Yes they do, but not in the same way a human does. Humans have a tetrapolar, mostly individualized soul. Animals have a group-soul, as do humans in a lesser degree, but the animals are nowhere nearly as individualized as humans. None the less they do have souls and these souls evolve the same as ours. You can look at a tiger and know the behavior of basically all tigers. You cannot look at a single person and figure out how his family behaves completely, let alone the rest of the race.
So highest doesn't mean best, just the one who expresses itself most. I can buy that. But a lot of our expressions are brought on by other things in nature. We feel beauty when we see a butterfly or a flower. Then we act on that. So do we draw our ability to express soul from other life's expression of their soul?
Not sure exactly what you're asking, but to give an example, humans have the ability to act according to wisdom. That is the main difference. Animals act mostly out of natural instincts. The free will of an animal is expressed to a much lesser degree. As humans, we have the capability to act only by the dictates of the soul's wisdom, as opposed to acting by habit, natural instinct, desires, emotions, etc. We can transcend all of those things and live only by pure spiritual wisdom. That is what makes the human an ideal habitat for the soul. There are higher beings in the universe, angelic beings, gods, etc., but it's still preferable to be a human. The Buddha said that out of all the places that you can be born in the universe, places like our earth, which are mixes of good and evil, are the most beneficial. This is because there is enough bad here to spur us onto the spiritual path, to awaken in us dispassion for earthly things, but it's also good enough so that there is nothing that will keep you from advancing spiritually if you so choose to do it. Places that are too good, heavenly worlds, there is less incentive to strive for enlightenment/liberation, and places that are worse, worlds full of sin and evil, the people are too busy trying to survive, they have no time to seek God.
I believe a soul is just energy as everything else. When a thought is produced, that thought is a form of energy; you could think of it as being released but it isn't released, it is just here and everywhere always, without time. Those thoughts in whole make a soul because every thought ever is always here. This goes for non living as well because all of existence is only one energy, meaning if anything has a soul; everything has a soul. Life in general is just a soul.
pretty close to the truth. don't get hung up on all that classification. classification is a crutch for fake thinkers. cockroaches have better souls than most of you humans. contemplate humility. More or less correct. Hey guess what? "there is no such thing" is what we call dogma. sorry, but you just shot yourself in your own foot with your own dogma. how do you know there is no such thing? is color not real because a blind man can't see it? How do you know so much? You can't even use 100% of your brain yet. No, that's not how religion started. You weren't even there. I was. Religion started when we created Keepers of the Flame, the first non-killing occupation in the world. Ancient humans got along just perfectly fine without religion for tens of thousands of years dude. It still amazes me sometimes that most of you still think that the purpose of religion is to explain shit. Well, it's not. Ancient humans were a lot better at understanding the world in a figurative sense then you modern, stupid humans. You guys are so literal about everything. So hung up on right and wrong. I just have to shake my head sometimes at this one. Just remember that all the buddhas still love you ok? Yes, this is pretty close too. Nice work. Ok so, i just wanted to know before we get into it. How can you guys talk about souls without defining what a soul is? And what's with all the classifications and concepts of "higher level" souls? You are all nothing but motes in God's eye. When you realize how low you really are on the universal totem pole, then you'll start to see things different. If a pathetic weak being like you can have a soul, then everything there is can have one too. But like i said, you guys haven't even agreed on what a soul is....... My suggestion is that a lot of you should drop spirituality and philosophy altogether and instead, go study linguistics, history and quantum physics. These 3 things should be prerequisites before even attempting to delve into matters of the soul. And no, i'm not here to spoon feed you wisdom. That's cheating! You gotta work for your own enlightenment!
I believe there's an oversoul of the earth in itself like tree's, insects, and other living things. I think the main word here is "LIVING". Nothing ever really dies (in my spiritual aspect), so I guess that means that everything including the earth itself has a soul, and even the universe.
Anything that is conscious, IMO, has a soul. All life is connected to the Tao. Even the smallest of organisms...
But just because the human mind is limited in what can be understood, does not rule out the mysterious. Also, one cannot look at the concept of the soul with the ego...
Souls are a manifestation of the Energy we all come from....this Earth is a Soul 'school'..we are here to learn.... As for animals...that arent humans...lol...who knows..it depends on if you believe in reincarnation...I only know that I am experiencing it as a human....and need to live it like that...it can be nothing else. I prefer not to dwell on any afterlife conjecture..as we are here now on this Earth to make a difference.
i think souls have some sense of degree of sophistication but id say anything with the drive of life pushing on their existance has a soul, so planets and trees too, bacteria and fungus and yes yes blacks and gingers as well