My answer was:
A corpse is a dead person/soul.
A dead person is a dead
soul.
Right now within tombs & coffins are dead souls.
What one buries
or cremates is a dead person/soul
Jews in the OT were not allowed to touch dead souls ... (subtly
translated dead body)
So a person according to the Hebrew Bible, dead
or alive, is a soul/nephesh
Again, in the Bible, 'person=soul'
To touch or see or speak
to a living person, is to touch, see & speak to a living soul.
To touch a
dead person is to touch a dead soul.
It was Greek philosophy & Platonism that taught that a soul
is some ethereal, immortal, incorporeal part of man.
The Scriptures teach no
such thing.
See for yourself ...
(Lev 21:11) Neither shall he go in to any dead body
[Heb. nephesh=soul], nor defile himself for his father, or for his
mother;
(Num 9:6-7) And there were certain men, who were defiled
by the dead body [Heb. nephesh=soul] of a man, that they could not
keep the passover on that day: and they came before Moses and before Aaron on
that day: 7 And those men said unto him, We are defiled by the dead body
[Heb. nephesh=soul] of a man: wherefore are we kept back, that we may not
offer an offering of YAHWEH in his appointed season among the children of
Israel?
(Num 9:10) Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If
any man of you or of your posterity shall be unclean by reason of a dead
body [Heb. nephesh=soul], or be in a journey afar off, yet he
shall keep the passover unto YAHWEH.
(Num 19:11) He that toucheth the dead body [Heb.
nephesh=soul] of any man shall be unclean seven days.
(Num 19:13) Whosoever toucheth the dead body [Heb.
nephesh=soul] of any man that is dead, and purifieth not himself,
defileth the tabernacle of YAHWEH; and that soul shall be cut off from Israel:
because the water of separation was not sprinkled upon him, he shall be unclean;
his uncleanness is yet upon him.
(Num 19:16) And whosoever toucheth one that is slain with
a sword in the open fields, or a dead body [Heb. nephesh=soul], or
a bone of a man, or a grave, shall be unclean seven days.
(Hag 2:13) Then said Haggai, If one that is unclean by a
dead body [Heb. nephesh=soul] touch any of these, shall it be
unclean? And the priests answered and said, It shall be unclean.
( See also http://adonimessiah.blogspot.com/2006/08/concerning-soul.html )
