You are not alone.
Yes, indeed – a catwoman for the ages. I was happy to see she’s still alive and kicking.
I am a little ways in ** you do not have permission to see this link ** and so far, so good. If I don’t post his insights along the way, I’ll be sure to summarize his conclusions when I finish.
Levison believes that the seeds of the Holy Spirit can be found in the Tanakh.
Although holy spirit is explicitly mentioned only three times (Psalms 51:11; Isaiah 63:10-11), ruach — sometimes translated as God’s spirit or divine breath—appears in various roles such as prophecy (e.g. Ezekiel) and leadership (e.g. Moses and the Judges) among others.
One of the central themes in the Tanakh is God’s liberation of Israel, particularly in the story of the Exodus, where we see the divine presence manifested in pillars, an angel, and God’s presence/face. Over time, this narrative was transformed into a broader understanding of God’s active role in both liberation and restoration.
Jeremiah 16:14-17 foretells a future deliverance akin to the Exodus, emphasizing God’s redemptive action.
Ezekiel 20:33-35 portrays God’s active presence in guiding and redeeming Israel.
Isaiah 40:1-55:13 highlights the ruach as a source of divine assurance and renewal, especially in the context of restoration.
The author views two passages as being central in understanding the evolving role of the ruach. The first is Isaiah 63:7-14 where we see the spirit’s guiding and protective role during the Exodus. Angel and God’s face/presence are fused into the angel of God’s presence with the ruach emerging as the ultimate agent of deliverance. The spirit not only rescues Israel but provides rest. The second is Haggai 2:4-5 in which the spirit offers hope and encouragement to a community rebuilding the temple after the Babylonian exile. Haggai emphasizes the Spirit standing among the people, linking its presence to the Exodus and at the same time underscoring its enduring and sustaining role.
The great conceptual breakthrough of the 2nd Temple Period was the idea of Divine Mediation. As God became more holy and distant, his manifestations became more apparent – and necessary. What a wonderful metaphor, ruach! Both breath and spirit, born in a world where such a metaphor describes reality, reduced by us to a complex figure of speech.
A hypothetical reconstructed explanation (less than 100 words)
-that the numerous names, spirit, and word of God were archaic paleo-hebrew concepts of the Lative, Locative, and Ablative cases. The specific words used as God were the case itself, and not the spellings. There wasn’t a true case where the spelling was changed. This interpretation of the Hebrew texts was lost in grammar after the Babylonian captivity and lost even more during the Septuagint translation because the Greek at the time of the LXX also did not use a genuine Lative, Locative, and Ablative case spelling.
ELOHIM:GOD.
Ablative case of Seperation: “Separation” of Elohim from mankind and the sky and land. The Elohim exist somewhere else: The Origin, the Heavens. εν αρχη
LORD:YHWH.
Locative case: “Within” the sky and land, i.e. heaven and earth, a Being of the Elohim was manifested within.
SPIRIT of GOD.
Ablative of Instrument/Means and Locative: a Being of the Elohim was manifested within the sky and land.
WORD of YHWH.
Ablative of Instrument/Means and Locative: similar to SPIRIT of GOD.
and now i runsaway fast before the imputations of heresy hear of it demanding more evidence and proof,
😰🏃
I wonder what the relation of the rauch of Isaiah, speaking of the exodus, has to:
“So the Lord said to Moses, “Take Joshua son of Nun, a man in whom is the spirit, and lay your hand upon him;” (Numbers 27:18)
and
“Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, because Moses had laid his hands on him; and the Israelites obeyed him, doing as the Lord had commanded Moses.” (Deuteronomy 34:9)
This transition of power also has some spirit entity transferred. As Moses goes to his death, Joshua (Jesus) takes over. So I wonder if this is what Isaiah was referring to, or even if this spirit was the sole leader before the names Moses and Joshua are attached to the storylines.
Mimicking that, in what I think is a reworking of the Moses-Joshua dynamic, in Elijah-Elisha, as Elijah journeys to his death we have:
“When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me what I may do for you, before I am taken from you.” Elisha said, “Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit.” 2 Kings 2:9
and
“When the company of prophets who were at Jericho saw him at a distance, they declared, “The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha.” They came to meet him and bowed to the ground before him.”
yet this is not the “spirit of the Lord”, since…
“They said to him, “See now, we have fifty strong men among your servants; please let them go and seek your master; it may be that the spirit of the Lord has caught him up and thrown him down on some mountain or into some valley.” He responded, “No, do not send them.””
Of course these two transitions of power occur on the plain of Moab across from the Jordan, where Jesus of Nazareth receives the Spirit in the form of a dove as the prophet John baptizes him in the Jordan.
This transition of power also has some spirit entity transferred. As Moses goes to his death, Joshua (Jesus) takes over. So I wonder if this is what Isaiah was referring to, or even if this spirit was the sole leader before the names Moses and Joshua are attached to the storylines.
If you would, please expand a little more on the above so I can better understand what you’re suggesting.
