In Search of the Spirit

""Jack Levison's first volume of essays on the Spirit was devoted to canonical texts. His second volume is devoted to Jewish writings of the Hellenistic and early Roman periods. Levison is one of the few scholars who is equally adept with Hebrew and Greek, with the Dead Sea Scrolls and Philo. The three essays on Philo in this volume amount to the most sustained treatment available of the philosopher's view of inspiration."" --John J. Collins, professor emeritus of Old Testament, Yale Divinity School ""Taking the reader on a grand journey through early Jewish writings in search of the Spirit, Jack Levison decisively and once and for all proves all those wrong who have claimed with Hermann Gunkel that ancient Judaism is bereft of the Spirit. A masterful, authoritative, and inspiring treatment of the diverse notions of the Spirit in ancient Judaism. Levison puts the Spirit back to where it belongs, at the center of our reading of ancient Judaism."" --Matthias Henze, professor of Hebrew Bible and early Judaism, Rice University ""Jack Levison's masterful work will invite you to take seriously the biblical roots of Christian pneumatology. The result is an invitation to think about pneumatology first from below, from the core of all that is meant to be human, rather than from the heights of trinitarian dogma. This is a provocative read from start to finish."" --Frank D. Macchia, professor of systematic theology, Vanguard University