F
FreeGrace
Guest
John 1:1 - The case of the missing article
John 1:1 - The case of the missing article...
I wish to apologize beforehand for those who hate seeing Greek arguments and lexical stuff. But in this instance, I don't see any any around it. Some (the NWT for e.g.) have claimed that John 1:1c says something that it simply does not.
BTW, the NET translation (found at http://www.bible.org), they have a translation note on John 1:1c which is excellent and part of my argument here.
Here's that NET note (with a few comments) on John 1:1. But 1st of all let me add that the NWT's handling of that text violates a basic understanding about the use of the article ("the") in Greek as well as an understanding about the predicate nominative structure. Here's the note. Sorry... it gets kinda technical->
NET footnote #3:
OK, those who oppose the translation here of "and the Word was God" argue that since THEOS ("God" or "god") in John 1:1c does not have the article it is referring to "a god" rather than "God."
What is the purpose of the article in Greek ("the")? In koine Greek it's different than in modern English. It had not long evolved from the demonstrative pronoun ("this"/"that") at that time. The purpose of the article was to "identify." ANY Greek grammar will tell you this. The focus is on identity when the article is used. But it is crucial that we realize that just because no article is used it does NOT mean that identity is not the focus. And we will see later that there is a very good reason why John could NOT use an article here grammatically. So he may well have intended identity without an article, as nearly every Bible translates this phrase. That is quite common in koine Greek.
In English, for example, we could say,
1 - "Don is the man."
2 - "Don is man."
3 - "Don is a man."
In # 1 above to say that would be to identify Don. "Which man were you referring to? Oh, the one with blue suade shoes? Well, Don is the man."
How about an elderlylady who didn't see too well. Don has fairly long hair. To her we might answer her question about his gender by, "Oh, Don is a man." That's # 3 above.
OK, say someone was being critical of how well Don was doing something. In defense we might answer that he was only human. We might say, "After all, Don is man." That would be#2 above.
OK, we have a problem in Greek. You see first of all, koine Greek does not have an indefinite article. An indefinite what you say? That is referring to "a"/"an." Also, the definite article ("the") had just recently evolved from the demonstrative promoun ("this"/"that") in koine Greek.
Hence the use of the article in Greek is much different than in English. Sometimes we need to just ignore the article. For example, it is often used before proper names. We wouldn't say, "The Dave is here." :roll: Other times one needs to be supplied in order for it to read right in English and not sound awkward.
But often the article is not used - purposely... to focus on quality. That's why Dr. Wallace above translates it as "what God was the Word was." IOW, is God holy? The Word is holy. Is God omnipotent? The Word is omnipotent...
Now I don't know how else to say it, but simply to say that the argument that a missing article in John befoe THEOS indicates that THEOS there does not refer to God is simply... wrong. That's a basic Greek misunderstanding. Don't know where such a crazy idea came from.
Now, how can I make this point clear? Well, how about if I find some examples in John in which find clearly "God" is intended, and where no article is used (called "anarthrous"). How far do we have to look? Not very far! It occurs a few more times in chapter 1 alone. Here's the really obvious ones:
John 1:6 - "There came a man sent from God, whose name was John." Here it says that John (the Baptizer) was sent from God... no article there. Let's see... when does THEOS appear again:
John 1:12 "But to all who received Him, who believed in His name, he gave the right to become children of God." You guessed it - no article. Oh, in vs. 13... no article either:
John 1:13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
Let's see, well then, when's the next time that "God" appears in this 1st chapter? Ahhh, not until vs. 18. That's the really clear one ->
John 1:18 No one has ever seen God. The only Son - the One who is at the Father's side - He has revealed Him.
Surely there's an article there, right? Wrong - no article.
So we can obviously conclude that the lack of an article does not mean that we should read a noun as "indefinite." Actually, if THEOS does not have an article, it can and often does still mean "God," not "a god." Such a conclusion cannot be denied by just looking in the immediate context alone.
Now to be fair, I should mention that John 1:1c has a special format - it's a "predicate nominative." That's where the NET note above explains the proper way to handle such so well.
But just think about that for a second. A predicate nominative has an equating verb joining two "nominative" case nouns (They're both the "subject."). Here's an example: "Bill is the doctor."
