3 things that would make Jesus Yahweh

Dale Tuggy Retweeted

Ryanprott

@ryanprott

3 thing [sic.] that would make Jesus YHWH

•1)Complete Superiority 

•2)Immortality that wasn't given

•3)Without Beginning

Acts 3:13 "God has glorified his SERVANT Jesus"

1 Cor. 15 "Christ DIED for our sins"

John 3:16 "He gave his only BEGOTTEN son"

1)❌X

2)❌X

3)X

https://twitter.com/ryanprott/status/1257336497772072961

1. Once again, unitarians keep demonstrating that they have no idea how to argue with folks who don't think like unitarians. They never leave their bubble. 

If the aim is to show that Trinitarian, Incarnational theology is inconsistent with Scripture, then the onus is on the unitarian to show that the Trinitarian, Incarnational theology can't be harmonized with Scripture given the assumptions and resources of Trinitarians. You must assume the opposing viewpoint for the sake of argument, then explain how that's contradictory on its own grounds. Why is Dale unable to grasp that elementary burden of proof? Why does he plug Ryan Prott's incompetent objection? Is this social promotion for unitarians? 

2. Jesus isn't merely Yahweh but Yahweh Incarnate. Yahweh Incarnate can undergo demotions or promotions in his status.

3. Immortality has reference to Jesus as Yahweh Incarnate. Biological mortality/immortality, and not immortality in the divine sense of aseity and timeless eternality. God is not physically mortal or immortal. He's not that kind of being. But God Incarnate assumes a body which can be mortal or immortal. 

4. Dale must be aware of the fact that most modern-day NT scholars and lexicographers don't think monogenes means only-begotten, but unique, one of a kind.

5. Jesus has a point of origin in time: the Incarnation. The Son has no beginning. Jesus is a composite being. The Son in union with a human body and soul. ❌

"Hints" of the Trinity

Part of Dale Tuggy's stump speech is that he objects to Christians finding "hints" of the Trinity in the OT. He thinks that's special pleading. They begin with their dogma, then cast about for prooftexts. 

I'd simply point out that Christians aren't doing anything exceptional when it come to the Trinity. Christians have always taken the position that OT theology is less developed than NT theology. That's a given. Although there's continuity between OT theology and NT theology, in many cases you won't find full-orbed NT theology in the OT. Rather, you'll find adumbrations of NT theology in the OT.

That's because, unlike Buddhism, Christianity is a religion of events as well as ideas, and God didn't do everything at once. Biblical revelation is progressive in large part because theology runs in tandem with redemptive events. Doctrine provides a theological interpretation of redemptive events.

So it's not as if Christians use one basic methodology for relating OT theology to NT theology in general, but switch to something completely different when it comes to the Trinity and the Incarnation. Rather, it's the same methodology throughout. 

Unitarian prooftexts

I've often commented on unitarian prooftexts, so some of this will reiterate my stated interpretations. However, I'll add a few new things. Finally, there's value in pulling that together in a single post. So in this post I'll evaluate what I take to be the major unitarian prooftexts (such as they are). The most popular, most quoted unitarian prootexts. A few general observations before I comment on specific passages:

i) If we didn't have any prooftexts for the Trinity or deity of Christ, then some of the unitarian prooftexts would be more persuasive. But Trinitarians aren't reading these passages in a vacuum. Since Trinitarians rightly think the deity of Christ is multiply-attested in the NT, it becomes a harmonistic issue. 

ii) In my experience, most unitarians are so lacking in critical detachment that they don't know what it means for a Bible verse contradict Trinitarian theology. They fail to appreciate that when you contend that a Bible verse is inconsistent with Trinitarian theology, you have to argue that point on Trinitarian grounds. You have to take the Trinitarian paradigm into consideration, you have to adopt that viewpoint for the sake of argument, then show how the verse is incompatible with Trinitarian theology given Trinitarian assumptions. 

Instead, they quote prooftexts that are inconsistent with Trinitarian theology from a unitarian viewpoint. They don't bother to ask themselves how a sophisticated Trinitarian would respond. They don't play devil's advocate with their own position, to anticipate the counterarguments. This is true even for someone who ought to know better, like Dale Tuggy. 

iii) In addition, some unitarians are so uninformed or uncomprehending that they don't even know what the opposing position represents. They haven't stopped to consider the implications of the opposing position. They never studied the other side of the argument. 

The quaternity argument

Call it the Quaternity Argument:

1. If something intentionally communicates using a human language, it is a self.

2. According to the Bible, God intentionally communicates using various human languages.

3. Therefore according to the Bible, God is a self. (1,2)

4. According to the Bible, God is the Trinity.

5. Therefore according to the Bible, the Trinity is a self. (3,4)

6. Each Person of the Trinity is a self.

7. None of these are numerically identical: Father, Son, Spirit, Trinity.

8. Each of these is divine: Father, Son, Spirit, Trinity.

9. Therefore, there are at least four divine selves. (5-8)

https://trinities.org/blog/the-quaternity-argument/

That's simple-minded. The Trinity isn't something over and above the three persons that communicates in distinction to the three persons. The Trinity just is the three persons. It isn't the Trinity communicating in contrast to the three persons–individually or in combination. The Trinity doesn't operate independent of the three persons. For a philosopher of religion whose specialty is the Trinity, Dale is hopelessly muddled-headed about the concept of the Trinity. He can't even grasp what the position represents. A hack philosopher. Call it the Dale is out of his depth argument. 

