All Have One Spirit

Qohelet (Ecclesiastes) 3.19 states that humans and animals have the same “ruach”. In most versions of the text this is expressed as “ve-ruach echad lakol”. However, it is clear from the seventeenth century Concordantiae sacrorum Bibliorum hebraicorum that there is a version of the text as “ve-ruach echat lakol”. The first version treats “ruach” as masculine, the second as feminine. In Qohelet 3.21, “ruach” is feminine for both that of humans and that of animals. So, the feminine version of 3.19 is better in context. Why would it have been changed? When “ruach” refers not to breath or wind but to the Divine Breath or Spirit it is almost invariably feminine in the Tanakh. So, as “ruach echat” one can understand that the One Divine Breath is present in both humans and animals. By making it “ruach echad” there may have been an attempt to change the text to remove this equivalence. It is worth noting that the “roshei teivot” of “echat/echad lakol” are “aleph lamed” – the Divine Name El – identifying explicitly the nature of the “ruach” here. This feature further supports the idea that the One Divine Breath/Spirit is the referent in this verse. Thus, with the restoration of the more plausible text, one finds yet another reason to see the Divine in animals and oneself in animals, and to avoid killing them and to avoid any non-vegetarian food.