podcast 70 – The one God and his Son according to John

Dale mentions that o wn in Ex3:14 (Sept) may be a mistranslation. I trust Dale is aware that John uses o wn in Rev1:4 (etc.) to refer to Jehovah…. John does not think it is a mistranslation.

The notion that the man Jesus is not described as “my God” is silly – and very forced (as if someone is looking beyond the man and talking to God in the man…). The sense is clear – the man Christ Jesus is OUR GOD. This is the same sense that the Psalmist uses in Ps45 re Heb king – and legitimately applied to Jesus…. Not sure why anyone has a problem with this simple, clear reading of the Word of God.

Hi Talitha,

Good idea. Maybe Dale could host something like that sometime.

Mario,

Good summary of the different perspectives that have come up here.

It’s interesting to see the different variations between full deity and eternal preexistence (#1) and no deity and no preexistence (#7). That’s what makes keeping a fresh perspective on the evidence worthwhile.

Mario,

I wouldn’t say that Jesus is “God’s expressed will” for the reason that it is too broad and leads to the imagination filling in gaps. For example, I can imagine one person considering Jesus in a gnostic sense, to where Jesus is an emanation of the “Godhead”.

Rivers,

About the “all” in John 1, I think the immediate context overrides the broader usage, in that it goes like this:

“All” were through the Word, and in Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
Then it goes on later that John came as a witness that all might believe through him.

I don’t think therefore that “all” is anything outside of the context, but that specifically which is within. It just seems to flow better to me, that’s all.

Also, as far as people wasting their time, I know what you mean. The studies of others can certainly give clues, but I see far too many people that get that good feeling about something and they run with it – I also had to learn not to do that. For instance, I have come across those that believed the Jesus = hai Zeus (or whatever) thing, which makes no sense. For some reason, they confused Latin (yay-soos) with Spanish, and then acted as though a broken Spanish (hay-zoos instead of xay-soos) was the exact transliteration. I then pointed out many errors, and it’s like people you tell these things to are so sure of this ridiculousness that they don’t listen to the errors that you point out.

Rivers [January 14, 2015 at 9:19 am]

Your … er … tripartite “relationship between John 1:1 and John 1:18” is a spectacular exercise in mystification. 🙁

Jon,

Good point about John 1:17.

The “grace and truth that were realized (Grk. EGENETO) through Jesus Christ” (John 1:17) certainly could be the “all things that came into being (Grk. EGENETO) through him” (John 1:4). That makes perfectly good sense with how the writer used “all things” to describe what Jesus himself was going to reveal to the people in his own words (John 4:26; John 5:20; John 14:26; John 16:4).

I think “the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ” (Mark 1:1) is referring to the same thing as “in the beginning of the word” (John 1:1). The term “beginning” was commonly used by the apostles to refer to the public ministry of Jesus Christ (Luke 1:2-3; John 6:64; John 8:25; John 15:27; John 16:4; Acts 1:21-22). As Dale noted in his podcast message, it’s also evident that the writer used “from the beginning” to refer to their relationship with Jesus Christ himself (1 John 1:1-2).

Unfortunately, a lot of this linguistic evidence is overlooked (or disregarded) on account of presuppositions about preexistence and incarnation that effect the way most interpreters read the Prologue. Even many biblical unitarians waste their time trying to defend some kind of preexisting “plan, purpose, or wisdom” of God (that became incarnated as Jesus Christ) because they misconstrue the time of “the beginning” (John 1:1-3) and adopt a lexical definition of LOGOS that isn’t consistent with how the biblical writers always used the term.

Another consideration I think should be taken is the relationship between John 1:1 and John 1:18 in the Prologue. Let me illustrate this:

1. “In the beginning was the word” (John 1:1a) = “No man has seen God at any time” (John 1:18a). In other words, the writer understood that believing the words of Jesus Christ was the only way to “see” that Father (John 14:10).

2. “and the word was with (toward) God” (John 1:1b) = “who is in the bosom of the Father” (John 1:18b). In other words, Jesus Christ went “toward God” (Grk. PROS TON THEON) through his resurrection (John 13:3) and came to be in the bosom of his Father.

