Jesus's Relationship to God in John  🔗 **Source:** [Jesus's Relationship to God in John](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lLsIEqv2nU) There is no part of the Gospel of John that describes Jesus as the very God of Israel. Hey everybody, I'm Dan Mlelen. I'm a scholar of the Bible and religion. And the christoologgical framework that makes the most sense of every syllable of the Gospel of John is not a trinitarian framework. It's not a divine identity framework. It's more of a divine agency framework. Specifically, a hybrid logos/image christoologgical framework. And I'm going to go through all of the relevant passages in the Gospel of John and explain why a hybrid logos/image Christologology best accounts for all of the data. Now, we're going to start at the beginning, a very, very fine place to start. This is John 1:1. This is the translation from the updated edition of the New Revised Standard Version. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. Now, this is not a great translation because it uses capital G god as the predicate in this predication and that's not really what the Greek is saying. Here's the Greek and I've underlined that third clause in holos and scholars have noted for a long time that theos here is an arthurus. I'm going to use that word quite a bit in this video and it means it does not have the definite article. Now, in ancient Greek there was not really an indefinite article. You could use the word for one to function kind of like an indefinite article, but when you were referring to the God of Israel, except for some syntactical constructions, you usually had the definite article. Now, this is one of those syntactical constructions where you can or you should omit the definite article when theos is being used qualitatively, and that's what the majority of scholars agree is going on in this passage. So the else here doesn't mean the God of Israel. It means deity, divine or a god. So the logos, the word was deity, was divine or was a god would be the three most precise translations of what's going on here. Now this does not identify the logos as the god of Israel. It also doesn't identify the logos as God the father. Now, there are folks who are going to argue like Daniel Wallace and others that this is still identifying the word as the God of Israel, just not as the father. And that requires presupposing that the God of Israel exhausted the category of deity for first century Jewish writers. And we have no data that support that conclusion. In fact, this passage fits right into a tradition that understands the logos, the word of God, as a distinct being from the very God of Israel. And we see this in Pho of Alexandria prior to the writing of the gospel of John and even after the writing of the gospel of John. We see it in Justin Martyr. We see it in origin. We even see it in Ucius writing after the council of Nika. And let's take a look at all of those writings to see if we can get a clearer understanding of what the author of the Gospel of John might be saying by referring to Jesus as the logos and saying the logos was theos without the definite article was deity was divine was a god. So we're going to start with pho in a text called on dreams. And I've brought this up many times. I'm sure there are those of you who are sick of seeing this passage. I'm sick of sharing this passage, but it's something that I think needs to be repeated. Now, in this particular passage, Pho is talking about Genesis 31:13, where God appears to Jacob. And in the Septuagent translation, which is the Hebrew Bible for Pho because he doesn't really understand Hebrew well enough to be engaging the text in Hebrew. In the Septuagent, it says, "I am the God who appeared to you in the place of God." And that's a headscratcher for Pho. And he asks his reader to inquire whether there are two gods. For we read, "I am the God that appeared to thee, not in my place, but in the place of God, as though it were anothers." What then are we to say? He that is truly God is one. But those that are improperly so-called are more than one. Accordingly, the holy word in the present instance has indicated him who is truly God by means of the articles, saying, "I am the God." While it omits the article when mentioning him who is improperly so-called, saying, "Who appeared to thee in the place not of the God, but simply of God." Here it gives the title of God to his chief word not from any superstitious nicity in applying names but with one aim before him to use words to express facts. So for Pho the logos is not the god of Israel but it can bear the title theos as long as it doesn't have the definite article to indicate that it is kind of a secondary god. In fact, Pho explicitly refers to the logos as a second god. In another text, questions and answers on Genesis uh chapter 2, section 62, he's talking about Genesis 9:6. Why does scripture say, "As if speaking of another God? In the image of God, he made man, and not in his own image. Most excellently and voraciously or truly this oracle was given by God. For nothing mortal can be made in the likeness of the most high one and father of the universe, but only in that of the second God, who is his logos. So the logos theology that the author of the Gospel of John is most likely building upon is probably informed by Pho's position that when you're