Now, in Greek, if you put the article before both "Bill" and "doctor," then the statement would have to be fully reversible. You see, word order is not significant in Greek as in English (except for emphasis).
So in our example we'd have to be able to say not only, "Bill is the doctor," but "the doctor is Bill." IOW, all doctors must be named Bill! Ludicrous. How do you make it clear that you only intend to go one way? You guessed it - by NOT putting an article (if this was in Greek) with "doctor."
Similarly, if there had been an article before "God" in John 1:1c then we'd have to also be able to say, "The Word was God," but also, "God was the Word." Or, as my 15 y.o. daughter said when she was 3 y.o., "Jesus is God and God is Jesus."
But you see, that's not true. That's essentially modalism. And no, I didn't correct my daughter, I was very impressed that she could express it the way she did.
BTW, in the Greek THEOS ("God") appears 1st... you guessed it - for emphasis. So if John wanted to emphasize that the Word was God, what would he do? Ah, he could put THEOS first in the clause, right? Guess what? That's what he did.
So then, one more grammatical point: since koine Greek does not have the indefinite article as there is in English ("a" - "an"), context tells you when it should be supplied. And since the context for John 1 is that this Word created the world and contains life in Himself... the context is clear that THEOS in John 1:1c without the article was referring to deity. There are actually 3 possibilities here then:
The Word was God - definite
The Word was a god - indefinite
The Word was God. ("divine") - quality
FYI, the NET Bible is an excellent resource, found at http://www.bible.org. Also, Dr. Wallace, the editor of the NET Bible is one of the foremost recognized Greek scholars in the world. He'd be on any short list of such. His Greek grammar textbook, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics is the #1 Greek grammar used for advanced Greek studies in seminaries in the US. The point is - he's no slouch.
Oh, BTW, modalism is when we say that there is but one God who appears in different forms or modes. In this instance, an article with THEOS would have forced the statement that God is Jesus as well as Jesus is God. But that is not sound trinitarian blblical truth. Hence, one thing we know, John could NOT have placed an article before THEOS. It woiuld have forced him to make an inaccurate statement about the Godhead.
A Greek writer can express the definite force unambiguously by placing the noun after the verb and dropping the article - as was done here. By doing that he is saying something like "the Word was divine," meaning that Jesus has the quality of God - He has the characteristics of God. In English that does not always get read as saying that Jesus was God in essence or quality, so it wouldn't be a good translation. It is similar to what Colossians 2:9 says, "And in Him the full nature of God's dwells bodily."
The fact that he can also place the anarthrous ("no article") noun prior to the verb, and when doing so, the result - more often than not - lays stress on the quality of the noun - is a rather clear GRAMMATICAL distinction. Such nouns can also - in some cases - convey a definite semantic nuance (that is, be semanticaly equivalent to having the article - hence this could simply mean "the Word was God."). Thus, we cannot assume that simply because the noun is anarthrous that it must be indefinite ("a god"). In fact, context will be the key.
So what is the context here?
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God..."
The Word was with God from the very beginning. The first words of John’s Gospel, “In the beginning … ,†bring to mind the account of creation in Genesis 1, and they were intended to do just that. This is not coincidence The phrase, “in the beginning,†in Greek as in English and is the same as in Genesis 1:1 (OT -Greek septuagint compared) and John 1:1. "In the beginning God …" John is doing virtually the same thing in the first two verses of this Gospel. You see, the terms "Messiah" ("Christ"), "Son of God," and "Jesus" are only appropriate when referring to our Lord after His incarnation. Our Lord has always existed as God, and He has always existed in oneness and fellowship with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit, but He did not become God incarnate (Jesus - in the flesh) until He was "born" as described in Matthew and Luke. IOW the Son was always God, but He BECAME man at a point in time in history.
In fact, here in John we see that John doesn't even mention Jesus by name for several vss., but instead refers to Him as "the Word." Because Jesus Christ was God's expression of Himself to the world. Jesus was born at a point in time. He became a man at a point in time in history. But He was ALWYS God... has always existed... is the self-existant One. That is clearly a point that the Holy Spirit is making here through John.
"All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being."
So the Word is the creator of all things.
"In Him was life and that life was the light of men."
So the Word (Jesus) is life to all men. He is the One who enlightens the world.
"The light shines in the darkness, yet the darkness has not overcome it."
