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Saturday, June 18, 2011

And the Word was God

DALE [TUGGY] SAID:

Consider this sentence: Steve, poster on this blog, likes beer.
Here, I affirm that you like beer. But this also shows I assume what is in the dependent clause. Why'd I add it? To clarify just who I was talking about. I'm not here asserting that you post here, but this does show I assume it.
Now, go back to the verse. Jesus is praying in front of the disciples.
"Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent."
Again, the relative clause specifies who the "you" is. It's the only true God - the speaker here assumes that the Father (v.1) is (numerically identical to) the one true God.

That the Father is the grammatical referent of the phrase “the only true God” in Jn 17:3 is not in dispute.

The only difference between the examples is that "poster on this blog" but not "the one true God" could be predicated of more than one thing.

That’s based, in part, on your persistent failure to appreciate the stereotypical import of that particular phrase, as well as the way Jn 17:3 functions in reference to related statements earlier in the Gospel, although I’ve corrected you on both points.

When you raise an objection, I respond, and you repeat the same objection instead of interacting with my response, that does nothing to advance the argument.



Re: John 17:5 - oh, I see - you think it implies pre-existence. We think it is a matter of foreknowledge - there are other NT examples of this idiom, but I don't have time to dig them up at the moment. This is a wash in the present debate.

i) Jn 17:5 doesn’t use the language of “knowledge” or “foreknowledge.”

ii) Where the Bible uses the Hebraic idiom of foreknowledge, that’s an idiom for prior choice, not prior knowledge.

Eh, no, I don't think so. The question is who John thinks is identical to whom. He can use words however, according to all the normal rules of language.

And John doesn’t say the Father is identical with God or Yahweh in contrast to the nonidentity of the Son with God or Yahweh.

Rather, John posits an equivalence relation between the Father and God or Yahweh, but he also posits an equivalence relation between the Son and God or Yahweh. He does both.

You may think that’s illogical, but that’s Johannine practice.

I think in the phrase "one true god" the noun theos is a common noun, but because of the qualifiers, it can only apply to one being. So, it is much like a proper noun.

i) I think theos is a proper noun in this verse since John typically uses theos as a proper name for the Father.

ii) You’re repeating your earlier mistake of treating the qualifiers as if they were isolated semantic units, which you add together, rather than treating these three words as an idiomatic phrase. I’ve corrected you on that, but you simply repeat your original contention rather than updating your contention to address the counterargument. That doesn’t make a constructive contribution to the dialogue.

iii) Why would you suggest a proper noun can only apply to one being? Does “Dale” only apply to one being? Is there only one “Dale” in the phonebook?

iv) Moreover, it’s exegetically unsound to isolate Jn 17:3 from other Johannine statements which assert or imply the deity of Christ (e.g. Jn 1:1-3,14,18; 5:18,23; 8:58; 10:30; 12:41; 14:9; 17:5; 20:28). What John says here must be counterbalanced against what was said elsewhere to produce an integrated interpretation.

v) Likewise, we need to see how these statements function in the narrative structure of John, with 1:1 and 20:28 forming an envelopment around the revelation of the Son, and recognition of his identity by the faithful, in the course of the unfolding narrative.

No, I do not.

A denial is not a disproof. You’re failing to engage the argument.

Sorry, I don't see what this has to do with a unitarian reading of John 17.

Since I already explained the connection, and you don’t bother to explain yourself in return, my original argument prevails.

Well, sure. The point is not being made, for it is everywhere assumed in the NT. There is no need to make that point. They saw Jesus with their eyes. They touched and smelled him, and knew him to be a man. And they assumed Yahweh to not be a man. And they heard and saw Jesus pray to God, and relate to God, who he said was HIS god too. The agonies of Chalcedonian two-natures theories never entered their heads.

i) You’re completing disregarding John’s incarnational Christology.

ii) Moreover, to assert that the non-deity of the Son is “everywhere assumed in the NT” begs the very question at issue. At the very least, there’s abundant prima facie evidence to the contrary. Evidence that various NT writers did, indeed, affirm the deity of Christ. You can try to argue that down, but to take your unitarian position for granted as if that’s the default position is not an intellectually serious response to the challenge.

Distinction without a difference, I think.

No, the doctrine is based on the testimony of Scripture. The doctrine is not based on a philosophical harmonization showing how Jesus can be Yahweh if the Father is Yahweh.

If there are several incompatible claims which various folk firmly believe is THE doctrine - Sorry, that seems like a doctrinal problem to me. Nor is it separable from interpretive issues.

