The Soul's Journey ― A History of Human Being

The challenge for a task of a subtle nature like the nature of the soul is that in our recent culture, aside from a variety of religious doctrines holding fast to traditional definitions, we encounter the absence of soul from serious consideration. Past efforts like William Barrett’s The Death of the Soul (1986) described the decline in philosophy and culture in general and its replacement by our intense interest in the nature of consciousness. This shift effectively removed an expansive vision of human existence beyond our present lives into the vagaries of a consciousness centered in the brain or mind. As the description of Barrett’s book has it, he “enables us to see how philosophical thought has taken us to where we stand, and why questions of the soul figure so faintly in the minds of today’s technocratic intellectuals.” Today, of course, we are known as “device people,” but that is another story. Consciousness studies by themselves are presently centered mainly in the laboratories of neuroscience, where cell biology and electrical circuitry rule exploratory investigation. In a more esoteric setting, however, consciousness studies in what we term the wisdom traditions include study of the soul if for no other reason than to reaffirm the traditional presence of such an entity in human life and nature. If consciousness and soul are taken together, human nature then possesses a fullness of articulation that recognizes the rich experiences of many lives. The soul may be unfathomable, but it exists in the records of cultures of nearly every period, language, belief and experience. According to some sages and traditions, the soul may be dormant or illusory, and it may awaken and be felt or imagined, return asleep or remain active, but such an important entity warrants serious attention.