Do Clones Have a Soul? 3/9/11

Tonight we had a very interesting discussion.  The question was:  If scientists successfully cloned a human being would the clone have a soul?  Now, just for clarification, we are going to stick completely with the question at hand.  This is not a debate about the ethics of cloning.  We are only questioning whether a clone would have a soul.  We debated this issue for a while and both sides had some very good points.  I had never really thought about it too much, so I didn't really have an answer right off.  I also thought it would be difficult to find an answer, but a little research proved this one to be a slam dunk.  Here is a quote from a website I came across in researching this.  Unfortunately I didn't save the web address, so I guess the source is unknown:

"The answer is undoubtedly “yes.” James 2:26 tells us that if you are alive you have a spirit, a soul: “For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” Just because everything begins with one cell but then yields two persons doesn’t mean one of them does not have a soul. Identical twins, nature’s version of cloning, begin from one cell: “Multiple births in human beings arise either from the simultaneous impregnation of more than one ovum or from the impregnation of a single ovum that divides into two or more parts, each of which develops into a distinct embryo.(7) Is anyone going to realistically argue that one of the twins is short a soul? Let’s tell the truth: we don’t know everything about souls, how God puts it in there, and those kind of matters. But we are sure that God does that, and takes care of it. “Then the dust will return to the earth as it was, And the spirit will return to God who gave it” (Ecclesiastes 12:7)."

Rather than just look at this from an academic standpoint.  What does this mean for each of us?  First off, science has yet to make something from nothing, so we're going to address this as still part of God's creation.  Anyone that God gives life to He is personally concerned for (Ps 139:14).  He cares for each of us.  We are made in His image and we have tremendous value (Gen 1:27).  The fact that God has given us a soul and wants to have a real relationship with us shows us the value He places on us (Ps 95:6-7).  Don't ever let anyone or anything convince you otherwise.