Muhammad: Paraclete and Spirit of Truth in John's Gospel?

[Vouthon]

In another thread, which is still trending on RF but directed solely to Muslim posters, the question was posed as to whether the 'Advocate' and 'Spirit of Truth' in the Gospel of John could refer to the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

This interpretation appears to have been argued expressly, for the first time, in the Arabic version of Jesus's sermon on the “advocate/comforter” (Gk. paráklētos) in John 15: 23–16, found within Ibn Isḥāq's Kitāb al-Maghāzī (the earliest known attempt by Islamic scholars to reference and articulate a New Testament proof-text for Muhammad's prophethood).

My friend Adrian wrote the following in that other thread, to which I would like to respond below in two parts:

It would be reasonable to equate Muhammad (PBUH) with the comforter in John 14:26. Through Muhammad a new measure of truth and understanding was made manifest.

I think the reason this suggestion is deemed untenable by Christians, is for the same reason secular scholars would be loathe to give it credence: it appears to evade an objective and contextualized reading of the text itself.

As per Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation needing the fewest assumptions is to be preferred. The Muhammad-Comforter 'hypothesis' forwarded by some medieval Islamic theologians, strikes me as far from being that. In my honest estimation, it insinuates a lot that doesn't seem warranted by either the gospel text itself or the usage of the term Spirit of Truth in Jewish literature of that time.

We need to understand the meaning of the 'Spirit-Paraclete' in the context of the references to the Spirit in the entire gospel narrative and its broader theology.

If it were not for the religious desire, on the part of medieval Muslim divines, to link the "another Advocate" of John 14:26 with the Ahmad prophecy attributed to Jesus by the Qur'anic ayat in Surah As-Naf, it seems unlikely to me that any exegete would have so construed it - as referring to an entity other than God's pneuma (Spirit) already alluded to throughout the text.

To be quite fair here, the argument on the basis of 'paraclete' itself is not entirely inarguable.

If Jesus had made no reference to 'the Spirit', and simply predicted the coming of 'another Advocate' (the first one being Jesus himself), then one could feasibly advance an argument that this may refer to an angel or prophet acting as symbolic 'legal counsel' for the disciples before God's divine court (for that, is its legal-juridical and mystical meaning in a Second Temple Jewish milieu).

However, the passage clarifies to whom this title is referring and it is unambiguously described as to pneuma tēs alētheias, "the Spirit of Truth":

John 16:13 ὅταν δὲ ἔλθῃ ἐκεῖνος, τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς ἀληθείας, ὁδηγήσει ὑμᾶς ἐν τῇ ἀληθείᾳ πάσῃ· (BNT)
NKJ However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth.​

(continued...)

 

[Vouthon]

This term, 'the Spirit of Truth', is not unique to the Johannine gospel in Jewish literature of the period. The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (circa. first century) refers to it:

‘Know, therefore, my children, that two spirits wait upon man - the Spirit of Truth and the Spirit of Deceit’ (T. Jud. 20.1: Charles’s translation [1913]; see also T. Benj. 6.1; T. Reub. 4.9; T. Naph. 2.5; T. Jos. 2.6; 7.4; T. Jud. 11.1; 13.8; 18.3; 25.3)
​

Likewise, in the Qumran text entitled by scholars, The Community Rule (1QS) which dates from 100-75 BCE, we find passages which refer to the mysterious plan of God (the ‘mystery of God’) through which the Creator tolerates the influence of the two cosmic spirits on human hearts: ‘[God] appointed for him [man] two spirits in which to walk until the time of his visitation: the Spirits of Truth and Falsehood’ (1QS 3.18, 19; 4.6, 9, 23).

In that same text and others similarly dated from Qumran, we learn that this 'Spirit of Truth' is also referred to with a possessive pronoun and personified as the 'Spirit of the Lord' Himself, by which he infuses his moral force into a person, cleanses them from sin and also reveals divine truths:

"He [God] will cleanse him of all wicked deeds with the Spirit of Holiness: like purifying waters He will shed upon him the Spirit of Truth" (1QS 4.21a)

"And He makes known His Holy Spirit to them by the hand of His anointed ones, and He proclaimed the truth (to them)" (CD 2.12-13a)

"I implore Thee by the spirit which Thou hast given [me] to perfect Thy [favours] to Thy servant [for ever] purifying me by Thy Holy Spirit, and drawing me near to Thee by Thy grace according to the abundance of Thy mercies" (1QH 16.12)

"Thou hast upheld me with certain truth; Thou hast delighted me with Thy Holy Spirit and hast opened my heart till this day" (1QH 9.32).​

When we turn to the Gospel of John now itself, we find that the 'Spirit' is characterized in practically exactly the same way throughout the text, as these early Jewish sectarians had already been using it.

