Tag: god

HOW MANY THEOIS IN THE NT?

The following excerpt is taken from the monumental work titled The Incarnate Christ and His Critics: A Biblical Defense, authored by Robert M. Bowman Jr. & J. Ed Komoszewski, published by Kregel Academic, Grand Rapids, MI, 2024, Part 3: The Name of Jesus: Jesus’ Divine Names, Chapter 21: Could Jesus Be One of the Gods?, pp. 404-407.

In my estimation this is THE best and most comprehensive exposition and defense of the biblical basis for the Deity of Christ. Every serious Trinitarian Christian student of the Holy Bible, apologist, and/or theologian must have this book in the library.

“IF HE CALLED THEM GODS . . .” (JOHN 10:34–36)

We now move to considering whether the New Testament writings support the notion of a category of “gods,” other than false gods, into which Christ might be placed. As we mentioned earlier, Psalm 82 has played a significant role in debates over the deity of Christ because of Christ’s own reference to the psalm:

The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken—do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?” (John 10:33–36)

Unitarians tend to lean very heavily on this passage to trump all of the biblical evidence for the deity of Christ.³⁸ Latter-day Saints, on the other hand, interpret both this passage and Psalm 82 as support for their belief in the (potential) deity of all humanity.³⁹ These diverse theological uses of both Psalm 82 and John 10 might suggest the need for careful consideration before using these texts as proof texts for a particular doctrine.

In current biblical scholarship, John 10:34–36 is one of the most controversial passages in the New Testament—and not because of its supposed difficulty for orthodox theology. One of the difficult questions concerns what view, if any, of the identity of the “gods” in Psalm 82 is presupposed in John 10:34–36. The dominant theory today is that John 10 reflects the view (documented only in later Jewish literature) that the “gods” were the Israelites when they received the law at Mount Sinai.⁴⁰ However, we agree with Andrew Lincoln that John 10 does not clearly refer to that interpretation of Psalm 82 and that Jesus’ argument can be understood without settling this question.⁴¹

The more important question is how Psalm 82 fits into Jesus’ response to his Jewish critics who accused him of blasphemy. Many people understand John 10:34–36 to be arguing that if others (whoever they were) could rightly be called “gods” in Psalm 82, then Jesus could also rightly call himself a god or God’s son. This way of reading John 10:34–36 assumes that the term “gods” is used affirmatively in Psalm 82:6, which we have shown is incorrect. Does John 10:34–36 mistakenly assume such a reading of Psalm 82:6, and if not, how is Jesus using the Psalm in his argument?

A helpful insight comes from an older, largely neglected article in 1964 by Lutheran scholar Richard Jungkuntz. Most interpreters assume that the statement “Scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35b) means simply that Scripture is true. While agreeing with that principle, Jungkuntz argues that John 10:35b means something more: that Scripture cannot go unfulfilled.⁴² Note the parallel between the following two sayings of Jesus in John’s Gospel:

“If [ei] on the Sabbath a man receives circumcision, so that the law of Moses may not be broken [lythē], are you angry with me because on the Sabbath I made a man’s whole body well?” (John 7:23)

“If [ei] he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken [lythēnai]—do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’?” (John 10:35–36)

In these texts, “breaking” Scripture does not mean merely denying its truth but causing it to be unfulfilled. The verb luō and the synonymous verb kataluō in a few other places also have this meaning of causing Scripture to be unfulfilled (Matt. 5:17; John 5:18). The implication is that in John 10:35, Jesus was saying that Psalm 82:6 must be fulfilled in some way. The aside, “and Scripture cannot be broken,” which normally is something that would not have needed to be said in a discussion among Jews, apparently was made to indicate that the text pointed forward to a genuine if surprising fulfillment.

We see how Jesus interpreted this fulfillment of Psalm 82 in his concluding rhetorical question in John 10:36. Whatever those gods were, Scripture did not call them “gods” for no purpose. What those so-called gods failed to be, Jesus really was. They were unrighteous; Jesus was “consecrated” (John 10:36a). They did not genuinely represent God; Jesus, who was sent by the Father (10:36a), did. They failed to live up to the titles of “gods” and “sons of the Most High” (synonymous in the context of Psalm 82:6); Jesus really was “the Son of God” (10:36b). Thus, Jesus’ argument was not, “They were rightly called gods, and so am I,” but rather, “Their failure as ‘gods’ is stated in Scripture to point forward to me coming from the Father as his real Son.” On this reading of John 10:34–36, the “gods” of Psalm 82 are contrasted with Jesus in a sort of “reverse typology” roughly analogous to the way Paul contrasts Adam as the source of sin and death with Christ as the source of righteousness and eternal life (Rom. 5:12–19; 1 Cor. 15:21–22).

If Jesus was not claiming deity, it would have been easy enough to have said something like, “I’m not God; I’m just one of his many sons.” He never did. Whatever the precise nuance of Christ’s argument, he was clearly placing himself in a category of one—not arguing that he belonged in the same category as the “gods” of Psalm 82. Jesus was not, as his critics claimed, a man who was “making himself ” God; he was God’s Son whom the Father had sent by making him a man (cf. John 1:14).

ARE THERE GENUINE “GODS” IN THE NEW TESTAMENT?

If John 10:34 does not refer to a group of genuine “gods” subordinate to God the Creator, are there any such references in the New Testament? The answer to this question is emphatically no. The Greek word theos (“God,” “a god,” or “gods”) occurs 1,317 times in the New Testament. Remarkably, there are only eight occurrences of the noun in a plural form (John 10:34, 35; Acts 7:40; 14:11; 19:26; 1 Cor. 8:5 [bis]; Gal. 4:8) and at most only eight that in English we would translate as “god” with a lowercase g (Acts 7:43; 12:22; 19:27; 28:6; 2 Cor. 4:4; Phil. 3:19; and possibly Acts 17:23a; 2 Thess. 2:4).⁴³ We have already seen that John 10:34–35 does not refer to a group of beings as legitimate “gods.” There is no debate over the fact that at least most of the remaining texts refer unmistakably to false gods. There is, however, debate over Paul’s statement, “For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as indeed there are many ‘gods’ and many ‘lords’” (1 Cor. 8:5). Notoriously, Joseph Smith cited this text (in his usual authoritarian style) to prove his doctrine of the plurality of Gods:

Paul says there are Gods many and Lords many; and that makes a plurality of Gods, in spite of the whims of men. . . . You know and I testify that Paul had no allusion to the heathen gods. I have it from God, and get over it if you can.⁴⁴

LDS scholars have sometimes presented a softer claim, arguing that in 1 Corinthians 8:5 Paul was not referring exclusively to heathen or idolatrous gods. Such a qualification of Joseph’s position is forced on them by the explicit references to idols that frame Paul’s statement (see 1 Cor. 8:4, 7). In order to infer genuine gods from verse 5 along with the admitted pagan gods, Richard Draper and Michael Rhodes appeal to the Greek word hōsper there, translating it “as in fact.”⁴⁵ The problem with this argument is not the translation “as in fact” but their assumption that “many gods” means that there are many beings that are rightly affirmed to be gods. There are “in fact” many gods, but the question is whether these gods deserve to be called by that name.

Paul answers no to that question in the immediate context in two ways. First, he qualifies his reference to other gods and lords by saying, “although there may be so-called gods” (1 Cor. 8:5a). The Greek word translated “so-called” in several of the major contemporary English versions (ESV, NABRE, NET, NRSV, etc.), legomenoi, makes it clear that these objects of religious devotion are only called gods (by their devotees).

Second, Paul contrasts these other “gods” and “lords” with “one God, the Father” and “one Lord, Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 8:6). He has already affirmed that “there is no God but one” (8:4); now he expands on that confession by including Jesus Christ alongside the Father. Latter-day Saints, however, think that Paul qualified this confession to allow that there are other gods by saying “yet for us” (8:6a). In their view, “for us” in 1 Corinthians 8:6a contrasts our one God and one Lord with the many gods and many lords that rule other earths or worlds. The Father and the Son are the one God and one Lord for “this earth,” but there are many gods and lords for other worlds.⁴⁶

Nothing in the context of 1 Corinthians 8:6 supports this LDS interpretation. To the contrary, the “us” in context refers to well-informed believers, in contrast to unbelievers and new converts who may not fully understand the issue. Thus, Paul had just written, “we know that ‘an idol has no real existence,’ and that ‘there is no God but one’” (8:4). The affirmation that “we know . . . that ‘there is no God but one’” is then repeated and elaborated in Paul’s statement, “yet for us there is one God the Father . . .” (8:6). Paul is saying that although there are indeed many “so-called gods” (8:5), that is, objects of worship called gods by unbelievers, we recognize only one God, one Lord.⁴⁷

The New Testament, then, makes no positive, affirmative references to a group of “gods.” The word theos in the New Testament always refers either to the one true God or (a surprisingly few times) to false gods. There is no third category of lesser “gods.”

38. E.g., Buzzard and Hunting, Doctrine of the Trinity, 45–46, 87, 125, 220, 291–92, 309.

39. See Daniel C. Peterson, “‘Ye Are Gods’: Psalm 82 and John 10 as Witnesses to the Divine Nature of Humankind,” in The Disciple as Scholar: Essays on Scripture and the Ancient World in Honor of Richard Lloyd Anderson, ed. Stephen D. Ricks, Donald W. Parry, and Andrew H. Hedges (Provo, UT: FARMS at BYU, 2000), 471–594.

40. See Jerome H. Neyrey, “‘I Said: You Are Gods’: Psalm 82:6 and John 10,” JBL 108 (1989): 647–63; Menahem Kister, “Son(s) of God: Israel and Christ: A Study of Transformation, Adaptation, and Rivalry,” in Son of God: Divine Sonship in Jewish and Christian Antiquity, ed. Garrick V. Allen, Kai Akagi, Paul Sloan, and Madhavi Nevader (University Park, PA: Eisenbrauns, 2019), 188–224 (esp. 200–203).

41. Andrew T. Lincoln, The Gospel according to Saint John, BNTC (London: Continuum, 2005), 307.

42. Richard Jungkuntz, “An Approach to the Exegesis of John 10:34–36,” CTM 35, no. 9 (Oct. 1964): 559–60.

43. In Acts 17:23a, Paul uses an altar “to an unknown god” (NET) as an object lesson for his proclamation about the true God the Athenians did not know. Second Thessalonians 2:4 can be taken to mean that the man of lawlessness will proclaim himself “to be God” (most translations) or “to be a god” (NABRE, NWT), but either way the man of lawlessness is a false god.

44. Smith, History of the Church, 6:475.

45. Richard D. Draper and Michael D. Rhodes, Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, BYU NT Commentary (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2017), 413.

46. Draper and Rhodes, Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, 413.

47. For more on 1 Corinthians 8:6, see pp. 496–500, 608–12.

FURTHER READING

“I SAID: YOU ARE GODS”

JWS, PSALM 82 & HUMAN JUDGES

The Meaning of “Lord” in 1 Corinthians 8:6

1 COR. 8 AND JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES

A HYMN TO THE DIVINE CHRIST

REV. 3:14 REVISITED… ONE MORE TIME!

FIRSTBORN OF CREATION REVISITED… AGAIN!

GOD GAVE JESUS LIFE?

GNOSTIC ORIGINS OF ISLAM

In this post I will share another case of the Gnostic influence upon the teachings of Islam, specifically as it relates to Adam and Satan.

