Do Dogs Have Souls? (Catholic & Bible Reference)

Do Dogs Have Souls

Souls are the basic explanation of life.

According to the Catholics, the soul technically is the breath of life to human beings.

Life was breathed into living beings such as humans making up the existence of the soul.

It is said that all living organisms have souls but it has remained to be a very questionable belief because it is based on faith and religion.

Because normal living organisms do not come back from the dead to let us know what is on the other side.

 

According to the Catholics and the Bible in general, dogs do have souls but the difference between the souls which belong to humans and those that belong to plants and animals is; souls that belong to human beings are material-like while human souls are more spiritual. This means, in a religious setting, dogs are believed to have souls that do continue to exist even after they die.

 

This is quite new for some people, especially those who have not asked themselves these questions.

Below is more on whether dogs have souls and other things you may need to know if this is something that interests you:

 

How do we know that dogs have souls?

dog staring at sunset

How exactly do we know whether dogs and other animals, in general, have souls?

The Bible gives some instances where it shows that dogs were held in high esteem as pets even in death.

Such an instance is where in some cultures in the Bible, the pets were given a proper burial complete even with the tombstone.

 

There is more about that as you read on.

But this particular instance led us to believe the people in that community believed in a proper send-off for their pets.

Mainly due to their belief in an afterlife for them too; that their souls would live on.

 

Why are the souls of dogs said to be materialistic?

There are a couple of reasons as to why the souls of dogs are said to be materialistic and different from spiritual souls that belong to other human beings.

Below are some of the reasons why we have been led to believe the above:

 

The absence of the moral code of conduct for dogs

When it comes to dogs, to be specific, they have no moral code of conduct created for them to follow.

Unlike humans who refer to the Bible or any other religious book on what is right and what is not.

This means dogs cannot sin because they do not understand the need for a moral code of conduct.

Yet they have not been created to internalize and comprehend such matters.

 

Dogs do not have the concept of having actual intelligence

Before understanding this point, it may seem that the point being pushed across is that dogs are not clever.

Dogs are pretty clever thus making them domesticated dogs.

They can also undergo serious training to work with humans from sectors such as narcotics in airports all the way to guide dogs to those with special needs.

 

Dogs seem to stop being existent after their death

This means once they die, religion does not mention places like dog heaven or hell which stems from the point that for animals and plants in general there is no exact moral way of living.

Once they die, they simply stop existing, at least for us which is why they don’t get prayers from religious leaders to take their souls into a better place.

 

 

Learn More:

Will Dogs Go Extinct

 

 

All the above is why the souls of dogs and other living organisms (except humans) are deemed as materialistic souls.

Below is why human souls are considered more valuable and more spiritual as compared to the rest:

 

A human soul is said to be spiritual because of the ability to discern between emotions such as love and some aspects such as wisdom.

This simply means that the spirituality of our souls is explained by the ability to choose to love and to be caring all at the same time when using logic as the base of most of your judgment as compared to dogs.

 

A human spirit is also said to be immortal because it is meant to remain forever whether by going to either hell or heaven or in some cases purgatory.

This is because the human spirit is said to not decompose at any point in time.

The human body is quite easy to decompose as compared to its soul which is now spiritual.

 

What exactly does the bible say about dogs?

dog holding a bible

1. Dogs in the Bible times have been considered in different lights throughout the Old Testament and even in other Apocrypha books used in religion.

In some places in the bible, they refer to dogs as companions, and in some other places, dogs are used as insults to other people.

 

2. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew discovered that the dog is the only animal that was being domesticated and could bark to alert the homeowners against intruders in their compound.

This is the reason why they were used as guard dogs and hunting dogs as well. This is found in the book of Isaiah in the Old Testament.

 

3. It is also seen that in the Bible, it was acceptable to beat up dogs and be physically abusive towards them.

This is found in the book of Proverbs.

 

4. Around the same time, it was also insulting to call someone a dog.

The irony of this is that one of God’s prophets, one who succeeded Moses was named after the Hebrew name for the dog.

The Hebrew name for a dog was ‘celeb’, the prophet was called Caleb.

 

5. In other instances, such as the Greeks and the Romans, they are seen to treasure their pets especially dogs.

They have some practice where they bury their pets with engraved tombstones.

This action would lead us to believe they thought that a decent burial was required to make sure that their dogs got a decent afterlife in the next world.

 

6. There a few instances where dogs have been described as animals that eat leftovers from humans, thus eat leftovers under tables.

In some extreme cases, they have been referred to as scavengers that eat dead bodies after their death.

These were mainly deaths that God had cursed the one to die.

 

Conclusion

According to the Catholic doctrines; all living organisms have souls whether materialistic or even spiritual ones.

They all have something that remains after their death, as for the rest of where they go and what happens, we mere mortal souls do not have the answers to that for it is beyond our knowledge.

 

See Also

Russel

A pet owner who loves to share useful facts and information about a variety of animals.