Job 32 · a question people ask
"The Spirit of the Almighty gives them understanding" (32:8). What is the Hebrew word behind Spirit here, and where else does it come?
Start with the words. In Hebrew 32:8 has two words where the WEB has spirit: "a spirit in man" is ruach, and "the Spirit of the Almighty" is nishmat Shaddai, from neshamah, which Brown-Driver-Briggs gives as "breath" (tap spirit, Spirit of the Almighty). Elihu uses the same two words together again: "The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life" (33:4), where breath of the Almighty is the same nishmat Shaddai. Job has both words in one verse too: "the spirit of God is in my nostrils" (27:3), with neshamah earlier in the verse. Elihu has the two words together again in "his spirit and his breath" (34:14). And neshamah is the word of Genesis, where the LORD God "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life" (Genesis 2:7). These verses sit beside 32:8 as parallels. The chapter doesn't say more about what Elihu meant, or whether what he claims for himself is so, and these notes don't decide either.
The verses
“But there is a spirit in man, and the Spirit of the Almighty gives them understanding.”
“The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.”
“(for the length of my life is still in me, and the spirit of God is in my nostrils);”
“If he set his heart on himself, if he gathered to himself his spirit and his breath,”