and thus death spread to all men because they had all sinned.”​—Romans 5:12.

Having forfeited perfection, Adam could not pass it on to his offspring. From the start his children were born with weaknesses. The outworkings of sin in his body made it impossible for him to father offspring without limitations and weaknesses. This harmonizes with the Bible’s statement at Job 14:4: “Who can produce someone clean out of someone unclean? There is not one.” Hence, the aging and death of humans today can be traced initially to the sin inherited from Adam. As his offspring, they are receiving the wages that sin pays​—death.​—Romans 6:23.

What does that really mean? Does death mark the end of all one’s life processes, or is there some part of man that lives on? Does conscious existence continue after the death of the body?

Chapter 5

What Is This Thing Called “Soul”?

WHAT are you? Are you, in effect, two persons in one​—a human body with a brain, heart, eyes, ears, tongue, and so forth, but also having within you an invisible spiritual person completely separate from your fleshly organism and that is called the “soul”? If so, what happens when you die? Does just your body die, while the soul continues living? How can you know for sure?

Nearly all religions teach that, in the case of humans, death is not the end of all existence.