The original Hebrew version of Isaiah lists six gifts of the "spirit of the Lord," but when Isaiah was translated into Greek—in a translation known as the Septuagint—a seventh gift, piety, was listed. Therefore here is the list of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit that has come down to us in the Catholic tradition: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord. In his 1986 encyclical on the Holy Spirit, Lord and Giver of Life, Pope John Paul II pointed out that "The Messiah of the lineage of David … is precisely that person upon whom the Spirit of the Lord 'shall rest.'" In other words, the gifts of the Spirit rest on Jesus, and if they are our gifts too, they come to us by being incorporated into the Body of Christ. This suggests that the Gifts of the Holy Spirit are given to us in community, that it is as a community that we gain wisdom and understanding and the courage to live vibrant Christian lives. How important it is that we participate in the life of the Church!
