ON THE DEITY OF CHRIST

By Bruce Metzger

In John 20:28 the apostle Thomas addressed the risen Lord Jesus Christ with a confession of His deity when he said, "My Master and my God!" If Jesus were not truly divine, Thomas was wrong in adoring Him as God. Also, if Thomas WAS wrong, why didn't Jesus make an effort to correct him? In fact, Jesus not only accepts Thomas's words, but actually COMMENDS all those who share Thomas's faith (verse 29).

While Stephen, the first martyr, was being stoned, "he made appeal and said, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit'" (Acts 7:59). Here Stephen invoked the Lord Jesus. It is obviously both foolish and sinful to pray to anyone accept God. If it is true that Jesus is only a spirit creature, then Stephen was an idolater in praying to one who was not truly God.

The Epistle to the Galatians begins as follows: "Paul, an apostle, neither from men nor through a man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father . . ." Here the Apostle declares that his apostleship was derived neither from men nor through a man as a channel. Instead of receiving his appointment as an Apostle from or through any human being, he declares emphatically that it was "through Jesus Christ and God the Father." In these words, Paul clearly distinguishes Jesus Christ from men and ranges Him with God the Father.

So habitually did Paul think of Christ as fully divine that it comes naturally to him to refer, even in passing, to Jesus Christ and God in the same breath, using the same preposition for both persons. Remember that Paul was a strict monotheist, yet he thought of Jesus as the divine Son of God. He assumes that everyone agrees with him about it, so he does not argue the point. The consensus of various groups within the early church was that Jesus Christ must be ranged alongside God the Father.

Not only do Thomas, Stephen, Paul and others regard Jesus as God, but according to John 10:30, Jesus Himself claimed, "I and the Father are one." The marginal note of the New World Translation (used by Jehovah's Witnesses) suggesting that "are one" means "are at unity," is a FALSE interpretation completely lacking in justification. Here Jesus is claiming much more than having one purpose or outlook with the Father. He claims to be one with the Father in ESSENCE--and the Jews understand Him to mean this, for they took up stones to stone Him for blasphemy (verses 31-33). Psychologically, there was no reason for them to become angry at Jesus if all He asserted was His being one in purpose and outlook with the Father. Verses 34-36 can be summarized as follows: "If the fallible and sinful judges of Israel were rightly called 'gods,' MUCH MORE MAY I, who am one with the Father and free from sin, claim the title of 'the Son of God.'" Verse 38, which refers to the Son being in the Father and the Father in the Son, illuminates Jesus' assertion in verse 30, "I and the Father are one."

Although the word "Trinity" cannot be found in the Bible, there are many passages in the New Testament that reveal how deeply the Trinitarian pattern was impressed upon the thinking of early Christianity. There are direct and obvious statements in Matthew 28:19 and 2 Corinthians 13:14, as well as many others: 1 Corinthians 6:11; 12: 4-5; 2 Corinthians 1:21-22; Galatians 3:11-14; 1 Thessalonians 5:18-19; 1 Peter 1:2, etc.

It is a fallacy to think that, since the word "Trinity" does not appear in the Bible, the doctrine of the Trinity is not taught in the Scripture. The word "theocracy" likewise appears nowhere in the Bible. In neither case, however, does the absence of the word "Trinity" or the word for "God's rule" (theocracy) imply that the realities expressed by those two words are absent from the Scripture.

Occasionally writers in the New Testament apply to Jesus Christ passages from the Old Testament which refer to Jehovah:

(a) Isaiah promises that "Jehovah will be unto thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy glory" (Isaiah 60:19). Luke applies this to Jesus, quoting it in the form, "A light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel" (Luke 2:32).

(b) Isaiah's vision in the Temple (Isaiah 6:1, 3, 10) was of Jehovah. In the Gospel of John, however, it is said that Isaiah saw the glory of Jesus Christ and spoke of Him (John 12:37-41).