The demon-puppet objection

https://trinities.org/blog/some-additional-thoughts-about-my-demon-puppet-objection/

i) It's hard to make sense of Dale's analogy. Unless you're a physicalist, a body without a soul is a corpse. If a demon takes possession of a fresh corpse, then it's merely piloting a human body. The combination isn't a human being. But from the standpoint of a Cartesian dualist, a body without a soul isn't a human being anyway, whether or not the body happens to be co-opted by a demon. So the demon part of the analogy is superfluous. 

ii) At best the analogy would only apply to Apollinarian Christology. On that view, one could indeed say the Son is merely piloting a human body. The combination isn't a human nature. But so what? W. L. Craig excepted, most Christians reject Apollinarian Christology. 

iii) Of course, the Incarnation isn't supposed to be reducible to a human nature. That's a necessary but insufficient condition. The combination isn't supposed to be just a human nature, but a union of two natures. 

iv) So Dale then has to stipulate that the demon deactivates the soul. Okay, it's his thought-experiment, so he can tweak it however he pleases. If the soul is deactivated, then the demon is merely piloting a body. The combination isn't functionally human. But a body with a deactivated soul wouldn't be a human being anyway. Demonic possession doesn't add anything in that respect. 

v) More to the point, the Incarnation doesn't deactivate the soul. In the Incarnation, the soul is fully functional. A union of the Son with an intact soul and body. 

So his thought-experiment is hopelessly confused. Rather than illustrating the Incarnation, his thought-experiment illustrates Dale's intellectual impediments as a philosopher. He's just not up to the challenge. 

Reading between the lines

1. In his ill-fated debate with Chris Date, which I reviewed here:

https://triablogue.blogspot.com/2019/06/tuggy-v-date-jesus-is-not-divine.html

Dale Tuggy accused Trinitarians of "reading between the lines"–unlike unitarians, who read the lines. Supposedly, unitarians just go with what the text says whereas Trinitarians are forced to go behind the text. Ironically, Date cited numerous examples in the course of the debate where Tuggy was reading between the lines to salvage unitarianism whereas Date accepted the text as it stands.

2. But now I'd like to make a different point. In the past, I've documented how Tuggy has a very naive grasp of semantics, and this is another example–albeit of a different kind. Evidently, it never occurred to Tuggy how much communication relies on the ability to read between the lines. A technical term for this is implicature. At least, that's one dimension of the phenomenon. For instance:

Cases in which what a speaker means differs from what the sentence used by the speaker means. Consider the following dialogue.

Alan: Are you going to Paul's party? 

Barb: I have to work.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/implicature/#Phe

On the face of it, Barb's response doesn't answer the question. If you just go by the meaning of the statement, that's unresponsive to the question. That's because the answer is compressed. Alan is expected to be able to fill in what was intended, but not actually stated. She's not going because she will be at her job at the time of the party, and she can't get off work. Yet the speaker doesn't say all that. It's up to the reader to complete the train of thought. 

3. There are many examples in which speakers say less than they mean (mean more than they say). The onus is on the listener to read between the lines. That's similar to the distinction between high-context and low-context communication, where low-context communication relies on the explicit meaning of the statement whereas high-context communication relies on the implicit meaning. Low-context communication is more dependent on the speaker's contribution while high-context communication is more dependent on the listener's contribution. For instance, take cinematic genres like science fiction movies about time-travel or parallel worlds. Or horror films about vampires or werwolves. These take for granted stock conventions which the viewer is supposed to recognize without exposition or explanation. Consider how puzzling a vampire flick would be to a viewer with no background knowledge of the vampire mythos. 

4. I once read an article about how foreign tourists sometimes find it confusing to order at American fast-food joints because customers are expected to use idiomatic shorthand. To take an example from my own experience, when I used to eat lunch at Wendy's, years ago, I'd order "double cheese mayo only". But that's not self-explanatory. The first few times I went, I ordered off the menu. I said something like: "I want a cheeseburger with a double patty and mayonnaise only". However, I noticed that when the casher verbally relayed the order to the chef, she'd translate my statement into "double cheese mayo only". After that, I used the same telegraphic expression the cashiers did. 

5. Another example: one time a supermarket employee asked me if I was going to watch the football game that evening. I asked him which team he was rooting for. He said he was a Dolphins' fan. Consider how baffling that statement would be to someone without the requisite background knowledge. How can dolphins play football? Dolphins are marine mammals. They have no arms, legs, hands, or feet? To understand the statement, you need to know the convention of naming sports teams after animals. 

6. A final example is the use of hyperbole in the Sermon on the Mount. There's nothing in the meaning of the words that flags the language or imagery as hyperbolic. Rather, that relies on the ability of the listener to read between the lines.

7. And those are just samples. Interpreting the NT isn't merely a matter of construing what the text says. For the sense of the NT often carries an OT subtext. In addition, exegesis frequently benefits from having background knowledge which was common knowledge to the original audience, but is lost on a modern audience, absent historical supplementation. What the original audience knew through cultural osmosis a modern read must acquire through study of the ancient culture. 

"Reading between the lines" isn't some ad hoc expedient by Christians to read the Trinity or Incarnation into the text of Scripture. To the contrary, reading between the lines is a universal and necessary feature of communication. 

Of course, we must guard against eisegesis. Just because reading between the lines is an indispensable hermeneutical principle doesn't ipso facto warrant just any willy nilly reading between the lines. But for Tuggy to act like the principle is eisegesis per se reveals a woeful ignorance of how communication operates. 

Tuggy v. Date: Jesus is not divine

1. Last night I watched the debate between Chris Date and Dale Tuggy about the deity of Christ:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c35_uFjEbx8

In general, I thought Date won by a wide margin. I don't say that because we're friends–since we're not friends. We're not even on friendly terms with each other. Because I'm a long-standing critic of annihilationism, I'm highly unpopular with the Rethinking Hell coterie.

A unitarian might say my assessment of the debate is skewed by my Trinitarian bias. However, I'm quite capable of saying that somebody on my own side of an issue dropped the ball. 

In terms of style, Tuggy has a better speaking voice. Mellow and resonant. But he has a flat, droning delivery. Date has a thin speaking voice, but he's a livelier speaker. Dale read from a piece of paper while Date was freer and made better use of the technology.

