If mankind is able to clone a human will it have a soul/spirit? Isn't God the only one able to give us our soul/spirit? I've heard that a clone will be the exact person its' cloned from, therefore, will it also share the same soul/spirit? Pretty weird stuff to consider. It's frightening to think of what lies ahead with man messing with creation. Thank you.

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2003

Answers

Your question is intriguing. However, speculation times speculation equal speculation. I say let the proof be shown! To the extent that is is actually proven that man has successfully cloned another human being, we have no basis for intelligent conversation. This is simply because the thing itself will not be ascertainable. Thus, it cannot be counted, weiged and assayed. Until it is proven, we have nothing.

How does one distinguish one's soul or spirit from another's? Is spirit "property" of the person, or is it rather a gift or a loan from God? Does spirit or soul have definable features or wavelengths or colors to differentiate it from another? Just like the woman with the seven dead levirate husbands (Mark 12:18-27) belonged to none of them in the resurrection, because there is no marriage there, I infer that spirit, being spirit, is indistinguishable from spirit. Help me. Holy Ghost! So your question about "sharing" or having the same spirit may be moot. We may all share but one spirit, God's, at any event.

I deeply enjoyed your question. It is worthy of rumination.

Rev. Dr. Larry D. Coleman

-- Anonymous, January 14, 2003

Humankind, at best, can only clone the genetic material. A person is so much more than that: body (which is cloned), sould and spirit.

The Bible teaches us (Gen 2:7) "and God breathed into man the breath of life, and man became a living soul". So no matter how the human gets the physical or genetic start, once God gets a hold of him//her the true person is deposited into the cannister. :)

A "clone" is analogous to a twin, or more specifically, an identical twin, from a genetic perspective. While twins may look alike, even down to certain features like whirl of the hair or placement of moles, a clone will be as different a person as two twins are different. Probably more different, given that the environment of the clone (the nurture) will be different from the donor human.

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2003

Wow!!! Dr. Larry Coleman,

Your response to that question was so profound, one has to think about it for days. It reminds me of some of the writings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Howard Thurman, and Dr. Cain Hope Felder.

-- Anonymous, January 21, 2003

hello i live in northern ireland and wish to tell you of an occurance which happened to me some years back, i was sound asleep and suddenly i found nyself hovering over a scene i knew at the time was to take place the following day, please be assured i do not take drugs nor alchohol, i watched the scene play out to its end and it really did feel so normal, but still i had a look at myself and could see that i was not unlike a crystal or diamond like being shiny yet not transparent. you must believe what i have written because at the time this happened i could have made a vast amount of money from it but i did not because i did not believe myself, yet on awakening i decided to check out what i had seen the night before as it seemed to me to have been such a vivid dream i was still in ireland at the time and the occurance was to take place in england i still knew it could be watched on t,v, so i switched on sometime before it as i still knew the exact time it was to happen so i waited and at the precise time i watched the same scene being played over again exactly as it happened to the finest detail, you can believe me or not as is youre wish but you ask what has this to do with cloneing and religeon so here is my reply from that night for the first time i understood we all have what we are told is the human soul and i still distinctly remember a feeling that i was part of the cosmos and most likely a part of god yet because of that experience which lasted quite sometime i have always remembered that even jesus told us greater things than these shall ye do and did he not die so that we might live, judge not lest ye be judged humanity has suffered long and we die in terrible circumstances which i do not believe jesus came to earth and allowed himself to be crucified by ignorance, so i see no reason why humanity should not take the advantage of all things as there is always the good with the bad if people can someday stop death im sure god would not object if we stopped useing bits and pieces of the bible which suits our own selfish means as in all things to all men. no there should be no stopping human progress that can only give cause to those in power who abuse all who have no benifit in life or those who do not live long eneough to experience the shortest time to live of course there will always be selfish people until death and war and famine can be overcome for all humans i for one would feel very much the hypocrite that breeds in todays society. we walk everyday through the valley of the shadow of death and im sure that beings human or otherwise could never live even a split second if they had no soul god provides science is doing exactly what jesus said even though we still do not understand what we do, it is time for humanity to move forward just as all things have passed away the acceptance of cloneing cannot be stopped and many more things which older generations cannot hack, one thing i remember from that soul experience is that god would not nor nature would not allow us to think of anything unless it could be done so let science play theire childs games even if it hurts we are here for a short while and how much wiser do any of us become, david bailie.

-- Anonymous, February 03, 2003