talking about the God of Israel, you include the definite article. When you're talking about another deity or when you're talking about an entity who can be referred to as divine or as deity or as a god but is distinct from and subordinate to the very god of Israel, you omit the article and that clarifies for the readership or those hearing that this is not a reference to the very God of Israel. Now that's somebody writing decades prior to the gospel of John. Let's take a look at someone writing a few decades after the Gospel of John. This is Justin Martyr's text, Dialogue with Trifo. And one of the things that Justin Martyr is trying to do is establish that the word and the angel of the Lord are references to the pre-incarnate Jesus. And we have here from scripture I shall attempt to prove my assertion namely that there exists and is mentioned in scripture another God and Lord under the creator of all things who is also called an angel because he proclaims to man whatever the creator of the world above whom there is no other god wishes to reveal to them. And then a little further down we have then I said let us return to the scriptures and I shall try to convince you that he who is said to have appeared to Abraham, Jacob and Moses and is called God and by the way that's an arthus that is God without the definite article is distinct from God the creator and there God has the definite article distinct that is in number but not in mind and the word there for mind is gnomi and this is sometimes incorrectly translated essence by folks who want to read trinitarianism into Justin's text. It does not mean essence. It means mind, will, or intention. Going on, for I state that he never did or said anything other than what the creator above whom there is no other god desired that he do or say. In other words, the logos is under the God of Israel, the creator of the earth and gets that title God because he obeys him in all things. He is united in will and intent. And then we have further on chapter 61. So my friends, I said, I shall now show from the scriptures that God has begotten of himself a certain rational power as a beginning before all creatures. The Holy Spirit indicates this power by various titles. Sometimes the glory of the Lord at other times son or wisdom or angel or God, again anarthus, no definite article or lord or word. He even called himself commander and chief when he appeared in human guise to Joshua the son of noon. Indeed, he can justly lay claim to all these titles from the fact both that he performs the father's will and that he was begotten by an act of the father's will. Notice Justin does not say he is God. He says he can lay claim to the title the anarthus title theos so deity because he is born of an act of the father's will and the fact that he performs the father's will. He is united with the father in will and intention. So Jesus is a separate distinct being who can be referred to as the anarthus god. In other words, as divine, as deity, as a god, but he is not god overall. He is not the creator of the universe. He is not God the father. He is not the god of Israel. Consistently, Justin makes that distinction just like Pho did around a century before him. Just like the author of the Gospel of John is doing between the two. But let's go on to Ucius on ecclesiastical theology. This is book two, chapter 14 in the red box. And what beginning he attributes to him, he John clarifies immediately afterward. Not having said, "And the word was the God with the addition of the article, lest he assert that the word was the God who was over all." So for Ucius the logos Jesus is not the god overall. That would be heresy to call the word the god overall. Again we have this appeal to the lack of the definite article in John 1:1. Ucceius is saying John very carefully distinguishes the logos from hos from the god of Israel from the god overall from the creator of the universe. The logos is none of those things. The logos is deity, is divine, or is a god. Further down, but it is necessary to confess that that which is beyond the universe is one single thing, divine, ineffable, good, simple, incomposite, something of one form, that is God himself. Here we're talking about hos, God with the definite article. intellect itself, word itself, wisdom itself, light itself, life itself, beauty itself, goodness itself, and whatever one could think is greater than these, and rather beyond all knowing and beyond all thought and conceiving. And one must also confess that the only begotten son of this God as if he were the image of the father who has been brought forth from him and is altogether and in every way most like the one who has begotten him. And one must confess that he too is God and theos and intellect and word and wisdom and life and light and image of the good and the beautiful itself. Not that he himself is the father, but that he is the only begotten son of the father. Not that he himself is the one who is who is unbegotten and without source, but the one who has been brought forth from the latter and who acknowledges as source the one who has begotten him. But if denying these arguments, Marcellus should allege that God and the word within him were the same, defining God as incomposite and simple, see then how he confesses neither the father nor the son, but openly either professes what Jews