(c) In Psalm 23:1 and Isaiah 40:10-11, Jehovah is said to be our Shepherd. In John 10:11, Jesus, with obvious reference to the Old Testament passages, claims to be the Good Shepherd.

(d) Paul quotes the promise in Joel, "whosoever shall call upon the name of Jehovah shall be delivered" (Joel 2:32), and refers it to Jesus: "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved . . . for, whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:9, 13).

Only God can forgive sin. Jesus often forgave sins (Mark 2:10, etc.)

The statement in John 10:30, "I and the Father are one," is the constant claim of Jesus. His statement is either true or false. If it is true, then He is God. If it is false, He either knew it to be false or He did not not know it to be false. If while claiming to be God He knew this claim to be false, He was a liar. If while claiming to be God He did not know this claim to be false, He was demented. There is no other alternative.

The New World Translation was MISTRANSLATED John 1:1, by overlooking the well-known fact in Greek grammar that nouns may be definite for various reasons, WHETHER OR NOT the Greek definite article is present. The New World Translation has "and the word was a god." It must be stated quite frankly that, if the Jehovah's Witnesses take this translation seriously, they are POLYTHEISTS (belief in many gods).

Colwell's rule in Greek states: "A definite predicate nominative has the article when it follows the verb; it does NOT have the article when it precedes the verb." The absence of the article (before theos) does NOT make the predicate indefinite or qualitative when it precedes the verb. It is indefinite in this position only when the context demands it. The context does NOT demand it in the Gospel of John--this statement that "the Word was God" cannot be regarded as strange in the prologue of the gospel which reaches its climax in the confession of Thomas, "My Lord and my God" (John 20:28).

In Colossians 1:15-17 the New World Translation falsifies what Paul originally wrote, rendering it: "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, because by means of him all OTHER things were created in the heavens and upon the earth . . . All OTHER things have been created through him and for him. Also he is before all OTHER things and by means of him all OTHER things were made to exist." Here the word "other" has been unwarrantably inserted four times. It is NOT present in the original Greek, and was obviously used by the translators in order to make the passage refer to Jesus as being on a par with other created things. In fact, the ancient Colossian heresy which Paul had to combat resembled the opinion of the modern Jehovah's Witnesses, for some of the Colossians believed the Gnostic notion that Jesus was the first of many other created intermediaries between God and men. For the true meaning of Paul's exalted description of the Son of God, therefore, the above translation must be read without the fourfold addition of the word "other."

Frequently Jehovah's Witnesses make the assertion that this passage teaches that God created the Son. Actually the verb "to create" in reference to the relation of the Son of God to the Father appears neither here nor anywhere else in the New Testament. Here Jesus is spoken of as "the first begotten of all creation," which is quite different from saying that He was made or created. If Paul had wished to express the latter idea, he had available a Greek word to do so, the word protoktistos, meaning "first-created." But Paul uses the word prototokos, meaning "first begotten," which is something different. C. S. Lewis, the famous author and theologian, has this to say: "To beget is just this. When you beget, you beget something of the same kind as yourself. A man begets human babies, a beaver begets little beavers, and a bird begets eggs which turn into little birds. But when you make , you make something of a different kind from yourself. A bird makes a nest, a beaver builds a dam, a man makes a wireless set . . . Now that's the first thing to get clear. WHAT GOD BEGETS IS GOD; just as what man begets is man. What God creates is not God; just as what makes is not man." Jesus was BEGOTTEN.

So, in Colossians 1:15, Paul is alluding not only to Christ's PRIORITY to all creation, but also to his SOVEREIGNTY over all creation.

Later, in Colossians 2:9, Paul declares, It is in Him [Jesus Christ] that all the fullness of the divine quality dwells bodily." Nothing could be clearer or more emphatic than this declaration. It means that everything without exception which goes to make up the Godhead, or divine quality, dwells or resides in Jesus Christ. Paul's verb tense here ispresent: "dwells." He doesn't say "has dwelt" or "will dwell" in Jesus Christ, but that it "dwells" there.

