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The Shekhinah (Biblical Hebrew: שכינה šekīnah; also Romanized Shekina(h), Schechina(h), Shechina(h)) is the English transliteration of a Hebrew word meaning "dwelling" or "settling" and denotes the dwelling or settling of the divine presence of God. This term does not occur in the Bible, and is from rabbinic literature. [47]: 148 [48] [49]
Pneuma (πνεῦμα) is an ancient Greek word for "breath", and in a religious context for "spirit". [1] [2] It has various technical meanings for medical writers and philosophers of classical antiquity, particularly in regard to physiology, and is also used in Greek translations of ruach רוח in the Hebrew Bible, and in the Greek New Testament.
The Hebrew Bible contains the term "spirit of God" (ruach elochim) which by Jews is interpreted in the sense of the might of a unitary God. [citation needed] This interpretation is different from the Nicene Christian conception of the Holy Spirit as one person of the Trinity. [2]
In Hebrew the word for Spirit (רוח) (ruach) is feminine, (which is used in the Hebrew Bible, as is the feminine word "shekhinah" in rabbinic literature, to indicate the presence of God, Arabic: سكينة sakina, a word mentioned six times in the Quran).
What the Hebrew Bible calls "Spirit of God" and "Spirit of Elohim" is called in the Talmud and Midrash "Holy Spirit" (ruacḥ ha-kodesh). Although the expression "Holy Spirit" occurs in Ps. 51:11 and in Isa. 63:10–11, it had not yet acquired quite the same meaning which was attached to it in rabbinical literature: in the latter it is ...
The ruach elohim which moves over the Deep may therefore mean the "wind/breath of God" (the storm-wind is God's breath in Psalms 18:15 and elsewhere, and the wind of God returns in the Flood story as the means by which God restores the earth), or God's "spirit", a concept which is somewhat vague in the Hebrew bible, or simply a great storm-wind ...
In philosophy and religion, spirit is the vital principle or animating essence within humans or, in some views, all living things.Although views of spirit vary between different belief systems, when spirit is contrasted with the soul, the former is often seen as a basic natural force, principle or substance, whereas the latter is used to describe the organized structure of an individual being ...
Focusing on the holiness of the text, Jewish mystics consider every nuance of the text to be a clue in discovering divine secrets, from the entire text to the accents on each letter. Once one can find such knowledge, one can use the text in mystical rituals to affect both the upper worlds (heavens) and the lower world (our world).