3. “and God was the word” (John 1:1c) = “he has explained God” (John 1:18c). In other words, Jesus exhibited the words and works of the unseen God so that the disciples could understand the truth (John 5:19-20, 36-37).

Rivers,

I’m not saying that John is trying to make a parallel with Genesis or that he is necessarily trying to get people to think of Genesis when saying “in the beginning”, and certainly not that John is saying that all of this is happening at Genesis time; but rather that the things pertaining to Jesus there can be compared to Genesis in that it’s a creation, and that Jesus considers Himself like that light for such a reason, and also for the other reasons that I mentioned earlier. About “in the beginning”, maybe it’s a dual thing, but for instance we see one Gospel account saying, “the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God”, whereas John’s says, “in the beginning”.

About eternal life in His words, I do think that it’s along the same lines as you said. You’ve got to understand that of course when I’m speaking from John, I’m kind of speaking like him anyway (by default), and so the shorthand would just be to say that Jesus gives life by His words. This is actually from the Father, and this is only possible because He was resurrected. He could only be resurrected if He spilled His blood and pleased God by His obedience, etc. As such, I feel that Jesus Christ shedding blood for us also is shorthand for all of that, and that it’s not a literal shedding of blood that saves us, but it does indeed lead to that salvation being possible. If the case is that those who die in Him might live in Him, then certainly He must have died, and this is portrayed as a lamb from God, as though God were offering a sacrifice for someone’s sins, and yet Jesus says that we must offer our own selves in order to have a part with Him (take up our cross).

As far as belief in Who Jesus was, I personally relate that to Him being that specific, awaited Messiah Who would be beloved by God. As such, they must be subservient to Him. “Kiss the Son” and like passages, such as Luke 19:27. Jesus relates the teachings of Himself to that “word” I was talking about in Matthew 7:24. The Gospel is the good news of the kingdom, which in Isaiah is “Zion, your God reigns!” This is what we pray for in the Lord’s prayer. However, if a person believes the Good News, then obviously they believe Jesus is the Christ. Believing Jesus is the Christ, they must understand that God gives Him all nations. Understanding that, they must be ruled by Him, and all those who don’t want to are like those in Psalm 2 whom God laughs at.

With what you said about John 1:4 in that it’s all the things that He spoke, that could be. After all, it is that by which they have life. So to me, it could be either way. This also relates to John 1:17. Now, this could be specifically therefore the words, or it still could be the people by the words. Either way, it fits, so I’m not seeing it as 100% certain there. I could examine that some more.

Thanks!
-Jon

Rivers,

I notice that you haven’t answered my question … 🙁

(hint: the last paragraph, where there is a question mark)

P.S. You say that the Gospel of John reflects “the simple message of the gospel that was preached by Jesus and the apostles”, “were speaking to ordinary people in the common language of the day”. You make me seriously doubt that you are aware of the complex Christology that the Prologue announces, of the misunderstandings that a superficial reading (some confuse it with “critical exegesis”) leads to, very much the same kind of misunderstanding in which Nicodemus and many others fall.

Rivers,

the overwhelming majority of Christians are (at least nominally) “trinitarians”. They “read” “Word”, in those critical Johannine verses, as their churches dictate. Let’s not consider them, for the moment.

Let’s consider “scholarly literate people”, who, beside being capable to read Bible Greek and having at least a smattering of Bible Hebrew, are also aware of ancient and modern exegesis and hermeneutics. Some knowledge of Christian history would be an added plus.

Question: how many of those “scholarly literate people” do you thing share your understanding of the logos as a “name” that the Johannine author would have attributed to Jesus, beginning with when John the Baptist started witnessing about him? Just curious.

Jonathan,

… continued from the previous comment:

1. Although I agree that “the word” in John 1:1-3, 14 and 1 John 1:1-2 is most likely referring to Jesus Christ himself, I think we have to be careful about taking the term “word” too literally. I don’t think that the actual “words” he spoke had any kind of inherent mysterious power of their own. The message itself was just a means of communication.