I admit that after listening to a few minutes of Tuggy's opening speech, I skipped to Date's opening speech. That's because it sounded like Tuggy's usual stump speech. I'm quite familiar with that, whereas this is the first time I've heard Date on this issue, so I was more interested in what Date had to say as well as the rebuttals and cross-examinations. As such, it's possible that Tuggy said something new in his opening statement that I missed, but I doubt it. Throughout the debate he fell back on his well-worn tropes.

Dale Tuggy and the Biblical Basis of the Trinity, Part 2: Is the Doctrine of the Trinity Incoherent?

https://robertbowman.net/2019/04/18/dale-tuggy-and-the-biblical-basis-of-the-trinity-part-2-is-the-doctrine-of-the-trinity-incoherent/

Is Heb 1 about the new creation?

A while back I asked a renown Bible scholar to comment on Dale Tuggy's idiosyncratic, "new creation" reinterpretation of Heb 1. Here's how the scholar responded: 

The point of the catena [in Heb 1] is to demonstrate Jesus's superiority to the angels - or. better, difference in kind from the angels. It does not have to all relate to the exalted Jesus, but works with the standard Jewish correlation of "God is the only Creator of all things" and "God is the only sovereign Lord of all things."

"The beginning" is virtually a technical term for the primordial time at the beginning of everything (Gen 1:1; Prov 8:22-23; John 1:1). 

"You founded [past tense]  the earth and the heavens ..." would be utterly unparalleled as a way of referring to the new creation. For the NT, the new creation of heaven and earth is still very much future (Rev 21; Acts 3:21). Only in the case of individual Christians can new creation be said to have already happened (2 Cor 5:17). 

The new creation, when it comes, will not perish (Heb 12:27).

Tuggy's exegesis is ridiculously forced and quite obviously special pleading.

Functional Polytheism: A response to Dale Tuggy by Vladimir Šušić

http://adlucem.co/functional-polytheism-a-response-to-dale-tuggy-by-vladimir-susic/

Trinity of the gaps?

Recently I listened to the tail-end of a podcast by apostate Dale Tuggy critiquing Fred Sanders for allegedly concealing a trade secret from lay Christians that he concedes when writing to fellow scholars. Tuggy casts the issue as if the Trinity is like the God-of-the-gaps. Due to the steady march of exegetical theology, the biblical foundations of the Trinity are now in "crisis" because, one after another, traditional prooftexts for the Trinity have been invalidated by "textual scholars". A few brief observations:

1. Tuggy's characterization is deceptive, combining a half truth with a falsehood. To begin with, when it suits his agenda, Tuggy is quick to say there is no one model of the Trinity. Sanders is operating with a Nicene paradigm. And it's true that elements of that paradigm (e.g. eternal generation of the Son, eternal procession of the Spirit) have been threatened by modern exegesis. 

However, that isn't new. As Tuggy knows, Moses Stuart's Letters on the Eternal Generation of the Son of God, challenging that paradigm, were published almost 200 years ago (1822). And Stuart was writing in defense of the Trinity, in response to New England unitarians. 

2. Moreover, there are models of the Trinity that don't operate with the Nicene paradigm (i.e. monarchy of the Father, eternal generation/procession). And these aren't new. Take 17C Dutch-Reformed theologian Herman Alexander Röell. In response to the Remonstrants and Socinians, he defended a consistently autothean model of the Trinity ("in each of the persons the whole idea of deity is involved") by appealing to Cartesian natural theology and perfect being theology. Cf. Brannon Ellis, Calvin, Classical Trinitarianism, and the Aseity of the Son (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 127-36. That's invulnerable to exegetical attacks on eternal generation/procession inasmuch as it eschewed those elements of the Nicene paradigm, preferring an egalitarian model of the Trinity. 

3. Furthermore, while some traditional Trinitarian prooftexts have been retired, newer prooftexts (e.g. Jn 1:18) have been advanced, as well as neglected hermeneutical perspectives. For instance, the work of Alan Segal and Michael Heiser on the second Yahweh tradition in Second Temple theology, the work of Andrew Malone and Rod Elledge on illeism in Scripture, as well as probing studies of Synoptic high Christology, viz. Simon Gathercole, The Preexistent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark, and Luke (Eerdmans 2006), Joshua E. Leim, Matthew's Theological Grammar: The Father and the Son, WUNT 2/402 (Mohr Siebeck 2015). In addition, there's the groundbreaking studies of Richard Bauckham all across NT Christology. So even though some traditional prooftexts have been withdrawn from consideration, that's more than offset by newer lines of evidence.

Is John 8:58 about predestination rather than preexistence?

In his debate with Michael Brown:

https://www.21stcr.org/one-god-over-all-videos/debate-dr-dale-tuggy-vs-dr-michael-brown/

Around the 2:26 mark, Dale Tuggy takes Jn 8:58 to be an example of Jews characterizing predestined events as having always been. 

But a basic problem with his interpretation from Tuggy's own perspective is that Tuggy is an open theist. For instance:

https://trinities.org/dale/threeroads.pdf

According to open theism, the future is indeterminate. There are multiple potential futures in play, any one of which might become the actual future. There is no one future until the dust settles. So how does Dale's God predestine an indeterminate future? 

Praying to Jesus

As part of his opening statement, in his recent debate with anti-Trinitarian Dale Tuggy, Michael Brown said the following:

That’s why Paul could pray to the Father and Son together in 1 Thessalonians 3:13, saying, “Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you,” using a singular verb for the Father and Jesus. And why else would Paul include Jesus in a prayer to the Father, let alone pray to the Father and Son using a singular verb in the Greek – unless they are one? (See also 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17, where Paul puts Jesus first in the prayer, using a singular verb again: “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.”)

https://askdrbrown.org/library/dr-brown%E2%80%99s-opening-comments-debate-dr-dale-tuggy-january-11-2019

I've seen that challenged on Twitter. Here's what some recent, major commentators say, in support of Dr. Brown's interpretation. Notice that this is not an argument from authority. I'm not simply quoting scholarly opinion. Rather, they present exegetical arguments for their interpretation:

But in this prayer, as in 2 Thes 2:16-17, the Lord Jesus is the one to whom prayers are directed alongside God the Father. To address prayers to the Lord Jesus (so 2 Thes 3:5,16) in the same breath with God the Father implies a very high Christology. This prayer would be proper only if the apostles held to the divinity of Christ. This point is even clear in the prayer of 2 Thes 2:16, where the order of the names is reversed, "May our Lord Jesus Christ and God our Father". G. Green, The Letters to the Thessalonians (Eerdmans 2002), 176. 