THE ISLAMIC TEACHING

The Muslim scripture states that after Allah had created Adam with his two hands and breathed his spirit into him, Allah then ordered all the angels and Satan to bow down in worship of the first man. The devil refused to do so since he believed he was superior to Adam to his being created from fire, whereas the latter was produced from clay:

When thy Lord said unto the angels: Lo! I am about to create a mortal out of mire, And when I have fashioned him and breathed into him of My Spirit, then fall down before him prostrate, The angels fell down prostrate, every one, Saving Iblis; he was scornful and became one of the disbelievers. He said: O Iblis! What hindereth thee from falling prostrate before that which I have created with both My hands? Art thou too proud or art thou of the high exalted? He said: I am better than him. Thou createdst me of fire, whilst him Thou didst create of clay. He said: Go forth from hence, for lo! thou art outcast, And lo! My curse is on thee till the Day of Judgment. He said: My Lord! Reprieve me till the day when they are raised. He said: Lo! thou art of those reprieved Until the day of the time appointed. He said: Then, by Thy might, I surely will beguile them every one, Save Thy single-minded slaves among them. He said: The Truth is, and the Truth I speak, That I shall fill hell with thee and with such of them as follow thee, together. S. 38:71-85 Pickthall

The Quran describes the Devil as genie or jinn, all of whom were produced from smokeless fire:

[Remember] when we said unto the angels, worship ye Adam: And they [all] worshipped [him], except Eblis, [who] was [one] of the genii, and departed from the command of his Lord. Will ye therefore take him and his offspring for [your] patrons besides me, notwithstanding they are your enemies? Miserable [shall such] a change [be] to the ungodly! S. 18:50 Sale

Surely We created man of a clay of mud moulded, and the jinn created We before of fire flaming. S. 15:26-27 Arberry

He created man of a clay like the potter’s, and He created the jinn of a smokeless fire. S. 55:14-15 Arberry

The ahadith also indicate that angels were made from light, in contrast to the jinn:

28 Events of the Day of Resurrection and the Beginning of Creation

(9a) Chapter: The Beginning of Creation, and Mention of the Prophets – Section 1

`A’isha reported God’s messenger as saying, “The angels were created from light, the jinn from smokeless fire[1], and Adam from what has been described to you[2].”

Quran; 4:13,

Quran; 3:59 (dust); 15:26, 28:33; 55:14 (crackling clay).

Muslim transmitted it.

Reference: Mishkat al-Masabih 5701

In-book reference: Book 28, Hadith 172 (Sunnah.com https://sunnah.com/mishkat:5701)

And:

18 The Book of Miscellaneous ahadith of Significant Values

(370) Chapter: Ahadith about Dajjal and Portents of the Hour

‘Aishah reported: The Messenger of Allah said, “Angels were created from light, jinns were created from a smokeless flame of fire, and ‘Adam was created from that which you have been told (i.e., sounding clay like the clay of pottery).”

[Muslim].

Reference: Riyad as-Salihin 1846

In-book reference: Book 18, Hadith 39 (Sunnah.com https://sunnah.com/riyadussalihin:1846)

Other hadiths attest that Adam was created in the very image and form of Allah:

I. Initiating the Greeting

5873. Hammam related from Abu Hurayra that the Prophet said, “Allah created Adam on HIS FORM and HIS HEIGHT was sixty cubits. When He created him, He said, ‘Go and greet that group angels and listen to how they greet you. It will be your greeting and the greeting of your descendants.’ He said, ‘Peace be upon you,’ and they said, ‘Peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah,’ and they added, ‘and the mercy of Allah.’ Everyone who enters the Garden will be in form of Adam. People have been getting shorter until now.” (Aisha Bewley, The Sahih Collection of al-Bukhari, Chapter 82. Book of Asking Permission to Enter; emphasis mine)

Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger as saying: Allah, the Exalted and Glorious, created Adam in HIS OWN image with HIS LENGTH of sixty cubits, and as HE created him HE told him to greet that group, and that was a party of angels sitting there, and listen to the response that they give him, for it would form his greeting and that of his offspring. He then went away and said: Peace be upon you! They (the angels) said: May there be peace upon you and the Mercy of Allah, and they made an addition of “Mercy of Allah.” So he who would get into Paradise would get in the form of Adam, his length being sixty cubits, then the people who followed him continued to diminish in size up to this day. (Sahih Muslim, Book 040, Number 6809 https://sunnah.com/muslim:2841; *; emphasis mine)

GNOSTIC INFLUENCE

The fable that I will be citing is taken from the Gospel of Bartholomew (GB), which scholars believe has been influenced by Gnosticism. What makes GB such an interesting document is that it explicitly affirms the eternal preexistence and essential Deity of Christ and his personal distinction from the Father. It also teaches Jesus’ virginal conception and birth, and describes his virgin Mother in a highly exalted manner.

With the said I now plunge into the text itself. All emphasis is mine.

The Gospel of Bartholomew

From “The Apocryphal New Testament”

M. R. James-Translation and Notes

Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924

Particular scholars believe that Bartholomew may have been written in the 4^th century AD in Greek, and later translated into the Coptic language between the 5^th and 6^th century (MS 1991 – The Schoyen Collection).

10 And as he thus spake, Jesus raised him up and said unto him: Bartholomew, wilt thou see the adversary of men? I tell thee that when thou beholdest him, not thou only but the rest of

11 But they all said unto him: Lord, let us behold him.

12 And he led them down from the Mount of Olives and looked wrathfully upon the angels that keep hell (Tartarus), and beckoned unto Michael to sound the trumpet in the height of the heavens. And Michael sounded, and the earth shook, and Beliar came up, being held by 660 (560 Gr., 6,064 Lat. 1, 6,060 Lat. 2) angels and bound with fiery chains. 12 And the length of him was 1,600 cubits and his breadth 40 (Lat. 1, 300, Slav. 17) cubits (Lat. 2, his length 1,900 cubits, his breadth 700, one wing of him 80), and his face was like a lightning of fire and his eyes full of darkness (like sparks, Slav.). And out of his nostrils came a stinking smoke; and his mouth was as the gulf of a precipice, and the one of his wings was four-score cubits.

14 And straightway when the apostles saw him, they fell to the earth on their faces and became as dead.

15 But Jesus came near and raised the apostles and gave them a spirit of power, and he saith unto Bartholomew: Come near, Bartholomew, and trample with thy feet on his neck, and he will tell thee his work, what it is, and how he deceiveth men.

16 And Jesus stood afar off with the rest of the apostles.

17 And Barthololmew feared, and raised his voice and said: Blessed be the name of thine immortal kingdom from henceforth even for ever. And when he had spoken, Jesus permitted him, saying: Go and tread upon the neck of Beliar: and Bartholomew ran quickly upon him and trode upon his neck: and Beliar trembled. (For this verse the Vienna MS. has: And Bartholomew raised his voice and said thus: O womb more spacious than a city, wider than the spreading of the heavens, that contained him whom the seven heavens contain not, but thou without pain didst contain sanctified in thy bosom, &c.: evidently out of place. Latin 1 has only: Then did Antichrist tremble and was filled with fury.)