believe or introduces sealianism because he alleges that the same is father and son. So to be the god of Israel is to be the father. The word may be theos anarthurously deity divine a god but the word is not the very god of Israel because that is to be the father. Further on and indeed John also shows this when he says and the word was with god. But since it was fitting for us to know also to what rank he belonged, he necessarily added, "And the word was God." And this is the anarthus theos. For how was he who was begotten from the one and only unbegotten God? That's hos. That's theos with the article. That's God the father not going to be God. And here divine or deity would probably be a better translation because this is the anarthus theos. This is the theos that is distinct from hos. For if that which has been begotten of the flesh is flesh and that which has been begotten of the spirit is spirit. Notice we have the flesh and the spirit and then flesh and spirit. The qualitative use. So we're referring to something broader distinguished from the single main instantiation of these things. According to the saving teaching, it would follow too that that which has been begotten from God hos would be God anus theos. For this reason also the word was God. Anarus theos even God the maker and fashioner of all things. Again here, God is an Arthurus. Now, lest you get confused by referring to Jesus as God, the maker and fashioner of all things, the Greek words are distinct from the Greek words that are used to refer to God the father as the creator of all things because we don't have petis or poetes if you're nasty. What we have in the Greek is peticos. And then the word for fashioner is not deorgos, it's deorgos. And this is an adjective and this refers to one that has the capacity of. It is one characterized by that verbal action. So when it refers to Jesus as theos without the article and that doesn't refer to Jesus as the creator and the demi urge of all things but instead the one who is capable of making and the one who is characterized by fashioning all things. It's again distinguishing the word from the very god of Israel. So we have all the way down in Ucius after Nika, we have the preservation of this logos theology that understands the logos to be subordinate to the God of Israel to be a distinct being from the God of Israel and we can see it before the gospel of John and we can see it after the gospel of John. So the best reading of the gospel of John based on the christoologgical frameworks based on the ideas about divine mediation based on the ideas about God's nature and God's relationship to their creations based on all of those things at the end of the first century CE when the gospel of John was written. We have to understand John 1:1 to be referring to the logos as theos meaning deity divine or a god not the god of Israel. Let's move on to John 10. This is where in verse 30 we have Jesus saying the father and I are one. Let's keep going. The Jews took up stones again to stone him. Jesus replied I have shown you many good works from the father. For which of these are you going to stone me? The Jews answered, "It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you, but for blasphemy, because you, though only a human, are making yourself God. We're going to come back to this." Jesus answered, "Is it not written in your law, I said you are gods? If those to whom the word of God came were called gods and the scripture cannot be enulled, can you say that the one whom the father has sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheing because I said I am God's son. If I am not doing the works of my father, then do not believe me. But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works so that you may know and understand that the father is in me and I am in the father. So we begin in verse 30 by explaining the father and I are one. We end in verse 38 by saying there is a mutual inddwelling. Now we're going to see later on that this is the nature of that oneness. The oneness is not saying I am God. The oneness is the father is dwelling in me and I am dwelling in the father. And that mutual inddwelling has an explanation that we're going to get to as well. But here I want to talk about something going on in the Greek. So, here's the Greek of those nine verses. Now, I've underlined uh this passage here, which is translated because you being a man, make yourself God. Capital G, God, the God. That's not what's in the Greek. Once again, we have the anarthus use of theos in the accusative theon. And there's no definite article. Just like anthropos in the parallel clause, you being anthropos are making yourself theos. Both of them are anarthus. Both of them are intended to be understood qualitatively. You being human or ahuman are making yourself divine or a god. That's the accusation. They are not saying you are making yourself the very god of Israel. And the way Jesus responds confirms that because what does Jesus do? Jesus quotes Psalm 82 from the Greek translation that is underlined you are God's estice no definite article. So within the logos framework where hos is distinct from theos and theos can be a title applied to beings that are not god and we've already seen that this can be the logos but it can also be other entities as well. So Jesus is literally saying your own scriptures