Humankind was created with a heart, mind, and soul, all three of these things matter greatly and play different roles. It’s necessary for humans to have a heart, mind, as well as soul to function properly. Even without one of them, humans can malfunction and not be able to function the way they are supposed to, thus humans are created with all three of them.
- Mind
The mind is as complicated as the heart and soul. The mind is a part of a human that gives the ability to think rationally, and to feel emotions. It’s described as the faculty of consciousness and thought. It’s strange to think that, the brain is physical in nature, it is merely the organ but the mind is what forms our consciousness, and can’t be detected in an MRI, but the fact that the mind is in conscious form is accepted universally.
In the language of Buddha and Pali, the teachings that are written down were based on Sanskrit, so that we can look at the Sanskrit terms and understand them, moreover Pali was also derived from Sanskrit.
Both Pali and Sanskrit define the mind by the same word which is: mana and it came from the root verb man, which means “to think.” Although, if we think about it, the mind has more territory compared to the intellect which includes senses and emotions as it’s a response to feelings that our thoughts arise in the process of labeling and understanding them.
- Heart
The Heart is a complex organ, in biology heart is just an organ, although if we look at the spiritual perspective, it’s quite interesting. The heart is an organ that is the size of a fist, it pumps blood throughout the body. A heart has four chambers that are powered by electrical impulses, moreover, it’s made of muscles. The function of the heart is to circulate blood throughout the body, thus maintaining blood pressure.
The meaning of heart in spirituality is profound and takes a great amount of understanding to comprehend. Many cultures have magnified the importance of following your heart, when they say “listen o your heart” they don’t mean the physical heart, but the spiritual heart. Our spiritual heart is said to be the key to our deepest fulfillment, moreover, it’s a doorway to the profound relationship with the Creator. One defines it as the doorway to peace, gratitude, love, and joy.
- Soul
In many religious, mythological, and philosophical traditions, there’s a belief that the Soul is an incorporeal essence of a living being. The soul or psyche of a living being consists of mental abilities, such as reason, character, memory, thinking, and many more which also depend on the philosophical system. Moreover, in many systems, it’s believed that a soul can be mortal or immortal.
Greek philosophers like Socrates, Aristotle, and Plato comprehended the phenomena of the soul, that it must have logical faculty which is considered the most divine exercise of human actions. Socrates at his defense trial explained that his teachings are nothing but just an exhortation for his fellow Athenians to excel in the matters of the psyche because every bodily good depends on its excellence. Moreover, Aristotle reasoned saying, a man’s body is his matter and his soul is his form; in simpler words, the body is a collection of elements and the soul is the essence.
Let’s have a deeper look.
Differences between Mind, Heart, and Soul
We all know how the heart works in biology, but let’s look at all these three entities from the perspective of spirituality. Here is a table that will help you grasp the differences easily, although all three of them are immensely different and play different roles, thus it’s quite complicated to differentiate among them.
| Mind | Heart | Soul |
| It’s a faculty of consciousness and thought | The spiritual heart is the key to our deepest feeling of fulfillment | The soul comprises mental abilities, such as reason, character, memory, thinking, and many more |
| The mind takes up more territory than the intellect | The spiritual heart is a doorway to creating a meaningful relationship with the Creator | A soul can only be mortal or immortal. |
What is the difference between mind and heart?
Heart and mind both are complex. The heart is related to emotional sentiments like joy or excitement, while the mind is related to rational or logical thinking. The heart is of a physical nature, but on the other hand, the mind is in conscious form.
The mind has the ability to make decisions without anything clouding its judgment, whereas heart follows the sentimental values.
Here is a video that explains how the heart and mind work.
What is the difference between the soul and the mind?
The soul is an incorporeal essence and the mind is in conscious form, meaning they both can’t be seen with the naked eye or through any technology. The mind has the ability to think logically, while the soul is the entity inside the body which makes it alive.
The mind has potential in the sense that, it’s actually capable of “creating reality”, this is the reason we say, the mind is the most powerful weapon. The soul is as important as the mind because without a soul there won’t be a “living” being and the mind will be of no use.
Is the soul in the heart or mind?
The soul is a complex entity to comprehend as we haven’t seen the soul with our eyes. Although, Pythagoras described the soul as comprising of three-parts which are intelligence, reason, and passion. The roots of the soul extend from the heart to the brain as passion is located in the heart and intelligence and reason are located in the brain or mind if you will.
It’s also said that from the only brain alone our joys, laughter, pleasures, as well as sorrows, pains, and griefs arise. Moreover, through the brain we see, think, as well as recognize the ugly from the beautiful, and the bad from the good. As the brain encompasses all the abilities, the heart becomes merely an organ that pumps blood. As I said learning and differentiating among soul, mind, and heart is complex and they’re still being studied.
What is more important: mind or heart?
It’s evident that both the heart and mind are important. Both of them play a different role, and if one of them is not working, a living being isn’t whole.
When we say mind, we don’t mean the brain, the mind is in conscious form and the brain is in physical form. The same goes for the heart, when we say heart, it usually refers to what heart means spiritually.
When we compare heart and mind, it gets clearer which is the master. As it’s said in Hippocrates: On the sacred disease, Quoted by Prioreschi, “Men ought to know that from the brain, and from the brain alone, arise our pleasures, joys, laughter, and jests, as well as our sorrows, pains, griefs, and tears. Through it, in particular, we think, see, hear and distinguish the ugly from the beautiful, the bad from the good, the pleasant from the unpleasant… I hold that the brain is the most powerful organ of the human body… wherefore I assert that the brain is the interpreter of consciousness.”
If the mind consists of everything that the heart can do then the mere purpose of the heart is to pump blood. As Sadghuru (an Indian guru) said, “never did ever heart generate any thought or intention.”
Does the heart control the mind?
In biology, the heart is merely an organ that pumps blood, but the mind is in a conscious form that evidently has immense power. As Prioreschi quoted from Hippocrates: On the sacred disease, only the brain (mind) can arise emotions like joys, pleasures, grief, and pains. However, we are told that such emotions are located in the heart, the only conclusion we can get from this is that the mind is the one that controls the heart.
Moreover, the heart is considered as an insight into our fulfillments, but not logical reasoning. Whereas the mind is said to have all the emotions as well as logical reasoning, thus the mind is in charge without any doubt.
To Conclude
The mind has been described by many philosophers as the faculty of consciousness and thought. The heart is considered a doorway to peace, joy, and many other emotions, moreover it’s also a way to forge a relationship with the Creator. Furthermore, the Soul is an incorporeal essence of a living being and it can only be mortal or immortal.
Mind, heart, and soul are the most perplexing entities and a huge amount of understanding is needed to differentiate among them. Many philosophers have studied them and come to the conclusion, but still, due to their profoundness, they’re being studied.
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