18 And Bartholomew was afraid, and fled, and said unto Jesus: Lord, give me an hem of thy garments (Lat. 2, the kerchief (?) from thy shoulders) that I may have courage to draw near unto him.

19 But Jesus said unto him: Thou canst not take an hem of my garments, for these are not my garments which I wore before I was crucified.

20 And Bartholomew said: Lord, I fear lest, like as he spared not thine angels, he swallow me up also.

21 Jesus saith unto him: Were not all things made by my word, and by the will of my Father the spirits were made subject unto Solomon? thou, therefore, being commanded by my word, go in my name and ask him what thou wilt. (lat. 2 omits 20.)

22 [And Bartholomew made the sign of the cross and prayed unto Jesus and went behind him. And Jesus said to him: Draw near. And as Bartholomew drew near, fire was kindled on every side, so that his garments appeared fiery. Jesus saith to Bartholomew: As I said unto thee, tread upon his neck and ask him what is his power.] And Bartholomew went and trode upon his neck, and pressed down his face into the earth as far as his ears.

23 And Bartholomew saith unto him: Tell me who thou art and what is thy name. And he said to him: Lighten me a little, and I will tell thee who I am and how I came hither, and what my work is and what my power is.

24 And he lightened him and saith to him: Say all that thou hast done and all that thou doest.

25 And Beliar answered and said: If thou wilt know my name, at the first I was called Satanael, which is interpreted a messenger of God, but when I rejected the image of God my name was called Satanas, that is, an angel that keepeth hell (Tartarus).

26 And again Bartholomew saith unto him: Reveal unto me all things and hide nothing from me.

27 And he said unto him: I swear unto thee by the power of the glory of God that even if I would hide aught I cannot, for he is near that would convict me. For if I were able I would have destroyed you like one of them that were before you.

28 For, indeed, I was formed (al. called) the first angel: for when God made the heavens, he took a handful of fire and formed me first, Michael second [Vienna MS. here has these sentences: for he had his Son before the heavens and the earth and we were formed (for when he took thought to create all things, his Son spake a word), so that we also were created by the will of the Son and the consent of the Father. He formed, I say, first me, next Michael the chief captain of the hosts that are above], Gabriel third, Uriel fourth, Raphael fifth, Nathanael sixth, and other angels of whom I cannot tell the names. [Jerusalem MS., Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Uriel, Xathanael, and other 6,000 angels. Lat. I, Michael the honour of power, third Raphael, fourth Gabriel, and other seven. Lat. 2, Raphael third, Gabriel fourth, Uriel fifth, Zathael sixth, and other six.] For they are the rod-bearers (lictors) of God, and they smite me with their rods and pursue me seven times in the night and seven times in the day, and leave me not at all and break in pieces all my power. These are the (twelve, lat. 2) angels of vengeance which stand before the throne of God: these are the angels that were first formed…

48 Bartholomew saith unto him: Be still (be muzzled) and be faint, that I may entreat my Lord.

49 And Bartholomew fell upon his face and cast earth upon his head and began to say: O Lord Jesu Christ, the great and glorious name. All the choirs of the angels praise thee, O Master, and I that am unworthy with my lips . . . do praise thee, O Master. Hearken unto me thy servant, and as thou didst choose me from the receipt of custom and didst not suffer me to have my conversation unto the end in my former deeds, O Lord Jesu Christ, hearken unto me and have mercy upon the sinners.

50 And when he had so said, the Lord saith unto him: Rise up, suffer him that groaneth to arise: I will declare the rest unto thee.

51 And Bartholomew raised up Satan and said unto him: Go unto thy place, with thine angels, but the Lord hath mercy upon all his world. (50, 51, again enormously amplified in lat. 2. Satan complains that he has been tricked into telling his secrets before the time. The interpolation is to some extent dated by this sentence: ‘ Simon Magus and Zaroes and Arfaxir and Jannes and Mambres are my brothers.’ Zaroes and Arfaxatare wizards who figure in the Latin Acts of Matthew and of Simon and Jude (see below).

52 But the devil said: Suffer me, and I will tell thee how I was cast down into this place and how the Lord did make man.

53 I was going to and fro in the world, and God said unto Michael: Bring me a clod from the four corners of the earth, and water out of the four rivers of paradise. And when Michael brought them God formed Adam in the regions of the east, and shaped the clod which was shapeless, and stretched sinews and veins upon it and established it with Joints; and he worshipped him, himself for his own sake first, because he was the image of God, therefore he worshipped him.

54 And when I came from the ends of the earth Michael said: Worship thou the image of God, which he hath made according to his likeness. But I said: I am fire of fire, I was the first angel formed, and shall worship clay and matter?

55 And Michael saith to me: Worship, lest God be wroth with thee. But I said to him: God will not be wroth with me; but I will set my throne over against his throne, and I will be as he is. Then was God wroth with me and cast me down, having commanded the windows of heaven to be opened.

56 And when I was cast down, he asked also the six hundred that were under me, if they would worship: but they said: Like as we have seen the first angel do, neither will we worship him that is less than ourselves. Then were the six hundred also cast down by him with me.

57 And when we were cast down upon the earth we were senseless for forty years, and when the sun shone forth seven times brighter than fire, suddenly I awaked; and I looked about and saw the six hundred that were under me senseless.

58 And I awaked my son Salpsan and took him to counsel how I might deceive the man on whose account I was cast out of the heavens.

59 And thus did I contrive it. I took a vial in mine hand and scraped the sweat from off my breast and the hair of mine armpits, and washed myself (Lat. 2, I took fig leaves in my hands and wiped the sweat from my bosom and below mine arms and cast it down beside the streams of waters. 69 is greatly prolonged in this text) in the springs of the waters whence the four rivers flow out, and Eve drank of it and desire came upon her: for if she had not drunk of that water I should not have been able to deceive her.

