Ruach Elohim

Grammar

Word: רוח אלהים
Representation: RUKh ELHIM
Transliteration: Ruach Elohim
Noun: "Elohim's directing power"
Strong Concordance: H7306 and H430

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Exposition

This is one of the exceptional times when I will be presenting a pair of Hebrew words as a single expression.

The term "ruach" is generally translated as "spirit", "wind", "breath". And when it is combined with "Elohim", it is treated as a Divine blessing of power and direction, a sort of prophetic ability (without being a prophet) because Elohim is directing you. It only appears 5 times in the Torah, but 11 times in the other books. 

"Ruach Yahweh" also appears, nearly twice as much, but never in the Torah. It is interesting that Yahweh will give someone Ruach Elohim to do His work in the books of Torah, but not Ruach Yahweh in those same books.

Apparently having Ruach Elohim thrust upon you can be good as well as bad. In the case of King Shaul, when God was unhappy with him and removed the Ruach Elohim from the king, Shaul became emotionally unstable, wiping out an entire town out of spite, and sometimes loving David and other moments wanting to kill him.

Here are the 5 instances in the Torah where "Ruach Elohim" actually appears:

Genesis 1:2 - A force hovering over the waters in order to do the will of the Elohim
Genesis 41:38 - Pharaoh wants someone with a connection to the Gods to interpret a dream.
Exodus 31:3 - Yahweh gave Ruach Elohim to Betzalel to give him wisdom and understanding on how to create the divine instruments.
Exodus 35:31 - Moses tells the people that Yahweh gave Betzalel Ruach Elohim to make artistic designs demanded by Yahweh.
Numbers 24:2 - Bilaam was given Ruach Elohim by Yahweh in order to do His will and bless Israel.

So it should be apparent that "Ruach Elohim" is something used by Yahweh or the Elohim to cause things to happen according to His/Their will. And it is because of this, I am translating this as "Elohim's directing power" rather than "a spirit of Elohim" (there is no "the" prefix ever used).