In the Qur’an Jesus is given the title, Ruhullah,
meaning Spirit of God. It comes from the same text, chapter 4:171
where Jesus is called wa-ruhun-minhu, a spirit from him; the same structure is
used as for the Word of God: ruh (spirit), min (from), hu (him). In this case
we do find some evidence in the Qur’an that helps us to define the title. The
expression occurs again here:
“… These are those in whose hearts he has
inscribed faith, and strengthened them with a spirit from Him…” (Qur’an 58:22).
These are same words used as in chapter
4:171, ruhun-minhu, “a spirit from him.” Nowhere else in the Qur’an does this
expression occur. In his commentary on the Quran, Yusuf Ali says that the
“phrase used is stronger” than that for the Holy Spirit (Ruhul-Quds) in the
Quran who is identified in Islam as the Angel Gabriel. Ali implies that this
Spirit of God is greater than the mighty angel and says it is, “the divine
spirit which we can no more define adequately than we can define in human
language the nature and attributes of God.”
The Muslim commentator has, unintentionally
but very impressively, given a precise definition of the Holy Spirit as it is
in the Bible. He is the “divine spirit” who cannot be defined in human language
with terminology other than that used for God himself. Yet the Quran, in the
only other place where this expression occurs, applies this same divine title
to Jesus!
The Quran, in the very passage (Chapter
4:171)—which contains a denial of the trinity (“Do not say Trinity! God is only
one God.”) —paradoxically attributes three titles to Jesus which affirm his
deity! He is the Anointed One / The Messiah; He is the divine Word of God, and
He is a Spirit coming from God. Jesus was not just another prophet called to
office at an appropriate point in time. He is the message of God, he came from
God, his very spirit is the Spirit of God.
So Muslims have a third
title in chapter 4:171—Spirit of God—which attributes divine features to Jesus
just as the titles Messiah and Word of God do. Significantly they are synonymous with
titles used in the Bible for Jesus to further express his profile towards
mankind as the eternal Son from the Father.
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