Now, if it be asked what the Scriptures define a living soul to be, the answer is a living natural, or animal body, whether of beasts, birds, fish or men. The phrase living creature is the exact synonyme of living soul. The words _nephesh chayiah_ are in Hebrew the signs of the ideas expressed by Moses, _nephesh_ signifying _creature_, _life_, _soul_, or _breathing frame_ from the verb _breathe_, and _chayiah_, a noun from the verb _to live_, _of life_. _Nephesh chayiah_ is the genus which includes all species of living creatures. In the common version of the Scriptures, it is rendered _living soul_, and, therefore, under this form of expression they speak of all flesh which breathes in air, earth and sea. From the evidence adduced a man then is merely a body of life in the sense of his being an animal or living creature--_nephesh chayiah adam_. Therefore, as a natural man, he has no preëminence over the creatures God has made. Moses makes no distinction between him and them, for he calls them all living souls, breathing the breath of lives. His language, literally rendered, says, “and God said, the waters shall produce abundantly _sheretz chayiah nephesh_ the _reptile living soul_;” and again, “_kal nephesh chayiah erameshat_ every living soul creeping.” In another verse, “let the earth bring forth _nephesh chayiah_ the living soul after its kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after its kind,” and “_lekol rumesh ol earetz asher bu nephesh chayiah_ to everything creeping upon the earth which has in it living breath,” that is, the breath of lives. And lastly, “whatsoever Adam called _nephesh chayiah_ the living soul that was the name thereof.”