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By\u00a0<\/strong>Imam Mufti<\/p>\n John 14:16 \u00a0“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.” (American Standard Version<\/i>)<\/p>\n In this verse, Jesus promises that another “Comforter” will appear, and thus, we must discuss some issues concerning this “Comforter.”<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Greek word paravklhto\u00df,\u00a0ho parakletos<\/i>, has been translated as \u2018Comforter.\u2019 \u00a0Parakletos<\/i>\u00a0more precisely means \u2018one who pleads another\u2019s cause, an intercessor.\u2019[1]<\/span>\u00a0 The\u00a0ho parakletos<\/i>\u00a0is a person in the Greek language, not an incorporeal entity.\u00a0 In the Greek language, every noun possesses gender; that is, it is masculine, feminine or neutral.\u00a0 In the Gospel of John, Chapters 14, 15 and 16 the\u00a0ho parakletos<\/i>\u00a0is actually a person.\u00a0 All pronouns in Greek must agree in gender with the word to which they refer and the pronoun “he” is used when referring to the\u00a0parakletos<\/i>. \u00a0The NT uses the word\u00a0pneuma<\/i>, which means “breath” or “spirit,” the Greek equivalent of\u00a0ruah<\/i>, the Hebrew word for “spirit” used in the OT. \u00a0Pneuma<\/i>\u00a0is a grammatically neutral word and is always represented by the pronoun “it.”<\/p>\n All present day Bibles are compiled from “ancient manuscripts,” the oldest dating back to the fourth century C.E.\u00a0 No two ancient manuscripts are identical.[2]<\/span>\u00a0 All Bibles today are produced by combining manuscripts with no single definitive reference.\u00a0 The Bible translators attempt to “choose” the correct version.\u00a0 In other words, since they do not know which “ancient manuscript” is the correct one, they decide for us which “version” for a given verse to accept.\u00a0 Take John 14:26 as an example.\u00a0 John 14:26 is the only verse of the Bible which associates the\u00a0Parakletos<\/i>\u00a0with the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 But the “ancient manuscripts” are not in agreement that the “Parakletos<\/i>” is the \u2018Holy Spirit.\u2019 \u00a0For instance, the famous Codex Syriacus, written around the fifth century C.E., and discovered in 1812 on Mount Sinai, the text of 14:26 reads; “Paraclete, the Spirit”; and not “Paraclete, the\u00a0Holy Spirit<\/i>.”<\/p>\n Why is it important?\u00a0 It is significant because in biblical language a “spirit,” simply means “a prophet.”<\/p>\n “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”[3]<\/span><\/p>\n It is instructive to know that several biblical scholars considered\u00a0parakletos<\/i>\u00a0to be an \u2018independent salvific (having the power to save) figure,\u2019 not the Holy Ghost.[4]<\/span><\/p>\n The question, then, is: was Jesus\u2019\u00a0parakletos<\/i>, Comforter, a \u2018Holy Ghost\u2019 or a person – a prophet – to come after him?\u00a0 To answer the question, we must understand the description of\u00a0ho parakletos<\/i>\u00a0and see if it fits a ghost or a human being.<\/p>\n When we continue reading beyond chapter 14:16 and chapter 16:7, we find that Jesus predicts the specific details of the arrival and identity of the\u00a0parakletos<\/i>.\u00a0 Therefore, according to the context of John 14 & 16 we discover the following facts.<\/p>\n John 16:13 “He will speak.”<\/p>\n John 16:7 “\u2026for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you.”<\/p>\n It is impossible that the Comforter be the “Holy Ghost” because the Holy Ghost was present long before Jesus and during his ministry.[5]<\/span><\/p>\n John 16:13 Jesus referred to the paraclete as \u2018he\u2019 and not \u2018it\u2019 seven times, no other verse in the Bible contains seven masculine pronouns.\u00a0 Therefore,\u00a0paraclete\u00a0<\/i>is a person, not a ghost.<\/p>\n “And if any man sin, we have an advocate (parakletos) with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” (1 John 2:1)<\/p>\n Here we see that parakletos is a physical and human intercessor.<\/p>\n Jesus was not accepted as divine until the Council of Nicea, 325 CE, but everyone, except Jews, agree he was a prophet of God, as indicated by the Bible:<\/p>\n Matthew 21:11 “…This is Jesus the prophet of Nazareth of Galilee.”<\/p>\n Luke 24:19 “…Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people.”<\/p>\n John 14:16 “And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another parakletos.”<\/p>\n <\/p>\n FOOTNOTES:<\/span><\/p>\n [1]<\/span>Vine\u2019s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words.<\/p>\n [2]<\/span>“Besides the larger discrepancies, such as these, there is scarcely a verse in which there is not some variation of phrase in some copies [of the ancient manuscripts from which the Bible has been collected]. No one can say that these additions or omissions or alterations are matters of mere indifference.” \u00a0\u2018Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts,\u2019 by Dr. Frederic Kenyon, Eyre and Spottiswoode, p. 3<\/span>.<\/p>\n [3]<\/span>1 John 4: 1-3<\/span><\/p>\n [4]<\/span>\u2018…Christian tradition has identified this figure (Paraclete) as the Holy Spirit, but scholars like Spitta, Delafosse, Windisch, Sasse, Bultmann, and Betz have doubted whether this identification is true to the original picture and have suggested that the Paraclete was once an independent salvific figure, later confused with the Holy Spirit.” \u00a0\u2018the Anchor Bible, Doubleday & Company, Inc, Garden City, N.Y. 1970, Volume 29A, p. 1135.<\/span><\/p>\n [5]<\/span>Genesis 1: 2, 1 Samuel 10: 10, 1 Samuel 11: 6, Isaiah 63: 11, Luke 1: 15, Luke 1: 35, Luke 1: 41, Luke 1: 67, Luke 2: 25, Luke 2: 26, Luke 3:22, John 20: 21-22.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By\u00a0Imam Mufti John 14:16 \u00a0“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever.” (American Standard Version) In this verse, Jesus promises that...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1090,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,1,4,153],"tags":[129,292],"class_list":["post-2644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comparative-religion","category-general-topics","category-about-islam","category-religious-studies-and-research","tag-bible","tag-mohammad"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2644"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2645,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2644\/revisions\/2645"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investigate-islam.com\/web\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Jesus said the parakletos is a human being:<\/h2>\n
2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Jesus is called a parakletos:<\/h2>\n
3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Divinity of Jesus a later innovation<\/h2>\n
4.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Jesus prayed to God for another parakletos:<\/h2>\n
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