The New World Translation also mistranslates Philippians 2:6, saying that Jesus gave no consideration to be equal with God; in other words, he WAS NOT equal with God, nor did He desire to be. There is a misunderstanding of the Greek here. Referring to the standard Greek lexicon of the New Testament edited by J. H. Thayer (which is used quite often by Jehovah's Witnesses translators): "[Christ Jesus], who, although he bore the form of God, yet did not think that this equality with God was to be eagerly clung to or retained" (p. 418, col. b). So the correct idea here is that, even though Jesus was in the form of God and EQUAL with Him, He did not cling to that position, but instead became a SERVANT on this earth; a SAVIOUR, revealing the true character of God.

In still another crucial verse the New World Translation has garbled the meaning of the original to avoid referring to Jesus Christ as God. Titus 2:13 reads: "we wait for the happy hope and glorious manifestation of the great God and of our Savior Christ Jesus." This rendering , by separating "the great God" from "our Savior Christ Jesus," overlooks a principle of Greek grammar which was formulated in a rule by Granville Sharp in 1798. This rule states that when the copulative kai connects two nouns of the same case, if the article precedes the first noun and is not repeated before the second noun, the latter always refers to the same person that is expressed or described by the first noun.

This verse in Titus, therefore, must be translated like this: "Awaiting our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ" (RSV).

Exactly similar to the last error looked at above is the rendering of 2 Peter 1:1 in the New World Translation, " . . . by the righteousness of our God and the Savior Jesus Christ." Just like above, and for the same reason, this verse should read, " . . . of our God and Savior Jesus Christ."

The New World Translation also mistranslates Revelations 3:14, where it makes the exalted Christ refer to Himself as "the beginning of the creation by God." The Greek text of this verse (hae archae tase ktisaose tou theou) is far from saying that Christ was created by God, because the genitive case, tou theou, means "of God" and not "by God" (which would require the preposition hupaw). Actually the word archae("beginning") carries with it the same idea Paul expressed in Colossians 1:15-18, and signifies that Christ is the ORIGIN, or primary Source, of God's creation (compare also John 1:3, "Apart from Him not even one thing came into existence").

The book What Has Religion Done for Mankind?, referring to Proverbs 8:22 and following, says this: "In the proverbs of wisdom [the Son] speaks of himself as wisdom and calls attention to his being a creation of the eternal heavenly Father," (p. 37). This rendering understands the verb to be used here with the meaning "to create." The true translation of this passage, however, according to an excellent study by the eminent Semitic scholar, F. C. Burney, must be, "The Lord BEGAT me as the beginning of his way . . ." The context favors this rendering, for the growth of the embryo is described in the following verse (verse 23), and the birth of Wisdom is described in the two following verses (24 & 25). So, in the context the verb in verse 22 appears with certainty to mean "got" or "begot."

In any case, it is wrong to abandon the consistent New Testament representation of Jesus Christ as uncreated and to seize upon a disputed interpretation of a verse in the Old Testament as the only satisfactory description of Him.

Regarding Subordination of the Son: Alongside the passages of Scripture which teach the equality of the Son with the Father are also others which refer to a principle of subordination. Since the early centuries of the Christian Church, the teaching has been "the Father is first, the Son is second, and the Spirit is third, in the operations of God by which redemption is accomplished." Whatever the Father does, He does through the Son by the Spirit. The principle of subordination is the "modes of operation" in the functions ascribed to the Persons of the Trinity in the redemptive process, is reflected in what some call "the liturgical precedence." For example, Jesus told us that the baptismal formula should be in the sequence of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, who together constitute one God ("baptizing in the NAME . . .," not names).

In John 14:28 Jesus says, "My Father is greater than I." As Calvin points out: "Christ does not here compare the divinity of the Father with His own, nor His own human nature with the divine essence of the Father; but rather His present condition with the celestial glory to which He would be presently received." It is a fact that the question treated in the context is not about Christ's being born but the comforting of His disciples.