61 And Bartholomew came and fell at Jesus’ feet and began with tears to say thus: Abba, Father, that art past finding out by us, Word of the Father, whom the seven heavens hardly contained, but who wast pleased to be contained easily and without pain within the body of the Virgin: whom the Virgin knew not that she bare: thou by thy thought hast ordained all things to be: thou givest us that which we need before thou art entreated.

62 Thou that didst wear a crown of thorns that thou mightest prepare for us that repent the precious crown from heaven; that didst hang upon the tree, that (a clause gone): (lat. 2, that thou mightest turn from us the tree of lust and concupiscence (etc., etc.). The verse is prolonged for over 40 lines) (that didst drink wine mingled with gall) that thou mightest give us to drink of the wine of compunction, and wast pierced in the side with a spear that thou mightest fill us with thy body and thy blood:

63 Thou that gavest names unto the four rivers: to the first Phison, because of the faith (pistis) which thou didst appear in the world to preach; to the second Geon, for that man was made of earth (ge); to the third Tigris, because by thee was revealed unto us the consubstantial Trinity in the heavens (to make anything of this we must read Trigis); to the fourth Euphrates, because by thy presence in the world thou madest every soul to rejoice (euphranai) through the word of immortality.

64 My God, and Father, the greatest, my King: save, Lord, the sinners.

65 When he had thus prayed Jesus said unto him: Bartholomew, my Father did name me Christ, that I might come down upon earth and anoint every man that cometh unto me with the oil of life: and he did call me Jesus that I might heal every sin of them that know not . . . and give unto men (several corrupt words: the…

69 Then I, Bartholomew, which wrote these things in mine heart, took hold on the hand of

Glory be to thee, O Lord Jesus Christ, that givest unto all thy grace which all we have perceived. Alleluia.

Glory be to thee, O Lord, the life of sinners.

Glory be to thee, O Lord, death is put to shame.

Glory be to thee, O Lord, the treasure of righteousness.

For unto God do we sing.

70 And as Bartholomew thus spake again, Jesus put off his mantle and took a kerchief from the neck of Bartholomew and began to rejoice and say (70 lat. 2, Then Jesus took a kerchief (?) I and said: I am good: mild and gracious and merciful, strong and righteous, wonderful and holy): I am good. Alleluia. I am meek and gentle. Alleluia. Glory be to thee, O Lord: for I give gifts unto all them that desire me. Alleluia.

Glory be to thee, O Lord, world without end. Amen. Alleluia.

71 And when he had ceased, the apostles kissed him, and he gave them the peace of love.

COMMENTARY

Note the similarities between GB and the Islamic corpus:

Both teach that Adam was fashioned after the image of God/Allah.
Both teach that the angels and Satan were to worship Adam, with GB emphasizing that this was to be done in recognition of the man being the very image of God.
Both teach that Satan refused to do so because he was made of fire, whereas Adam was made of clay, which made Satan think he was better than the first man.

It is obvious that the author(s) and/or editor(s) of the Quran has/have adapted the various uninspired myths, fables, traditions etc., which were held by Christians, Jews, pagans, etc., and passed them off as revelations from God. This is the precise charge which the disbelievers leveled against the compiler of the Muslim scripture:

Those who disbelieve say: “This (the Qur’an) is nothing but a lie that he (Muhammad) has invented, and others have helped him at it, so that they have produced an unjust wrong (thing) and a lie.” And they say: “Tales of the ancients, which he has written down, and they are dictated to him morning and afternoon.” Say: “It (this Qur’an) has been sent down by Him (Allah) (the Real Lord of the heavens and earth) Who knows the secret of the heavens and the earth. Truly, He is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.” S. 25:4-6 Hilali-Khan

The example of GB proves that the unbelievers were right since the Quran is nothing more than a garbled up, incoherent and unintelligible mishmash of fairytales, traditions and specific legal rulings, which “Muhammad” “borrowed” from the beliefs and practices of the various cultures of that time.

FURTHER READING

Christian Fables That Expose the Fraud of Muhammad

CHRISTIAN FABLES OF THE QURAN

GNOSTIC FABLES OF ISLAM

The Quran’s Manifold Blunders Pt. 2

Sujood – The Act of Worship Which Allah Shares With His Creatures

Is Jesus Really Like Adam After All?

A HYMN TO THE DIVINE CHRIST

The following is taken from the monumental work titled The Incarnate Christ and His Critics: A Biblical Defense, authored by Robert M. Bowman Jr. & J. Ed Komoszewski, published by Kregel Academic, Grand Rapids, MI, 2024, Part 2: Like Father, Like Son: Jesus’ Divine Attributes, Chapter 11: Preexistence in Paul and Hebrews, 213-221.

CHRIST WAS IN GOD’S FORM AND BECAME A MAN

(PHILIPPIANS 2:5–8)

One of the most important biblical passages for Christology is Philippians 2:5–11. Most scholars think Paul wrote Philippians from Rome about AD 62,²⁵ although a date as early as the mid-50s is sometimes defended.²⁶ As Christians have traditionally understood this passage, Paul teaches that Christ was a preexistent person who was fully God and yet who humbled himself by becoming human and dying on a cross (vv. 5–8). Then, in Christ’s resurrection, God the Father exalted him so that all creation would honor him as their divine Lord (vv. 9–11). Although this understanding of the passage has come under criticism, the evidence is decisive that Paul was affirming the divine preexistence of Christ. Here we will discuss the interpretation of the first part of the text (vv. 5–8). We will examine the second part of the passage (vv. 9–11) in some detail later in the book (see pp. 488–93).

