Thirty Pieces of Silver

Answering a question on Quora:

When was Jehovah valued at 30 silver pieces (Zechariah 11:12,13)?

(On Quora, Jehovah's (false) Witnesses have denied that Zechariah's prophecy had anything to do with Jesus and Judas. Incredible, considering that the gospel writers explicitly linked Judas's actions to the prophecy (e.g., Matthew 27:9, etc.)! 

Zechariah 11 contains a marvelous passage that compresses messages applying to Zechariah’s day as well as to first-century Judea, Israel, and Messiah Jesus. The answer is that YHWH was valued twice at 30 pieces of silver; first, with Zechariah as His proxy, and later as the incarnate I AM, Jesus of Nazareth.

First we have to point out an ambiguity in verse 13’s translation. Some translators attribute to the LORD (in Hebrew, YHWH), within the quotation marks, “Throw it to the potter, this magnificent price at which they valued me.” So the LORD is saying that they valued Him at thirty pieces of silver.

Tangent: Thirty pieces was an insultingly low wage, so “magnificent” is actually sarcastic. Let that sink in: God used sarcasm when people earned it.

Other translators include only “Throw it to the potter,” so that the valuation applies to Zechariah. However, as God’s prophet, Zechariah represented God, so the price that the owners of the flocks placed on Zechariah’s prophetic and shepherding work also represented a price placed on God.

So, either way you place the quotation marks, the price was placed on YHWH.

Anyone blessed by the Holy Spirit with New Testament-based hindsight can see that the passage contains prophecies about Jesus of Nazareth, Judas.

YHWH translates as “I AM.” When Jesus said, “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58), He used Jewish terminology to claim to be YHWH in the flesh. The New Testament confirms the claim in numerous ways. For example, Jesus forgave sins (Matthew 9:2–8), which only God can do. Jesus claimed to share God’s glory, which YHWH said He will not share (Isaiah 42:8, Isaiah 48:11), and claimed to do so before God created the world (John 17:5). And God the Son created the universe (John 1:3, Colossians 1:16)), which God did Himself (Job 38:4, Jeremiah 10:12, Amos 4:13). Such claims leave anti-trinitarians with huge problems.

So when the priests paid Judas thirty pieces of silver to betray Jesus, they put the bounty on YHWH that was prophesied by Zechariah (Matthew 26:15).

Those in denial about the scripture’s teachings about the fact that Jesus is God in the flesh are quick to skip over other prophetic language in Zechariah 11. For example:

• Throughout the chapter, Zechariah performs the role of a shepherd who cares for the sheep, particularly the weak, diseased, and wounded. The antitype is Jesus, the Good Shepherd (John 10).
• Verse 10 signifies the severing of God’s blessings on Judea and Israel after they refused to repent of murdering God the Son. This was a recurring them in Jesus’s teachings (for example, the parable of wicked tenants, Matthew 21:33–46), and it was fulfilled in waves starting with general Titus’s siege of Jerusalem in 67 AD.
• Verse 13 parallels Judas throwing the thirty pieces of silver in the temple AND the priests using the money to buy the potter’s land in Judas’s name (Matthew 27:3–10).
• Verse 14 signifies the division between Judea in the south and Israel in the north. In New Testament times, that corresponded roughly to the geographical boundaries separating Judea from Samaria, Galilee, Peraea, and Syro-Phoenicia. Today, much of the division remains, although Israel has taken back (more or less) Syro-Phoenicia and half of Galilee.

With so many details of Zechariah’s prophecy fulfilled in the gospels, saying that verses 12 and 13 have nothing to do with Jesus and Judas takes wishful thinking and bad teaching of an organization that qualifies under 1 John 4:3

[E]very spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and which is already in the world at this time.

