“The Paraclete is the Holy Spirit”

The objection

“The Paraclete is the Holy Spirit.”

It rests on the text itself:

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.

John 14:26

This is the principal proof for most Christians (Ameri, p. 194-195). Jesus also calls him “the Spirit of truth” (John 15:26). Three further arguments weaken the Muslim reading: no Greek manuscript has periklytos, “the much praised”, which some recent Muslim authors read behind parakletos (Ameri, p. 201-202); Montanus and Mani claimed to be the Paraclete before Islam; and Ibn Ishaq, one of the first to apply the text to the Prophet ﷺ, adapted the text of John, as Sean Anthony shows (research file v1, part 1).

The answer

The features of a man, not of the Spirit

He comes only if Jesus goes. “If I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you” (John 16:7). Yet the Spirit is at work before that departure. John the Baptist shall be “filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb” (Luke 1:15), Elisabeth “was filled with the Holy Ghost” (Luke 1:41), and Jesus breathes on his disciples: “Receive ye the Holy Ghost” (John 20:22). The one who is to come is therefore not the one who is already here (Ataie, p. 73-75; Ameri, p. 197-198, 215-216; al-Saqqar, p. 156).

He is another. “I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter” (John 14:16). The Greek allos marks another of the same kind as Jesus: a man (al-Saqqar, p. 156-157; Ataie, p. 79-80). And the title suits a man: the First Epistle of John gives it to Jesus himself, “an advocate with the Father” (1 John 2:1; Ameri, p. 196).

He does not speak of himself. “He shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come” (John 16:13). This is the biblical definition of a prophet (Ameri, p. 212), that of the prophet like Moses, who receives the words of God in his mouth (Deuteronomy 18:18; al-Saqqar, p. 157; Ataie, p. 80-81).

He glorifies Christ, and he reproves the world. “He shall glorify me” (John 16:14). No one has honoured Jesus more than the Prophet ﷺ: the Qur’an cleared him of any claim to divinity and defended his mother against slander (4:156; Ameri, p. 212-215; al-Saqqar, p. 158-159). He “will reprove the world” (John 16:8): the Prophet ﷺ reproved the Jews and the Christians, which the Spirit did not do (Ameri, p. 215).

He abides. He is to abide “for ever” (John 14:16). The disciples did not live for ever: it is therefore his message that abides, like the law of the Prophet ﷺ (Ameri, p. 217; al-Saqqar, p. 158-159).

The word: an advocate, not a comforter

Parakletos means one called to one’s side, a defender, an advocate; Johannes Behm notes that the sense of “comforter” fits no passage of the New Testament (Ameri, p. 195-196). To defend and to intercede is the office of the prophets, and the Jews called Moses a “paraclete” (Ameri, p. 210).

Christian critics, Spitta, Windisch, Bultmann or Betz, cited by Raymond Brown, think that the Paraclete was at first a person expected after Christ, later confused with the Spirit (Ameri, p. 197; Ataie, p. 82).

Montanus and Mani: the argument turns around

Montanus in the second century, then Mani, claimed to be the Paraclete. Far from weakening the Muslim reading, the fact shows that a man was expected (Ataie, p. 79-80; al-Saqqar, p. 155; Ameri, p. 199). And Mani, whereas the Paraclete was to abide, has lost even his name, his scripture and his religion (Ataie, p. 81-82).

Two objections of detail

“He was to come in the lifetime of the disciples.” Speaking to someone does not imply that the thing will come to pass in his lifetime. Jesus says to the high priest: “Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power” (Matthew 26:64; Ameri, p. 217-219; al-Saqqar, p. 161-165, following Rahmatullah al-Hindi).

“It is Christ who sends him.” Jesus says no more than “I will pray the Father” (John 14:16), and it is “the Father” who will send him (John 14:26; Ameri, p. 217; al-Saqqar, p. 161-165).

What the objection gets right

The present text of John 14:26 names the Holy Spirit. Three remarks limit its reach. C. K. Barrett notes three readings of this verse, among them “the Spirit” alone in the Sinaitic Syriac, and judges the short reading possibly original, since nothing would have prompted a scribe to drop “holy” (Ameri, p. 219-222). Ali Ataie notes that these words have the look of parenthetical phrases, in verses that have variants, even though no manuscript omits them (Ataie, p. 77-78). And in John the word spirit also designates prophets: “try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1; Ameri, p. 216; Ataie, p. 79).

No Greek manuscript has periklytos (research file v1, part 1; Ataie, lecture). This site builds nothing on that word. The name Ahmad ﷺ does not depend on it: for Ibn Ashur, the “name” of which the Qur’an speaks conveys at once the most praised person, the most praiseworthy renown and the name Muhammad ﷺ (Ameri, p. 207-209).

Ibn Ishaq adapted the text of John. The reading presented here does not depend on him: it starts from the present Greek text, not from Ibn Ishaq.

None of these points reaches the thesis. It rests on the Qur’an (61:6) and on the features of the Paraclete, all of which the present text preserves.

Further reading

• The prophecy: The Paraclete, the good tidings of Jesus.
• The word received: A prophet like Moses.
• The full portrait, even without the Paraclete: The convergence.
• A neighbouring objection: “The prophet like Moses is Joshua, or Jesus”.

Sources for this page

• Qur’an: Tanzil text (Uthmani); translation of the meaning by this site.
• Bible: King James Version.
• Sami Ameri, al-Bishara bi-nabi al-islam fi kutub al-yahud wa-l-nasara, Takween, 2nd ed., 2021, p. 194-222.
• Ali Ataie, Finding Muhammad in the New Testament, master’s thesis, Graduate Theological Union, 2011, p. 73-82; lecture at Zaytuna College on Qur’an 7:157-158.
• Munqidh al-Saqqar, Hal bashshara al-Kitab al-Muqaddas bi-Muhammad ﷺ?, al-Huda wa-l-Nur series, 5, 2023, p. 155-165.
• Research file “Annonces du Prophète ﷺ”, v1.0, 14 October 2026, part 1.