This means that by comparing two similar Pauline prayers, the reader arrives at a sublet but undeniable attestation of the divinity of Christ. In both cases, God the Father and the Lord Jesus are petitioned in prayer, and one or the other might answer the prayer. What Paul explored a few times in explicit propositions (Rom 9:5; Phil 2:6; Tit 2:13) becomes clear when he turns to God and the Lord Jesus in prayer; it is in prayer that he shows who he really thinks the Lord Jesus is. G. Shogren, 1 & 2 Thessalonians (Zondervan 2012), 307. 

The second part of the prayer, the divine source, is striking not only because of the addition of the intensive pronoun "himself" but even more for the use of two subjects ("our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus") with a singular verb. The similar use of a compound subject with a singular verb occurs elsewhere in the NT (e.g., 1 Cor 15:50; Mt 5:18; Mk 4:41; Jas 5:3). These examples, however, virtually always involve a conventional word pair ("flesh and blood," "heaven and earth," "wind and sea," "gold and silver") so that the parallel with two persons mentioned in the transitional prayer of 3:11 is not exact. 

Indeed, the repetition of the definite article for both nouns suggests that Paul views God the Father and Jesus our Lord as two individual entities and so avoids the danger of a complete merging of the two figures to whom he prays. On the other hand, that these two individual figures are closely linked by a singular verb–a grammatical construction that Paul repeats (though in reverse order) in another prayer for the Thessalonians (2 Thes 2:16-17)–suggests that Paul views Jesus as sharing the deity of God and so avoids the danger of a complete separation of these two figures to whom he prays…As Marshall (1983: 100) declares, "It would be more exact to say that Paul assumes the divinity of Jesus–to call him "Son of God' in the way in which Paul uses the phrase cannot mean anything else".

As Milligan (1908: 108) observes, "We have another striking example of the equal nor ascribed to the Son with the Father throughout these epistles" J. Weima, 1-2 Thessalonians (Baker 2014), 236, 561.

The prayer itself, however, begins in a way that should catch everyone's attention. Here is a Jew, born and bred in, and deeply committed to, a monotheism where a person regularly repeated the traditional "creed" of all Judaism, the Shema of Deut 6:4: "Hear, Israel, Yahweh your God, Yahweh is one." But a couple of centuries before Paul, Yahweh's sacred name was no longer spoken aloud, apparently so that no one would take it "in vain" and thus break the third commandment. So in the oral reading of the Hebrew text, Adonai ("Lord") came to be substituted for Yahweh. This in turn was taken up in the Septuagint, where kyrios ("lord") was consistently substituted for Yahweh, this translating the oral substitution for the written word. So the oral Shema now took the form, "Hear, Israel, kyrios your theos, kyrios is one." What Paul himself did with this most sacred tradition–and well before writing this letter–is remarkable indeed. He is now praying to the one theos as "our God and Father" and to the one kyrios as "Jesus," whom he had earlier identified as "God's Son" (1:10)…the remarkable inclusion of the on as the compound subject of the singular verb seems to exist in anticipation of the rest of the prayer, which is directed solely to Christ.

Two further matters need to be noted, both christological. First, one should observe (a) that Paul can pray to both God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ together as one (v11), (b) that he can pray to both together but single out one as the object (grammatical subject) of the concerns of prayer at a given time (vv12-13), and (c) that in these earliest two letters he can pray to either separately (for the Father see 1 Thes 1:2-3; 5:23; for Christ see 2 Thess 3:5 and 15). 

Second, even though the first emphasis in this case is on God the Father, the final focus of the prayer is altogether on the Lord Jesus…Indeed, this same phenomenon happens in reverse in 1 Thes 2:16-17, where Christ is mentioned first (including with the autos ["himself"]) while the pickup, exactly as in the present case, is with prayer addressed to the second divine person mentioned at the outset, namely God the Father….together these realities indicate the very high place Christ had in Paul's understanding of God's identity. Here is a strict monotheist praying with ease to both the Father and the Son, focussing first on the one and then on the other, and without a sense that his monotheism is being stretched or is in some kind of danger. G. Fee, The First and Second Letters to the Thessalonians (Eerdmans 2009), 130-31. 

I'd mention in passing that on a unitarian interpretation, this is yet another way in which unitarianism parallels Catholicism. Just like in Catholicism, you can pray to "exalted humans" (Mary) as well as God–in unitarianism, you can pray to God and the merely human Jesus alike. 

Your throne, O God, is forever and ever

In preparation for his debate with Michael Brown, Dale Tuggy did a post offering his interpretation of Heb 1:

https://trinities.org/blog/the-arguments-of-hebrews-1-2-part-1/

This also came up several times in the course of the debate. Before getting to the specifics, let's begin with a general observation: Tuggy appealed to a sensus plenior ("new meaning, second fulfillment") hermeneutic. Of course, that's a huge issue in Christian apologetics and biblical hermeneutics. The accusation is often made that when NT writers say Jesus fulfills the OT, they quote the OT out of context. 

