the _Torah_ or the
_Spirit of God_. The older term was retained only in liturgical formulas,
such as: "Who created the heavens by His Word," or, "Who by His Word
created the twilight and by Wisdom openeth the gates of heaven."(596)

3. As has been shown above,(597) Wisdom is described in the Bible as the
first of all created beings, the assistant and counselor of God in the
work of creation. Then we see that Ben Sira identifies Wisdom with the
Torah.(598) Thus the Torah, too, was raised to a cosmic power, the sum and
substance of all wisdom. In fact, the Torah, like the Logos of Plato, was
regarded as comprising the ideas or prototypes of all things as in a
universal plan. The Torah is the divine pattern for the world. In such a
connection _Torah_ is far from meaning the Law, as Weber asserts.(599) It
means rather the heavenly book of instruction which contains all the
wisdom of the ages, and which God himself used as guide at the Creation.
God is depicted as an architect with His plan drafted before He began the
erection of the edifice,--a conception which avoids all danger of deifying
the Logos.

4. Several other conceptions, however, do not belong at all to the
intermediary powers, where Weber places them.(600) This applies to
_Metatron_ (identical with the Persian Mithras),(601) whom the mystic lore
calls the charioteer of the heavenly throne-chariot, represented by the
rabbis as the highest of the angels, leader of the heavenly hosts, and
vice-regent of God. That no cosmic power was ascribed to him is proved by
the very fact of his identification with Enoch, whom the pre-Talmudic
Haggadah describes as taken up into heaven and changed into an angel of
the highest rank, standing near God's throne.(602)

5. The only real mediator between God and man is the _Spirit of God_,
which is mentioned in connection with both the creation and divine
revelation. In the first chapter of Genesis the Spirit of God is described
as hovering over the gloom of chaos like the mother bird over the egg,
ready to hatch out the nascent world.(603) God breathed His spirit into
the body of man, to make him also god-like.(604) The prophet likewise is
inspired by the spirit of God to see visions and to hear the divine
message.(605) Thus the spirit of God has two aspects; it is the cosmic
principle which imbues primal matter with life; it is a link between the
soul of man and God on high. The view of Ezekiel was but one step from
this, to conc