When Allah sends ALRUH for divine inspiration, it executes its purpose as commanded by Him 40:15,42:52. It is important to emphasize that whatever it does and the effect it has, it is by the will of Allah alone, not its own intrinsic will or power. This is particularly made clear with what the RUH, that manifested in human form to Mary, told her in regards her miraculous conception 3:47,19:21.
The angels of revelation then descend with the RUH upon those whom God deems fit
77:5,97:4,16:2"He sends down the angels with the RUH by His commandment on whom He pleases of His servants, saying: Give the warning that there is no god but Me, therefore be careful (of your duty) to Me".
RUH stems from r-w-h meaning anything that blows as in a wind/breeze/breath. It also carries the meaning of life giving breath. The word is always associated with a kind of breeze that brings something good such as life, rest or inspiration. Upon the prophet Jesus, the RUH al qudus/breeze of holiness, besides its basic role of inspiration, gave him the strength and aptitude to perform the miracles that he did 2:87,253,5:110. Jesus' association to the RUH do not however make any of them divine. It was a tool sent upon Jesus as was sent on all prophets and regular believers, each time for the purpose for which Allah intends for it. Jesus' mention with the RUH is among the patterns of the Quran of taking up the most cherished christological themes, then strip them from their paganistic implications.
The Quran leaves no room to the kind of conjecture trinitarians are known for when approaching their Bible, let alone the Quran. Christians feel comforted whenever they superficially approach the Quran and find these familiar Christological themes. They are sometimes bold enough to assume the Quran is confirming their doctrines. After all, none other than Jesus is referred to as God's word, His messiah or a RUH from Allah. But by doing so Christians are missing the consistent Quranic approach of taking up the major trinitarian themes and labels associated to Jesus, then recasts them in a monotheistic, unitarian perspective. It is the case with the kalima, just as with the RUH/spirit or the name "messiah". Jesus is not the literal nor metaphorical "son of God" but simply, the son of Mary as Christians themselves cannot deny. Similarly, Jesus is stripped from any intrinsic power as regards his ascension and ability to perform miracles. Being the muhaymin/guardian of the previous scriptures and traditions, the Quran could not leave those themes unaddressed. And it does so in an impactful way, using them just as is done in Christian scriptures, while redefining them so as to deny their Christological background.
That corrective function goes beyond these aforementioned pillars of Christology. In the Gospels' eschatology, the trinitarian godhead is at the forefront and Jesus is given the leading role of judgement by his "father" Matt25,26. In the Quran, no possible ambiguity exists as to Allah's supremacy on that day, whether in terms of glory, authority or judgement.
The sending of revelation upon a prophet is carried out by an angelic delegation accompanying the spirit 16:2. In 16:102,26:192-4 that particular descending spiritual entity is not named, in another place God singles out the descending entity by name as Gabriel 2:97. The Quran describes the eminence of that particular messenger of revelation
81:19-21"honored messenger, the posessor of strength, having an honorable place with the Lord of the Dominion, One (to be) obeyed, and faithful in trust".
He is one who is mutaAA 81:21 denoting authority and the angels are created in different grades 35:1. His power, honor and unfaltering trustworthiness 26:192-4, his sacredness 16:102, means he is most fit to accomplish this noble task. That is why the Quran always singles him out from among the angels of revelation 2:98,66:4,97:1-4. The mention of an angelic delegation descending with the revelation expresses the prestige of Allah's word and the singling out of one entity from among them denotes the distinct nobility of the one selected to carry it. As noble and honored the carrier of revelation is, He remains under God's authority in the process
2:97"he made it descend to your heart by Allah's command".
This emphasis is meant at dispelling any doubt, in the minds of those that dislike the indirect manner in which God communicates with His prophets, making clear Who the ultimate source of that message is. Not only is the descent commanded by Allah, but it in addition originates from Him
2:99"And certainly WE descended to you clear communications"2:105"Those who disbelieve..do not like..that the good should be brought down to you from your Lord, and Allah chooses especially whom He pleases for His mercy, and Allah is the Lord of mighty grace"26:192-4"And most surely this (ie Quran) is a sending down from the Lord of the worlds. The Faithful Spirit/RUH has descended with it, Upon your heart that you may be of the warners".
The Quran originates from Allah, was commanded to be sent down by Him, through the trustworthy RUH, elsewhere named Gabriel, who is accompanied by a delegation of angels. Elsewhere the Quran, in its surgical use of words and in a similar context of attesting to the otherworldly origin of the Book, says that it is
53:4"a revelation revealed".
