Some excerpts from an exposition by Richard Bauckham:
To let his readers into the secret of who Jesus really is, John thinks it is necessary to begin at the earliest possible beginning, when God the Creator was on the brink of bringing the whole cosmos into being…Here, in the beginning, before creation, there is no room for any beings other than the one God.In the Jewish definition of the one God's exclusive divinity, as well as being sole creator of all things (as in the prologue of John), God was also understood as the sole sovereign ruler of all things. A key aspect of this was his sovereignty over life and death (Deut 32:39). God is the only living one, that is, the only one to whom life belongs eternally and intrinsically. All other life derives from him, is given by him and taken back by him. Another key aspect was his prerogative of judgment, the implementation of justice [cf. Jn 5:17-23].…while understanding those ["I am" statements] in which an ordinary meaning is possible as instances of double entendre (a frequent literary device in John)…in the seventh of these absolute "I am" sayings, which forms an emphatic climax to the set by means of threefold repetition (18:5-6,8). Here the ordinary meaning, a reply to the soldier's question, fails to account for the soldiers' reaction. They fall prostrate on the ground, suggesting, as in 8:58-59, that Jesus has made some kind of divine claim.A more adequate explanation of these sayings in John is that they reflect the divine self-declaration "I am he". The LXX Greek uses the phrase ego eimi in Deut 32:39 and on several occasions in Isaiah 40-55 (41:4; 43:10; 46:4) to translate the Hebrew phrase ani hu, which is usually translated in English as "I am he". In the two cases (43:25; 51:2) where the Hebrew has the more emphatic form of the same phrase, anoki anoki hu, the LXX has the double expression ego emi ego emi. This phrase "I am he" is an extraordinarily significant one. It is a divine self-declaration, encapsulating Yahweh's claim to unique and exclusive divinity. In the Hebrew Bible it occurs first in what are almost the last words God himself speaks in the Torah, where it is an emphatically monotheistic assertion: "Behold, I, even I am he; there is no God besides me" (Deut 32:39). In the prophecies of Isaiah 40-55 this form of divine self-declaration (in Hebrew: Isa 41:4; 43:10,13,25; 46:4; 48:12; 51:12; 52:6) expresses emphatically the absolute uniqueness of the name of Israel, who in these chapters constantly asserts his unique deity in contrast with the idols of the nations, and defines his uniqueness as that of the eternal creator of all things and the unique sovereign ruler of all history. His great act of eschatological salvation will demonstrate him to be the one and only God…The "I am he" declarations are among the most emphatically monotheistic assertions in the Hebrew Bible, and if Jesus in John's Gospel repeats them he is unambiguously identifying himself with the one and only God, Yahweh, the God of Israel. Richard Bauckham, “The Trinity and the Gospel of John,” in The Essential Trinity: New Testament Foundations and Practical Relevance, ed. by Brandon D. Crowe and Carl R. Trueman (London: IVP [Apollos] 2016), chap 4.
"(18:5-6,8). Here the ordinary meaning, a reply to the soldier's question, fails to account for the soldiers' reaction. They fall prostrate on the ground, suggesting, as in 8:58-59, that Jesus has made some kind of divine claim."
ReplyDeleteSo, they fall down *from surprise* at the (alleged) "divine claim"? Well, that's one reading... and a strange one. It could also be that his "I am he" goes along with some kind of manifestation of glory and power, as in the transfiguration. But an early gospel reader would not see in that a "divine claim" - Moses manifested unusually on occasion, any OT reader knows.
"unambiguously identifying himself with" Associating himself with God? Of course! But who would deny it? Identifying himself as God, i.e. asserting "I am God"? Nonsense. Look at the rest of the book, which emphatically distinguishes Jesus from his God.
This is typical Bauckham - dodgy over-readings of some passages, while ignoring the obvious subordinationist ones. E.g. in this book Jesus explicitly credits God for his teaching and miracles, for being another who testifies on his behalf, for being the only true God, for being his and our God, for being greater, for sending him, etc. And he says that he (Jesus) is a "man" who is telling them the truth. Even if, Bauckham and catholic tradition are right in thinking that the Logos of John 1 is supposed to be the pre-human Jesus, it says that all things were created *through* the Logos. But God is supposed to be the ultimate source of the cosmos, not one through who all things were made! Early subordinationist logos theorists all got this, but Bauckham's claims make theirs hard to account for! That is, if this gospel so clearly presents Jesus as God himself, or as fully divine, and God is the ultimate source of all else, why do so many right up past Eusebius the historian consider the Logos to be merely second place to the one God, since he derives from God, whereas God derives from no one?
