurrection from the dead when Christ returns to this earth and grants immortality to the faithful. In the meantime, the dead lie in the earth in the sleep of death until Jesus comes.^[58]

Seventh-day Adventists beliefs[link]

Seventh-day Adventists believe that the main definition of the term "Soul" is a combination of spirit (breath of life) and body, disagreeing with the view that the soul has a consciousness or sentient existence of its own.^{[citation needed]} They affirm this through Genesis 2:7 "And (God) breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul."^[59] When God united His breath, or spirit with man, man became a living soul. A living soul is composed of body and spirit.^[60] Adventists believe at death the body returns to dust and life returns to the God who bestowed it. This belief is expressed in the following quotation from their fundamental beliefs, "The wages of sin is death. But God, who alone is immortal, will grant eternal life to His redeemed. Until that day death is an unconscious state for all people..." (Rom. 6:23; 1 Tim. 6:15, 16; Eccl. 9:5, 6; Ps. 146:3, 4; John 11:11–14; Col. 3:4; 1 Cor. 15:51–54; 1 Thess. 4:13–17; John 5:28, 29; Rev. 20:1–10.)