Breath of Life

Reanimation in its plainest form, stripped of every cost and rider that later designers attached to the effect. The black template doing this work cheaper was Animate Dead, the enchantment that left a creature it could be pulled off; here the spell pays full retail (no discount, no downside) to hand the creature back at full health, untapped, under your control. That straightforwardness is the design statement: white does not get to cheat on price the way black does, so its version of reanimation is a clean transaction with the graveyard, no strings beyond the mana itself. The wording carries no exile clause, no enters-tapped tax, no life payment, which makes it a durable build-around wherever recursion of a single fatty is the plan. Reanimate, Exhume, and Unburial Rites all came later with their own friction (life loss, symmetry, flashback); this one asked only that you have the mana and a creature in the yard. It does exactly what it says and nothing more, and the design history of reanimation is in large part a record of how much friction you can bolt onto this baseline before the rate stops being worth it.