In the Gospel of John, the phrase "greater then" means "of greater power and authority than" (John 4:12; 8:53; 10:29; 13:16; 1 John 3:20). This same meaning must be relevant here. The humiliation of the Son involved, in a very real way, a SEPARATION from the Father. Jesus' glorification and return to the Father restores to Him a position from which He can communicate to His disciples GREATER POWER: "greater works than these shall he do (the believer); because I go unto the Father" (John 14:12). As Sir Edwyn C. Hoskyns says in his The Fourth Gospel, "It is the promise of the greater power which is to be theirs because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, that renders the saying a consolation to the disciples" (p. 464).

By carefully reading the entire fourteenth chapter of John, it can be seen that Jesus was not referring to a permanent relation between He and His Father.

Three other passages touch upon the "modes of operation": 1 Corinthians 3:23, 1 Corinthians 11:3; and 1 Corinthians 15:24 and 28. Just three observations: (1) What the "subjection" means Paul does not say. (2) Such statements represent one side, but not the whole, of Paul's thought. So there is no need to find in these verses anything which contradicts the clear teaching elsewhere in the New Testament regarding the identity of essence of the Father and the Son. (3) It could be said that Christ relates to God as a son relates to a father: with RESPECT. A son carries out the will of the father, but is of the same essence as the father. There may be different roles perhaps, but of essence they are the same.

The Bible says "God is love." Those words can have no real meaning unless God is at least two Persons. Love is something that one person has for another person. If God were a single Person, then before the universe was made, He was NOT love. IF love is of the essence of God, He must always love, and, being eternal, He must have possessed an eternal object of His love. Furthermore, perfect love is possible only between equals. Just as man cannot satisfy or realize his powers of love by loving the lower animals, so God cannot satisfy or realize His love fully by loving man or anycreature. Being infinite, He must have eternally possessed an infinite object of His love, some "alter ego," or, to use the language of traditional Christian theology, a consubstantial, co-eternal, and co-equal Son.

The belief in the Trinity is not contrary to reason, but beyond it.

A God who would be fully understood by our finite intelligences would be unworthy to be called God.

When speaking of the "unity" of the Triune God, it is necessary to expand our idea of the nature of unity. In mathematics, "one is one and three is three; what is one is not three, and what is three is not one." But we have long been acquainted with unities which are not so simple. There is, for example, aesthetic unity, the unity of a work of art. And there is organic unity, the unity of a living creature. In both of these the unity is far from being simple. An organism unifies various "constitutive" elements in a singlelife, and the higher the organism, the more complex is its unity. The creature which comes the closest to arithmetical unity is the unicellular amoeba; but who would compare God to an amoeba! In the organic unity of a single man there is a trinity of feeling, willing, and thinking. Hodgson reminds us, "the degree of unity is to be measured by a scale of intensity of unifying power; if the elements in the Godhead are Persons in the full sense of the word, then the unity of the Godhead must exceed in intensity the lesser unity known on earth. All existent earthly unities are imperfect analogies of the divine" (Leonard Hodgson, The Doctrine of the Trinity, p. 90).

Nothing is said in the teachings of Jehovah's Witnesses about what the Apostle Paul emphasized with untiring insistence: that the Christian is "in Christ." This phrase, or something similar like "in the Lord," or "in Him," etc., OCCURS 164 TIMES IN PAUL'S LETTERS, and represents what he had found to be the central and all-unifying source of his Christian life. Yet the officially approved teaching of the Jehovah's Witnesses cannot logically (and does not) include this glorious Christian truth. They cannot do so because their teaching is directly and fundamentally anti-Trinitarian. It is only because Jesus Christ is God that we can be IN Him.

The Jehovah's Witnesses' teaching that Jesus Christ was CREATED, and therefore NOT EQUAL with God is simply a modern form of the ancient heresy of Arianism. Arianism was condemned by the Church in the early centuries.