At a doctrinal level they can affirm whatever the NT teaches without having a recondite theory of numerical identity in their back pocket. They can affirm all of the propositions which  comprise the relata even if they can’t finesse their interrelation. I can know that A is true, B is true, and C is true, even if I don’t know how they go together in some neat little package.

Steve, slow down, my friend. It's explicitly said, and plainly assumed throughout the NT, that Father = Yahweh. That needn't confuse anyone, if those names should also be applied to others. (How many "Steves" are there in the world?) The texts do not say anything of the Father that isn't true of Yahweh - if they did, one or more writers would be confused.

i) Among other things, that fails to distinguish between Yahweh qua Yahweh (i.e. Yahweh discarnate) and the advent of Yahweh in the flesh (i.e. Yahweh incarnate). What’s true of Yahweh in the OT and the NT isn’t going to be isometric if the NT involves a Yahwistic event (i.e. the “coming” of Yahweh) which didn’t take place in the OT.

ii) Likewise, you’re singling out NT statements about the Father as your standard of comparison, then using that to demote comparable statements about the Son. But the NT itself doesn’t put your favorite statements in a class by themselves.

Right - so it can't be that each is numerically identical to God. Do you see why?

I see you wielding “numerical identity” to unilaterally preselect for statements about the Father to the exclusion of analogous statements about the Son. But the NT doesn’t share your lopsided selection-criteria. And the NT doesn’t say that if the Father is divine, then the Son can’t be divine.

Add in the point that Father = God/Yahweh, and since the Son isn't = the Father, then he can't be = God. He could (consistently with this) be divine in some sense, and he could be addressed as "God", and even called a god. The fathers like Origen would agree with all this. I think that he's not asserted to be literally divine, because the NT uses the OT concept of divinity, as outlined in Is 40-55. Origin had that concept, but also used a looser Greek concept of a god (on which BOTH f and s count as gods).

i) Except for the awkward little fact that verses like Jn 5:23 and 8:58 have their background in Isaian theology (e.g. Isa 42:8; 48:11; 43:25; 45:19; 51:12), so that John is folding Jesus into uniquely Yahwistic claims.

ii) Likewise, Jesus isn’t designated “God” in a looser sense in Jn 1:1,18.

Not, this is a confusion. They do not identify Jesus as YHWH. Theologians are sloppy in their identity talk; what you say is true if "identify" means "associate with". But not if "identify" means assert or assume to be numerically identical to. But that's how I've been using it all along.

Once again, you’re bifurcating NT predications in a way that NT writers do not.

You grant that no NT author thinks f=s - they deny that. Well, they'd be pitifully confused if they also thought f = g and s = g. Do you see why?

i) I see that you constantly driving a wedge into NT Christology which you didn’t find in the NT itself.

ii) NT writers are witnesses. Reporters. They bear witness to what was said and done. They are on the receiving end of God’s historic self-revelation. In that respect, they don’t control the content.  They’re job is to faithful transmit their God-given experience.


We all interpret the Bible assuming laws of logic and other self-evident truths (e.g. no claim can be both true and false, and no contradiction is true).
Thus, this:
"You’re using your philosophical categories to prejudge the exegetical results. To preempt what the NT is allowed to say."
is a hollow charge. Compare: you object to my contradictory reading of some passage. I can complain till I'm blue in the face that you're allowing your philosophical commitments distort your reading of the text. You should allow that contradictions can be true, and embrace my nonsense. In a case like this, you'd be in the right; it's called common sense, and we should thank God we've got it.

i) To begin with, logical identity is an abstract principle. It has no predictive power or directional force. It doesn’t tell you in advance how the principle applies to any specific case. Logical identity is not a fingerpost directing you to absolutize NT statements about the Father’s Yahwistic status but relativize NT statements about the Son’s Yahwistic status.

So you’re misusing logic.

ii) In addition, you’re confounding logic and metaphysics. Logical identity is not a theory of numerical identity. It doesn’t include a prefabricated model of what it means for something to be the same something. And, indeed, definitions of identity tend to be circular.

You’re illicitly using logical identity to shortcut intricate metaphysical questions.

As such, you objections are misguided on both counts. Logical identity doesn’t pick out one set of NT statements about the Father to be your benchmark, then demote similar statements accordingly.

Likewise, logical identity doesn’t pick out a particular theory of numerical identity. That confuses logical identity with metaphysical identity. Although they’re related, logic operates at a purely general level.