Note:

1. Some may become distracted by an apparent contradiction between Matthew, who says the prophecy was made by Jeremiah, and the fact that it's written in Zechariah. A number of explanations have been proposed, including the possibility that Matthew simply had a brain fart. The most sensible to me is that Zechariah was part of the "Book of the Prophets." Jeremiah was the first book in the Book of the Prophets, so Jeremiah may have been a synecdoche, a name for the whole. Thus, Zechariah was a section of what was colloquially known as “Jeremiah.” If so, then the “contradiction” is resolved.
   
   
2. In Colossians 1, Jesus is said to be the firstborn over (not firstborn before) all creation and the firstborn from the dead. Firstborn does not always mean first one born. A number of examples can be cited in the Old Testament when later-born sons bore the title of firstborn. Rather, firstborn often means pre-eminent one, particularly when followed by the preposition over. This contrasts against firstborn from the dead, wherein Jesus actually was the first to resurrect with a glorified body; this, only figuratively, being a birth.

Copyright 2021 Richard Wheeler. Permission granted for non-remunerated use. Please give credit where credit is due. 

Judge Jesus: "Full of Himself?

Answering a question on Quora:

Why is Jesus so full of himself that he would condemn good loving peaceful people to an eternity in a burning lake of fire that doesn't worship him as a god?

First off, you’re not really “full of yourself” if you really are “all that.” Jesus is “all that.” If you understood the unimaginable precision of the constants of physics required to keep the universe from collapsing or exploding, you’d be just beginning to understand the greatness of God the Son. If you understood the virtual impossibility of the chain of events beginning with the formation of the right types of amino acids all having the same geometries, forming the right proteins, forming the right components that enable self-replication of RNA and DNA, and the half-gigabyte of quaternary-encoded information that enables the duplication of that environment (as well as itself) in even the simplest hypothetical biological organism, you would be just beginning to grasp how great God the Son is. He is “all that.” He is all that by nature, He is all that by virtue of being your Creator, and He is all that by virtue of the price He paid to secure your potential redemption.

Second, if you grasped the utter perfection and holiness of God the Son, you would never pretend that there’s such a thing as “good” people, This error normally results from judging people relative to ourselves or from judging ourselves relative to other imperfect people, rather than judging relative to God’s standard. What, you think your “good” outweighs your bad? Do you really think you can pay off your debts with what you already owe to your Creator? What, you think you’re perfect? You’ve never done anything wrong? Now who’s full of himself?!

Third, the unholiness of man and the holiness of God’s presence cannot coexist. The unholiness of a human would defile and insult an utterly righteous and holy God, and the glory of God would be unbearable to an unholy, unregenerated human. Neither could stand the other! Hell is not a problem, but rather, a solution.

Fourth, saying that not worshiping Christ as God sends people to hell is like saying one link in a chain suspends the load. It’s a flawed focus on a single symptom. God provided a means of redemption and regeneration. He offers it as a gift. Refusing that gift is the ultimate sin; it is a sin against oneself. But nobody goes to hell for that sin alone; it is merely one among many.

Hell was created for Lucifer and the angels who followed him in rebellion against God. We are born as citizens of Lucifer’s kingdom, and we all ratify that with by breaking God’s commandments. God’s gift can regenerate us so we gain citizenship in God’s kingdom. If we are so full of ourselves that we fail to receive that gift, we have only ourselves to blame.

Fear of hell is not a wrong reason to receive the gift and then worship God. But there is a better reason. God is good. In fact He is the ultimate standard of goodness. He not only gave us life, but also, at His own expense, created the means for our forgiveness, redemption, and regeneration. He balanced justice and love by paying a price that would have destroyed any mere human. In His kindness, He freely offers that to each of us.

When we rebel against physical laws, we pay a price. The price of rebelling against gravity by walking off a cliff is paid when you hit the bottom. You have only yourself to blame. Likewise, there is a moral law. If we fail to receive the gift of redemption, we will hit the bottom in hell. And how much more accountable will be those who actively reject the gift.