Christians who accept the deity of Christ are not alone in understanding the passage to speak of Christ as preexistent. Many scholars of other perspectives, including secular or skeptical ones, agree on this point. Bart Ehrman, for example, states that the passage “is an elevated reflection on Christ coming into the world (from heaven) for the sake of others and being glorified by God as a result.”²⁷ However, Ehrman does not think the passage views the preexistent Christ as God, but as “an angel or an angel-like being, who only after his act of obedience to the point of death was made God’s equal.”²⁸

Jehovah’s Witnesses may like Ehrman’s view that the preexistent Christ in Paul’s teaching was an angel, but they will not like his view that Paul thought Christ became God’s equal after his death and resurrection. (We should also recall that Ehrman claimed to find conflicting views in other parts of the New Testament.) Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that Christ began as Michael the archangel, was a man on earth, and is now Michael the archangel again. The Watchtower Society interprets Philippians 2:5–11 according to this doctrinal position: “So Michael the archangel is Jesus in his prehuman existence. After his resurrection and return to heaven, Jesus resumed his service as Michael, the chief angel, ‘to the glory of God the Father’” (note the quotation from Philippians 2:11).29 The Society understands the expression “form of God” in verse 6 to mean simply that “Jesus was a spirit person just as ‘God is a Spirit.’”³⁰

Our focus here will be on the preexistence of Christ, although we will find some evidence in Philippians 2:6 that Christ was deity, not angelic, in nature. In chapter 19, we will directly address the claim that Paul viewed Christ as a preexistent angelic creature (see especially pp. 371–75).

Oneness Pentecostals interpret Philippians 2:5–11 very differently. When Paul says that Christ existed “in the form of God” (v. 6), David Bernard understands this to mean that Christ simply was God. Jesus embodies both “Father and Son” because he is “identical” to God. When Paul says that “God highly exalted him,” that is, Christ (v. 9), Bernard interprets this to mean that “God (the Spirit of Jesus) has highly exalted Jesus Christ (God manifested in flesh).”³¹ In effect, God exalted himself, or at least exalted the human manifestation of himself. Thus, Oneness Pentecostalism denies that Christ existed as someone distinct from the Father prior to the incarnation. We shall see that Philippians 2:5–11 strongly challenges Oneness Christology on this point.

The most influential alternative interpretation comes from Unitarians and those with a similar understanding of Paul’s Christology. Unitarians hold that Christ was not God and did not preexist his human life. They interpret all of Philippians 2:5–11 as describing the human Jesus. Buzzard summarizes verses 5–8 as follows: “Enjoying the status of God as God’s unique agent, Jesus did not consider such likeness to God as something to be used for his own advantage. Instead he took the role of servant and conducted his whole ministry in the service of human beings, even giving up his life for them.”³²

Buzzard bases his interpretation of Philippians 2 at least in part on the notion that the passage reflects Paul’s “Adam Christology,” in which Jesus was a second figure like Adam who undid the damage that the first Adam had done. Specifically, he argues that “the form of God” in Philippians 2:6 is equivalent to “the image of God” in which God created Adam (Gen. 1:26–27).33 James Dunn is especially influential in advocating this interpretation of the expression “form of God.”³⁴ Dunn interprets the passage to mean that Christ, like Adam, was in God’s image and was tempted to grasp after equality with God, but, unlike Adam, Christ refused to give into that temptation (v. 6). Finding himself in our fallen human condition, Christ humbly obeyed God, again unlike Adam, redemptively submitting to the death that Adam had brought on all humanity (vv. 7–8). Dunn traces the Jewish theological background of these Adamic themes to Genesis 1–3 and Psalm 8 and cites evidence of Adamic Christology elsewhere in Paul’s epistles.³⁵This line of interpretation, then, understands all of Philippians 2:5–8 as describing the human life of Christ and as making no reference to or implication of his preexistence.

We will first set out our own literal translation of the passage, presenting the text in lines representing the distinct clauses of this complex statement, and with the verbs shown in italics. The clauses that use participles (in English, verbs that end in –ing) are subordinate to the main clauses (using indicative verbs) and are indented further to make it easier to see the relations among the various clauses.

6a who existing in the form of God,

6b did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped/exploited,

7a but emptied himself,

7b taking the form of a servant,

7c coming to be in the likeness of humans.

8a And being found in appearance as a human,

8b he humbled himself,

8c coming to be obedient to the point of death, death of a cross.

A massive body of literature exists on this passage, so much so that Joseph Hellerman, who has published extensively on it, acknowledges in his commentary on Philippians that “the literature on Philippians 2:5–11 has become virtually unmanageable.”³⁶ Much academic discussion of the passage concerns whether it was a pre-Pauline hymn that Paul inserted or adapted in his epistle and, if so, what its original form was. Many scholars think it was a pre-Pauline hymn, which would make it an exceptionally early source for the church’s view of Christ—perhaps composed within ten or fifteen years of his resurrection.³⁷ Other scholars either question its hymnic origins or maintain that if it was a hymn Paul has thoroughly integrated it into his argument.³⁸Dunn is surely right in saying that even if the passage derived from a pre-Pauline hymn, “Paul presumably made use of it as an appropriate expression of his own theology.”³⁹

The natural way of understanding this passage—and the way the vast majority of Christian interpreters have historically understood it—is that Christ existed “in the form of God” in heaven before he became a man. Thus, Paul goes on immediately to say that Christ “emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, coming to be in the likeness of humans,” and that he was “found in appearance as a human.”

There is no doubt that the Adam/Christ typology is a significant motif in Pauline theology (most notably in Rom. 5:12–19; 1 Cor. 15:20–22, 45–49). It is also plausible to find some contrast with Adam implicit in Philippians 2. However, as Dunn himself acknowledges, one may see some Adam-Christ allusions in Philippians 2 while still understanding it to mean that Christ preexisted his human life.40 For example, New Testament scholar N. T. Wright understands the contrast this way: “Adam, in arrogance, thought to become like God: Christ, in humility, became man.”⁴¹

We consider the key to interpreting Philippians 2:5–11 is to understand it in the context of Paul’s pastoral concern immediately preceding the passage. Paul urges the Philippians to be of one mind with each other, humbly considering others as more important than themselves, looking out not just for their own interests but also for the interests of others (vv. 1–4). Paul presupposes here that the Philippians are all in fact equal because of their common status as believers in Christ, but each is to act humbly as if others are more important. Several clear verbal links connect verses 1–4 to verses 5–11, especially “the same mind” and “this mind” (vv. 2, 5), “count” (vv. 3, 6), and “in humility” and “humbled” (vv. 3, 8).42 Thus, verses 1–4 express how the Philippians are to conduct themselves, and then verses 5–11 present Christ as the ultimate example.

