Author(s):
Hoheisel, Karl
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Seebass, Horst
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Gödde, Susanne
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Necker, Gerold
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Rudolph, Ulrich
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Et al.
[German Version]
I. Religious Studies
1. Phenomenology Western, Christian connotations of the concept of the soul, imposed on the religio-historical evidence by outside studies, must be generally excluded if the soul is understood as the principle of manifestations of life that are perceptible (or culturally considered to be perceptible), although they are rarely categorized under a common umbrella term. It is therefore reasonable to speak of a multiplicity of souls – for example four among the Ob-Ugrians (Hasenfratz,
Einführung, 38–41), five among the Proto-Germanic peoples (
ibid., 82–85); texts from India often count five “souls”: the power of breath (
prāṇa), the power of speech (
vāc), the power of sight (
cakṣus), the power of hearing (
śrotra), and the power of thought (
manas); collectively these are usually called
prāṇa (
ibid., 94): the blood soul, the breath soul, the shadow soul, the name soul – or, with Hasenfratz, functional classes like the ego soul, the vital soul, the outward soul, the reincarnation soul, and the prestige soul (
ibid., 105–111). Although the various manifestations of life may appear diffuse, unsystematic, and even contradictory, the awkward question comes when we ask which of these principles corresponds to the Western, Christian notion of the soul. According to this conception, rooted in Platonic philosophy, the soul is tripartite; since I. Kant, who adopted this conception and developed it in his own way, the three parts are usually called the faculties of knowing, willing, and feeling. But t…