For instance, you keep using the word “self,” but that’s not a philosophically rigorous category. There’s more than one ontological model of selfhood. Indeed, “self” is just a verbal placeholder waiting in line for a complex theory to fill in.

If you want to know why paradoxes are epistemological trouble, read my "On Positive Mysterianism", which discusses in depth James Anderson's creative attempt, in my view, the best yet, to defend positive mysterianism.

Which misses my point. If paradox is a common phenomenon in math, science, and logic, then why should theology be any exception?

Notice I didn’t say if the Trinity is paradoxical; just that even if it were paradoxical, that’s not surprising, or special pleading.

The crime, I take it, is reading them as assuming the identity of the Father and Yahweh. Sorry, that's just common sense - no big theory at work there. In a way, it's like figuring out that Abram just is Abraham.

No, the crime is your selective, one-sided appeal to some NT data to negate other NT data, even when you’re dealing with the same type of data (i.e. how the NT attributes Yahwistic passages to the Father and the Son alike).

Eh, no. There are many senses in which things can be "the same" or "identical". Having studied and taught metaphysics, I'm probably aware of most. Indeed, most come up in my SEP piece somewhere or other.

In which case you can’t use logic alone to settle the discussion–even on your own terms.

Example please? I'm not familiar with that term.

Enantiomorphism is a technical term for mirror-symmetry. On the one hand this type of symmetry exhibits equipollent correspondence. In that respect we’re dealing with an equivalence relationship. On the other hand it also exhibits chirality, which is irreducible.

For an overview, cf. Symmetry in Science and Art by A. V. Shubnikov & V. A. Koptsik (New York, Plenum Press, 1974), 16-18.

Well, we've finally agreed on something! ;-) The thing is, no one likes contradictions, and everyone has the concept of =, and knows the indiscernibility of identicals. And that's really all the philosophy that is at issue here. The project is finding a charitable and plausible interpretation - one which is seemingly consistent (charitable) and plausible - so it can't require any really out there thesis which only mathematicians or logicians or metaphysicians or physicists can grasp. Unitarian readings are just of this sort - they read the NT as self-consistent, and don't attribute anachronistic ideas to the authors. This is in sharp contrast to some (not all) Trinity theories.

My interpretive project involves allowing the writer to say what he wants to say, not what the reader wants him to say.

This is fine, not confusing, in a context where everyone assumes them to differ.

NT writers assume they differ in one respect (the Father is not the Son, or vice versa), but do not differ in another respect (the Father is Yahweh–and so is the Son). 

8 comments:

  1. I was looking through John Frame's 'The Doctrine of God' to see what he had to say about John 17:3 and he had this to say:

    'But Jesus does not use "the only true God" in contrast to himself. Rather, as any Jew of the time would have understood, "the only true God" is in contrast to false gods, the idols of the world. Indeed, in this verse, Jesus stresses his unity with the Father, for the disciples saving knowledge both of the Father and of the Son. "The only true God" and "Jesus Christ" are parallel objects of saving knowledge. Indeed, 1 John 5:20, which echoes John 17:3, identifies Jesus himself as "the true God," by whom saving knowledge comes:

    "We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true - even in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life."'
    (DoG, 685)

    That might even be enough to save an ST theorist!

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  2. Steve, fantastic discussions. I am truly learning a lot from these exchanges. I pray that our risen Lord will use this to bring Tuggy to the truth of what the Holy Bible says concerning the prehuman existence and essential Deity of Christ.

    I do have a question that both you and Tuggy can answer. In one of your earlier exchanges, Tuggy made the following assertion:

    On your idea that I somehow misunderstand nouns - this is a careless misreading. My point was that these authors assume the numerical identity of the Father and God. If f=g, and not(f=s) then it can't be that s=g. You're not getting my point that the authors don't merely predicate divinity of f & s - rather, they identify f and Yahweh.

    In light of what Tuggy says here, I have a Biblical example which I would like him to harmonize. Feel free to chime in, Steve, and tell me what you think.

    According to Genesis, God named both the male and the female Adam:

    "This is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created Adam, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Adam when they were created." Genesis 5:1-2 - cf. 1:26-27

    At the same time, however, the female is said to be the wife of Adam:

    "Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, "I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD" Genesis 4:1

    Moreover, the NT writers assume the numerical identity of the first male (m) with Adam (a) (cf. Romans 5:12-14; 1 Corinthians 15:20-23, 45-49; 1 Timothy 2:11-14). Therefore, employing Tuggy's reasoning we end up with the following dilemma If m=a, and not(m=f) then it can't be that f=a.