We therefore disagree with those exegetes who interpret Philippians 2:5 to say, “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus” (ESV), meaning that those who are “in Christ” share a corporate unity with one another. Instead, we firmly side with those exegetes who understand Philippians 2:5 to mean “let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus” (NKJV; cf. LEB, NASB, NET, NRSV), referring to Christ as providing the preeminent example of the “mind” or attitude believers should have.⁴³Paul is holding up Christ as an example of someone who humbly acted as though someone who was his equal was more important than himself. In context, who is that someone with whom Christ was equal but toward whom Christ humbled himself? The answer comes immediately in verse 6, which says that Christ, “existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited” (CSB). (We are not concerned yet with the best way to translate harpagmon, which the CSB translates “something to be exploited.”) Paul’s point here is not that the human Jesus resisted the temptation to sin against God, as Adam had. Instead, Paul compares Christ to God in a way that rather clearly indicates they were equals in some way. The point is that Christ is the supreme example of humility in our relationships with one another by the way he humbled himself to God (the Father).

We see how Christ humbled himself in what comes next. Paul says that Christ “emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity” (v. 7 CSB). A great deal of fruitless speculation about this text has proceeded on the faulty assumption that Paul means that Christ literally emptied himself of something, as if he had some specific thing and then got rid of it. Think of our similar idiom, “He put himself down”; it would make no sense to ask, “Put himself down where?” Likewise, we should not ask, “Emptied himself of what?” because such a question reflects a misunderstanding of the idiom. In context, “emptied himself” is the positive alternative that Christ pursued rather than to “consider equality with God as something to be exploited” (v. 6 CSB; note the flow of these two clauses: “did not . . . instead”). There is now widespread agreement, therefore, that “emptied himself” is metaphorical language, expressing Christ’s “divestiture of position or prestige.”⁴⁴Loh and Nida made the point cogently almost half a century ago:

It should be said at the outset that the verb [“to empty”] must be understood metaphorically, not metaphysically. . . . The verb “to empty” is used elsewhere in the Pauline Epistles four times (Rom 4:14; 1 Cor 1:17; 9:15; 2 Cor 9:3), and in each instance it is used metaphorically in the sense of “to bring to nothing,” “to make worthless,” or “to empty of significance.”⁴⁵

The translation “made himself of no reputation” (KJV, NKJV) is a nice paraphrase, as is the NIV rendering “made himself nothing.” It means that Christ acted as if his divine status was unimportant.

Unfortunately, a whole christological tradition called “kenotic” Christology, or “kenosis” theories, named for the Greek word translated “emptied himself” (ekenōsen) in Philippians 2:7, arose as an attempt to explain what was “emptied.” These theories speculate that Christ divested himself of at least some of his divine attributes in order to become human. (Such theories should be distinguished from the more general use of the terms “kenosis” and “kenotic” to refer to whatever Philippians 2:7 means by Christ having “emptied himself.”) The idea of a divine Person ceasing to possess some of the essential divine attributes is theologically problematic and misses the point of Paul’s statement.⁴⁶ Paul then says that the way Christ “emptied himself ” was by “taking the form of a slave.” This does not mean that Christ became the servant of other people (though he acted that way toward other people as well), but that he became God’s servant. (Remember, this is about Christ as an example of someone humbling himself toward an equal.) The Father’s Son became the Master’s Servant. And the way in which Christ took the form of a servant was by “becoming in the likeness of human beings.” Again, Paul’s line of thought here presupposes that Christ existed in heaven before becoming a man. A human being cannot take a lower status by becoming a human being because that is what he already and originally is. What Paul says here, then, must refer to Christ’s intention before the incarnation to become a human being.

Paul emphasizes next that being human was a change for Christ, the result of his emptying himself: “And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” (v. 8 NKJV). We find two “stages” in Christ’s self-humiliation:

1. Christ did not regard equality with God in a self-serving way (v. 6) but instead emptied himself to take on a servant’s form and human likeness (v. 7).

2. Christ further humbled himself to be obedient to the extent of dying on the cross (v. 8).

These two stages correspond to the main (indicative) clauses in verses 6–8, “did not regard . . . but emptied himself” and “humbled himself.” Since Christ’s humbling himself to obey God to the point of death was the second stage of his descent, the first stage was something prior to his life of obedience. Here again, the text very clearly indicates that Christ existed before he became a man.

Now that we have traced the thread of Paul’s complex statements in verses 6–8, we can go back and comment on the two highly controversial expressions in verse 6. First, when Paul says that Christ existed in “the form of God” (en morphē theou), what does this mean? It does not mean, as Dunn argues, that Christ existed as a man in the image of God (Gen. 1:26–27). In context, Christ’s existing in the form of God was something true about him prior to him emptying himself by becoming human. This natural reading of the text is confirmed by the grammar: the present-tense participle “existing” (hyparchōn) “suggests an ongoing essential status” in contrast to the string of aorist verbs that follow (“emptied,” “taking,” “coming to be,” “being found,” “humbled,” “becoming”).⁴⁷ Nor does “form of God” mean, as Jehovah’s Witnesses maintain, merely that Christ preexisted as a spirit. Rather, it means that Christ’s intrinsic or original mode of appearance was that of God, the brilliant, shining glorious appearance associated with his divine nature and status.⁴⁸ Christ “emptied himself,” or made himself nothing, by coming in the form of God’s human, earthly servant, completely unexceptional in appearance (cf. Isa. 53:2).

Finally, a great deal of the scholarly debate regarding Philippians 2:5–11 has focused on the meaning of the Greek word harpagmos. Since the word occurs only once in the Greek Bible and is rare in extrabiblical literature, scholars have limited lexical data on which to base their understandings of Paul’s intended meaning. It is now generally understood in two different ways, both of which are consistent with the divine preexistence of Christ.

