Is N.T. Wright without a soul-mate?

Yesterday, I read this essay by N.T. Wright. My initial response was to dismiss it as hogwash, but he strikes a blow against Kantian dualism, so it can't be all bad. You can wade through it, but if you're okay with a synopsis and commentary, keep reading this post.

Basically, he doesn't believe in the soul as a separate entity from the physical body. The concept of each individual human possessing an immortal soul, he says, only cropped up during the late Middle Ages, and only reached fruition in the thought of Descartes and Kant. No, says Bishop Tom, the corruptible body we know now is inextricably linked to the life force within us, our distinctly human element.

Wright's chief concern is that the idea of a personal soul detracts from the all-important doctrine of the resurrection. If the soul keeps right on living after we die, then what is the significance of the resurrection? All men are given once to die; if we die, but don't really die, how do we explain that?

The problems with this article are many. It verges on incoherent, evidences a misreading of key philosophical texts, and forces a complex subject to fit a synthetic if-then formula. More importantly, Wright consistently refers to Paul as a "good Jew," seemingly ignoring this profound distinction: Paul was not a good Jew, he was a Christian theologian and evangelist. What happened to Paul's avowal that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek?

I can agree that Hellenistic dualism is a pernicious and un-Christian idea. I am also willing to accept on Wright's authority that the Jews had no corollary concept, that for them the objective substance of physical existence was primary. What I cannot accept is that, if we reject pagan Greek ideas about the nature of the human soul, we must therefore revert to the Judaic view, whatever that might have been.

Certainly, the doctrine of the Resurrection (both Christ's and ours) is central to the Christian message; and definitely, I reject modernistic and ancient forms of dualism alike. We are a unity, whole persons that exists bodily as well as spiritually. And no, I don't know what happens when we die (though I was glad to see Wright rejects the doctrine of Purgatory). I'm pretty sure, though, that there is a disjunction between Jewish doctrine and Christian doctrine.

There were other problems with the article, but this one struck me most. Inasmuch as Wright espouses borderline New Perspective sentiments, it's not hard to see how he'd come to the conclusions he does about the human soul, especially if what he presents is an accurate summary of Jewish dogma on the matter. I like a lot of what Wright says, but not this. Christ is the center of our faith, and I couldn't care less what first century Jews thought if it doesn't match the doctrines of Scripture. Didn't Our Lord spend much of His earthly life making exactly that point?