that you cannot reject or annull or deny or break say that humans can be gods. So your accusation, you being a human, make yourself a god. That is not blasphemy. Your own scriptures say humans can be gods. Not the God of Israel can be gods. They can have that title applied to them. And why are they gods? Well, because the word of God came to them. And this is making use of an interpretation of Psalm 82 that we would see popping up in several different places in later rebbitic literature where Psalm 82 is about the Israelites at Sinai. When they received the law of Moses, the word of God, they became immortal. They were freed from the power of the angel of death. They became gods. But then upon sinning with the golden calf, they were relegated back down to mortality. So they're being rendered immortal made them gods. And Jesus is clarifying for his accusers, humans can become gods. Your own scriptures call humans gods because they receive the word of God. And guess what? That word is standing before you right now. That word is going to make other humans gods as well. John's sotariology is a sotariology of divonization. And that's what's probably going on in John 1:12, giving them power to become the technathu, the children of God. And we're going to see later on as well that salvation is going to involve unification with God, becoming one with Jesus just as Jesus is one with God. So that's all wrapped up in John 10:30 through38 because Jesus says, "I and the father are one." And then explains, "The father is in me. I am in the father." that mutual inddwelling will be extended to Jesus's followers. They will become divonized. I talked about this in a previous video where I was responding to Ali Beth Stucky and Jacob Hansen's discussion of theosis or deification or divonization. So the gospel of John has a divonization sotariology. And Jesus is saying you can't say it's blasphemous for me to identify as divine because your own scriptures say humans can be divine. That's what's going on with this oneness. Now, let's go look a little closer at this mutual inddwelling. We're going to John 14. We're going to look at verses 5-1. Thomas said to him, "Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?" Jesus said to him, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will know my father also. From now on, you do know him and have seen him." Philip said to him,"Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied." Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you all this time, Philillip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father?" How can you say, "Show us the Father?" Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me, just like we saw in John 10:38. The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. believe me that I am in the father and the father is in me. But if you do not then believe because of the works themselves. So Jesus is saying basically the same thing that he said to his accusers to Thomas and Philillip and whoever else was with him. But isn't this peculiar that Jesus says he who has seen me has seen the father because of this mutual indwelling because the father dwells in me. This is an image christologology because this is the intuitive logic of divine images. In the ancient world in the time when the gospel of John was written long before and even after the public space was saturated with divine images and other material media that could manifest or channel or reify divine agency and divine power. And to see a divine image that represented a specific deity was to see that deity. And we're going to go into a little more detail, but right now I want to go to John 17. We're going to talk a little bit more about this oneness. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me so that they may be one as we are one. Here Jesus is praying that that mutual inddwelling, the oneness that Jesus asserts with the father in John 10:30 be extended to his followers. And then we've got verses 20- 23. I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their word that they may all be one. As you father are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me the glory that you have given me. I have given them so that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me that they may become completely one so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. So here we get a further clarification, a repetition of this notion that Jesus wants his followers to become one with him exactly as he is one with the father. That is the oneness that Jesus asserts in John 10:30 that he clarifies in verse 38 is a result of this mutual inddwelling. And then in John 14 he says that mutual inddwelling results in seeing the father when you see Jesus. And now John 17, that mutual inddwelling, that oneness is going to be extended to Jesus's followers. He prays three different times that his followers become one with him precisely as he is one with the father. Now let's get to a passage that a lot of people think is the highest christologology that we have in all the New Testament. And this is the passage that is always thrown at me when folks want to insist that I'm wrong. that the Gospel of John never represents Jesus as God. That's John 20. We're looking at verses 26- 29. A week later, his disciples were again in the house and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." Then