For example, when the apostles understood that Jesus “had the words of eternal life” (John 6:63-68), I think it’s probably referring to the fact that Jesus was speaking the gospel message that would lead people in the way of receiving eternal life by resurrection on account of belief in who he was (John 11:25; 1 John 1:1-5).

2. I definitely think you are on the right track with your understanding of John 1:4-12. The writer was referring to what the appearing of Jesus Christ himself accomplished for God’s people to whom he was sent (and has nothing to do with what happened during the Genesis creation). I think the Prologue is looking back on the resurrection of Jesus Christ (John 1:1-4; John 1:17-18) and not to anything that happened before the John manifested him to the world (John 1:6-9; John 1:30-31).

Throughout the 4th Gospel, it’s evident that the “all things” (John 1:4) referred to what the people expected the Christ to explain to them when he arrived (John 4:26) and what Jesus himself was to receive from God the Father during that time (John 3:35; John 5:20; John 13:3; John 15:15; John 16:15; John 17:10) and what Jesus was going to reveal to his disciples (John 14:26). There’s no indication that the writer understood that any of this was referring to anything that happened during the time of the Genesis creation.

3. I don’t think what you’re doing with John 1:10-12 is a “stretch” at all. I appreciate that you are trying to draw your explanation of the text from how the words are being used in the context. I think John 1:10-12 interprets itself. It seems that the apostles understood that Jesus Christ was given the authority over all the people to determine who received eternal life based upon whether or not they received and believed him.

Jonathan

Essence: the underlying reality or principal, or even the metaphysical constitution or the meaning of the thing. For instance, although a wooden club is not a table leg, they can essentially be the same in the way that you could beat someone with a table leg, and you could nail a wooden club to a table.

It seems to me that you use the word “essence” in a sense very similar to that of “material constitution”. While I think I can understand how you apply your notion of essence to Jesus as “The Word of God”, it is less clear to me how Jesus would be “God” and the Word “God” in the a.m. sense of essence.

Mario,

I don’t think you are paying attention to context when you simply propose that there is a “thematic” distinction between the Prologue (John 1:1-18) and the rest of John 1:19-49). That is an arbitrary interpretation that you are forcing upon the structure of the passage. Someone else could argue that John 1:19-49 simply reiterates (and adds additional detail) to what was introduced in the Prologue.

For example, John 1:6-9 speaks of the beginning of the testimony of John the baptizer, as does John 1:19-34. This testimony of John is also introduced in John 1:15 and reiterated in John 1:27-30, as well as the fact that Jesus began to dwell among his apostles (John 1:14; John 1:34-49).

If there is any “theme” to the writer’s allusion to the Genesis language in John 1:1-18, then it should be consistent. That is why it makes no sense to take “in the beginning” (John 1:1-3) as referring to the time of Genesis 1:1 and then take “the light” and “the darkness” and “the world” to be referring to the time of John the baptizer and Jesus Christ.

That fact that John the baptizer was “testifying about the light” during his own lifetime (John 1:6-9) should make it obvious that “the light” is only an allusion to Genesis 1:3 that the writer is applying to the time of Jesus (who was “the light of the world” only during his public ministry, John 9:5).

As Dale noted in his podcast message, the writer also referred to “the beginning” as the time when the apostles began to follow Jesus (1 John 1:1-2). Thus, it seems more likely to me that “the beginning” (John 1:1-3) would be referring to the same period of time (and is only an allusion to the language in Genesis 1:1 being applied to what was beginning to happen through the ministries of John and Jesus).

John the baptizer could not be “testifying about the light” (John 1:7-8) back in the time of the Genesis creation

Rivers,
try to make an effort. 🙂

A text is not only made of grammar (morphology and syntax), but, if it is meant to convey any message at all, the author provides it with a structure and with themes. In Chapter 1 of the Gospel of John, we can easily recognize various parts. Let’s concentrate on the first two: The Prologue to the Gospel (John 1:1-18) and The Testimony of John the Baptist (John 1:19-39). Try to see the Prologue as some sort of “overture”. Like all “overtures”, the Prologue provides an anticipation of the themes that will play out in the course of the “opera”. In particular the theme of The Testimony of John the Baptist (see the key words martyria – John 1:19; emartyrêsen – John 1:32; memartyrêka – John 1:34) is anticipated in the Prologue (martyrian, martyrêsê – John 1:7; martyrêsê – John 1:8).