"It could also be that his 'I am he' goes along with some kind of manifestation of glory and power, as in the transfiguration. But an early gospel reader would not see in that a 'divine claim' - Moses manifested unusually on occasion, any OT reader knows."
DeleteI agree with you that there might well have been something additional to the "I am" statement which provoked that reaction. But Moses doesn't exemplify that combination of factors.
"Look at the rest of the book, which emphatically distinguishes Jesus from his God."
No, what it does is to distinguish the Father from the Son. You always make the same mistake. You're just a tape recorder on playback.
"This is typical Bauckham - dodgy over-readings of some passages, while ignoring the obvious subordinationist ones."
i) In the same chapter, Bauckham discusses the "subordinationist" passages.
ii) Because you can't refute Bauckham's exegesis directly, you change the subject. You divert attention to other passages, without even attempting to explain how his exegesis in the excerpts I quoted goes awry.
"Even if, Bauckham and catholic tradition are right in thinking that the Logos of John 1 is supposed to be the pre-human Jesus, it says that all things were created *through* the Logos. But God is supposed to be the ultimate source of the cosmos, not one through who all things were made!"
Bauckham already anticipates that objection. Before the "beginning" of the world, God is all there is. There can't be a creature prior to creation in John's chronology. It just has two sides. God on one side of the beginning and the world on the other side. There's nothing in-between.
And Jn 1 is clearly an allusion to Gen 1. The Johannine narrator is casting the pre-Incarnate Son in the role of the Creator God of Genesis.
Regarding Jn 18:5-6,8, as Lincoln notes in his commentary, they react to Jesus in the way humans typically react to a theophany in Scripture.
DeleteA reader with a good grasp of the OT will recognize how the Yahwistic formula in combination with their reaction depicts Jesus as a theophanic presence.
"Jesus as a theophanic presence" Well, of course. God's spirit is given to him without measure, it says, and God is "in" him and he's "in" God. He's the unique human Son of God, the greatest revelation of God. All explicit in John. Manifestations of God's power in such circumstances are expected on a unitarian christology, and don't require or even suggest a "two natures" theory.
Deletei) If he's just a human being, there's nothing unique about him. At best, he has a unique role, but many figures in Bible history had a unique role to play in the history of redemption.
Deleteii) Dale, it's the combination of the double entendre along with how the soldiers react, in the classic way people react to theophanies, that makes this episode (among many others) a sign of his deity.
PS - Title of your post is an anachronism. No mention of the Trinity (i.e. the tripersonal God, the triune God) in John, or in ANY source before the last half of the 300s. As in the rest of the NT, the one God in John is the Father himself. It's like talking about the Internet in the writings of John Adams - it's just a mistake to think there's such a reference there, a mistake premised on historical ignorance or misinformation.
ReplyDeleteDale, try not to be a nitwit. A concept can be present absent a technical term denoting that concept. Bone up on lexical semantics.
DeleteYou're an open theist, right? When is the first occurrence of "open theism" in historical theology? Or "unitarianism"?
And Catholic apologists assure me that Protestant theology is wrong because Protestant distinctives can't be documented in the church fathers.
Delete""Look at the rest of the book, which emphatically distinguishes Jesus from his God."
ReplyDeleteNo, what it does is to distinguish the Father from the Son."
Steve, I can't take the trinitarian blinders off your head. But for others: in this book, the Father just is God, and the Son just is the man Jesus. There is not the slightest hint that Father and Son here are to understood as two "Persons" within the triune God.
Thanks for the ref. I will have to see what Bauckham says about all the obvious subordinationism in the 4th gospel.
The phrase "ego eimi" is a well-known way to say in koine Greek, "It is I," "it's me," or "I am the one." Not once in this book can it be taken as "I am God himself". In John 8:58, I think Jesus's meaning is supposed to be "I am the one" i.e. the Messiah - which is of course the very thesis of the whole book. In ch 9 the main born blind uses the phrase about himself.
This "on the God side" rhetoric is due to Athanasius - yet another anachronism when reading John. John only said that the Word was "in the beginning" - i.e. at the time of the Genesis creation. All the early subordinationists saw this, so in logos theory before Origen (or Irenaeus - he is unclear) the Logos comes to be before creation, so as to be an intermediary - and on the basis of this very passage! This claim that before the Genesis creation only God existed - not clear to ancient readers! Again, all the early subordinationists. And the situation unclear with the angels. God seems to be talking to them with the "Let us make man" - yet their creation was not mentioned - leaves the door open to them being created before the heavens and the earth.
