Page:A critical and exegetical commentary on Genesis (1910).djvu/120

 up the waters (T$O$, IEz., and a few moderns), but the divine Spirit, figured as a bird brooding over its nest, and perhaps symbolising an immanent principle of life and order in the as yet undeveloped chaos. Comp. Milton, Paradise Lost, i. 19 ff., vii. 233 ff. It is remarkable, however, if this be the idea, that no further effect is given to it in the sequel. (1) The idea of the Spirit as formative principle of the kosmos, while in the line of the OT doctrine that he is the source of life (Ps. 33$6$ 104$29f.$), yet goes much beyond the ordinary representation, and occurs only here (possibly Is. 40$13$). (2) The image conveyed by the word brooding is generally considered to rest on the widespread cosmogonic speculation of the world-egg (so even De. and Di.), in which the organised world was as it were hatched from the fluid chaos. If so, we have here a fragment of mythology not vitally connected with the main idea of the narrative, but introduced for the sake of its religious suggestiveness. In the source from which this myth was borrowed the brooding power might be a bird-like deity (Gu.), or an abstract principle like the Greek 🇬🇷, the Phœn. 🇬🇷, etc.: for this the Heb. writer, true to his monotheistic faith, substitutes the Spirit of God, and thereby transforms a "crude material representation into a beautiful and suggestive figure" (Dri. Gen. 5).

due to an original female personification.—] Gk. Vns. and V express merely the idea of motion (🇬🇷, 🇬🇷, ferebatur); T$O$ ('blow' or 'breathe'); S. Jerome (Quæst.): "incubabat sive confovebat in similitudinem volucris ova calore animantis." It is impossible to say whether 'brood' or 'hover' is the exact image here, or in Dt. 32$11$,—the only other place where the Pi. occurs (the Qal in Jer. 23$9$ may be a separate root). The Syriac vb. has great latitude of meaning; it describes, e.g., the action of Elisha in laying himself on the body of the dead child (2 Ki. 4$34$); and is used of angels hovering over the dying Virgin. It is also applied to a waving of the hands (or of fans) in certain ecclesiastical functions, etc. (see Payne Smith, Thes. 3886).