You can reframe the consequences to shift the blame to the One who enforces the law. You may rage against Him for all eternity. But in all honesty, you will have only yourself to blame. 

Copyright 2021 Richard Wheeler. Permission granted for non-remunerated use. Please cite sources when copying.

Jesus: Only Way to God the Father

Answering a question on Quora: 

Where in the Bible does it say the only way to the Father is through the Son?

New Testament

John 14:6

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.”

Acts 4:12

And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among mankind by which we must be saved.

Note that approaching the Father requires “being saved.” This means that God must do what we cannot: redeem, regenerate, justify, and sanctify. Since the Son provided the means of redemption, it is not too much to ask that we acknowledge that the Son is whom He is and receive the gift as a free gift.

Old Testament

Psalm 2:11–12

Worship the LORD with reverence
And rejoice with trembling.
Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way,
For His wrath may soon be kindled.
How blessed are all who take refuge in Him!

Additional Evidence

The relationship between the Son and the Father is defined explicitly in the New Testament. Old Testament clues are there, but relevant passages are better interpreted in hindsight, that is, in light of the New Testament.

The first clue is in the opening lines of the Bible, where God says, let us make…. People who deny that the one God used creative power over space-time to experience it as three Persons frequently explain away “us” as a “royal we.” However, the literal interpretation is reinforced by the plural, “Gods,” in In the beginning Gods created the the heavens and the Earth. And the unity of the plural Gods is reinforced by the singular number of made. The best interpretation is that one God exists in space-time as three Persons in communication with each other.

Another clue, less clear in the Old Testament, is that, while God remains in heaven and unseen by any human, He also walked the earth in the appearance of a human. This can be traced from the Garden of Eden, through Abraham’s entertainment of strangers, to God’s revelation of Himself to Moses. The earthly liaison, so to speak, gave Himself a descriptive name, I AM — as contrasted with all other gods, who are not. He chose this name for our sakes but does not actually need one. No previous god existed with the authority to name Him, and no other god exists from whom He needs to be distinguished.

(The Hebrew word translated I AM and the LORD is YHWH. Note that the word has no vowels and the pronunciation was lost a few centuries before Jesus was born. Anybody who makes a big show about its pronunciation “knows” more than what the facts establish.)

To prevent desecration of God’s “name,” translators began a tradition of translating YHWH as the LORD (in capital letters). This is the God whom all Jews and Christians aspire to know.

In the New Testament, Jesus of Nazareth reveals Himself to be YHWH, the I AM (John 8:58), the Word who was God, who was in the beginning with God, and through whom all created things were created (John 1:1–3, Colossians 1:16–17). In this light, passages such as Isaiah 9:6 make sense:

For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

If you aspire to know the Lord, that is, God or God the Father, you aspire to know the Son. If you know the Son, you know the Father as well (John 14:7–11), but you cannot know the Father if you reject that the Son is who He says He is (John 8:9).

Copyright 2021, Richard Wheeler. Permission granted for non-remunerated use. Please give credit where credit is due.

Jesus was not Joseph Campbell's hero

Answering a question on Quora:

Is the book of Matthew a monomyth?

In my opinion, the Gospel According to Matthew has some elements of a monomyth but lacks the most critical characteristic.

According to Wikipedia, monomyth is a term from narratology Narratology and Comparative mythology, popularized by Joseph Campbell as the Hero's journey. The monomyth, is the common template of stories that involve a hero who goes on an adventure, is victorious in a decisive crisis, and comes home changed or transformed.

Atheists believe Matthew is mythological, but it was intended as biographical; and good historical evidence supports that. While the book may be biographical, it remains narrative, so I would not exclude it from being a “hero’s journey” just because it is factual. There are better reasons.

Wikipedia includes a quote from Campbell that boils the Hero’s Journey cycle to such simple elements that Matthew could qualify as monomyth. However, that quote oversimplifies the cycle.

