Pneuma
translates as “spirit,” which to our ears sounds immaterial, internal, or
psychological. Ancient pneuma for all but hardcore Platonists was very
fine matter, a material substance. Star bodies were made of it. According to
Paul, Christ had a pneumatic body before appearing in his fleshly one (the
“god-form” and “slave-form” of Phil 2:6-7), and regained it at his
resurrection, previewing the sōmata pneumatika into which his followers
whether living or dead will transform at his (fast-approaching) eschatological
return (1 Cor 15:20-52 for the eschatological panorama; spiritual body
specifically, v. 44; explicitly not a flesh-and-blood body, v. 50).
Through immersion in Christ’s name, his followers gain pneuma. Their
transformation is proleptically at work: they are “in” Christ (who has a
cosmic, pneumatic body) and Christ’s pneuma is in them. This empowers
Christ followers to heal, prophesy, speak in angelic tongues, perceive through
divination, and control lower and lesser spirits—a community empowerment that confirms
Paul and his colleagues in their conviction that Christ is soon to return and
that the end of the ages is at hand (e.g. 1 Cor 12 and 14 passim; evidently,
male angels are present on such occasions, 11:10). (Paula Fredriksen, “Paul,
the Perfectly Righteous Pharisee,” in The Pharisees, ed. Joseph Sievers
and Amy-Jill Levine [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2021], 128-29 n. 38)
