was the Messenger of Allah to her. From this it is understood that His “spirit” is a created being that belongs to Him; what is not intended is His life, which is His own eternal attribute, exalted be He. The same applies to His words, “So We breathed into her of Our spirit” (Al-Anbiyāʾ 21:91), which mirror His statement about Adam, peace be upon him: “When I have proportioned him and breathed into him of My spirit” (Al-Ḥijr 15:29). In fact, the Messiah was likened to Adam when He said: “The likeness of Jesus in the sight of Allah is like that of Adam; He created him from dust, then said to him, ‘Be!’—and he was” (Āl ‘Imrān 3:59).

The doubt on this matter arose among some uninformed people who assumed that, because a human says “my spirit” and thereby means the soul within the body—a self-subsisting entity—(even though some may use the phrase simply to denote life), the same should be applied to the Divine. Yet man is a composite of body and spirit, and that spirit, according to the early Muslims, their leading scholars, and the vast majority of nations, is an independent entity. The Lord, exalted be He, is utterly transcendent above any such composition; He is not made up of body and spirit. Therefore, one must not understand “My spirit” in the divine speech the way a human means “my spirit.” Rather, the phrase is attached to Him in reference to His angels, or to what He sends down upon His prophets of revelation, guidance, support, and the like.