If you are familiar with Matthew and compare the events in Matthew to the graphic on Wikipedia’s page, you will find monomyth elements such as a mentor (God the Father), although mentorship precedes the narrative. Jesus of Nazareth has helpers (primarily the God the Holy Spirit), but his disciples are more dependents than helpers. Jesus of Nazareth gains victory over a climactic challenge — a torturous, humiliating death — resulting in the transformation of His body, but His character remains unchanged, since the core of His being was always fully formed. Jesus does not really return “home.” After His victory, He sporadically appears to His disciples to convince them of His victory and
deliver parting messages, but Matthew does not include the return home because "home" is God's throne. (The return home is described in Luke’s book, The Acts of the Apostles.)

Matthew lacks a self-revelation that transforms Jesus. Rather, Matthew turns much of the template upside down. Instead of being changed, Jesus changes the world. Specifically, Jesus transforms the relationship between God and humans. What people previously saw only through ceremonial metaphors and through clouded prophecies, they came to know historically and personally. What was previously conditional and superficial, He made unconditional and everlasting. (To support this statement, I would need to go into theological differences between Old Testament and New Testament salvation, which would stray off topic.)

Matthew does not qualify as monomyth. Rather than experiences transforming the Hero, the Hero’s experience enables transformation of the audience. The intent of Matthew is not to entertain readers with a transformed hero’s journey, but rather, to transform readers and send them on their own journeys.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Permission granted for non-remunerated purposes, provided credit is given where credit is due.

Jesus's Teachings Without His Identify? Patronizing Nonsense.

My answer to a question on Quora:

Is there a religion that only believes in Jesus, and not necessarily God? I believe in the things Jesus taught, but not that he would be the son of God. I don't believe in God in general, honestly.

One religion that allows belief in Jesus but not in God would be Atheism. Some atheists completely reject Jesus’s existence because they have an emotional need to refute the existence of God. They claim that Jesus did not exist in order to refute the existence of, specifically, the Christian God. However, other, less biased atheists accept the preponderance of historical evidence that Jesus did exist.

Atheists would protest that Atheism is not a religion because they reject the existence of the supernatural. However, by making a claim about the supernatural, they claim to have information that they could not have in a materialist world. So their claim refutes itself. Furthermore, the claim of Atheism leads to further beliefs. For example, one line of though leads from non-existence of God to the non-value of individual lives and to the Collective being a higher form of organism than the individual. The highest form of organism would be the State. Since, without God, objective morality and individual value do not exist, the State can do anything to individuals. Anything. certain States have done “anything” and do so today. This line of thinking, a part of Marxism, has led to the slaughter of more people in a single century than all the religious wars in history. If that kind of “revelation” and fervor about the supernatural is not “religious,” I don’t know what is.

Many religions pay lip service to Jesus. One relevant religion would be Buddhism. Buddhism, or at least a major branch or it, believes that the ultimate state of being is a freedom from consciousness and pain, resulting in “god” being non existent. That would make Buddhism a sort of a spiritual form of Atheism.

Now, it is a contradiction to say one believes in what Jesus taught while not accepting that He is the Son of God. As CS Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity,

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say…. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

Jesus never said, “Worship me because I am God.” He followed one of the great rules of writing prose, Don’t tell them; show them. He made many claims that, against the backdrop of Jewish theology, were claims to divinity. He claimed authority over the Sabbath. He cast out demons by His own authority. He taught by His own authority without ever saying, “Thus says the Lord….” He claimed to have existed before the world and to have shared the glory of God. He claimed to have the power to judge and to forgive sins, which God alone can do. He even applied to Himself the name, I AM, that God had revealed to Moses. And he accepted worship and being called, “My Lord and my God!”

If Jesus was not the Son of God, then He was a liar, so His “teachings” would be morally dangerous. Indeed, by rejecting His divinity, you have already rejected a very large portion of His teachings. And the word for that religion is inconsistent.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Feel free to use this for non-remunerated purposes, but please give credit where credit is due.