So one problem with Tuggy's unitarian countermove is that he's contaminating the reservoir to poison Trinitarians, but that's the source of his own drinking water. The messiahship of Jesus must be validated by the OT. But if you appeal to a sensus plenior hermeneutic, that plays into the accusation that Jesus didn't really fulfill the OT. Indeed, because Jesus failed to fulfill the OT, NT writers have to twist the OT to make it appear as if he fulfilled the OT. Tuggy is too short-sighted to see that his sensus plenior hermeneutic is equally discrediting to a unitarian messiah. 

Also, notice that it is because of his exaltation that Jesus has become superior to the angels; again, this is not consistent with his being fully divine – in that case, he’d be eternally superior to them.

Tuggy never misses a chance to repeat the same mistake. He can never bring himself to assume the opposing viewpoint even for the sake of argument. The exultation of Jesus is not inconsistent with the deity and eternal superiority of the Son on Trinitarian grounds because it has reference not to the Son qua Son but the Son Incarnate, and the Son Incarnate can undergo demotions or promotions in his status. Tuggy constantly operates with a unitarian viewpoint when accusing the Trinitarian position of inconsistency. That's fundamentally confused. It's only inconsistent on unitarian assumptions, not Trinitarian assumptions. 

I take it that the name Jesus inherits at his exaltation is “Lord.”

“Lord” as in Yahweh.

Note that the context here these latter days (1-2) and then post-exaltation (2-4). This, and the fact that the Bible consistently credits God alone with the Genesis creation…

That's a unitarian assumption, but Trinitarians point to other passages as well which credit the Son with the Genesis creation (Jn 1; Col 1). Of course, that forces Tuggy to offer unitarian reinterpretations of those passages as well, so his argument is viciously circular. 

...makes it more plausible that the creation in v. 2 is the “new creation” Paul speaks of, which God accomplished through Jesus at this time (c. 33 AD). 

Since it's highly unlikely that Paul wrote Hebrews, it's methodologically dubious to filter Heb 1 through a Pauline lens. We need to interpret each writer on their own terms. 

Also, the one God is the ultimate source of the cosmos, but at very most, even if this is about the Genesis creation, note that it only says that God created through Jesus, which would make Jesus the instrument of creation, or the next to last source of the cosmos – not the creator in the sense God is the creator. So there is no help here for speculations that Jesus is “fully God” or “fully divine,” because that requires being the ultimate source of the cosmos.

What does that even mean? Does he mean in the Arian sense that the Son is the first creature who creates everything else? Does he mean God is the ultimate Creator whereas the Son is only the instrumental creator in the sense that the God creates the Son, who in turn, makes everything else? That would make the Son a Demiurge figure. Of course, Heb 1 doesn't say that or imply that.  

True, in the original Psalm, it is God/YHWH who is being spoken of, and his Genesis creation. This interesting biblical unitarian piece (HT: Rob Bjerk) argues that God is not the speaker in that Psalm, and so he can’t be speaking to the Son here. (The author is worried lest we read the passage as attributing the Genesis creation to Jesus, whereas the Bible consistently credits it to God alone.)

But the author of Hebrews is not going with the original context and meaning, but rather claiming to find a new meaning in it. And clearly, he’s still talking about the Son, not about God; he’s in his third contrast between the Son and angels. Buzzard’s Jesus was not a Trinitarian has a helpful appendix on this; basically, at least some Greek versions of Ps 102 make it sound like someone is speaking to someone else, which makes it easy for this author here to “see” that here God is addressing someone else as “Lord,” i.e. the exalted Son (compare with the “my lord” of Ps 110:1).

The reason the author of Hebrews makes God the speaker is not because he's dependent on a Septuagintal rendering. Rather, there's a pattern to how the author introduces OT passages. He operates with the theological presupposition that whatever Scripture says, God says. When quoting or introducing an OT passage, he bypasses the human author and attributes the statement directly to God or God's Spirit. So this isn't based on the LXX, but the author's view of Scripture, where God stands behind whatever Scripture says. Of course, he wouldn't deny the secondary human authorship of Scripture, but he prefers to go one step back to the primary divine authorship of Scripture. 

Note the “latter-day” context of the whole chapter after 1:1. Because of that, the “beginning” here and the creation (1:10) are best taken as the beginning of the new era, and Jesus’s “new creation.” These are part are parcel of his current exalted status, in virtue of which, the whole chapter argues, he is much superior to any angel.

That's a false dichotomy. In the OT, God is both creator and judge. The two are linked. 

It is unlikely that he introduces the time as these last days and then violently changes the subject to the beginning of the cosmos, and then back again to these last days.

1. It doesn't violently change the subject. To begin with, vv10-12 provide supporting evidence for v2. 

2. In addition, as one commentator explains:

Another theme of the quotation is that just as the Son was present and active from the beginning of time, so he will be at the end…the Son is eternal, a point which will become significant later in connection with Jesus' priesthood (see 7:3,24-25). J. Ramsey Michaels, Hebrews (Tyndale 2009), 338.

So the Son's past identity as Creator is necessary to his present identity as heavenly priest and agent of providence as well (as his future identity as eschatological judge_. Because he's divine, he's eternal at both ends. And that parallels Yahweh. Just as the OT God is the agent of creation, providence, and judgment, so is the Son, who created the world and sustains the universe (vv2-3). 

3. Finally, how are vv10-12 related to vv9-10? As two commentators explain:

In reinforcement of the ascription of the name "God" to the Son, the citation from Ps 101:26-28 ascribes to the Son what was first said of "the Lord," the God of Israel. L. T. Johnson, Hebrews: A Commentary (WJK 2006), 81.

In this section Christ is twice addressed as "God" (1:8a,9b)…The Jewish tradition centered on faith in one God (Deut 6:4), who was not be portrayed in human form or identified with human beings (Exod 20:4; Deut 5:8; 2 Macc 9:12; cf. Jn 5:18; 10:33). Hebrews uses the title "God" not in defiance of Israel's tradition, but on the basis of Israel's tradition using the words of Ps 45:6-7, which ascribe deity to the king that God has anointed, who here is identified as the exalted Christ. The final portion of the address elaborates what it means to call him "God" by identifying him as the one through whom all things were brought into being and who stands above the cycles of decay (1:1-10). C. Koester, Hebrews (Doubleday 2001), 202-3. 

