September 2009 Archives

A great fire struck Rome in A.D. 64, doing considerable damage. According to the Roman historian Tacitus, a rumor arose among the people that Nero was responsible for the fire. To dispel the rumor, Nero blamed the Christians and persecuted them. I will quote below the account given by Tacitus, as translated in Documents of the Christian Church by Henry Bettenson:

But all the endeavours of men, all the emperor's largesse and the propitiations of the gods, did not suffice to allay the scandal or banish the belief that the fire had been ordered. And so, to get rid of this rumour, Nero set up as the culprits and punished with the utmost refinement of cruelty a class hated for their abominations, who are commonly called Christians. Christus, from whom their name is derived, was executed at the hands of the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius. Checked for the moment, this pernicious superstition again broke out, not only in Judaea, the source of the evil, but even in Rome, that receptacle for everything that is sordid and degrading from every quarter of the globe, which there finds a following. Accordingly, arrest was first made of those who confessed [sc. to being Christians]; then, on their evidence, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much on the charge of arson as because of hatred of the human race. Besides being put to death they were made to serve as objects of amusement; they were clad in the hides of beasts and torn to death by dogs; others were crucified, others set on fire to serve to illuminate the night when daylight failed. Nero had thrown open his grounds for the display, and was putting on a show in the circus, where he mingled with the people in the dress of a charioteer or drove about in his chariot. All this gave rise to a feeling of pity, even towards men whose guilt merited the most exemplary punishment; for it was felt that they were being destroyed not for the public good but to gratify the cruelty of an individual.

Jehovah's Witnesses teach that the John 1.1 does not teach that Jesus is God and that the verse is properly translated with "a god."  One of the arguments they make is from the wording and context of the passage:

Consider what John further writes in chapter 1, verse 18: "No man has seen [Almighty] God at any time." However, humans have seen Jesus, the Son, for John says: "The Word [Jesus] was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory." (John 1:14 KJ ) How, then, could the Son be part of Almighty God? John also states that the Word was "with God." But how can an individual be with someone and at the same time be that person? Moreover, as recorded at John 17:3, Jesus makes a clear distinction between himself and his heavenly Father. He calls his Father "the only true God." And toward the end of his Gospel, John sums up matters by saying: "These have been written down that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God." (John 20:31) Notice that Jesus is called, not God, but the Son of God. This shows how John 1:1 should be understood. Jesus, the Word, is "a god" in the sense that he has a high position but is not the same as Almighty God. [1, p.203]

These objections are not difficult for anyone with a basic and accurate understanding of the doctrine of the Trinity. First of all, orthodox Christianity has always held that Jesus Christ was born with two natures, that is, that he is both fully God and fully man. The nature of God is immaterial and invisible, while the nature of man is material and visible. It is this unique situation of Christ, as the perfect God-man, which allows him to be both visible to us as a man, but also be the immortal, invisible God.

The next few sentences of Jehovah's Witnesses' argument betray either a complete ignorance of the accurate doctrine of the Trinity or a willing disregard for it. Trinitarians do not have to explain how an individiual can "be with someone and at the same time be that person" because that is not what Trinitarians believe. Trinitarians believe that the Father is a separate person from the Son but that the Father and the Son share the same essence or nature. The Father is not the same person as the Son, but they are both fully God. The Word described in John 1.1 is"with God" in the sense that the Son is with the Father, and the Word "is God" in the sense that he shares in the same divine nature as the Father. Such a concept may be difficult to understand, but it is not a logical contradiction, unlike the straw man argument to which the Jehovah's Witnesses are objecting.

Regarding the last statement in the paragraph quoted above, it should be noted that the emphasis on the title "Son of God" in the Fourth Gospel is not an implicit denial of the doctrine of the Trinity, but rather an important introduction to it. By focusing on this unique Father-Son relationship, the Evangelist is able to express that the Father and the Son are different persons while also indicating that they share the same nature, just as a human father and a human son share the same nature -- the human nature.


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What does the bible really teach?
From the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, Brooklyn, New York, 2005.