    In other words, employing Tuggy's logic leads us to conclude that the female cannot be Adam since she is distinguished from Adam, and Adam is identified as the male to whom Eve was married.

    Now, obviously, this would be nonsensical since the Bible authors affirm that Eve is both distinct from Adam (m) and identical with Adam.

    By the same token, the NT writers affirm that Jesus is both distinct from God (the Father) and identical with God (cf. John 1:1, 14, 18; 20:17, 28; Hebrews 1:8-9; Titus 2:11, 13-14).

    Can either Tuggy and Steve show me where I am wrong here.

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  3. "Adam" is a good example of the need to distinguish between common nouns ("Adam" in Gen 1) and proper nouns ("Adam" in Gen 2-3).

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  4. "persistent failure"

    Steve - yep. One of us is missing the point here. Let me again make clear that I accept that "the one true God" was a common idiom to refer to God. It matters not.

    Just imagine a context in which "the Greatest Ever" is standardly used to refer to Michael Jordan. I say "The Greatest Ever scored again." This statement has the same truth conditions, in a sense, means the same thing as "Michael Jordan scored again." But that I call him the Greatest Ever shows that I assume him to be, that is, to be identical to, the greatest pro basketball player to have ever played.

    So, your big point about the idiom is perfectly consistent with what I've said, in spelling out the obvious about John 17:3.

    "an idiom for prior choice"

    Sure, the ground of the foreknowledge. The point stands that 17:5 needn't imply literal pre-existence.

    "And John doesn’t say the Father is identical with God or Yahweh in contrast to the nonidentity of the Son with God or Yahweh."

    This is special pleading, since I've made that case that he does assume the = of g & f.

    "Rather, John posits an equivalence relation between the Father and God or Yahweh, but he also posits an equivalence relation between the Son and God or Yahweh. He does both."

    Really? Which equivalence relation did you have in mind? This is hand-waving, unless you pony up.

    "Why would you suggest a proper noun can only apply to one being?"

    Um... you need to slow down, friend, and read carefully.

    "exegetically unsound to isolate Jn 17:3 from other Johannine statements"

    Too much to go into all that in a thread. In your view, in some unclear sense John asserts Jesus' "deity". This can't mean or imply identity to God (as if to make this very point, John emphasizes qualitative differences between the two) - but then, what could it mean? Unitarians generally don't have a problem with John, who emphasizes the distinction between Jesus and God quite clearly. e.g. 20:17. There are a lot of issues here though; Buzzard would be a good place to start. Or the book One God and One Lord.

    "completing disregarding John’s incarnational Christology"

    No, I'm trying to hold to *John's* incarnational Christology, which is modeled on OT and Apocr. notions of the Law of God as it were traveling from heaven to make a home on earth.

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  5. "take your unitarian position for granted"

    Steve, I'm getting tired of these charges that I'm ignoring things. Please see my SEP entry, historical supplement on the Bible, in which I give very general analysis of all the main sorts of arguments which have been given for the "deity" of Jesus. That discussions points the way to what I think the weaknesses of these are.

    "John is folding Jesus into uniquely Yahwistic claims"

    Yeah, I see the influence of Bauckhaum here again.

    The argument seems to be

    Only YHWH could do/be F.
    Jesus is F.
    Therefore, Jesus = YHWH.

    A valid argument, to be sure, and one can must some support for each premise. But, for reasons I'm too tired to repeat, the conclusion is an uncharitable reading.

    Dale: "You grant that no NT author thinks f=s - they deny that. Well, they'd be pitifully confused if they also thought f = g and s = g. Do you see why?"

    Steve, what you say to this is not to the point. Above you suggest that it isn't = but rather some other relation that obtains between each of f & s and g. Say what it is, and then the business of comparing your readings with unitarians can START.

    "To begin with, logical identity is an abstract principle. It has no predictive power or directional force. It doesn’t tell you in advance how the principle applies to any specific case."

    I think you're not appreciating the fact that indisc. id. is a necessary truth.

    You throw a lot of bombs about my imagined philosophical and exegetical sins. But since we're comparing readings, what's most relevant is just that you supply the equivalence relation on which all your readings hang.

    "misses my point. If paradox is a common phenomenon "

    Oh, it's trouble in any field where we're seeking to have true beliefs, for the reasons I lay out.