So another function of Ps 102 in the argument of Hebrews is to unpack what is meant by calling the royal groom "God" in Ps 45. It's not used in an honorific sense, but in the true sense of the word. The Creator God. 

Therefore, quoting Ps 102 in the original sense doesn't "violently change the subject". To the contrary, that ties into v2 and vv8-9 (not to mention the future role of Christ as the final judge). 

Let's tie up some loose ends about Ps 45.

1. Standard commentaries on Ps 45 agree that the king is addressed as "God" (cf. Peter Craigie, John Goldingay, Allen Ross, Gerald Wilson, Nancy deClaissé-Walford/Rolf Jacobson/Beth Tanner).

2.  In the debate, Tuggy indicated that Ps 45 calls the king "God" because it's a coronation psalm, but Tuggy got his wires crossed. He may be thinking of some other Psalm, but Ps 45 is a royal epithalamion. It celebrates a wedding, not a coronation–albeit a royal wedding. 

3. Tuggy said the original referent in Ps 45 was a human king, which goes to show that Scripture sometimes refers to human beings as "gods". But Tuggy needs to be guarded in his reliance on critical scholarship inasmuch as critical scholars don't think OT writers foresaw the future. They think the OT contains false prophecies. They don't think Jesus fulfills the OT. They don't think these passages have anything to do with Jesus. 

That doesn't mean you can't cite scholars who may disagree with your overall position. But you need to have a principled reason for appealing to them about some things while you differ with then about other things. It can't just be an opportunistically selective appeal. 

4. Even if we offer a typological interpretation, where the passage is a wedding ceremony or coronation ceremony for an OT king, it would still be with a view to the future messiah. So the exalted language wouldn't be hyperbolic. Rather, it would truly be about a divine messiah, where the OT king is just a temporary stand-in. 

Framing the Tuggy-Brown debate

https://www.proginosko.com/2019/01/an-observation-about-the-tuggy-brown-debate/

Tuggy v. Brown

I listened to the recent debate between Dale Tuggy and Michael Brown. I think Brown made a powerful case. Here's his opening statement:

https://askdrbrown.org/library/dr-brown%E2%80%99s-opening-comments-debate-dr-dale-tuggy-january-11-2019

In this post I'm going to focus on Dale's side of the debate. This will be a long post.

In a way I'm surprised that Dale didn't do better. On the one hand, Brown wears many hats. A debater. Bible commentator. Messianic Jewish apologist. Culture warrior. Globe-trotting missionary. President of FIRE. And so on. 

By contrast, Dale is a single-issue guy who spends all his leisure time expounding unitarianism. That's his professional specialization. He's been honing his arguments for years. He's debated Bible scholars like Michael Heiser, Larry Hurtado, and Lee Irons on his podcasts. And Dale had the home-court advantage on philosophical theology. So I expected him to turn in a stronger performance. As such, it was striking to see how often he floundered.

Brown's opening statement

With permission, I'm posting Dr. Michael Brown's opening statement in his recent debate with Dale Tuggy:

Debate with Dale Tuggy About the One True God

Thanks so much for coming out tonight and for tuning in to our livestream, and thanks, Dr. Tuggy, for your comments, which I’m quite eager to rebut. The fact is, you claim that Jesus is simply a glorified man, and I want to declare in the clearest possible terms that the Son of God of the Bible – the one we rightly worship as God – is infinitely more than a glorified man. To make Him into a glorified man is to deny the clear and consistent witness of Scripture. To make Him into a glorified man is to neuter the gospel, since the idea that a glorified man died for our sins is hardly a demonstration of the immeasurable love of God. To the contrary, when God sent His Son to pay for our crimes, He was giving of His very self.

So, again, I’m eager to rebut Dr. Tuggy’s opening comments, and it’s clear that a lot of his difficulties come from the fact that Son took on human form, hence praying to the Father and having the Father as His God. But for now, in my opening statement, I will lay out the clear scriptural case that the Son is fully divine, and since there is only one God, then God must be complex in His unity. Simply stated, this one God has revealed Himself to us as Father, Son, and Spirit, and if we are to accept the testimony of the Scripture, this is the only fair conclusion.

For Dr. Tuggy and others, this is a logical contradiction, but the day we can fully wrap our minds around the nature of God is the day we’ve reduced Him to our level, thereby making a god in our image. The God of the Bible is marvelous and transcendent, without beginning and without end, rightly called in Judaism the eyn sof – the infinite One – and, according to the Scriptures, clearly complex in His unity. Will we accept the biblical witness, or will we try to create a god based on our own limitations and perceptions? 

In the Old Testament, the Lord stated categorically that He would share His glory with no one. As written in Isaiah 42:8, “I am the LORD; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.” (See also 48:11, “For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another.”)

Yet we see in the New Testament that massive glory and honor are given to the Son. As Revelation records, “Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, ‘Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!’ And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, ‘To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!’ And the four living creatures said, ‘Amen!’ and the elders fell down and worshiped” (Rev. 5:11-14).

Either God has gone back on His Word, and another, created being is sharing in His unique honor and glory, or the Son is one with the Father, equally God. And note here that all creation worships the Lamb, meaning that He Himself is not created.

Having interacted with religious Jews for the last 47 years, I can assure you that if the Son did not share in the divine nature, to worship Him like this would be blasphemous. That, indeed, would be detracting from the worship of the only God and engaging in some form of idolatry. This is not like one candle lighting another candle without the first candle losing its light. This is like the second candle becoming predominant – in this case, having millions of people praising and glorifying Jesus, often without mentioning the Father. If the Son is not God, then He has taken glory from the Father.