Jesus Proclaims the Jewish Jubilee

From a Question on Quora

What is the implication for Luke 4:18-19?

In Luke 4:18–19, Jesus read Isaiah 61:1–2. The passage in Isaiah refers to the typology (symbolism) in Leviticus 25’s command to hold a year of Jubilee. (The wordings in Luke and Isaiah do not line up word-for-word because our English translation of Isaiah usually comes from the Hebrew manuscripts whereas our English translation of Luke’s quotation comes from the Greek, which probably translates from a Hebrew or Aramaic manuscript that Jesus read.)

One of the answers inserts an interpretation of verse 19 by a self-proclaimed prophet from 1800’s America. According to that prophet, verse 19 refers to his prophetic work; however, the context and language trace the language back to Isaiah, Moses, and something that was fully understood 3500 years ago and was never “lost.” The Bible we already have can interpret itself.

Colossians 2:16–17 explains that Old Testament ceremonial rules symbolized truths about Jesus Christ. For example, Hebrews 4:8–11 clarifies that the rest from work on the Sabbath symbolized entering into a rest from working to establish one’s own righteousness before God. Good that one does after entering that rest becomes a gift of love and thanksgiving rather than an attempt to earn grace.

Similarly, the Year of Jubilee had more than practical applications. God commanded Israel to hold a Year of Jubilee. The Hebrew calendar had seven sets of seven years (7x7=49), with each seventh year being a “Sabbath year” (Leviticus 25:1–7) The fiftieth year after the conquest of Canaan, and every fiftieth year after that, was to be a Year of Jubilee (Leviticus 25:8–17).

During the Year of Jubilee, on the feast day called the Day of Atonement, a number of things should have happened. For example:

In Bronze Age Mediterranean culture, people often sold themselves or family members in order to pay off debts or to avoid starvation. Many Bible translations use the word slaves, but they were more like indentured servants in early American history. During the Year of Jubilee, all such Hebrew slaves were to be freed.

As Israel conquered Canaan, the land was divided among the twelve tribes, and the tribes divided their lands among their families. Over the course of 49 years, some prospered and others did not, so lands were sold. During the Year of Jubilee, all lands were to be returned to the original owners to preserve their inheritance.

Now that we have a path from the ceremonial symbols in Leviticus, through the prophetic preaching of Isaiah, to Jesus’s proclamation in Luke, we can consider the passage phrase by phrase.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me

Anointing was a ceremonial act analogous to, today, ordaining a minister. It meant that a person was authorized and empowered to perform a service such as priesthood, prophecy, or leadership. God anointing Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit was like, not just giving a policeman a badge, but giving him the whole utility belt. God the Holy Spirit verified Christ’s identity by empowering His miracles as well as working on the hearts of those whom Jesus served.

to proclaim good news to the poor

Jesus preached good news not just to the favored religious people, but also to despised poor. Metaphorically, the poor represented humble people who lacked a “treasury of grace,” but who, rather, confessed their moral poverty and cast themselves upon God’s mercy in total dependence.

He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives

The Old Testament “slaves” represented people who were in bondage to sins and its consequences. There is a twisted idea that the sinner is in bondage to the devil, and the devil will torment sinners in hell. That is not a Christian idea. We are born with an inclination to sin; which sin is optional, but sinning is inevitable. For this reason, we are all subject to the penalty for sin. Hell can torment us all by itself without any devils’ help. In fact, Hell will be the place of the devils’ torment, too.

