At the heart of the OT faith is the confession that YHWH God is one:
“Hear (Shema), O Israel! Yahweh is our God, Yahweh is one (YHWH echad)!” Deuteronomy 6:4
“And Yahweh will be king over all the earth; in that day Yahweh will be the only one (YHWH echad), and His name one.” Zechariah 14:9
The Jews refer to Deut. 6:4 as the Shema, which is the first word in the verse.
The Greek renders the words YHWH echad as kyrios heis (estin).
“Jesus answered, ‘The foremost is, “Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is one Lord (kyrios ho theos hemon kyrios heis estin);”’” Mark 12:29
“And the Lord (kyrios) shall be king over all the earth: in that day there shall be one Lord (kyrios heis), and his name one,” Zecharian 14:9 LXX
What this shows is that a Greek-speaking Jew would be aware that Kyrios heis or its equivalent, namely, heis Kyrios (“one Lord”) are simply the Greek way of saying YHWH echad (“the LORD is one”). As such, no monotheistic Jew could ever apply these words to a mere creature
Yet, remarkably, the first Christians who were predominately Jews ascribed this Greek phrase to the risen and exalted Christ!
Case in point:
“Now about eating food that was offered to false gods: We know that the false gods in this world don’t really exist and that no god exists except the one God (oudeis theos ei me heis). People may say that there are gods in heaven and on earth—many gods and many lords, as they would call them. But for us, ‘There is only one God, the Father (heis theos, ho pater). Everything (ta panta) came from him, and we live for him. There is only one Lord, Jesus Christ (heis kyrios ‘Iesous Christos). Everything (ta panta) came into being through him, and we live because of him.’” 1 Corinthians 8:4-6 GW
It is evident that the earliest Christians took the confession of Deuteronomy 6:4 and split it up in order to include the Son within the identity of YHWH God.
In other words, the first disciples of the risen Lord Christianized the Jewish confession of monotheism in order to describe the Father as the one God and the Son as the one YHWH, which the Shema profess.
As one popular reformed apologist puts it:
We close by looking at our final passage, which has again been presented as if it denies the deity of Christ, when in reality it is beyond understanding outside of that truth:
Therefore concerning the eating of things sacrificed to idols, we know that there is no such thing as an idol in the world, and that there is no God but one. For even if there are so-called gods whether in heaven or on earth, as indeed there are many gods and many lords, yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom are all things and we exist for Him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we exist through Him. (1 Corinthians 8:4-6)
Here some wish us to believe that, just like in John 17:3, Paul’s use of the phrase “one God, the Father” excludes Jesus from the realm of deity. Of course, we immediately recognize that there is a real problem here: that’s not all Paul says. If “one God, the Father” is meant to be taken exclusively, then does it not follow that “one Lord, Jesus Christ” also excludes the Father from the realm of Lordship? When we see the distinctive use of the terms “God” and “Lord,” we should realize that the Scriptures are not here introducing a competition or contest between the two. God is just as much Lord as the Lord is God. The two terms are merely being used to describe different Persons in their relationship to one another. They are not being used to say that God is more “Lord” than the Lord is “God.”
But there is something much deeper and glorious in this text that is often missed because we do not hear the words of the New Testament in their ancient context. Paul was a monotheistic Jew, a leader among his people. Each day he, and every Jew like him, repeated the Shema, the prayer that defined the Jewish people. But as an educated Jew, he was able to speak both Hebrew (Aramaic) and Greek, and hence knew the prayer in both languages. Many of his fellow Jews outside of Israel, however, would know it more proficiently in the language of the day, koine Greek. The passage comes from Deuteronomy 6:4: “Hear, O Israel! Yahweh is our God, Yahweh is one!”
But in the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, which was the Bible of the early church, the Septuagint, it reads
‘Akoue, Israel kyrios ho theos hemon kyrios heis estin
When one reads Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 8:6 with this famous prayer in mind, it is unquestionable that the apostle is purposefully drawing from the famous Shema and, in doing so, modifying it in light of the revelation that has taken place in the Incarnation of the Son! He takes the very words of the verse and expands them. He identifies the Father as theos, and says all things are made from Him and we exist for Him. This would fit with the old form of the Shema. But then he moves right on, takes the very important term kyrios (which in the original represents the divine Name itself, Yahweh), and applies it to Jesus, and says that all things are through Him and we exist through Him! And to make sure no one misses the point, he takes the very same term used in the Shema to affirm monotheism, the important Hebrew term we looked at previously, echad, rendered in the Septuagint as heis, and applies it to both the Father and the Son (one God, one Lord). Here, the apostle expands the definitional prayer of the Old Covenant people of God in light of the New Covenant revelation of the Son, all the while protecting and maintaining the assertion of monotheism. And he does it plainly with the understanding that his audience, the believers in Corinth, already know and understand this revelation!
Surely here we see how the New Testament is not seeking to reveal something new called the Trinity, but is written with this divine truth already as the common possession of the people of God.
In conclusion, Warfield expressed it very clearly when he wrote,
In the very act of asserting his monotheism Paul takes our Lord up into this unique Godhead. “There is no God but one,” he roundly asserts, and then illustrates and proves this assertion by remarking that the heathen may have “gods many, and lords many,” but “to us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we unto him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and we through him” (I Cor. vii. 6). Obviously, this “one God, the Father,” and “one Lord, Jesus Christ,” are embraced together in the one God who alone is. Paul’s conception of the one God, whom alone he worships, includes, in other words, a recognition that within the unity of His being, there exists such a distinction of Persons as is given us in the “one God, the Father” and the “one Lord, Jesus Christ.”47 (James R. White, The Forgotten Trinity: Recovering the Heart of Christian Belief [Bethany House Publishers, Grand Rapids, MI 2019], 5. Jesus Christ: God in Human Flesh, pp. 91-93; bold emphasis mine)
The following chart contrasts the Greek of Deuteronomy 6:4 with that of the Greek of 1 Cor. 8:6 in order to help the readers see this connection between YHWH and Jesus.
