Pneuma πνεῦμα

Pneuma (πνεῦμα), spirit — and, inseparably, breath.

Held apart from psyche

This corpus grades pneuma above psyche, and Hekhal never renders either with the other’s English. Psyche is “soul”, pneuma is “spirit”, and collapsing the pair destroys the doctrine the grading exists to express. At Refutatio 5.7.7 the soul is given to the moulded figure so that it may suffer; the spirit is what one is reborn of.

The place the English gives up

At 5.9.3 the report says the begotten one is called a piper (syriktēs) “because what is begotten is a harmonious pneuma” — and then quotes John 4:24, “God is pneuma”.

The argument only works if the word means breath and spirit at once: a piper produces harmony by breathing. English has to pick one, and picking either makes the sentence limp. Hekhal renders “spirit” and states the loss here, on the same principle applied to the eight etymological puns elsewhere in the report — the conclusion of the argument is preserved, and the apparatus carries the mechanism.

Rendering

“Spirit”, never “soul” (that is psyche) and never “wind”. “Breath” is available where the physical image is plainly dominant, and is used sparingly.

Hekhal Editorial. "Pneuma." Hekhal: An Open Reference for Esoteric Tradition. Last modified May 2, 2026. https://hekhal.org/lexicon/pneuma.

Hekhal Editorial. 2026. "Pneuma." Hekhal: An Open Reference for Esoteric Tradition. https://hekhal.org/lexicon/pneuma.

Hekhal Editorial. "Pneuma." Hekhal: An Open Reference for Esoteric Tradition, May 2, 2026, hekhal.org/lexicon/pneuma.

Hekhal Editorial. (2026). Pneuma. Hekhal: An Open Reference for Esoteric Tradition. https://hekhal.org/lexicon/pneuma

@misc{hekhal-lexicon-pneuma-2026,
  author       = {{Hekhal Editorial}},
  title        = {{Pneuma}},
  year         = {2026},
  publisher    = {{Hekhal: An Open Reference for Esoteric Tradition}},
  url          = {https://hekhal.org/lexicon/pneuma},
  urldate      = {[date accessed]}
}