As long as we rely on our own righteousness, ceremonies, sacrifices, or self restraint, we remain in bondage to the consequences of sin. Jesus came to proclaim liberty to that captivity. He did what we could not and offers that act to us as a gift. We can ignore or reject it and remain in our prisons, or we can walk out and enjoy the liberty God offers. It’s our choice.

recovering of sight to the blind

Israel had apostatized so severely (even practicing child sacrifice) that God allowed other nations to conquer and scatter them. Only a remnant of a few tribes survived, primarily Judea — or, the “Jews.” When Assyrians allowed Jews to return home, they had learned their lesson. But they took it too far. They became legalistic, shifting their focus from God to the Mosaic Law. It became part of their religion to try to establish their own righteousness. Metaphorically, they blinded themselves to the larger point concerning humility and dependence on God for redemption. You see Jesus contending with the Pharisees about this throughout the gospels. And you still see it in major “Christian” churches, too.

Through His teaching, Jesus repeatedly drove home the point that only those who performed the inhuman feat of achieving sinless perfection could enter heaven. The logical conclusion was that we are all condemned and must, in humble repentance, entrust ourselves to God’s promises. This lesson does not come naturally to us. Our pride blinds us to it. Recovering sight of it is a work of the Holy Spirit through Jesus’s message. He restores sight to the blind.

to set at liberty those who are oppressed

All these phrases interrelate. When we see ourselves through God’s eyes, or compare our lives to the spirit of the Mosaic Law or Ten Commandments, we see our condition. Guilt weighs us down. The Roman Catholic Church does a good job of this; I’ve encountered many who have completely shut themselves off to any discussion of spiritual topics because that load of guilt is so crushing.

That weight of guilt is a good thing when it drives us to rely on God’s mercy by trusting in the redemption that God offers through Jesus’s sacrifice. The first-century Jewish establishment had so weighed down its people with rules and regulations that the weight became unbearable. Jesus fulfilled the Mosaic Covenant. His self-sacrifice lifts guilt’s oppression off of those who entrust themselves to Him and sets them at liberty.

to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor

Because of the connection through Isaiah, we know that “year of the Lord’s favor” refers to the Year of Jubilee. The Bible does not record that Israel, or later, Judea, ever celebrated the Year of Jubilee. If it had been proclaimed in accordance with Leviticus 25:9, it would no doubt have been recorded because it would have been a very big deal. For the first time, Jesus proclaimed it. “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21). He did not merely proclaim the legal, religious holiday, but its symbolic fulfillment.

Those elements of the passage have another layer of implications. Jesus could proclaim Jubilee only as a High Priest or Prophet. He could set people free from guilt’s weight only as a Redeemer. He could serve as sufficient sacrifice for our sins only as perfect man and as infinite God. That identity could only be verified by the power and works of God Himself. And liberty from guilt, sight, freedom from legalism’s oppression, and favor of God are offered to all who will practice a “sabbath” rest from self-justification and receive the Gift as a free gift from the great Giver of gifts.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Use freely for non-profit use, but please give credit where credit is due.

Who is Jesus?

From a question on Quora:

Who is Jesus, and who is God?

First, let’s describe God.

This question is a bit like pointing at a picture of Joe and asking two questions. First, you point at Joe’s face and ask, Who is that? Then you point at Joe, as a whole, and ask, Who is that?

Since God created the universe, which includes time and space, God exists outside of time and space. (Philosophers debate about whether God exists timelessly or in super-time-and-space dimensions.)

When God created time and space, God chose to enter His creation. He could have used His creative power over time and space to enter as one Person or as billions.

According to Christian scriptures, God chose to exist in and experience His creation as three Persons. (Being both Creator and Spirit, the physical laws that prevent two people from occupying the same space at the same time do not apply to God. It is probable that God existed as three Persons outside of time and space, as well. I have not seen any commentary on that question.)

These three Persons voluntarily differentiate into three roles: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The three roles demonstrate relational truths to us and met God’s relational needs before He created man. (God is relational. If God did not exist as three Persons, God would have an unmet need for experiencing and exercising relational attributes such as love.)

The three Persons have one and the same substance and all attributes in common: God. Existing “before” creating the universe is hard enough to deal with. Existing both outside of and within time and space is a mind-blower.

Then we can describe Who Jesus is.

