Neshamah · נשמה — the breath-soulנשמה

From neshimah, breathing — and from Genesis 2:7, where God blows nishmat chayim into the nostrils of the clay. The rabbinic reading of that verse is worth keeping: one who blows, blows from within themselves.

Bereshit Rabbah defines it as a person's disposition — their particular character, the thing that makes them recognisably themselves. The later tradition raises it to the intellective soul, the seat of understanding, and files it at Binah and in Beriah, the world of creation.

⚠ It is also the top of the older list. Nefesh–ruach–neshamah is the set the Bible and the Zohar work with, and Sava de-Mishpatim — already a node in this house — is the classic discourse on the three. The two levels above are a later elaboration, and this app marks the seam rather than smoothing it.