What makes this all the more interesting is that throughout Isaiah 40-48, God repeatedly says of Himself, “I am” or “I am He” (translated into Greek as ego eimi), yet that is the very language Jesus uses of Himself in John, most decisively in John 8:58: “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (again, ego eimi) – not, “I was,” but “I am.”

So, not only does Jesus share in the Father’s glory, but He identifies Himself with the eternal God, saying, “I am” (or, “I am He”), also declaring His external preexistence. And just as the Lord says in Isaiah 48:12, “I am he; I am the first, and I am the last,” so also, in the book of Revelation, both the Father and Son are called the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last. See Rev 21:6, speaking of the Father, who says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end,” then Rev 22:13, where Jesus says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.”  (See also Rev 1:8, “‘I am the Alpha and the Omega,’ says the Lord God, ‘who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.’” And note Rev 1:17.)

He is clearly and unequivocally identifying Himself with Yahweh. No created being could utter such words. Only the eternal God could say, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” The Son is the eternal God!

That’s why in the Old Testament, Yahweh’s words remain forever (Isa 40:7-8) but in the New Testament it is Jesus’ words that will remain forever (Matt 24:35).

The Lord declared in Isaiah 43:11, “I, I am the LORD, and besides me there is no savior,” yet throughout the New Testament, Jesus is hailed as our Savior. Either He is one with God, or there is more than one true savior. Paul leaves us no doubt, referring to “our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” in Titus 2:13. That’s the most obvious and clear sense of the Greek. Jesus is our great God and Savior.

We also learn from this same section in Isaiah that when Yahweh created the universe, He did it alone. As written in Isaiah 44:24, “I am the LORD, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself.” Yet the New Testament tells us explicitly that the Son was involved in creation.

In John 1:1, John uses the language of Genesis 1:1 in the Septuagint, saying that the Word was in the beginning (en arche), and explaining that what God was, the Word was. And, he continues, “All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:3-4). And, John tells us, it is this preexistent Word, this Word through which all things were created, which became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14).

And that’s why John the Immerser explained that Jesus “ranks before me, because he was before me” (John 1:30). That’s why Jesus said that He was from above, that He came down from heaven, that He came from God and was returning to God (John 3:13; 6:38, 41; 8:23; 13:3).

That’s why Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 8:6, “yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” Even more emphatically, he wrote, “For by him [meaning the Son!] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-- all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Col. 1:16-17).

The text is clear. The Son is eternal. The Son is uncreated. All things were created through Him and for Him. 

You really have to engage in a hopeless series of exegetical gymnastics to deny the plain sense of these words. And remember: In Isaiah, Yahweh said no one was with Him when He created the universe, yet these texts say He created all things through His Son. That can only mean one thing: The Father and Son are one God! And that’s why Jesus explained that it was His Father’s will “that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father” (John 5:23).

There are other texts which explicitly point to the Son’s eternal preexistence. In John 17:5, Jesus prays to the Father, “And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” Once again, the text is clear.

John also tells us in chapter 12 that when Isaiah saw the Lord’s glory (meaning, Yahweh in His glory in Isaiah 6), it was the Son of God he saw, the one who suffers and dies in Isaiah 53. Isaiah saw the Son of God, and the Son was called Yahweh.

That’s why Paul tells us explicitly in Philippians 2 that Jesus existed in the form of God yet emptied Himself and became a servant, dying for us. And that’s why Paul uses a text speaking of Yahweh in Isaiah 45:23, where God swears that every knee will bow to Him and every tongue swear to Him and applies the verse to Jesus, saying that every knee will bow to Him and every tongue confess that He is Lord. If the Son is not deity, that’s blasphemous, and it cannot possibly be to the glory of the Father. Just think if the verse were referred to an angel, rather than Yahweh. It’s unimaginable.

Note also that Paul in this passage uses the example of Jesus in Philippians as an example of humility. He didn’t take what rightly belonged to Him – namely, the privileges of deity – but rather emptied Himself on our behalf. He who was eternally God came to earth as a servant to die for us!

That’s why Jesus says that He had often longed to have mercy on Jerusalem, but it was not willing (Matthew 23:37). He was the one wooing His people throughout Old Testament times.

That’s why Hebrews 1:8, quoting from Psalm 45:7, says to the Son, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever.” Yes, the Son is God and has an eternal throne! (The plain sense of the Hebrew and Greek texts is quite clear and the major reason there is any debate in how to translate the words is because of theological objections to the Messiah being God.)

Not only so, but Hebrews continues, quoting from Psalm 102 and applying these words to the Son, “And, ‘You, Lord, laid the foundation of the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of your hands;  they will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment, like a robe you will roll them up, like a garment they will be changed. But you are the same, and your years will have no end.’” (Heb 1:10-12) The Son is the eternal creator, the one who always was and always will be. That’s what Scripture states!

We don’t need to play games with this text and try to make it say something it is not saying. The text clearly and indisputably speaks of the Lord creating the heavens and the earth, which will ultimately wear out, but He – the eternal Lord – will remain the same. Yet Hebrews applies this to the Son! And Psalm 102 makes frequent reference to Yahweh, yet the psalm is referred to the Son in Hebrews 1. Not only so, but the Greek text speaks of the Lord creating the universe in the beginning (archas). There is no denying the plain truth of these words!

And Hebrews makes the consistent argument that the Son is greater than the angels, yet in first-century Judaism, the very context of these words, there was no one higher than the angels other than God Himself. 

That’s why Isaiah said in 9:6 that one of the Messiah’s titles would be, “Mighty God,” yet in Isaiah 10:21, it is Yahweh who is called “Mighty God.” That’s why Thomas said to the risen Jesus, “My Lord and my God!” in John 20:28. The text is totally clear! Thomas called Jesus his Lord and his God. And that’s why Paul wrote in Colossians 2:9 that “the whole fullness of deity” dwelt in bodily form in Jesus.

