Joshua 10:35
And they took it on that day, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein he utterly destroyed that day, according to all that he had done to Lachish. And they took it on that day, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein he utterly destroyed that day, according to all that he had done to Lachish.
It tells of Israel taking the city in a single day, striking it with the sword and wiping out everyone inside just as had been done to Lachish. The souls destroyed there were the people themselves, the whole persons living in the city when it fell. That repeated use for people slain in city after city shows the first sense of soul in Scripture is the whole being, the living person, the entire man. Those souls were cut down and killed with the sword, which proves they were mortal persons who could die and not a deathless part living on apart from the body. The word behind it is nephesh, here meaning dead souls once slain, as Adam became a living soul when breath entered him, so the soul is the man himself and can be destroyed and killed.
Conquest Story and Setting
Israel took the city on that day, smote it with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls in it that day, doing to it just as had been done to Lachish. The event belongs to the account of Israel's battles and conquest of several small kingdoms in Canaan, whose inhabitants were not spared because letting them continue would have perpetuated a like people. Joshua carried the conquest of the city through completely, striking down its people that day just as at Lachish, with none left remaining, illustrating thoroughness in finishing the work of battle.
The conquest was led by Joshua, whose name means saviour, one of the two of his generation who wholly followed the Lord through the forty years of temptation in the wilderness. He entered his greatest work at about eighty years of age when he led Israel through the Jordan, divided the land, and set them in a fair way to conquer all foes and find the promised rest. The victory was won with the Captain of Jehovah's hosts with him, as at Jericho where the invisible army of God leveled the walls, showing how soon Israel might have possessed the whole land had they been faithful. Failure to trust brought defeat as at Ai and afterward general backsliding, repeated captivity, and years lived in adversity that might have been lived in prosperity.
Meaning of Soul
In this verse souls means the people or persons who were in the city, the whole persons who lived there and were destroyed when the city was taken. The souls were the inhabitants themselves who were killed in the city, not conscious beings existing apart from the people themselves. Their destruction is described, not the separation or survival of an immortal soul.
The repeated use of souls for those destroyed, over and over in Joshua 10 for people killed in various cities, gives the primary meaning of soul in Scripture as the whole being, the whole creature, a living person, the entire man. All the souls utterly destroyed means all the persons were slain. It is the same use as man became a living soul and eight souls were saved by water, and the term living soul in the original applies even to the lowest kinds of creatures possessing animal life.
Those souls were killed and utterly destroyed with the edge of the sword, showing that souls are living persons who can be killed and die. Soul here can mean a whole living person, rather than an inherently immortal, deathless part, immortal being, or conscious entity separate from the body. The inhabitants of the city were destroyed, not merely some separate part of them, which supports that the soul can die.
The verse does not establish that a soul exists separately from the body or is immortal. The souls in the captured cities were the persons who were slain, not immortal beings distinct from them. The Hebrew word translated all the souls therein is nephesh, which can refer to a person or the whole living human, and here the expression is dead soul, proving that a soul can be lifeless and killed. As Adam became a living soul when the breath of life entered him, these were dead souls when slain, so the soul is the whole man himself, not a separate inner man breathed into him, and is liable to be destroyed and killed.