On the final and most sacred day of the feast of Tabernacles, Jesus cries out in John 7:37-38: “If any one thirst, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in me, as the scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” In the next verse, the narrator explains the meaning of Jesus’ proclamation in 7:39: “Now this he (Jesus) said about the Spirit (pneumatos), which those who believed in him were to receive; for as yet the Spirit (pneuma) had not been given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

Note, that the effulgence of the Holy Spirit alighting on the believers (in the future, after his glorification/ascension to heaven) is anticipated by Jesus as being like "rivers of flowing water" that will satisfy and purify people who have faith. This is precisely what the Dead Sea Scroll 1QS had taught, more than a century before the birth of Jesus, with regards to God's own Holy Spirit described as the Spirit of Truth (as the Fourth Gospel will later name it in John 16:13): "like purifying waters He will shed upon him the Spirit of Truth", and it is specifically noted above in the Qumran text 1QH that this occurs in the believer's heart.

Earlier in the Gospel, John the Baptist testifies Jesus in John 1:32-34:“I saw the Spirit (pneuma) descend as a dove from heaven, and it remained on him (Jesus). I myself did not know him; but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit (pneuma) descend and remain, this is he who baptizes with the Holy Spirit'".

In this capacity, the Spirit serves as God's means of revelation of the 'anointed one' of God (the messiah), as above in the Qumran text: "He makes known His Holy Spirit to them by the hand of His anointed ones"

The same Second Temple Jewish religious belief is clearly being referred to here in both texts.

Moreover, in that same Qumran text the Holy Spirit/Spirit of Truth is associated with the attribute of divine counsel and this is precisely what the term paraclete in the Greek of John 14:26 (which can also be construed as 'comforter' though this is not its earliest and technical definition) actually means: "advocate/counsellor":

"I, the Master, know Thee O my God, by the spirit which Thou hast given to me and by Thy Holy Spirit I have faithfully hearkened to Thy marvellous counsel. In the mystery of Thy wisdom Thou has opened knowledge to me and in Thy mercies" (1QH 12.11-12).​

And as if to ram this point home, about the identity of the paraclete, John 14:15-17 actually notes using the Greek word en that the Spirit-Paraclete will reside within 'you' (plural) the disciples, just as Jesus predicted of the Spirit earlier flowing from believer's hearts with the purifying waters of baptism: “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he will give you another Counselor (allon paraklêton), to be with you for ever, even the Spirit of truth (pneuma tês alêtheias), whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him; you know him, for he dwells with you, and will be in/inside [en] you.”

This is exactly what the Spirit of Truth, God's Holy Spirit, does in the Qumran texts as well - and indeed whenever the role of the Spirit in relation to believers is mentioned in other NT texts, such as St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians:

"ἢ οὐκ οἴδατε ὅτι τὸ σῶμα ὑμῶν ναὸς τοῦ ἐν ὑμῖν ἁγίου πνεύματος ἐστιν οὗ ἔχετε ἀπὸ θεοῦ, καὶ οὐκ ἐστε ἑαυτῶν;

Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?"

(1 Corinthians 6:19)

​

As one can see, Jesus in John 14:17 anticipates the very same experience of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit as their 'counsel' in Jesus's absence, that has become habitual amongst the disciples of Christ by the time of St. Paul - thus 'counselling' and 'consoling/comforting' them of Jesus's absence.

In all cases, a reality is being predicted/directly experienced by the disciples of Christ then present with him, in their lifetimes - and that prediction in fact did transpire as described at Pentecost, when the Spirit of Truth came upon the Apostles and imbued them with the Spirit of Christ in his earthly absence, as he had consoled them beforehand.

This is simple and clear on the basis of the text itself (I would argue) - in consonance with the rest of the NT and Second Temple Jewish literature - and furthermore requires no other excessive assumptions being plugged in to make it attempt to fit with a religious personage who emerged nearly seven centuries later in an entirely different context and socio-cultural historical milieu - which, I'm afraid, strikes me as a very weak and unconvincing argument, objectively speaking. It comes across as very much a faith position, rather than an earnest scholarly exegesis of an ancient Koine Greek text.

The contemporaneous and intra-textual evidence would appear to support the normative exegesis, which holds that the Paraclete-Spirit is in fact the Holy Spirit which was yet to indwell the believers in Christ, individually and collectively, after Jesus's death at Pentecost (serving as their guide and revelator in his physical absence).