“our God (ho theos hemon)” “The Lord… is one Lord (kyrios… kyrios heis estin).” | “and that there is no God but one (oudeis theos ei me heis)… one God, the Father (heis theos ho pater).” “one Lord Jesus Christ (heis kyrios ‘Iesous Christos).” |
That Jesus is being described as the one YHWH can be further demonstrated from the fact that 1 Cor. 8:6 teaches that the Father created all things by the agency of Christ:
“yet for us there is only one God, the Father, from whom everything came into being and for whom we live. And there is only one Lord, Jesus the Messiah, through whom everything came into being and through whom we live.” 1 Corinthians 8:6 ISV
Here are a few more translations of this very important text:
“to us there is only one God, the Father, from whom everything comes, and for who we live. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom everything exists, and by whom we ourselves are alive” PHILLIPS
“But for us, ‘There is only one God, the Father. Everything came from him, and we live for him. There is only one Lord, Yeshua Christ. Everything came into being through him, and we live because of him.’” NOG
“But we know there is only one God. He is the Father. All things are from Him. He made us for Himself. There is one Lord. He is Jesus Christ. He made all things. He keeps us alive.” NLV
“But for us, There is one God, the Father, by whom all things were created, and for whom we live. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things were created, and through whom we live.” NLT
Now the only way that the Father could have created all things by the Lord Jesus is if Christ was already existing alongside of him before the creation ever came into being. This in turn would require the Son to be an uncreated divine Person who is separate and distinct from every created thing.
In fact, the Hebrew Scriptures emphatically insist that YHWH alone created and sustains all things:
“You alone are Yahweh. You have made the heavens, The heaven of heavens with all their host, The earth and all that is on it, The seas and all that is in them. You give life to all of them And the heavenly host bows down to You.” Nehemiah 9:6
Thus says Yahweh, your Redeemer, and the one who formed you from the womb, ‘I, Yahweh, am the maker of all things, Stretching out the heavens by Myself And spreading out the earth all ALONE,’” Isaiah 44:24
“Who ALONE stretches out the heavens, And tramples down the waves of the sea;” Job 9:8
“It is I who made the earth and created man upon it. I stretched out the heavens with My hands, And I commanded all their host… For thus says Yahweh, who created the heavens (He is the God who formed the earth and made it; He established it and did not create it a formless place, but formed it to be inhabited), ‘I am Yahweh, and there is none else.’” Isaiah 45:12, 18
This next one is quite interesting,
“Hear Me, O Jacob, even Israel whom I called; I am He, I am the first, I am also the last. Also, My hand founded the earth, And My right hand spread out the heavens; When I call to them, they stand together.” Isaiah 48:12-13
Since in the book of Revelation, it is Jesus who describes himself as that very First and Last!
“And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man. And He placed His right hand on me, saying, ‘Do not fear; I am the first and the last, and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forever and ever, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.’” Revelation 1:17-18
1 Cor 8:6 isn’t the only passage which speaks of Christ creating and preserving all creation:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men… There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens everyone. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him… And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:1-4, 9-10, 14
“Who rescued us from the authority of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and FOR Him. And He IS before all things, And in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church; Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything.” Colossians 1:13-18
“God, having spoken long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, 2 in these last days spoke to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds, who is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power; who, having accomplished cleansing for sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high… And, ‘You, Lord, in the beginning founded the earth, And the heavens are the works of Your hands; They will perish, but You remain; And they all will wear out like a garment, And like a mantle You will roll them up; Like a garment they will also be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end.’” Hebrews 1:1-3, 10-12
Remarkably, Hebrews has the Father glorifying Christ with the words of the following Psalm, which describes YHWH as the immutable Creator and Sustainer of creation!
A Prayer of the afflicted when he is faint and pours out his complaint before Yahweh. O Yahweh, hear my prayer! And let my cry for help come to You… But You, O Yahweh, abide forever, And the remembrance of Your name from generation to generation… Of old You founded the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. Even they will perish, but You will remain; And all of them will wear out like a garment; Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end.” Psalm 102:1, 12, 25-27
This merely reinforces the fact of Jesus being that very YHWH God confessed in the Shema, even though he is not the Father or the Holy Spirit.
And since YHWH is uncreated by nature, having no beginning or end,
“A Prayer of Moses, the man of God. Lord, You have been our dwelling place from generation to generation. 2 Before the mountains were born Or You brought forth the earth and the world, Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.” Psalm 90:1-2
“Your throne is established from of old; You are from everlasting.” Psalm 93:2
“But the lovingkindness of Yahweh is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, And His righteousness to children’s children,” Psalm 103:17
“Are You not from everlasting, O Yahweh, my God, my Holy One? We will not die. You, O Yahweh, have placed them to judge; And You, O Rock, have established them to reprove.” Habakkuk 1:12
Jesus, therefore, has no beginning to existence and his years will never end since he is that one YHWH God who became a human being for the salvation of his creation.
Unless noted otherwise, biblical citations taken from the Legacy Standard Bible (LSB).
FURTHER READING
Paul says there is only one God, and that is the Father, this means that Jesus is not God
The Christianization of the OT Shema
The Christian Shema: Confessing Jesus as Yahweh God the Son
JESUS CHRIST: THE ONE LORD OF THE SHEMA
JESUS: THE ONE AND ONLY ADONAY YHWH
The Use of Exclusive Language and the Deity of Christ [Part 1]
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