Just a note on “however this was not the spirit of the Lord”. I recall reading in the NT somewhere, roughly, that one can give/impart spirit (of the Lord) without loss. Say, like laughter, or, maybe, a cold virus. Just a note. I would want to ✔️ further. Maybe that’s a change from the OT.
Does that make sense, or am I misunderstanding the context?
Just a note on “however this was not the spirit of the Lord”. I recall reading in the NT somewhere, roughly, that one can give/impart spirit (of the Lord) without loss. Say, like laughter, or, maybe, a cold virus. Just a note. I would want to ✔️ further. Maybe that’s a change from the OT
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But, thinking about it, what about DNA? John 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
Too much? Anachronistic? But the concept is there. . .
BJH1960, I hope I’m not getting toward being troublesome or off thread, but looking up Psalm 51:11, I find a prayer to blot out sin. V. 51:13 is prayer for the Holy Spirit to remain. Ruach Qadeshcha. (My Biblical Hebrew is working.) I’m trying to get the gist of your post #42 above. Does Levenson cite 51:11?
Jill, of course, you’re not being troublesome or off thread.
Very glad to hear that your Biblical Hebrew is working!
Yes, he does cite Psalm 51:11. The verses in the two languages are numbered differently. I see from the ** you do not have permission to see this link ** that the introductory note or title is included as part of the verse.
Levison’s basic premise is that the Christian understanding of the Holy Spirit originates from Jewish tradition and that we can see an evolution of the ruach in the Tanakh from a temporary presence to a more permanent and enduring one.
One ongoing problem with references to the the spirit in the Bible is the insistence by translators of capitalization and making it into a proper noun. Never ‘the spirit of God’ or ‘the spirit of holiness’ but, The Holy Spirit. This Trinitarian lens distorts the original meaning which is probably mostly intentional of course.
But then there is Paul’s peculiar reference in Philippians 1:19 –
…for I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my salvation.
The NRSV transforms it into a proper noun again of course but it is by no means clear that this reference is to the same thing as ‘the spirit of God’, much less the Third Person of the Trinity.
So, initially, my questioning would start with the ruach moving over the waters at Gen. 1:2. This is seen in the “Priestly” version of creation by a “transcendent” God Spirit. Then in Gen 2:7, God blows the ruach/breath of life into man’s nostrils. This is the Yahwist version; and we do see a “spirit of man” in the books but not especially identified at Gen 2:7. The two writers P & Y are weaved together throughout the Torah. We know the prophet Ezekiel was priestly school and the “priestly” manifestations of God are dreams and visions – seems Ezekiel combines dreams and visions (Priestly) with the messengers of God (that would be the interpreter angel) (Yahwist). And the Spirit is what places him into the vision and in the company of the angel interpreter.
And a problem does arise that there is no capitalization in all of this.
Well, so, is God to have a ruach, man a ruach, and then there is the ruach qadeshcha?
Jill, the NRSV really flubs Gen 1,1.
When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters…
A wind from God? Not wrong but sadly diminished. Much better to have simply transliterated ruach and in the note put “breath, spirit, wind – it means ALL of those things!”
Ruach is like Logos. Translators have to make a choice. Every choice is correct but still wrong because it’s not enough.
This is from N. Scott Momaday’s book, The Man Made of Words. I think it kind of captures what Stephen is saying:
“It was when I was five years old that my grandfather made me a bow and some arrows. The grass was young and I was on horseback. A thunderstorm was coming from where the sun goes down, and just as I was riding into the woods along a creek, there was a kingbird sitting on a limb. This was not a dream, it happened. And I was going to shoot at the kingbird with the bow my grandfather made, when the bird spoke and said: “The clouds all over are one-sided.” Perhaps it meant that all the clouds were looking at me. And then it said: “Listen! A voice is calling you! Then I looked up at the clouds, and two men were coming there, headfirst like arrows slanting down; and as they came, they sang a sacred song and the thunder was like drumming. I will sing it for you. The song and the drumming were like this:
“Behold, a sacred voice is calling you;
All over the sky a sacred voice is calling.”
I sat there gazing at them, and they were coming from the place where the giant lives (north). But when they were very close to me, they wheeled about toward where the sun goes down, and suddenly they were geese. Then they were gone, and the rain came with a big wind and a roaring.
I did not tell this vision to any one. I like to think about it, but I was afraid to tell it.”
Black Elk Speaks as told to John G. Neihardt (Flaming Rainbow) by Nicholas Black Elk
So, elementally, I think.
Well, so, is God to have a ruach, man a ruach, and then there is the ruach qadeshcha?
In reading through ** you do not have permission to see this link ** I was struck by:
What the Bible generally calls “Spirit of God” is called in the Talmud and Midrash “Holy Spirit” due to the disinclination to the use of the Tetragrammaton.
Anyway, I did a little searching and found ** you do not have permission to see this link ** which definitely looks of interest, and which hopefully I’ll get through in the next week or so.
BDEhrman
FreedomBen
evgendob
Robert