Is it clear in the following sentence the distinction between the "individual" and the "whole"?

Question

Is it clear in the following sentence the distinction between the "individual" (a single person), and the "whole" (nature, universe...everything around, etc)? "People want to be eternal as an individual because they forgot how to be eternal as a whole." I wrote that as an indirect way of saying: People created the soul to be eternal because they forgot that they were already eternal with nature, the universe.

Answer 1

The meaning of the word "whole" is lost within the sentence. There is no indication of what "whole" is without the author providing a definition, either explicitly or through context, if this sentence is part of a larger passage. The below example provides the given meaning for whole, but makes a guess as the exact meaning of "eternal" due to a lack of larger context.

"People conceived of individual souls to be immortal because they forgot how to be eternal with the whole, eternal with nature and the universe."

Answer 2

Hi! I do think it's clear what you mean. However, I would rewrite it as:

People want to be eternal as individuals because they have forgotten how to be eternal as a race.

Note that I have pluralized the adjective "individual" to properly modify the plural noun "people".

Then, I chose the word "race" instead of "whole" to more adequately refer to people as humanity. The word "whole" can be used for many, many different things. In your writing, always prioritize clarity, precision, and specificity so that the reader can have no doubt as to what you are referring in a given sentence or phrase.

I hope this helps!