Jesus's Name Is God Name

Answering a question on Quora: 

"If Jesus was not the Archangel Michael in heaven, what was his name there?"

The question starts with an assumption that Jesus had a name in heaven. This is called “begging the question,” meaning that the assumption has not been shown to be true. (The term is almost always misused by people who mean “demands the question.”) Before asking what Jesus’s name was, one should first ask whether Jesus had or even needed a name.

This may sound like I start out on a tangent, but if you read patiently, you’ll see that it stays directly on topic.

Our names serve to distinguish us from one another. When a Being is unique in type, He does not need a name to distinguish Him from other, similar beings. So, since there is exactly one God, God does not need a name.

Also consider that having been named implies that a previous being must have created you and, thus, had the right to give you a name. Since no previous god created God, no being had the authority to name Him. So in heaven (more properly, in eternity), God was not given a name.

Instead of a formal name, God has assumed many titular names that tell us about Him. Examples include El (God), Adonai (Lord), YHWH* (I AM or I AM THAT I AM), and most interestingly, Elohim (Gods). Elohim is interesting because, although it is plural, it takes a singular verb. It hints about God’s nature in the very first chapter of the Bible.

(The pronunciation of YHWH was forgotten around 200 BC; Jehovah is an anglicized version of a Spanish version of the Latin version of the Greek version of the vowels from Adonai added to the consonants YHWH.)

Angels are created beings. Jesus / Christ / Messiah is the Creator.

All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. John 1:3, NASB 1995

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. Colossians 1:16, NASB 1995

John clearly states that Christ created the universe. Colossians repeats that and specifically includes all personal beings, which includes angels. If Christ created the angels, then Christ cannot be a mere angel.

There’s a word for the Creator of all things: God.

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6 ESV

But of the Son [Jesus] He [God] says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom. Hebrews 1:8 ESV

Many models of the nature of God exist. Only one such model resolves all the Bible’s claims. Physics and cosmology tell us that when God created the universe, He created even time and space. They’re facets of the universe.

The triune version of the Trinity fits with science. God, being timeless, used His creative power to exist in, experience, and interact with His creation, and with each other, as three temporal Persons. Each Person, or center of consciousness, is fully God, having the same essence in eternity, yet having a separate consciousness in time.

The three Persons voluntarily took on distinct roles: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. (People often make a category error, confusing difference due to a hierarchy with difference in nature, but the inference does not hold up logically. Role does not necessitate a difference in nature because three co-equals can assume a hierarchy in order to create order among the roles that they assume, as well as to exemplify messages about love, authority, and obedience to their creatures.)

In the Father-role, God remains unseen in heaven.

Not that anyone has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He has seen the Father. John 6:4, NASB 1995

In the Son-role, God represents and explains the Father to us.

No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten* God who is in the bosom** of the Father, He has explained Him. John 1:18, NASB 1995

(* Translators are divided about whether monogenes, “only-begotten,” means literally only-begotten (a male counterpart to only-born) or is an idiom that meant unique, one-and-only as a result of having taken on a human body. Both descriptors lead to the same conclusion.

** “In the bosom” was a word-picture of one person resting his head on another’s chest, indicating platonic or familial trust and intimacy.)

In the Son-role, God added a human nature to HIs divine essence, and we call that earthly representation, Jesus of Nazareth. Yet the Son represents the Father because he has the same nature in every dimension.

Who [Jesus], being the radiance of His [the Father’s] glory and the exact expression of His substance, and upholding all things [Creation] by the power of His word…. Hebrews 1:3, Berean Literal Bible

So Jesus is the Creator who spoke the universe into existence and upholds it; and whose essence is exactly the same as the Father’s essence. In fact, since there exists exactly one God, they have the same essence. The theological word for this is “consubstantiality.” Thus, although there has been, is, and ever will be exactly one God, God chose to enter His creation three simultaneous times as three consciousnesses or personal Spirits.

(I have not addressed the Holy Spirit in this because the question is specifically about the Son. I don’t think He minds.)

Other models of the Trinity, such as

• three Gods (a common false accusation from Muslims)
• an angelic Jesus (Jehovah Witnesses)
• a child-god (“Mormons” or Latter Day Saints)
• a costume-changing God (Modalists or Oneness Pentecostals)
• a human Jesus (Unitarians and “Progressive Christians”)
• God plus little or developing gods (Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, Word-Faith Pentecostals)

create numerous contradictions in the Bible. Only the triune model (one timeless God as three temporal Persons) reconciles all the biblical evidence.

Additional reason: If it is logical to ask the heavenly formal name of God the Son, then it is also logical to ask the heavenly formal name of God the Father and of God the Holy Spirit. If asking the heavenly formal name of God the Father or God the Holy Spirit is not logical, then neither is it logical to expect God the Son to have a heavenly formal name.

Although God has, for our sake, distinguished Himself from imaginary gods by taking on various descriptive, titular names, He has no need for a formal name in heaven.

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

Only God (Christ) versus Only God (Father)

Answering a question on Quora: 

Why does the ESV contradict itself in John 1:18 versus John 17:3 (John, contradiction, Christology, Trinity, ESV, hermeneutics)?

The question is a non sequitur. It presumes, without evidence or specificity, that there is a contradiction. There is, in fact, no contradiction.

The first verse is a declarative sentence in the author’s voice:

No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known. John 1:18 (ESV)

The second verse quotes a prayer by Jesus:

And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent. John 17:3 (ESV)

(The links take you to a page that lists over two dozen translations of the verses. Versions based on the five-century old Received Text, or Byzantine family of ancient manuscripts, have variations of “only-begotten Son” or “one-and-only Son.” The other versions, which include the ESV, are based on the oldest manuscripts, or Critical Text, which have variations on “only-begotten God” or “one-and-only God.”)