As I see it, the burden of proof is with our Muslim friends to substantiate this hypothesis based upon the internal evidence (prior usage of the terms Spirit, Truth etc. that could shed light on the meaning in this passage) and external evidence in the form of contemporaneous usage in the wider literature of Second Temple Judaism, as above vis-à-vis the standard understanding that it refers to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

At this very moment in time, I have seen no compelling evidence that would persuade me otherwise; though I remain open-minded to considering it dispassionately, critically and objectively, if such were to be presented.

 

[Epic Beard Man]

I personally like to shy away from topics such as these unless someone here is a certified linguist especially in the language of Aramaic, Greek, or Latin, otherwise, we are just another form of armchair scholars trying to self-interpret words and definitions in our own understanding without knowing the actual language. @Vouthon that thread that you've mentioned was disingenuous anyway because the OP outright dismissed the Islamic scholars as liars without giving proof and instead committed ad hominem attacks against Muslim scholars. Anyway, something interesting I found from a book reference that showed a similarity between the Bible and Qur'an:

The Paraclete or Mohammed

(Jesus said) "And I will pray the Father, he shall give you another Paraclete, that he may be with you forever, even the spirit of truth." -St. John Chapter 14:16

"And (remember) when Jesus son of Mary said, O' children of Israel! of a truth I am God's apostle to you to confirm the law which was given before me, and to announce another apostle that will come after me whose name shall be Ahmad (which means The Praised One)." Surah 61:6

See:Error - Cookies Turned Off

 

[Vouthon]

@Vouthon that thread that you've mentioned was disingenuous anyway because the OP outright dismissed the Islamic scholars as liars without giving proof and instead committed ad hominem attacks against Muslim scholars.

Thanks for your post Epic! I would hope, that this thread might offer a fresh opportunity for the debate to be conducted on a more mutually respectful footing on both sides.

You're point about armchair scholars is a very good one, however (although, I would note that my post above is inspired / based on works by certified scholars in the relevant fields, the sources for which I would be happy to provide later, if you or others would like to read further).

 

[Jeremiah Ames]

you had a lot of writing there, that I cannot read right now.

it did read some of your first post

my question to those equating Mohammed to the advocate/comforter

why would it refer to a person?

I'm sure I don’t understand where they are coming from

 

[Twilight Hue]

In another thread, which is still trending on RF but directed solely to Muslim posters, the question was posed as to whether the 'Advocate' and 'Spirit of Truth' in the Gospel of John could refer to the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

This interpretation appears to have been argued expressly, for the first time, in the Arabic version of Jesus's sermon on the “advocate/comforter” (Gk. paráklētos) in John 15: 23–16, found within Ibn Isḥāq's Kitāb al-Maghāzī (the earliest known attempt by Islamic scholars to reference and articulate a New Testament proof-text for Muhammad's prophethood).

My friend Adrian wrote the following in that other thread, to which I would like to respond below in two parts:



I think the reason this suggestion is deemed untenable by Christians, is for the same reason secular scholars would be loathe to give it credence: it appears to evade an objective and contextualized reading of the text itself.

As per Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation needing the fewest assumptions is to be preferred. The Muhammad-Comforter 'hypothesis' forwarded by some medieval Islamic theologians, strikes me as far from being that. In my honest estimation, it insinuates a lot that doesn't seem warranted by either the gospel text itself or the usage of the term Spirit of Truth in Jewish literature of that time.

We need to understand the meaning of the 'Spirit-Paraclete' in the context of the references to the Spirit in the entire gospel narrative and its broader theology.

If it were not for the religious desire, on the part of medieval Muslim divines, to link the "another Advocate" of John 14:26 with the Ahmad prophecy attributed to Jesus by the Qur'anic ayat in Surah As-Naf, it seems unlikely to me that any exegete would have so construed it - as referring to an entity other than God's pneuma (Spirit) already alluded to throughout the text.

To be quite fair here, the argument on the basis of 'paraclete' itself is not entirely inarguable.

If Jesus had made no reference to 'the Spirit', and simply predicted the coming of 'another Advocate' (the first one being Jesus himself), then one could feasibly advance an argument that this may refer to an angel or prophet acting as symbolic 'legal counsel' for the disciples before God's divine court (for that, is its legal-juridical and mystical meaning in a Second Temple Jewish milieu).

However, the passage clarifies to whom this title is referring and it is unambiguously described as to pneuma tēs alētheias, "the Spirit of Truth":

John 16:13 ὅταν δὲ ἔλθῃ ἐκεῖνος, τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς ἀληθείας, ὁδηγήσει ὑμᾶς ἐν τῇ ἀληθείᾳ πάσῃ· (BNT)
NKJ However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth.​

(continued...)

I have to. Can't help myself. I just have to....