Jesus is Creator of the Universe. According to the apostle Paul, by 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. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:16–17) Another follower who was personally trained by Jesus for three years wrote, All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.

As a Person of God and as Creator, “Jesus” seems too familiar at times. He has the title of Messiah (Hebrew) and Christ (Greek), both of which mean Anointed One. Jesus is both fully human and fully God. To emphasize Jesus’s humanity, we often call Him Jesus Christ; to emphasize His deity, we often call Him Christ Jesus or God the Son.

Anointed One refers that not only is Jesus God in the flesh, but the full wisdom and power of the Holy Spirit rested upon Him. Jesus normally refrained from using His power as God, and instead allowed the Holy Spirit to perform His miracles. Through such action, the Holy Spirit bore witness to the hidden identity of Jesus.

Part of Jesus’s role is to be the representation or metaphorical face of God to humans. Jesus’s disciple John said, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. This resolves Genesis chapter 1′s cryptic, “In the beginning Gods (plural noun) created (singular verb) the heavens and the earth…. And Gods (plural noun) said (singular verb), “Let there be light, and there was light.”

The Word (Greek: Logos) expresses that Christ Jesus is the earthly revelation of God. For this reason, Paul called Christ Jesus the image of the invisible God, and the unknown writer of the scriptures epistle to the Hebrews wrote, Christ Jesus is the radiance of His (God’s) glory and the exact representation of His (God’s) nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. The words the exact representation literally mean, in the original Greek, “the exact, three-dimensional imprint and representation of the substance of God.” Note that it does not say Jesus reflects or channels God’s glory; rather, He is the radiance of God’s glory. Christ does not depict God, but is the exact representation of God’s nature. To do so, He must have the same nature as God.

The Watchtower organization (Jehovah Witnesses) adds the indefinite article a into John 1:1 so that it reads, “the Word was with God, and the Word was a god.” Greek grammar does not allow this. In fact, in the Greek the word order is, the Word was with God and God was the Word.

The Watchtower also mistranslates firstborn in the second half of Colossians 1:15. After He is the image of the invisible God, the text says, the firstborn over all creation. For by 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. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

Firstborn has two meanings. The obvious meaning is first one born. However, in Hebrew culture, the word became a metaphor for preeminence. That is why the original Greek text says, firstborn OVER (not of or among) all creation. He is the preeminent one over all the things He made. As the text continues in verses 16 and 17, For by 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. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

The Watchtower teaches that Christ Jesus is a created being, less than God the Creator. Notice that this demotes God the Son to the same level as the fallen angel, Lucifer (AKA Beelzebub, the devil, and Satan). That is why they have to twist the scriptures to say Christ was a god (which contradicts their belief in only one god) and to say Jesus Christ was the first one born among all creation. They cannot make an honest case, so they tamper with the evidence.

That God the Son took on a human nature has already been addressed. The writer of Hebrews wrote in chapter 4, verses 14 and 15, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

In his human body, Jesus suffered growing pains, tummy aches, stomach flu, and the loss of loved ones (specifically Joseph, his adopted father, and Lazarus, his friend). He suffered splinters, fatigue, blisters, hunger and thirst, and the attempts of aunts to match Him up with a nice Jewish girl — just like all of us. He suffered false accusations, opposition, attempts on his life, and finally ridicule, torture, and execution. He can fully empathize with us in all our trials and temptations. Together with His divinity, His humanity makes Him the ultimate High Priest for us.

So Who is Jesus? Jesus is a Person of God within space and time who added human substance to His divine substance. He is Almighty Creator, Judge of the universe, and the exact representation of God — not just what God is like, but what God is. He is the Anointed One who suffered in our place to provide us the sole way of escape from the consequences of our wrong thoughts and actions. And He is the ultimate intercessor and representative between us and God.

Copyright 2020, Richard Wheeler. Maybe posting this on Quora voids the copyright. I still expect people to give credit where credit is due.