Soul from Conception?

[Turgonian]

One of the reasons why Christians oppose abortion is that they believe that a baby has a soul from the moment of conception, the moment when a new individual being is formed. Presumably, when this being splits into a twin, the soul sticks to the one who was first (to phrase metaphysical things in our clumsy physicalist dialects), and the second gets another soul. But I have heard that it sometimes happens that a twin will 'fuse' again in the womb and once again become one person. In that case, how do you think we should see the body/soul problem? Were there two souls at one stage? If so, what happened to the second soul? And if there was one all along, can we maintain that babies or fetuses have souls from the moment they begin to exist?

[themuzicman]

This is the problem with separating a human being into ontological pieces of differing substances.

The "soul" is a part of the body and develops as part of the body. If a twin separates, then they both develop "souls" from the cells that split.

Michael

[TuckEverlasting]

A person doesn't have a soul; a person is a soul. FWIW. :smile:

[Storico]

My belief is that God knows us intimately. He knits our soul to our body. If, for whatever reason, anything happens to that body in the womb or out of it, God knows. In advance. There's nothing wrong with saying that if twins begin and form into one, that a soul given goes back to God. Nothing disappears. Our soul's the part of us that links our body to God, the part that makes us His. I believe firmly that He knows that in advance, and that we're given souls at all times.

[Ecualegacy]

When speaking of souls we are speaking of things we simply don't know a lot about, even from Scripture. My position on abortion is that, out of respect for God's valuation of human life, I am not going agree with intentionally aborting a child from conception on unless the mom would otherwise very likely die.

When the soul enters the embryo or leaves is not something I even think much about because it isn't a question I believe can be answered this side of heaven.