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Dr. Richard Bauckham has urged, especially in his book Jesus and the God of Israel, that everywhere in the New Testament Jesus is taught to “have the divine identity” or to “belong to the identity of God” or to be “included in the divine identity.” Such language has widely proliferated in recent evangelical scholarship.
In a 2013 article to which Dr. Bauckham has never responded, I pointed out that the meaning of this new language is unclear, and that various interpretations run into serious problems.
But of course those were not the only possible interpretations. In his 2020 article “Elucidating Divine Identity” Dr. Joshua Sijuwade suggests that a certain conception of essence can clarify in what sense the biblical Jesus “belongs to the identity of” God. In this episode we discuss his ideas in this article.
In your view, do Dr. Sijuwade’s suggestions clarify Dr. Backham’s claim that Jesus “belongs to the identity” of God? Why or why not?
Links for this episode:
Sijuwade, “Elucidating Divine Identity,” Heythrop Journal, 2020
Dr. Sijuwade’s Academa.edu page
podcast 13 – On Bauckham’s Bargain (published paper)
podcast 214 – Has Bauckham clarified his “divine identity” theory? – Part 2
podcast 213 – Has Bauckham clarified his “divine identity” theory? – Part 1
podcast 124 – a challenge to “Jesus is God” apologists
Is Jesus Human and Not Divine?
on “Leibniz’s Law” (aka the indiscernibility of identicals)
Fine, “Essence and Modality“
Essential vs. Accidental Properties
podcast 227 – Who Should Christians Worship?
podcast 259 – Who is the one Creator? – Part 2
podcast 258 – Who is the one Creator? – Part 1
podcast 227 – Who Should Christians Worship?
This week’s thinking music is “Cardboard Engineering” by Jesse Spillane.
