Paraclete
Paraclete ( Greek . Παράκλητος PARAKLETOS , lat . Paracletus ) is an award in the Gospel of John used term, which in Christian theology usually associated with the Holy Spirit is identified.
Concept history
The ancient Greek word "παρακαλεῖν" means "summon", "invite"; παρακαλεῖσθαι ( medium ) means "to comfort"; the Paraclete ("παράκλητος") is therefore the "summoned" and the "comforter". In the non-religious area, the word appears as a legal term technicus in the meaning of “summoned” ( adj. ) Or “lawyer” ( subst. ) Or as “mediator, advocate”.
Biblical evidence
In John's Gospel, Jesus calls the Holy Spirit "the Paraclete" who comes from God, whom he, Jesus Christ, will send to his disciples to encourage them in trouble, to speak for them, to bring them to their goal. Likewise, it is the Holy Spirit who connects people with God, leads them to the knowledge of God and the work of redemption in Jesus Christ, to repentant self-knowledge and to hope (cf. Joh 14.16 EU ; 14.26 EU ; 15.26 EU ; 16.7 EU ).
In the first letter of John is Jesus Christ himself referred to as "παράκλητος" (2.1 EU ).
Translations
Martin Luther translated the term "comforter", which in his time meant even more encouragement for the discouraged than it does today. The Zurich Bible , which goes back to Ulrich Zwingli and his colleagues, translates “Beistand”, as does the standard Catholic translation and the Elberfeld Bible, which is valued in some free churches . Other translations such as the New Geneva Translation also speak of “helper” or “deputy”.
In the context of the 1st letter of John, the term is translated from the Vulgate as " advocatus ", in the German translations it appears as "advocate", "assistance" or "advocate".
Extra-Christian interpretations
Several early Christian sects or other religions from the Judeo-Christian environment, such as the Manichaeans, saw the Paraclete as a human figure, usually the respective sect founder.
Islam
In Islam , the biblical announcement of the Paraclete is seen as a reference to the Prophet Mohammed .
This is not based on biblical readings , but could be explained if one had read the word περικλυτος (periklytos = the highly praised) instead of παρακλητος (paraklētos), which can be translated as Ahmad in Arabic . This assumption was already made by Ludovico Marracci (1612–1700). The convert Muhammad Asad even states explicitly that the parakletos of the Gospel of John is a distortion of periklytos , which in turn is supposed to be an exact translation of the Aramaic expression and name Mauhamana (used in Jesus' lifetime in Palestine) . Accordingly, the periclytus with the names Muhammad and Ahmad, both derivatives of the Arabic verb hamida (“he praised”) and the noun hamd (“price”), could be translated appropriately.
In any case, the Koran paraphrases the Gospel of John in Sura 61: 6 (15.23-16.1) as follows:
“When Jesus, son of Mary, said:“ You children of Israel, behold, I was sent to you by God to confirm what was of the law before me and to announce a messenger who will come after me and his name Ahmad is. ""
The biography of the prophet (Sīra) of Ibn Ishāq (d. 767) goes even further :
“One of the prophecies that I have learned about the prophet Jesus, the Son of Mary, in the gospel, which came to him for Christians from God, is what the apostle John wrote in the gospel according to the testament of Jesus namely that Jesus said: “[…] But when Munhamannâ has come, whom God will send you out of the presence of the Lord, and the Spirit of truth that will have gone out from the Lord, then he will bear testimony of me, and you too will bear your testimony because you were with me from the beginning [...]. "Munhamannâ means Mohammed in Syriac, in Greek it is Paraclitus."
Religious studies
René Girard tries to use the Greek meaning of the word paraclete as a defender or advocate to interpret the concept of the Holy Spirit in John's Gospel anthropologically. The Paraclete is the defender of the victims, whose innocence he makes evident and thus puts an end to the mechanism of the scapegoat of the archaic religions. In this function he is the opposing party of Satan , the public accuser who creates the unanimity of the community against the victim. In this sense Girard would like to interpret the “ Redeemer ” of the Book of Job (19.25 EU ) as the forerunner of the Paraclete (I know that a “lawyer” lives for me).
literature
- Otto Betz : The Paraclete. Advocate in heretical Judaism, in the Gospel of John and in newly found Gnostic texts. (Works on the history of late Judaism and early Christianity; 2), Leiden / Cologne 1963.
- William Barclay: Interpretation of the New Testament, Gospel of John, Vol. 2. Neukirchen-Vluyn 1991.
- Timo Güzelmansur (Ed.): Did Jesus announce Muhammad? the Paraclete of the Gospel of John and its Koranic interpretation. Pustet, Regensburg, 2012.
Individual evidence
- ↑ S. LSJ sv παράκλητος, p. 1313: "called to one's aid", "legal assistant, advocate", "summoned", "intercessor".
- ↑ See Theodor Nöldeke , Friedrich Schwally : Geschichte des Qorans . Vol. I, Dieterich'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Leipzig 1909, p. 9, footnote 1.
- ↑ Muhammad Asad: The Message of the Koran, 2009, p. 1057, note 6.
- ↑ Kurt Bangert : Muhammad: a historical-critical study on the origin of Islam and its prophet. Springer VS, Wiesbaden, 2016. p. 567.
- ↑ Kurt Bangert: Muhammad: a historical-critical study on the origin of Islam and its prophet. Springer VS, Wiesbaden, 2016. P. 566f.
- ↑ René Girard: I saw Satan fall from the sky like lightning. A critical apology for Christianity. Munich, Vienna 2002.