Al-Baqarah 2:97

The issue

This verse states that the angel Gabriel (Jibrīl) is the one who transmitted the Qur’ān to Muhammad. However, another Qur’ānic text states that the Holy Spirit is the one who carried out this task: “Say, ‘The Holy Spirit brought it down from thy Lord…’”

(Q 16.102).Yet a third verse, in Q 26, identifies “the Faithful Spirit came down with it” as the one responsible for transmitting the Qur’ān (Q 26.193). Because Islāmic literature seeks to spread the viewpoint that the Holy Spirit is Gabriel, this might not seem like a contradiction. However, the reality is that the name “Holy Spirit” appears in the Qur’ān only four times. Three of these times, the Holy Spirit is associated with Christ, as in this verse: “we gave Jesus the son of Mary manifest signs and aided him with the Holy Spirit” (Q 2.87). This verse is repeated word for word in verse Q 2.253 and is stated in a similar way in Q 5.110.

Concerning the meaning of the Holy Spirit, scholarly sources say that he, or it, could be Gabriel, Injīl (Gospel), “the name through which he (Christ) would raise the dead,” or “it is the Spirit that was breathed into Mary, and the Holy is Allah.”

To understand the origin of this contradiction, we must look at the historical context of these terms. The expression “the Faithful Spirit” (Q 26.193) was introduced during Muhammad’s call in Mecca. Later (probably as he came to know more about Christian ideologies albeit in a questionable manner), Muhammad added the name “Holy Spirit” to his concordance and attributed the transmitting of the Qur’ān to the Holy Spirit in Q 26 (one of the late Meccan sūras). Further, in Medina, Muhammad mentioned the name “Gabriel” (Q 2.97-98 and Q 66.4).

What is obvious is that these names—the spirit of Faith and Truth, the Holy Spirit, and Gabriel—were not one and the same in the mind of Muhammad. Rather, he was using a variety of religious terms that reflected the environmental changes in his life, such that, as he moved from place to place, he would use the words that were common to that locale and appropriate to the conditions of the day.

The Angel Israfil

We have a confirmed narrative (hadīth sahīh) that says that the angel Israfil had the responsibility of delivering the Qur’ān to Muhammad: “...he would bring him word by word. Then Gabriel came down upon him with the Qur’ān.” This narrative speaks of not one, but two angels (Israfil and Gabriel) charged with the same task: to deliver the Qur’ān to Muhammad. And, in yet another text, we read about a third angel, the one who transmitted the al-Fātih. a (Q 1) to Muhammad: “an angel who had never come down to earth at all.”