@ Dale [January 12, 2015 at 6:43 pm]

I am not aware that Augustine “comes back to John 17:3 several times”. Where would that be? (That he abominably twisted Jesus’ words once, was more than enough, BTW …)

He certainly twisted Jesus’ words because he was perfectly aware that they were incompatible with his “trinitarianism”, and that ONLY with his “treatment”, Jesus’ words would have become compatible with the “trinity”. On the other hand, you are way too kind, assuming that he messed up John 17:3 because he was persuaded that the Arians “must have changed it” (and so he thought he was “restoring” it). Do you have evidence for that, or is it just a mere guess of yours?

Oh, BTW, it is a real pity that (if he ever did), Augustine did not formulate the incompatibility this way:

1r. If this passage is uncorrupted, then my theology is wrong.
😉

Never ever did Jesus claim to be God.

Dale,

A particular mistake I think you made in your presentation here is when you made the claim that “in the beginning” in John 1:1-3 must refer to the Genesis creation. Instead of developing that theory from anything in the context of the Prologue, you deferred to a couple of texts from the Hebrew scriptures (Psalms 33:6; Proverbs 8) and made the unsubstantiated assertion that “the early readers of John’s Gospel would had had these passages in mind when they read John 1.”

In keeping with your logical argument that the writer would probably be consistent in how he was expressing his ideas, it seems more reasonable that he would have used “in the beginning” (John 1:1-3) to refer to the time of the public ministry of Jesus Christ since he used “the light” and “the darkness” and “the world” (also from the Genesis creation language) to refer to things that were happening during that time.

On what contextual basis should “in the beginning” be disconnected from “the light” and “the darkness” and “the world” when the writer is using the latter figures to refer to Jesus Christ himself (“the light”, John 1:4, 5, 7-8), the people to whom he came (“the world”, John 1:10-13), and those who didn’t recognize him (“the darkness”, John 1:5, 11). Moreover, John the baptizer could not be “testifying about the light” (John 1:7-8) back in the time of the Genesis creation.

Moreover, Jesus Christ called himself “the light of the world” (John 8:12; John 1:4, 7-9) and his own flesh “the life if the world” (John 6:51; John 1:4), just like John called him “the word” (Revelation 19:13; John 1:1-3). These appellations are referring to a human being (and not “a personfied divine property or action”.

Rivers,

I’ll go one step further and assert that the Word is Jesus as a Person, and that it’s used interchangeably with the words of God, and assert also that this is the reason that Jesus is called the Word. For instance, we have in Revelation Jesus having the name “The Word of God” written on Him. I don’t think that Jesus would be revealing things from Philo, but in Revelation 19, here is the section that pinpoints it contextually:

I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and wages war. His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. “He will rule them with an iron scepter.” He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written:

KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.

Remember all of the relevant Old Testament passages referred to here? There are at least three or four, and if you look at this paragraph as a whole and read it for what it is, it’s saying:
1) He’s called “faithful and true” because He speaks faithfully and truly
2) He’s called “the Word of God” because He speaks the words of God
3) He judges with justice and righteousness — by speaking the words of God
4) He slays the wicked — by speaking the words of God

All-in-all, He’s called “The Word of God” because He is, for all intents and purposes, the ACTUAL words of God, by representation or in essence (and not in “essential being”). Furthermore, it should also be obvious that Jesus is “God” and the Word is “God” in the sense of representation and essence also (again, not in “essential being” as in one Being).

What do I mean here? Well, Jesus plainly states that the way in which they see the Father by Him is because of all He speaks from the Father. His whole purpose is to speak the Word of God (Deuteronomy 18:17,18; John 18:37), and for that reason, it should be now obvious that He’s named “The Word of God”.