"The Johannine narrator is casting the pre-Incarnate Son in the role of the Creator God of Genesis."
So, Steve, you think that in Genesis God is the one *through whom* all things were made, ultimately by someone else? Who in your view would that be?
"while ignoring the obvious subordinationist ones."
DeleteThe "subordination" of the Son to the Father is equivalent to the subordination of a prince to a king, where the prince is temporarily subordinate as heir to his father's throne. That's a stock messianic paradigm in the OT and NT alike. The loyal royal son who acts on behalf of and in the place of his royal father before he himself ascends to the throne. That's a major theological metaphor. And it has a literal counterpart in the stages of the Incarnate Son's career.
"in this book, the Father just is God, and the Son just is the man Jesus."
DeleteYour appeal is circular. You discount all the many Johannine ascriptions of deity to Jesus on your immovable assumption that the Son just is a human being, so whatever they mean, they can't mean that! Your a priori filter screens out any evidence to the contrary.
"The phrase 'ego eimi' is a well-known way to say in koine Greek."
Notice Tuggy's M.O. He doesn't even attempt to engage Bauckham's evidence. But words have connotations as well as denotations. Some phrases have an idiomatic meaning. As Bauckham documents, in OT usage, "I am" can, in context, function as a Yahwistic formula. And that pattern is replicated in John's Gospel.
"This 'on the God side' rhetoric is due to Athanasius"
I didn't get that "rhetoric" from Athanasius.
"so in logos theory before Origen (or Irenaeus - he is unclear) the Logos comes to be before creation, so as to be an intermediary - and on the basis of this very passage!"
That would make the Logos part of creation. God's first creature. That would be a three-stage creation:
Before the "beginning">Logos>"beginning (=creation)
But in Jn 1, it's a two-stage creation. In the pre-creation stage, God is all there is. There's nothing before the beginning except God. The beginning marks the inception of something other than God: what he makes.
"This claim that before the Genesis creation only God existed - not clear to ancient readers!"
That's how John interprets Genesis.
"Again, all the early subordinationists"
You keep appealing to the "early subordinationists" as if that's supposed to be the standard of comparison. But that's irrelevant to biblical exegesis.
"And the situation unclear with the angels. God seems to be talking to them with the 'Let us make man' - yet their creation was not mentioned - leaves the door open to them being created before the heavens and the earth."
i) First of all, this is not a question of exegeting Gen 1 directly, but John's interpretation of Gen 1.
ii) Even on its own terms, there are two creative characters in Gen 1: God and the Spirit of God. I agree with David Clines that God's interlocutor in Gen 1 is his Spirit. Invoking angels is extraneous to the passage. The "divine council" reference frame comes from passages outside the Pentateuch.
"So, Steve, you think that in Genesis God is the one *through whom* all things were made, ultimately by someone else? Who in your view would that be?"
i) You seem to lay a lot of weight on drawing fine distinctions between prepositions. But "dia" can mean "by" as well as "through".
ii) Gen 1 lays down some markers that will be developed in the course of the Pentateuch.
iii) Once again, though, you keep missing the point. The question at issue is not interpreting Gen 1 independently, but John's use of Gen 1. Understanding what the Johannine narrator takes Gen 1 to mean–in light of Christ. We're supposed to be exegeting the Prologue to John. Try to wrap your head around that elementary hermeneutical distinction.
Yeah, Steve, quite a sneaky MO I have, not engaging a whole article in your com box! Sheesh.
Delete"No, it's not surprising that there's no word for the Trinity in Scripture, just as it's not surprising that Scripture lacks the jargon of systematic/philosophical theology,... The Bible isn't written in an Aristotelian style."
LOL! As if having a word to refer to the being who is supposedly the centerpiece of your theology requires being an Aristotelian - or having any significant degree of sophistication!
"That would make the Logos part of creation. God's first creature."
Yeah, many of them didn't care about that. Origen c. 250 calls the Logos a creature. But slightly on, eventually, they distinguished "generation" from creation. Either way, not the ultimate source of the cosmos, like God is.
Early Christian views are relevant, as Bauckham's wild over-readings were seemingly wholly missed by them. This shows that such readings are not, and have never been obvious. Reading 1st c. documents in their context requires attention to both earlier and later work. Bauckham seems very deficient in the later, while being an expert in the earlier.
If the Father created all things "by" the Son or "through" the Son, the idea of an immediate vs. ultimate cause of the cosmos is the same. So, I repeat my question to you:
Do you think that in Genesis God is the one *through whom* all things were made, or *by* whom ultimately someone else made the cosmos? If so, who in your view would that other be?