There have ALWAYS been attacks made on both the HUMAN and the DIVINE natures of Jesus Christ. Satan has tried to confuse people about both of these, because he knows that if they misunderstand who Jesus IS, they will not understand salvation itself--how it is that they are saved; and they will also miss out on the abundant life that the Father wishes them to have on earth. They will not experience the full measure of the joy and power of being a child of God. Satan has been rather successful in spreading lies about the Son of God.

Only God could die to redeem the human race from the natural result of sin--eternal death. An angel would not do--neither would you or me or anyone else--NOBODY COULD REDEEM MAN EXCEPT THE CREATOR. The reason for this is simple. It was God's law and government that were attacked by Lucifer before the creation of the world. It was God's law that had been broken. Only the death of Someone equal to orgreater than the law could ransom those lost in sin.

This is BASIC to a correct understanding of the atonement. The Bible says that sin is the transgression of the law (1 John 3:4). None but the Son of God could accomplish our redemption; for only He who was in the bosom of the Father could declare Him. Only He who knew the height and depth of the love of God could make it manifest. Nothing less than the infinite sacrifice made by Christ in behalf of fallen man could express the Father's love to lost humanity. Only the LAMB OF GOD could take away the sin of the world.

When Jacob fled from his brother Esau, he was weighed down with a deep sense of guilt, because he had deceived his brother. In sadness he lay down to rest on the bare earth, around him only the lonely hills, and above, the heavens bright with stars. As he slept, a strange light appeared around him. From the ground on which he lay, vast shadowy stairs seemed to lead upward to the very gates of heaven, and upon them angels of God were passing up and down; while from the glory above, the divine voice was heard in a message of comfort and hope. Thus was made known to Jacob that which met the need and longing of his soul-- a Saviour. With joy and gratitude he saw revealed a way by which he, a sinner, could be restored to communion with God. The mystic ladder of his dream represented Jesus, the only medium of communication between God and man.

This is the same figure to which Christ referred in His conversation with Nathanael, when He said, "Ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man" (John 1:51). In the apostasy, man alienated himself from God; earth was cut off from heaven. But through Christ, earth is again linked with heaven. With His own merits, Christ has bridged the gulf with man. CHRIST CONNECTS FALLEN MAN IN HIS WEAKNESS AND HELPLESSNESS WITH THE SOURCE OF INFINITE POWER.

Jacob's ladder spanned from heaven to earth: this means that Jesus Christ spanned from heaven to earth; so He HAS TO BE A PARTICIPANT IN BOTH A DIVINE NATURE (top of the ladder) AND A HUMAN NATURE (bottom of the ladder). This is the only way that Jesus could possibly save us. He has to be DIVINE because 'sin" is "sin against GOD;" He has to be HUMAN because He is our SUBSTITUTE--in all our ways tempted as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15).

Christ alone was able to represent the Deity. He who had been in the presence of the Father from the beginning (John 17:5), He who was the express image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15), was alone sufficient to accomplish this work. Jesus blessed the world by living out in human flesh the life of God, thus showing that He had the power to unite humanity to divinity.

And so we are privileged to be "partakers of the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4). We don't have to be slaves to our sinful natures, since we are IN CHRIST. To be in Christ--the REAL Christ--is to be filled with and led by His Holy Spirit. This is the agent of change in a Christian; only by being in Christ can we be transformed by His Spirit, who testifies of Christ.

If Jesus was merely a spirit-being who became human, we would have absolutely NO HOPE. We would still be in our sins. We would be lost.

It is my hope that you will prayerfully consider these things. Study for yourself--ask God to reveal Himself to you, and He will. If your church is wrong, that will be evident. The Word of God will uphold the truth, and you will see that the grandest revelation of God was when He said, "I love you this much" -- and He spread out His arms and DIED for you . . . . . . . . . . . on a cross.