he said to Thomas, "Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt, but believe." Thomas answered him, "My Lord and my God." Jesus said to him, "Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." And here's the Greek of this passage, verse 28, down at the bottom. My Lord and my God. Now, why is Thomas calling Jesus, my God, the God of me with the definite article? Is it because Jesus is hotheos? No. It is because Thomas finally gets what he saw Philillip fail to get in John 14 that to see Jesus is to see the father because the father dwells in Jesus. Thomas now gets it and addresses both of them separately. My lord and my god. My God is born by my Lord. Is manifested by my Lord. I look at my Lord and I also see my God. I confess the two of you. The Lord who is the image that bears the presence of the God. So throughout the gospel of John, the word Jesus is distinguished from the God of Israel. But the word is one the logos which the author of the gospel of John is taking up from Pho and probably from a broader tradition of logos theology and is sharing in the same way that it would later be shared by Justin Martyr and even later by more trinitarian oriented thinkers like origin and also we've got this image christologology that Jesus is the image of God therefore bears God's power and presence and agency See, and to see Jesus is to see God because Jesus bears those things. And I wrote a whole book about divine images in the Hebrew Bible called Adonized Divine Images, a cognitive approach where I develop a theoretical framework based on the cognitive science of religion for what's going on with the intuitive logic of divine images. Why do divine images work? Why were they so ubiquitous? Why are the features that made divine images possible still bubbling to the surface of our cognition even down to today? And one thing that Jesus says in John 17 that the father has given a divine name to Jesus is a critical element of that because we already have in the Hebrew Bible a divine image who does the same things who bears God's name and as a result can do things that only God is supposed to be able to do. Let's go take a look at Exodus 23:es 20 and 21. I am going to send an angel in front of you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Be attentive to him and listen to his voice. Do not rebel against him for he will not pardon your transgression for my name is in him. And the idea here is that the endowment of the angel with divine name, the inddwelling of the name in the angel authorizes the angel to do the things that only God is supposed to be able to do. Because this reference to not forgiving your transgression, that is word for word, the exact way that the author of Joshua 24:19 refers to L as a jealous God. He will not forgive your transgression. Now, if you go look at chapter 5 of my book, I go into a great deal of detail regarding where this concept of the Malik Adonai, the angel of Adonai or the angel of the Lord comes from. And I go into a great bit of detail about the role of the name in authorizing the angel. But we have in John this reference to Jesus being given the name and also being given God's glory and passing on that glory to others. And we can see in other second temple period Jewish literature the idea of angels doing what only God is supposed to be able to do because they are endowed with the divine name. We see that in the apocalypse of Abraham with the angel Yahawel. And then in later rabbitic literature we've got in Sanhedrin 38b the statement the Gammorrah relates a certain heretic said to Rav Edit it is written in the verse concerning God and to Moses he said come up to the Lord. This is Exodus 24:1. The heretic raised a question. It should have stated, "Come up to me." Ravidit said to him, "This term, the Lord," in that verse is referring to the angel Medatron, whose name is like the name of his master. As it is written, "Behold, I send an angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Take heed of him and obey his voice. Do not defy him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him." So we have this passage in later rabbitic literature saying, "Hey, the angel who bears God's name can be referred to as Adoni, can be referred to as the very God of Israel." In fact, we have that angel in Exodus 3:2 appearing to Moses in the flame of fire in the midst of the burning bush. Later in verse 6, that angel says, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob." Similarly, in Genesis 31:13, that entity that appeared to Jacob and said, "I am the God Bethl or the God of Bethl, that is supposed to be the messenger. That is supposed to be the angel." So by virtue of possessing the divine name having the divine name indwelling the angel or any entity that entity can then be referred to as God can do what only God is supposed to be able to do precisely as Jesus does. So we have in the gospel of John a hybrid logosimage Christologology where Jesus is the logos that pre-existed his incarnation in the flesh and enables him to be referred to as theos without the definite article. But there's also an image Christology that facilitates this notion that to see Jesus is to see God the father because the father dwells within Jesus and Jesus dwells within the father. And this is what facilitates Thomas's confession, my Lord and my God. It's not because Jesus is both Lord and God. It's because Jesus is Lord and bears the presence of God that Thomas is also addressing. Now, there's another passage that I haven't gotten to, and that's John 8:58. Here are verses 56 through 59. Your ancestor Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad. By the way, this is probably a reference to the apocalypse of Abraham. That's where you have this notion that Abraham rejoiced about this coming day. Anyway, then the Jews said to him, "You are not yet 50 years old, and have you seen Abraham?" Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, before Abraham was, I am." So, they picked up stones to throw at him. But Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple. Now, as a lot of people have pointed out, I am egoimi in Greek, as you can see underlined here, is a coded reference to the divine name. The divine name, Adonai, the tetetrogrammaton is not the phrase I am. It is not translated egoi into Greek. But if we go back to Exodus 3:14, when Moses asks God, whom should I say has sent me? God says in Hebrew, I am who I am or I will be what I will be. In the ancient Greek translation, the Septuagent here is a translation of the Septuagent into English. And God said to Moes, I am the one who is. And he said, thus shall you say to the sons of Israel, the one who is has sent me to you. Here is the Greek. God said to Moses, ego. So eia has been translated into Greek as ego. I am the one who is or the being one. And then God goes on to say tell him hon the being one or the one who is sent you. So ego and me here is actually not what is presented as the specific name of God but it can function as a coded reference to the divine name. And we can go on to look at places like Deuteronomy 32:39 where God says, "See, see see that I am and there is no God except me." This is in Hebrew anihoo. I am he. But it gets translated into Greek as we see here as egoimi. So anihoo as well as eia are translated into the ancient Greek as ego. So it's not the divine name. It's a coded reference to the divine name. And it happens uh several more times in duterro Isaiah. For instance, here Isaiah 43:10, be my witnesses. I too am a witness says the Lord God and the servant whom I have chosen so that you may know and believe and understand that anihoo I am or as it's translated into ancient Greek, ego me. So in John 8:58 Jesus is saying ego emi which is a coded reference to the divine name not because Jesus is saying I am the I am but because Jesus is saying guess who is the authorized possessor or bearer of the divine name. Jesus is kind of going divine name and winking at the folks to indicate he is the one who has been endowed with the divine name who is indwelled by the divine name who is the authorized bearer of the divine name based on the conceptual template of the messenger of Adonai or the angel of the lord and early Christians as we saw with Justin martyr and others would identify the pre-existent angel of the lord as Jesus as the logos but this is just an image christologology because the angel is functioning as a divine image as I discussed in chapter 5 of the book Adonai's divine images so from beginning to end in the gospel of John Jesus is never identified as the very god of Israel Jesus is the logos the word who can be referred to as theos anarthusly without the definite article because the word is not the very god of Israel but The word can take upon himself the title of theos as a distinct entity as a second god as pho says as another god as Justin Martyr says as a subordinate deity who is united with god not in number not in being but in gnomi in mind will or intent. It's not until the late 2nd century where the apologists really bring on the Greek philosophy that we get these ontological ways of thinking about the relationship of Jesus to God and we merge them into one being one usa that we get the later idea of Jesus as the very God of Israel the one and only true God that's not anywhere in the gospel of John. So we have the logos theology and then we have the image christologology that is based on the idea that an animate being can bear the presence and the power and the authority of the God that they index and Jesus indwwells God. God indwells Jesus. That mutual indwelling is basically a an incremental conceptual elaboration on the idea of the animate divine image that we read in the Hebrew Bible. that is the messenger of Adonai, the angel of the Lord with whom Jesus would later be identified. So the christoologgical framework that makes the easiest and the best sense of every word of the gospel of John is a hybrid logos/image christologology has nothing to do with the trinity. It has nothing to do with the notion that Jesus is the very God of Israel because the gospel of John does not present Jesus as the very God of Israel. Jesus has come from the very God of Israel. But Jesus is only theos and arthrously. And when Thomas says, "My Lord and my God," it's not because Jesus is Thomas's God. It's because Jesus bears the presence of Thomas's God. And Thomas finally gets what Philip couldn't get in John 14. Sees both of them and confesses, "My Lord and my God." That's what's going on in the Gospel of John. And that's why the Gospel of John does not identify Jesus as God., Jesus's Relationship to God in John, YouTube, 01kr1es1xf35e27n67czpwd31v.