"LOL! As if having a word to refer to the being who is supposedly the centerpiece of your theology requires being an Aristotelian - or having any significant degree of sophistication!"
DeleteA word for the Trinity would be opaque. "Trinity" is not self-explanatory. It requires a definition. It's a theological construct, like penal substitution. Just using a word for the Trinity would be uninformative to readers.
Just like the Bible doesn't have a word for aseity or dualism or omniscience or the intermediate state. Instead, it has descriptions that imply those concepts.
"Yeah, many of them didn't care about that. Origen c. 250 calls the Logos a creature."
The question at issue isn't exegeting Origen or Origen's opinion, but exegeting John. I'm not chasing your decoys.
"Early Christian views are relevant, as Bauckham's wild over-readings were seemingly wholly missed by them. This shows that such readings are not, and have never been obvious."
Your M.O. is to offer a pejorative characterization of Bauckham rather than a refutation.
"Reading 1st c. documents in their context requires attention to both earlier and later work."
Wrong. The relevant background material for interpreting 1C documents is prior material that might supply a precedent or contemporaneous material. Not material after the fact. Ironically that you accuse me of anachronism, when you then appeal to some church fathers.
You then repeat the same mistake of asking me to exegete Gen 1. But that's a red herring since the question at issue is how John's Gospel glosses the creation account. We're discussing John's interpretation of Gen 1. The wording and context of John's Gospel is the frame of reference. You want me to bypass John, but that's illicit since the question at issue is the interpretation of John's Gospel, and not Genesis apart from John. You keep making elementary semantic and hermeneutical blunders.
From a theological standpoint, the Trinity made the world.
The Johannine narrator is riffing off the fact that in the Genesis creation account, God makes the world by means of his spoken word. Divine speech is not a creature, but the means or instrument by/through which the world is brought into being.
DeleteYou act as though the Logos is the first creature, who in turn makes everything else. But you can't find that in either Gen 1 or Jn 1. Rather, the Logos preexists with the Father at the eve of creation. In the beginning, the Word already was.
Well, that was a nice dismantling of Unitarian silliness.
DeleteJohn 14:6-9.
DeleteSteve, I would count as a mention of the Trinity ANY sort of reference to it or implication of it, by any word or words whatever. See my podcast 189 on that. The nitwit move here, is thinking that I was arguing that the NT isn't trinitarian because the word "Trinity" isn't there. No, it's not trinitarian because there is no concept of a triune god in play there, and no reference to it by any means - when you take the trouble to read it in its first century context. This is actually well-known by people not sold-out to the apologetic defense (by any means) of catholic orthodoxy, e.g. this Roman Catholic scholar. http://trinities.org/blog/hans-kung-on-new-testament-theology/
ReplyDeleteAbout no word "Trinity" in the Bible: yes, it is very surprising that there should be no such word there which was meant to refer to a triune God, IF indeed they believed in a triune God. That's the most we can say. It's just one many signs that there were indeed unitarian, not trinitarian. The lack of any such word IS logically consistent with their being trinitarian.
Catholics typically think orthodox Trinitarian Christology represents a post-biblical ecclesiastical development. That's hardly news. And it's true that some patristic/conciliar/scholastic refinements and formulations go well beyond Scripture. But that was never my frame of reference.
DeleteNo, it's not surprising that there's no word for the Trinity in Scripture, just as it's not surprising that Scripture lacks the jargon of systematic/philosophical theology, viz. aseity, omniscience, soteriology, dualism, special providence, vicarious atonement, the intermediate state. The Bible isn't written in an Aristotelian style.
Dale, you are a smart guy, but John’s gospel pretty clearly shows that the author thinks Jesus is YHWH come to Israel. The proclamation of John the Baptist makes this clear:
ReplyDelete23 He said, “I am a voice of one crying out in the wilderness: Make straight the way of the Lord—just as Isaiah the prophet said.”
Along with the prologue. I’m sure you have some way to reinterpret these passages, but your explanations fail to convince.
Blake, what you're telling me is that you don't care what else the book says, because surely that bit implies that Jesus is YHWH himself. But this is not how we carefully read any text. What it says in ch 20 can affect how you read ch 2. One key way this works is that we try to read an author as self-consistent. About that text, your reading is a clear example of what I call the fulfillment fallacy. Search at trinities for that if you care to learn what that mistake is. I note also that you're relying on a currently fashionable theme promoted by NT Wright. But that reading you're pushing is something I can't find in any ancient reader, in any of the church fathers.
ReplyDeleteSteve,
ReplyDeleteMay I share this on my blog?
Sure.
Delete