Peter is clear as well, writing in 2 Peter 1:1 about “the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.” And it is very likely that Paul speaks of Jesus as God in Romans 9:5, while it is most likely that in 1 John 5:20, John states that Jesus Christ is “the true God.”

That’s why Jesus could say that the Father was in Him and He in the Father (John 14:9-11). That’s why Paul identifies the Spirit of God with the Spirit of Christ in Romans 8:9-11. That’s why Paul could pray to the Father and Son together in 1 Thessalonians 3:13, saying, “Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you,” using a singular verb for the Father and Jesus. And why else would Paul include Jesus in a prayer to the Father, let alone pray to the Father and Son using a singular verb in the Greek – unless they are one? (See also 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17, where Paul puts Jesus first in the prayer, using a singular verb again: “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.”)

And that’s why prayer is offered directly to the Son in the New Testament. Stephen prays to Him in Acts 7:59 (“Lord Jesus, receive my spirit”); we are taught to pray, “Maranatha,” which in Aramaic means, “Our Lord, come!” And John calls out to Him in prayer in Revelation, “Even so, come Lord Jesus!” (Rev 22:20). Jesus even told us to ask Him for anything and He would do it (see John 14:14).

And that’s why, in Revelation 22, we read that “the throne of God and of the Lamb will be” in the New Jerusalem, “and his servants will worship him” – not them, but Him, God and the Lamb, one divine Being and one throne. And that’s why, in Revelation 22, we read that “the throne of God and of the Lamb will be” in the New Jerusalem, “and his servants will worship him” – not them, but Him, God and the Lamb, one divine Being, and in the end, one throne, not two. “They will see his face” – not their faces – “and his name” – not their names – “will be on their foreheads” (Rev. 22:3-4).

The very thing that Dr. Tuggy tries so hard to resist is the very thing that Scripture teaches.

To review: There is no question whatsoever that the Son is eternal, preexistent, and fully divine, the one through whom all things were created, and the one who is worthy to receive praise, honor, and glory and to whom prayer can be directed. That’s why He is called God in a number of texts, and that’s why we worship Him as God – one with His Father. And that’s why, when Jesus returns to the earth and His feet touch the Mount of Olives, as promised in Acts 1:11, Zechariah tells us that it will be Yahweh’s feet that touch down (see Zech 14:3-4). And that’s why we baptize in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (Matt 28:19). A glorified man has no place between the Father and the Spirit. 

In fact, as we look at the scriptural evidence, we see that lying to the Spirit is lying to God (Acts 5:3-4), that the Spirit can be grieved (Isa 63:10; Eph 4:30), that the Spirit teaches, guides, speaks, intercedes, appoints leaders, and bears witness (e.g., 2 Sam 23:3; Neh 9:19-20; Rom 8:14; John 14:26; Acts 13:2; 1 Tim 4:1; Rom 8:26; Acts 20:28; 5:32), that the Spirit is manifest through wisdom and knowledge (1 Chr 28:11-12; 1 Cor 12:7-8), and that the Spirit is eternal (Heb 9:14). The Spirit also is God!

That’s why Paul could speak of “the love of the Spirit” (Rom 15:30). And that’s why Paul could invoke this benediction, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Cor. 13:14; and note carefully, you do not have “fellowship” with a thing; you have fellowship with a person).

That’s why Christians concluded that God was triune, one God, made known to us as Father, Son, and Spirit. In the New Testament, the Father is primarily known as “God,” the Son is primarily known as “Lord,” and the Spirit is given various titles to explain His work and mission (although He is sometimes called “Lord” too, as in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18; and, of course, the Son is sometimes called God and the Father is sometimes called Lord).

That’s why Jesus could say things like this, in John 15:26: “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will testify about me.”

And that’s why blasphemy against the Spirit – not against an impersonal force but against God Himself – was a damnable sin. You are damned for sinning against a divine someone, not just a powerful something.

And it is only when we understand God’s tri-unity that we can understand how people saw God in the Old Testament, yet the Bible says no one has ever seen God. The Father remains hidden, and it is the Son who makes Him known. That’s why Jesus could say, “If you’ve seen Me, you’ve seen the Father” (John 14:9). And that’s why He could say, “All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows who the Son is except the Father, or who the Father is except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Luke 10:22). You can’t say those words about a glorified man.

Nor can you say that God created the world through a glorified man (Heb 1:2) or that a glorified man “is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact expression of his nature” (Heb 1:3, NET).

That’s why Jacob in Genesis 48 described God as, “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day, the Angel who has redeemed me from all harm” (Genesis 48:15-16). Yes, Jacob equated the one true God with the angel who redeemed him. This was his way of describing the preexistent Son, who appeared sometimes in the Old Testament as the Angel of the Lord. Jacob encountered Him too! And just as Paul prayed to Jesus and the Father as one, using a singular verb, so also here Jacob appeals to God and His redeeming Angel – one being! – in the singular as well.

As a Jewish follower of Jesus, there has always been pressure on me to deny what Scripture plainly teaches, namely, that Jesus the Son is eternal deity and that God’s unity is complex. But because the Word is so clear on this, I could not and would not yield to this pressure. (For the record, I could have brought much, much more support from the Old Testament, but there is simply not enough time to review the massive amount of scriptural truth affirming the deity of the Son.)

I urge each of you to fall down at the feet of the glorious Son and worship Him as God. This will please the Father, who sent His Son to be the Savior of the world, and who continues to work among us by His Spirit.

After Paul laid out God’s extraordinary plan to save both Jews and Gentiles in Romans 9-11, he wrote these incredible words, quoting from the Old Testament as well: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! ‘For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?’ ‘Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?’ For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” (Rom 11:33-36).

Let’s stop trying to put the infinite and eternal God into the tiny box of our limited minds, as if we in ourselves could figure out or define him or reduce him to a mathematical formula, and let’s instead worship our triune God with reverence and awe. That is humility and that is wisdom.