First, the traditional interpretation is that Paul was saying that Christ did not consider equality with God “something to be grasped” (ESV, LEB, NABRE, NASB, NET, NJB, NRSV). In context this statement cannot mean that Christ was an inferior being who did not wrongfully try to seize equality with God (as Jehovah’s Witnesses, for example, interpret the verse). We have already shown that Paul’s argument in the passage depends on Christ’s essential equality with God. In this context, then, the translation “something to be grasped” would mean that the preexistent divine Christ did not try to seize recognition of his rightful status of equality with God but chose to put the glory of the Father ahead of his own glory.

Second, the interpretation that a majority of exegetes now favors understands Paul to mean that Christ did not think of equality with God as “something to be exploited” (CSB; similarly, CEB) or “to be used to his own advantage” (NIV).⁴⁹ This translation would mean that Christ was equal with God but did not seek to take advantage of that status for his own personal gain. Whichever of these two translations of harpagmon we accept, Paul is saying that Christ was divine but did not act in the self-serving manner one might have expected an omnipotent deity to act—taking whatever he wanted, demanding to be treated as superior. This understanding fits the context well. Paul’s point is that although Christ was in God’s form and was (at least by right) God’s equal, he did not demand his divine right but humbly took a servant’s form and became a human being.

Clearly, Philippians 2 does indeed speak of Christ as a preexistent divine person who humbled himself by becoming a human being.⁵⁰He was not simply a human being, as Unitarians argue, but was someone who became human. Nor was he simply God (the Father), choosing to manifest himself as a human, as Oneness Pentecostals claim, since the preexistent Christ became human as an act of humble deference toward God, in order to glorify the Father. On the other hand, he was not just one of many heavenly spirits, not even the chief angel, but existed in God’s very form or glorious appearance. In short, Philippians 2 reveals that Christ was a preexistent divine person distinct from God the Father yet existing with his same divine, glorious form and rightfully equal with God.

25. E.g., Moisés Silva, Philippians, 2nd ed., BECNT (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), 2–7.

26. E.g., G. Walter Hansen, The Letter to the Philippians, PNTC (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 19–24.

27. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God, 254.

28. Ehrman, How Jesus Became God, 266.

29. “Is Jesus the Archangel Michael?” Watchtower, April 1, 2010, 19.

30. “Philippians Study Notes—Chapter 2,” in NWT (Study Edition), loc. cit.

31. Bernard, Oneness of God, 221–23.

32. Buzzard, Jesus Was Not a Trinitarian, 188; similarly, Chandler, God of Jesus, 340.

33. Buzzard, Jesus Was Not a Trinitarian, 187; likewise, Chandler, God of Jesus, 335–36.

34. Dunn, Christology in the Making, xix, 115, 117.

35. For Dunn’s interpretation of the passage, see Christology in the Making, xviii–xix, xxxiii–xxxiv, 114– 21; “Christ, Adam, and Preexistence,” in Where Christology Began: Essays on Philippians 2, eds. Ralph P. Martin and Brian J. Dodd (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998), 74–83; and The Theology of Paul the Apostle (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), 281–88 (which repeats most of the essay in Where Christology Began).

36. Joseph H. Hellerman, Philippians, EGGNT (Nashville: B&H Academic, 2015), 105.

37. See especially Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, chapter 3.

38. An influential early article questioning the hymnic view is Gordon D. Fee, “Philippians 2:5–11: Hymn or Exalted Pauline Prose?” BBR 2 (1992): 29–46; more recently, Benjamin Edsall and Jennifer R. Strawbridge, “The Songs We Used to Sing? Hymn ‘Traditions’ and Reception in Pauline Letters,” JSNT 37, no. 3 (2015): 290–311.

39. Dunn, Theology of Paul the Apostle, 281 n. 64.

40. Dunn, Theology of Paul the Apostle, 286–87.

41. N. T. Wright, “Harpagmos and the Meaning of Philippians 2:5–11,” JTS 37 (1986): 348.

42. See Hellerman, Philippians, 91.

43. The text literally reads, “Have this mind in/among you [pl.] which also in Christ Jesus.” The literature on this one exegetical issue alone is massive. For a good discussion favoring the exegesis accepted here, see Mark J. Keown, Philippians, EEC (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2017), 1:372–78.

44. BDAG, “kenoō,” 539.

45. I-Jin Loh and Eugene A. Nida, A Translator’s Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, Helps for Translators 19 (Stuttgart: United Bible Societies, 1977), 57, 58.

46. For helpful overviews and critiques of kenosis theories see Millard J. Erickson, The Word Became Flesh: A Contemporary Incarnational Christology (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1991), 78–86, and Gordon R. Lewis and Bruce A. Demarest, Integrative Theology, Three Volumes in One (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), 2:252–53, 283–86. Two collections of essays reflecting differing approaches to the topic are C. Stephen Evans, ed., Exploring Kenotic Christology: The Self-Emptying of God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), and Paul T. Nimmo and Keith L. Johnson, eds., Kenosis: The Self-Emptying of Christ in Scripture & Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2022). A notable critique of kenosis theories is offered by Andrew Ter Ern Loke, A Kryptic Model of the Incarnation, Routledge New Critical Thinking in Religion, Theology and Biblical Studies (New York: Routledge, 2016), especially chapters 3 and 6.

47. Keown, Philippians, 384–85.

48. See especially Daniel J. Fabricatore, Form of God, Form of a Servant: An Examination of the Greek Noun μορφή in Philippians 2:6–7 (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2010).

49. The groundbreaking study presenting this interpretation is Roy W. Hoover, “The HARPAGMOS Enigma: A Philological Solution,” HTR 64 (1971): 95–119. A helpful overview of recent discussion on harpagmos is found in Loke, Origin of Divine Christology, 36–41.

50. For further study of Philippians 2:5–11, in addition to the commentaries and the studies already cited, see Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel, 37–45, 197–210; Fee, Pauline Christology, 372–401; Joseph H. Hellerman, Reconstructing Honor in Roman Philippi: Carmen Christi as Cursus Pudorum, SNTSMS 132 (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005); Wesley Hill, Paul and the Trinity: Persons, Relations, and the Pauline Letters (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), 77–110; Larry W. Hurtado, How on Earth Did Jesus Become a God? Historical Questions about Earliest Devotion to Jesus (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 83–107.

FURTHER READING

BEYOND THE VEIL OF ETERNITY