Paraclete

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Paraclete (Ancient Greek: παράκλητος, Latin: paracletus) means 'advocate' or 'helper'. In Christianity, the term paraclete most commonly refers to the Holy Spirit.

Paraclete comes from the Koine Greek word παράκλητος (paráklētos). A combination of para ('beside/alongside') and kalein ('to call'), the word first appears in the Bible in John 14:16. René Kieffer further explains the development of the meaning of this term:

The word parakletos is a verbal adjective, often used of one called to help in a lawcourt. In the Jewish tradition the word was transcribed with Hebrew letters and used for angels, prophets, and the just as advocates before God's court. The word also acquired the meaning of 'one who consoles' (cf. Job 16:2, Theodotion's and Aquila's translations; the LXX has the correct word parakletores). It is probably wrong to explain the Johannine parakletos on the basis of only one religious background. The word is filled with a complex meaning: the Spirit replaces Jesus, is an advocate and a witness, but also consoles the disciples.

Lochlan Shelfer suggests that the Greek term paraclete is a translation of the preceding Latin term advocatus:

παράκλητος [does not have] any independent meaning of its own, it is in fact a calque for the Latin term advocatus meaning a person of high social standing who speaks on behalf of a defendant in a court of law before a judge. When Greeks came into contact with the Roman Empire during the late Republic, the word παράκλητοs was developed as a precise equivalent to the Latin legal term advocatus. Thus, its significance must be found not only in its very few extant appearances, but also in the specific use of the Latin legal term.

The term is not common in non-Jewish texts. The best known use is by Demosthenes:

Citizens of Athens, I do not doubt that you are all pretty well aware that this trial has been the center of keen partisanship and active canvassing, for you saw the people who were accosting and annoying you just now at the casting of lots. But I have to make a request which ought to be granted without asking, that you will all give less weight to private entreaty or personal influence than to the spirit of justice and to the oath which you severally swore when you entered that box. You will reflect that justice and the oath concern yourselves and the commonwealth, whereas the importunity and party spirit of advocates serve the end of those private ambitions which you are convened by the laws to thwart, not to encourage for the advantage of evil-doers.

— Demosthenes, On the False Embassy 19:1