Since the most obdurate could still find a way to disbelieve, admitting to the divine origin of the Quran but rejecting the legitimacy of the prophet who could have been given the revelation by an inspired human, God makes it clear, it is a process twice revealed. The first time to the medium, that is Gabriel, and the second time to the prophet's heart, by the inspired medium. Sure no explicit statement says that Gabriel or holylspirit is an angel. Strong indications however point to the descending delegation as always and exclusively angelic. Throughout the Quran, no entity carrying God's will from heaven (revelation, punishment or else) is ever said to be other than angels. It is known that the descending entities fully encompassed by Allah's will in 19:64-5 are angels for whom Gabriel is speaking in the passage. What those attempting to deny Gabriel's identification with the holy spirit are left with is a slightly ambiguous statement in 97:4. And that is if one disregards the aforementioned patterns, as well as linguistic reasons for singling out the spirit from among the angels.
The WAW in 97:4 which is translated in general as AND, also often means inclusion of a particular entity within the general more encompassing entity. The purpose is to create a distinction in terms of prominence relevant to the context. For example the Quran says "and the prophets and Jesus and Moses" 2:136,3:84. It mentions the two in WAW/AND form to mean that they are included but to bring particular attention to those two amongst the prophets. Elsewhere it says 69:14"the earth and the mountains are lifted" or in 55:68"In both of them are fruit and dates and pomegranates". See also 31:16.
Finally, the attempted parallel of the syntax in 97:4 (separating entities part of the same angelic group) with 3:87 fails for the reason that in this verse God, angels and humans are explicitly stated elsewhere as being different entities. No statement in 97:4 or indications elsewhere say that the descending spirit and the angels are different entities, quite to the contrary as previously demonstrated.
The description of Gabriel with "RUH" denotes that angels are breeze like entities of the unseen realm. In this world they can take any form or be used for any purpose according to God's will. To Mary, that immaterial entity appeared as a human being 19:17-9. Then this immaterial entity, which assumed human form, blew a part of itself into her, so that she might conceive
21:91"So We breathed into her from/MIN Our RUH".
The Quran does not detail how that process was executed in relation to Mary. It uses the euphemism "farj" for the location where the breath was sent 66:12 a word referring to the space between 2 things, in this instance the legs. Farj is used for both men and women 23:5,33:35 eloquently but indirectly alluding to the private parts, which are located between that space. This process does not make Mary nor any part of her divine, just as God's breathing from His RUH in every human being doesnt make us or part of us divine 32:9,38:71-2. Ruhana/our breeze or breath is attached to God's name to stress its greatness, the particular connection it creates between the recipient and Allah, as is stated concerning the righteous
58:22"These are they into whose hearts He has impressed faith, and whom He has strengthened with a RUH from Him/minhu".
And just as the Quran associates the RUH with Jesus, it does the same with the prophet Muhammad in the context of divine inspiration 16:102.
The RUH sent by Allah, under His command, affects multiple people at once like the wind would. Similar usage is seen with the house of Allah or the month of Allah or the sakina of Allah/the soothing calmness that filled Muhammad and the believers, or the love from Allah bestowed upon Moses 20:39 etc. None of those things are considered parts of Allah, having any intrinsic power, or emanating from within His essence, or sharing in His divinity. Again, it is the RUH that breathed a portion of it into Mary, not Allah
19:19"He (the RUH) said: I am only a messenger of your Lord, that I will give you a pure boy".
The RUH is consistently described as in Allah's control and command. God in 21:91 attributes to Himself the breathing of a portion of the RUH into Mary, because the whole process is under His control. He commands the RUH to blow into Mary, and God alone gives power to the RUH to have the intended effect on Mary. The RUH has no intrinsic ability by itself other than what Allah grants it
19:21"She said, when shall I have a boy when no mortal has touched me, nor have I been unchaste? He (the RUH) said; Even so; Your Lord says "It is easy to Me"3:47"He (the RUH) said; Allah creates what He pleases, when He has decreed a matter, He only says to it "BE" and it is".
The RUH, like the prophets of old, is a vessel through which God manifests His will. There are no ambiguities the like of which trinitarians have read into passages of the HB. It doesnt even say that this RUH is an emanation FROM Allah, but that it is something TO Allah, meaning belonging to Him, in His possession and full control. The RUH breathed into every human being just as the RUH breathed into Mary is said to be OF God because it BELONGS TO God. The action of God blowing the RUH does not hint to it emanating from inside of Him. The RUH is a breeze-like entity external to Allah. The action of God breathing it for the performance of a task, means He creates the conditions external to Him that make blowing to happen, so that the RUH is transferred from its location to where He wants it to be. For example God, whether in the times of Moses as depicted in the HB or the times of Muhammad as described in the Quran, is said to be literally fighting the disbelievers in battle, although the physical reality was that the believers were the ones waging war. Religious scriptures are replete with such usage of God acting, and His actions manifesting through conditions external to Him. So, instead of naively imagining a human like deity blowing air out of its lungs, one can easily preserve the overall Quranic axiom of divine transcendence, by paralleling what causes the RUH to be sent, to the meteorological causes that send the wind on earth
30:46"And one of His signs is that He sends forth the winds bearing good news.."