    "Notice I didn’t say if the Trinity is paradoxical"

    Indeed, you really haven't said what you take "it" to be at all. This is a great strategy for avoiding refutation or self-induced implosion.

    "selective, one-sided appeal to some NT data to negate other NT data, even when you’re dealing with the same type of data"

    Steve, this is unkind. The data I think you refer to are that in some cases, both are called "YHWH" and that prophecies about YHHW are held to be fulfilled in Jesus. It's scurrilous to suggest that I ignore these, when I've fairly clearly explained how I understand them, in a way that does not pit them against other texts.

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  6. Sam, thanks for this interesting question.

    "employing Tuggy's reasoning we end up with the following dilemma If m=a, and not(m=f) then it can't be that f=a."

    No - sorry. We need to distingish the name "Adam" from the predicate "Man". (Hebr. word can mean either - depends on context.)

    In logic, we represent "Adam is a man" as Ma or M(a). The first man is a man could be Mm - but that wouldn't reveal that "the first man is a man" is trivial.

    It should rather be (x)((Mx & -Ey(My & E(y,x)) -> Mx)

    For any x, if x is a man and there's no earlier man (no y such that it is a man and y is earlier than x), then x is a man.

    So, "Adam is the first man" could be rendered a = m - but that wouldn't reveal it's deeper logical structure. More standardly, it would be something like: Ma & -Ey(My & E(y,a)) (Those E's should be backwards.) In English: Adam is a man, and there's no y such that it is a man and is earlier than Adam.

    If f refers to Eve, then we can be sure that (according to the texts) -(a=f), because in those texts some things are true of one that aren't true of the other. That is, they differ qualitatively.


    "In other words, employing Tuggy's logic leads us to conclude that the female cannot be Adam since she is distinguished from Adam, and Adam is identified as the male to whom Eve was married"

    Of course, the text asserts that Eve is a man (adam) in the generic sense of "man", i.e. a human being. That is: Mf. But it doesn't assert that she's Adam himself (i.e. f=a)

    It could be argued that there's a parallel to the Trinity here, but I don't think you've given it. A few fathers argue that just as -(a=f) yet Ma and Mf, so also we have -(f=s) yet Df and Ds. (Dx = x is divine) But note, this is all self-consistent. (There's a Platonic point in their use of this sort of example, but I'll leave that aside.)

    "By the same token, the NT writers affirm that Jesus is both distinct from God (the Father) and identical with God (cf. John 1:1, 14, 18; 20:17, 28; Hebrews 1:8-9; Titus 2:11, 13-14)."

    On your reading, the NT asserts

    -(j=g)
    and
    j=g

    Ouch! Back to the drawing board. :-) If this were another religion, our apologists would pounce all over this blatant and central of a contradiction, and righly so.

    Happily, there are many self-consistent ways around this. Bowman and Komo. wouldn't tell you what they are, though.

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  7. Sorry Dale, but your "reply" is not an answer which adequately addresses the issues. I am afraid that I am going to have to agree with Steve concerning the nature of your "replies."

    You say:

    No - sorry. We need to distingish [sic] the name "Adam" from the predicate "Man". (Hebr. word can mean either - depends on context.)

    Before I proceed to further show how and why you are being inconsistent, can you first explain what makes Adam a noun and why is this noun used for the first male? In other words, why is the first male's name Adam and what significance this has?

    You then say:

    On your reading, the NT asserts

    -(j=g)
    and
    j=g

    Ouch! Back to the drawing board. :-) If this were another religion, our apologists would pounce all over this blatant and central of a contradiction, and righly so.


    Sorry Dale, but this is not simply my reading. It is the sound exegesis of the texts which leads me to this conclusion. I can't help it if your unitarian assumption lead you to distort and twist these texts in such a way as to deny the plain and obvious reading of these verses.

    So I am going to have to say ouch right back at you for condemning the NT writers for being logically inconsistent. And here I thought you actually believed in the inspiration of the Holy Bible. However, it has become obvious that you value human reasoning above that of the God-breathed Scriptures. For that I have to say, double ouch!!!

    Moreover, besides equivocating on the word God, you again managed to show just how blatantly inconsistent you are at this point in your treatment of the word "God." However, I will explain why when you answer my question concerning Adam.

    This time, do try to be consistent when you do offer a response.

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  8. The 1st Day of Creation and John 1:1-5

    http://asimpleandspirituallife.blogspot.com/2010/08/let-there-be-light-john-11-5.html

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