Furthermore, we have to remember that John spoke from Jesus, and not the other way around; and certainly, he didn’t speak from philosophy during that time! Jesus plainly states that His flesh is the words of God — yes, the literal words of God. Do you know how I found this out?
I prayed to God.

Here’s what He showed me that moment that I prayed:
John 6:35, “I am the bread of life”
John 6:51, “this bread is My flesh”
John 6:54: “whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life”

(related passage) Matthew/Luke 4:4, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”
(Now Jesus speaks to His disciples specifically — see John 6:60)
John 6:63: “The SPIRIT gives life; the flesh COUNTS FOR NOTHING. The WORDS that I speak to you are Spirit and they are life.”

In other words, the “flesh” that He was talking about the whole time was figurative, and the eating of His flesh was actually believing in His words, as He goes on to say in verse 64.

This was not lost on the disciples, and this is why the ones in verse 66 walked away also; see verses 26-31, where these unbelieving “disciples” shamelessly keep trying to get Him to feed them with bread. As such, the believers also understood, including Peter, and presumably John who wrote this:
John 6:68, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

As such, I believe John 1:14 has more to do with the word (or Jesus) becoming flesh TO EAT, and that, having done so, then they saw His glory as an only-begotten child. I am relating this to John 17:24, where Jesus prays that they would (someday later than then) see His glory as beloved by the Father. This is by the Spirit, as He also says elsewhere, when He said that the one who believed HIS WORDS, Jesus and the Father would come to them and Jesus would reveal Himself to them (that He is God’s beloved Son). When we take these things plainly, they make more sense — in other words, Jesus is revealing that He’s beloved by God, and not “God the Son” and other mystical stuff.

Furthermore, the “word became flesh and dwelt among us”, I believe should be rendered a little differently. For instance, certain Trinitarian apologists have (rightly) said that the word there is tabernacled for “dwelt”. They, however, reckon that this is like God entering the temple, when in reality, the Spirit is entering Jesus as a temple. Also, the tabernacling in this case would be Jesus entering us in that we are the temple, and Jesus is to us the Spirit (for both the Father and Son come to us by way of the Spirit — as Paul said, “the Lord is the Spirit”). As such, the word translated “among” is literally just “in”. The way it’s rendered is dependent on the context, the way it is used. For instance, is Jesus “in” the crowd i.e. among them, or is Jesus “in” the believers, i.e. tabernacled within their hearts? Those who have believed His words have had the Holy Spirit come into them and have received the Spirit, and since Jesus relates the words to the Spirit, and giving eternal life, then I think that this is very consistent not only with what John is saying that Jesus said, but with reality itself. Even Athanasius, if I remember correctly, claimed that the Holy Spirit is the bread of life. So, despite his theology, even he understood this, at least in part (as we all see Him in part, but will someday see Him face-to-face).

There’s more to this in John 1, but I hope that you and also Dale might see this as consistent and worth investigating. For me, it’s a done deal, because not only is it consistent, but it was in answer to my prayers. There, however, is no wrong in seeking something out in order to authenticate it.

Love in Him,
-Jon

Dale,

I think what has happened over the centuries is that some of the controversial passages (e.g. John 1:1-3; John 1:15; John 1:27-30; John 8:58) in the 4th Gospel have been misconstrued as “preexistence” texts rather than correctly interpreted as resurrection texts. John 1:14a is also taken out of the immediate context of the public ministry of John the baptizer and Jesus (John 1:6-13, 14b-15) and forced to support the “incarnation” doctrine.

Regardless of when each of the Gospel accounts was written (and the 4th Gospel certainly could have been the first one), they all essentially put “the beginning of the gospel” (Mark 1:1) at the time when John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness and identified Jesus Christ as the son of God (Matthew 3; Mark 1; Luke 3; John 1). Thus, I agree that the fundamental agreement between the Gospels is consistent (and interpreting the Prologue and other controversial passages in the 4th Gospel should be able to account for this).