Most of the concepts in the two verses do not overlap. The parts that seem to conflict upon a superficial reading are the description of Jesus as the only God in 1:18 and the description of the Father as the only true God in 17:3.

To answer the question, one must understand the translation in 1:18 and how early Christians solved the paradox of three Persons or Personalities being identified as God, yet there eternally being a grand total of exactly one God.

The Quoran educated at the Theocratic Ministry School (i.e., the Watchtower, more commonly know as the Jehovah’s Witnesses) claims falsely that “The ESV dropped (Only Begotten). If you look the verse up in the Interlinear you will see that they dropped those (key) words.” This claim reflects a shocking lack of understanding of Koine Greek, or even of observing what the interlinear text shows.

The meanings of English words change over time; the same is true for Greek. According to qualified Koine Greek scholars, there’s uncertainty over whether monogenes, “onlybegotten,” had come to mean “unique” or “one and only” during the first century. Majority opinion had leaned toward “one and only” for a while, but opinion is swinging back toward “only-begotten.” In my opinion, “only-begotten” makes more sense in the context, but we should accept and live with the uncertainty.

“Only God” in the ESV, then, is an acceptable translation of monogenēs Theos (although it might suffer from under-emphasis of Christ’s uniqueness). The Watchtower-educated Quoran’s claim that the ESV dropped monogenēs is false.

Readers who resist the misdirection of attention toward monogenēs will notice that the verse calls Jesus, Theos, “God.” So, again, the Watchtower-educated Quoran’s claim that “Clearly because Jesus is not God” contradicts the text.

It’s tempting to go on a tangent showing how a triune God is the only solution to many scriptural claims that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are God, yet there is exactly one God. It is sufficient in this context to state that, if the Creator of space-time could use His creative power to exist in space-time as God the Father and God the Son, then “clearly” it is presumptuous to say “Clearly because Jesus is not God.”

So, while there is exactly one Creator, God, recognizing that God could exist within space-time as multiple centers of consciousness or “Persons” allows us to reconcile John 1:18 and 17:3.

“Only God” in 1:18 abbreviates a larger concept born out by reading the entirety of the book, or even the first three verses of the same chapter. The abbreviation has obviously caused confusion because, for a shallow reading, Christ cannot be the “only God” and the Father being the “only true God.” That’s why immediate, book, and New Testament levels of context and digging deeper into the language underlying the translation matter.

One more detail from the larger context is needed. The Author of the New Testament anticipated Modalism and ruled it out. Modalism asserts that the one God is one Person who changes modes (roles and costumes) to give the appearance of being three Persons. For that reason, it uses three titles of God: God (the Father), Lord (Christ the Son), and Spirit (the Holy Spirit).

Thus, depending on context, “only true God” can refer either to the eternal, One-as-Three God or to the temporal Person called the Father. And monogenes Theos (only God, one-and-only God, or only-begotten God) refers specifically to the Person who added a human nature to His spirit nature.

When you understand how the writer meant the language, there is no contradiction, even if the ESV is less verbose than it needs to be to prevent confusion by people who take snippets of scripture out of context.

Copyright 2021 Richard Wheeler. Permission granted for non-remunerated use, but please give credit 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.

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.

A Partial Case for the Trinity

God is Jesus, God is the Father, but Jesus Is Not the Father

I wrote this for someone on Quora who seemed unsure about whether Jesus is God, but not the Father.

Science tells us that, when God made the universe, it had to involve creating energy, matter, space, and time. Having creative power over space and time, God entered time to experience it in three roles. From our perspective, God is three Persons, yet one God.

It is, as we used to say, mind-blowing! Here is just a sample of of the biblical evidence:

• Jesus called Himself “I Am” (John 8:58).  God called Himself I AM (Exodus 3:14) 
  
  (Note: Through translation from Hebrew to Greek to Latin to English, YHWH turned into “Jehovah,” which has little resemblance to the original word. For this reason, sects that make a big deal out of knowing the name “Jehovah” are founded on a myth.)
  
  
• Jesus claimed to have existed before Abraham, who lived about 1900 years earlier. (John 8:58)
  
  
• John wrote that God the Son (“the Word”) made all things that have come into being. (John 1:3)
  
  
• Paul wrote that God the Son created all things, and He is what holds all things together. (Colossians 1:16-17)
  
  (Note 1: In verse 16, one very bad translation inserts the word “other” so it reads, “created all other things.” They insert the word because they deny that the Son of God was created and not the Creator.
  
  Note 2: Some will say, “But look at verse 15! It says he was the first one born, so He was created. However, the Greek word translated “firstborn” in verse 15 does not mean “first one born.” It means Preeminent One. If you search the scriptures, you will find men who were called firstborn but were not the first ones among their siblings to be born. They were “firstborns” despite not being first ones born.)
  
  
• Jesus existed with the Father before creation, sharing in God’s glory. (John 1:1-2, John 17:5, John 17:24)
  
  
• If you read the last reference in context (John 17), you will notice that Jesus talks to the Father as separate Persons. The Father sends, glorifies, give authority to, gives followers to, gives a mission to, and shares glory with the Son. The Son prays to, glorifies, receives glory from, accomplishes work assigned by, shared and will share the glory of, conveys the words of, goes forth from and returns to, the Father. And that’s just the evidence from one chapter that, although the Father is God and the Son is God, the Father and the Son are two distinct persons.
  

As I said, this is just a sample of the evidence. Many scoff at the Trinity, but they have to twist hard to get the scriptures to indicate that the Son and Holy Spirit are not Persons of God, or that God just switches identities to trick us into thinking a single Person doesn’t pray to Himself, delegate to Himself, send Himself, go forth from Himself, and obey Himself.

Here’s why this is very important: If you were saved by the wrong God, you still need to be saved.