Lastly, what should be kept in mind as regards the RUH, is that it is an issue of which very little knowledge has been imparted to the humans, other than it is an entity under Allah's complete grasp and control 17:85 as demonstrated earlier. Therefore, like every reality pertaining to the Hereafter or the heavenly realm, only a glimpse of its true nature and manner in which it operates can be accessible to our perception in this life.
Gabriel is a highly ranked archangel, and is so powerful as stated in sura takwir above, that evil spirits cannot overpower him; he is the head of all angels and whatever is entrusted to him by the Almighty, he fully protects. The adjective, "one (to be) obeyed", shows that there are other angels under his command.
Angels in general have thus been specifically pointed as the carriers of divine revelation, necessarily making the belief in them a tenet of faith 2:177,285. At two points during Muhammad's revelational experience, the angel Gabriel, the one repeatedly singled out as the possessor of mighty strength, became to him as a clearly perceptible, almost tangible presence, revealing himself in his true shape and form 81:19-25,53:4-18. As a side note, in 53:10"And He revealed to His servant what He revealed", the 3 pronouns refer to God who always revealed to His servant Muhammad through His angelic messenger Gabriel, who had come unusually close to the prophet on that occasion. There are many examples throughout the Quran of instances where the object of the pronoun is absent from the close context but is nevertheless implied either through logical deduction as in 35:45 where the "it" implies the earth, or through an established pattern as is here the case.
Very few humans have had the privilege of such visions of the heavenly creatures. They mostly appear in this world in the shape of humans, it therefore is a great favor from the Creator to make a human capable of withstanding such a vision. The HB speaks of Ezekiel's visions of the throne bearing angels in their true form. But what is to be noted is that even during those intense encounters, clear signs were shown to Muhammad to make him understand that there always will remain areas of knowledge no human mind can penetrate, which the Creator has reserved for Himself.
Divine inspiration transmitted to an individual by an angel is not something unique to Muhammad. Although the Tanakh (like the Quran) recognizes that every prophet receives the ruh/ruach that allows divine inspiration, it is mostly silent on whom the carrier of that inspiration is, except in Daniel's case whose visions, prophetic dreams and inspiration were brought by a third party, who was none other than the angel Gabriel/Jibreel Dan7:15,8:16,9:21. The fact that Gabriel is referred to as "a man" is due to his appearance in the form of a man in Daniel's vision. Gabriel, along with another angel, would later appear to Daniel while awake, but still in the shape of a man. He was sent to Daniel to reveal to him the meaning of a frightening vision he had. Again in
Dan9:21"While I was still speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I saw in the vision at first, approached me in swift flight about the time of the evening offering".
Gabriel proceeded by transmitting divine revelation upon Daniel.
Moses himself is described as receiving his ever first communication with God through an angel Ex3:2. Other prophets received revelation through angels. In dreams, Jacob was regularly visited by angelic messengers Gen31:11. Same for Elisha 2Kings1:3 or Zechariah's angelic visions later on throughout the book attributed to him. We also read that the spirit of God descending on an individual is always a pre-condition for prophethood. Even a regular person receiving the spirit of God automatically becomes a prophet Numb11:16-30. In fact we read that when God intends to speak with a prophet, He does so through an angel Numb22:20,35 and it was enough for the prophet Iddo to be convinced of the truthfulness of a man claiming to be a prophet when the latter said he received revelation through an angel 1Kings13:18.
When the prophets David and Solomon were visited in dreams by "the Lord", it obviously doesnt mean God physically appeared to them. God visiting these men means He made His will known to them through some means, like the angels 1Kings3:5. Not in one instance is there any prophet who was in this way "visited by the Lord" ever speaking of having literally seen the divine essence.
Prophetic revelation through angels, and more particularly through Gabriel, was therefore an already well established knowledge at least among the people of the book before the beginning of Muhammad's mission. The prophet himself claimed very early on in Mecca as seen from the above verses, that it was an angel who was carrying down revelation to him, not directly through God. The non-believing Arabs, who also believed in the existence of angels but had corrupted it by calling them God's daughters, echoed that claim by challenging him to show those angels of revelation 15:6-7. The Quran would reply to this demand and other similar ones that firstly angels, when they enter the physical realm, only appear in human form and that second, should they ever be sent as per the request of a disbelieving people, then the punishment would immediately follow.
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