Forgive me.

 

[Vouthon]

I have to. Can't help myself. I just have to....

Forgive me.

 

[Dawnofhope]

Thanks for starting this thread @Vouthon .

I claim no expertise in this field of study but it is of interest.

The best starting point is to consider the word 'Paraclete' that is used on five occasions in the New Testament, all from Johannine literature. It features early on in the first Epistle of St John (1 John 2:1) and on four occasions through out the Gospel of John (John 14:16, John 14:26, John 15:26 and John 16:7).

Paraclete | Encyclopedia.com

What do we know?

According to Wikipedia, Paraclete comes from the Koine Greek word παράκλητος (paráklētos). A combination of "para" (beside/alongside) and "kalein" (to call), the word first appears in the Bible in John 14:16.

A Latin etymological precedent is proposed: Lochlan Shelfer suggests that the Greek term "paraclete" is a translation of the preceding latin term advocatus:

"παράκλητος [does not have] any independent meaning of its own, it is in fact a calque for the Latin term advocatus meaning a person of high social standing who speaks on behalf of a defendant in a court of law before a judge. When Greeks came into contact with the Roman Empire during the late Republic, the word παράκλητοs was developed as a precise equivalent to the Latin legal term advocatus. Thus, its significance must be found not only in its very few extant appearances, but also in the specific use of the Latin legal term."

In Classical Greek the term is not common in non-Jewish texts.[4] The best known use is by Demosthenes:

Citizens of Athens, I do not doubt that you are all pretty well aware that this trial has been the center of keen partisanship and active canvassing, for you saw the people who were accosting and annoying you just now at the casting of lots. But I have to make a request which ought to be granted without asking, that you will all give less weight to private entreaty or personal influence than to the spirit of justice and to the oath which you severally swore when you entered that box. You will reflect that justice and the oath concern yourselves and the commonwealth, whereas the importunity and party spirit of advocates serve the end of those private ambitions which you are convened by the laws to thwart, not to encourage for the advantage of evil-doers.

— Demosthenes, On the False Embassy 19:1

In Judaism, Philo speaks several times of "paraclete" advocates primarily in the sense of human intercessors.

The word later went from Hellenistic Jewish writing into rabbinic literature.[5]

Other words are used to translate the Hebrew word מְנַחֵם‎ mnaḥḥēm "comforter" and מליץ יושר‎ mliṣ yosher.

Paraclete - Wikipedia

The clearest usage in the NT for me , appears in 1 John 2:1

My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:

There can be little doubt the Advocate or Paraclete is Jesus Christ Himself.

Let's consider the use in the Gospel of John where it first appears in John 14:16

And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;

The context of this chapter is that Jesus has predicted His martyrdom. His disciples are understandably distraught. Jesus comforts them and makes a prediction about future events. He says another comforter (Paraclete) will come and comfort and abide with them forever. Christians believe this to be the Holy Spirit, but not in the sense of a/the Holy Spirit embodied in a man, but a disembodied spirit. Many Baha'is and Muslims who take a keen interest in the NT would consider this Paraclete to be like Jesus in 1 John 2:1, an actual man with similar standing and attributes to Jesus.

The next verses (John 14:17-20) reads;

Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.
I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me: because I live, ye shall live also.
At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.

Admittedly, these verses will be understood differently, depending on who reads it and what we bring when we read it, including our preconceived ideas.

The Spirit of truth whom the world can not receive, to me is clearly Jesus or someone like Jesus. The vast majority of the people during Christ's Ministry could figuratively or literally understand Who He was and the Message He brought. For those who could accept Jesus into their hearts, it was as if Jesus lived in them. He lives in us, even though He is not with us, and He will come again (either as a Christ-like man or as a disembodied spirit). It is worth remembering the disciples believed Jesus would literally return in their lifetime based in part from words within the Olivet discourse (Matthew 24:34), the synoptic equivalent of Jesus's farewell speech in the Gospel of John.

John 14:26 reads:
But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.

In this verse, Jesus reveals the spirit to be the Holy Spirit, whom the father with send in His name. This Holy Spirit, clearly is Christ or a Christ like figure if viewed as a parallel text to the Olivet Discourse and consideration is given to the clear meaning of Paraclete in 1 John 2:1. Christians have been conditioned to view the verse as a disembodied Holy Spirit. The event where this presumably happened was Pentecost. How Christians understand John 14:16-26 is highly problematic IMHO. A future Christ-like teacher such as Muhammad is a better fit than the entry of some ill defined, unseen spirit. Further, the experience of being filled with such a disembodied holy spirit is believed by many Christians to be reserved exclusively to themselves. You don't have a problem with that?