GHOST.A ghost = Germ. Geist (the h has crept into the word through what Earle calls an Italian affectation of spelling) is a spirit. The word is also used in Old English of the breath, the soul or spirit of a living person, and even a dead body. In AV [Note: Authorized Version.] it occurs only in the phrase give up or yield up the ghost and in the name the Holy Ghost. Wherever in AV [Note: Authorized Version.] hagion holy occurs with pneuma spirit, the tr. [Note: translate or translation.] is Holy Ghost; but when pneuma occurs alone, it is always rendered Spirit or spirit, according as it is supposed to refer to God or to man. See Holy Spirit and Spirit.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909
gōst (נפשׁ, nephesh; πνεῦμα, pneúma) : ?Ghost,? the middle-English word for ?breath,? ?spirit,? appears in the King James Version as the translation of nephesh (?breath,? ?the breath of life,? animal soul or spirit, the vital principle, hence, ?life?), in two places of the Old Testament, namely, Job_11:20, ?the giving up of the ghost? (so the Revised Version (British and American)), and Jer_15:9, ?She hath given up the ghost?; gawa‛, ?to gasp out,? ?expire? (die), is also several times so translated (Gen_25:8, Gen_25:17; Gen_35:29; Gen_49:33; Job_3:11; Job_10:18; Job_13:19; Job_14:10; Lam_1:19). In Apocrypha (Tobit 14:11) psuchḗ is translated in the same way as nephesh in the Old Testament, and in 2 Macc 3:31, en eschátē pnoḗ is rendered ?give up the ghost,? the Revised Version (British and American) ?quite at the last gasp.?
In the New Testament ?to give up the ghost? is the translation of ekpnéō, ?to breathe out? (Mar_15:37, Mar_15:39; Luk_23:46; so the Revised Version (British and American)); of ekpsúchō, ?to breathe out,? ?expire? (Act_5:5, Act_5:10; Act_12:23); in Mat_27:50, aphḗken tō̇ pneúma, and in Joh_19:30, parédōken tō̇ pneúma, are rendered respectively, ?yielded? and ?gave up the ghost,? the Revised Version (British and American) ?yielded up his spirit,? ?gave up his spirit.?
?The Holy Ghost? is also frequent in the King James Version; in the American Standard Revised Version it is invariably changed to ?Holy Spirit,? in the English Revised Version sometimes only, chiefly in the Gospels. See HOLY SPIRIT; SPIRIT.
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.
Mar_15:37 (a) Here and elsewhere the word should be rendered "Spirit." It is the same word rendered "Spirit" in all the other places where "Spirit" is used.
Wilson's Dictionary of Bible Types
press 1957.
Ghost
an old English word of Saxon origin (Germ. geist), equivalent to soul or spirit, occurs as the translation of the Heb. נֶפֶשׁ, ne'phesh, and the Greek πνεῦμα, both signifying breath, life, spirit, or living principle, by which and similar terms they are elsewhere rendered (Job_11:20; Jer_15:9; Mat_27:50; Joh_19:30). It frequently occurs in the N.T. in the sacred name "Holy Ghost." SEE SPIRIT. Other phrases in which it occurs are those rendered to "give up the ghost," etc., all simply signifying to die, e.g. גָּיִ , to expire (Lam_1:19; Gen_25:17; Gen_35:29; Gen_49:33; Job_3:11; Job_10:18; Job_13:19; Job_14:10) έκπνέω to breathe out, etc., one's life (Mar_15:37; Mar_15:39; Luk_23:46); ἐκψύχω, to breathe out one's last (Act_5:5; Act_5:10; Act_12:23). Many commentators suppose, from the original terms used in the Gospels (άφῆκε τὸ πνεῦμα, Mat_27:50; παρέδωκε τὸ πνεῦμα, Joh_19:30), something preternatural in Christ's death, as being the effect of his volition. But there is, nothing in the words of Scripture to countenance such an opinion, though our Saviors volition must be supposed to accompany his offering himself for the sins of the world. The Greek words rendered yielded up, and gave up, are no other than such as is frequently used, both in the Septuagint (Gen_35:18; comp. Psa_31:5; Ecc_12:7) and the classical writers, of expiration, either with the spirit or the soul (Josephus, Ant. 5:2, 8; 7:13, 3; Alian, H. An. 2:1; Herod. 4:190. SEE SPECTRE.
CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.