inally to succumb to
the fate of annihilation, after they had been cast down into the fiery pit
of Gehenna or Sheol.(924) Of course, this view, which prevails in both the
Talmud and the New Testament, according to which the souls of the wicked
are to be consumed in the fire of Gehenna, is inconsistent with the
conception of the purely spiritual nature of the soul.

Nevertheless at this same epoch we find the higher idea expressed that the
soul is an invisible, god-like essence, pervading the body as a spiritual
force and differing from it in nature in much the same way as God is
differentiated from the world.(925) "Thou wishest to know where God
dwells, who is as high as are the heavens above the earth; tell me then
where dwells thy soul, which is so near," replied R. Gamaliel to a
heathen.(926) The prevailing view of the schools is that God implants the
soul in the embryo while in the mother's womb, together with all the
spiritual potentialities which make it human. In fact, R. Simlai, the
third-century Haggadist, advances the Platonic conception of the
preexistence of the soul, as a being of the highest intelligence, which
sees before birth all things throughout the world, but forgets all at
birth, so that all subsequent learning is only a recollection.(927) In
Hellenistic Judaism especially the doctrine seems to have been general of
the preexistence of the soul, or of the creation of all human souls
simultaneously with the creation of the world.(928) Of course, the soul
which emanates from a higher world must be eternal.

5. The first clear idea of the nature of the soul came with the
philosophically trained thinkers, who were dependent either on Plato, main
founder of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, or on Aristotle,
who ascribes immortality only to the creative spirit of God, the supreme
Intelligence as a cosmic power. The nearest approach to Plato was
Philo,(929) who saw in the three Biblical names for the soul, _nefesh_,
_ruah_, and _neshama_, the three souls of the Platonic system,--the
sensuous soul, which has its seat in the abdomen; the courageous or
emotional soul, situated in the breast; and the intellectual soul, which
dwells in the brain and contains the imperishable divine nature. This last
is kept in its physical environment as in a prison or a grave, and ever
yearns for liberation and reunion with God. The soul of the righteous
enters the world of angels after death; that of the wicked the