His sovereignty is implied here.
The context is clearly of one who is God. How could John have made that more clear?
Hope this helps.
Thx,
FG
John 1:1 - The case of the missing article...
I wish to apologize beforehand for those who hate seeing Greek arguments and lexical stuff. But in this instance, I don't see any any around it. Some (the NWT for e.g.) have claimed that John 1:1c says something that it simply does not.
BTW, the NET translation (found at http://www.bible.org), they have a translation note on John 1:1c which is excellent and part of my argument here.
Here's that NET note (with a few comments) on John 1:1. But 1st of all let me add that the NWT's handling of that text violates a basic understanding about the use of the article ("the") in Greek as well as an understanding about the predicate nominative structure. Here's the note. Sorry... it gets kinda technical->
NET footnote #3:
OK, those who oppose the translation here of "and the Word was God" argue that since THEOS ("God" or "god") in John 1:1c does not have the article it is referring to "a god" rather than "God."
What is the purpose of the article in Greek ("the")? In koine Greek it's different than in modern English. It had not long evolved from the demonstrative pronoun ("this"/"that") at that time. The purpose of the article was to "identify." ANY Greek grammar will tell you this. The focus is on identity when the article is used. But it is crucial that we realize that just because no article is used it does NOT mean that identity is not the focus. And we will see later that there is a very good reason why John could NOT use an article here grammatically. So he may well have intended identity without an article, as nearly every Bible translates this phrase. That is quite common in koine Greek.
In English, for example, we could say,
1 - "Don is the man."
2 - "Don is man."
3 - "Don is a man."
In # 1 above to say that would be to identify Don. "Which man were you referring to? Oh, the one with blue suade shoes? Well, Don is the man."
How about an elderlylady who didn't see too well. Don has fairly long hair. To her we might answer her question about his gender by, "Oh, Don is a man." That's # 3 above.
OK, say someone was being critical of how well Don was doing something. In defense we might answer that he was only human. We might say, "After all, Don is man." That would be#2 above.
OK, we have a problem in Greek. You see first of all, koine Greek does not have an indefinite article. An indefinite what you say? That is referring to "a"/"an." Also, the definite article ("the") had just recently evolved from the demonstrative promoun ("this"/"that") in koine Greek.
Hence the use of the article in Greek is much different than in English. Sometimes we need to just ignore the article. For example, it is often used before proper names. We wouldn't say, "The Dave is here." :roll: Other times one needs to be supplied in order for it to read right in English and not sound awkward.
But often the article is not used - purposely... to focus on quality. That's why Dr. Wallace above translates it as "what God was the Word was." IOW, is God holy? The Word is holy. Is God omnipotent? The Word is omnipotent...
Now I don't know how else to say it, but simply to say that the argument that a missing article in John befoe THEOS indicates that THEOS there does not refer to God is simply... wrong. That's a basic Greek misunderstanding. Don't know where such a crazy idea came from.
Now, how can I make this point clear? Well, how about if I find some examples in John in which find clearly "God" is intended, and where no article is used (called "anarthrous"). How far do we have to look? Not very far! It occurs a few more times in chapter 1 alone. Here's the really obvious ones:
John 1:6 - "There came a man sent from God, whose name was John." Here it says that John (the Baptizer) was sent from God... no article there. Let's see... when does THEOS appear again:
John 1:12 "But to all who received Him, who believed in His name, he gave the right to become children of God." You guessed it - no article. Oh, in vs. 13... no article either:
John 1:13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
Let's see, well then, when's the next time that "God" appears in this 1st chapter? Ahhh, not until vs. 18. That's the really clear one ->
John 1:18 No one has ever seen God. The only Son - the One who is at the Father's side - He has revealed Him.
Surely there's an article there, right? Wrong - no article.
So we can obviously conclude that the lack of an article does not mean that we should read a noun as "indefinite." Actually, if THEOS does not have an article, it can and often does still mean "God," not "a god." Such a conclusion cannot be denied by just looking in the immediate context alone.
Now to be fair, I should mention that John 1:1c has a special format - it's a "predicate nominative." That's where the NET note above explains the proper way to handle such so well.
But just think about that for a second. A predicate nominative has an equating verb joining two "nominative" case nouns (They're both the "subject."). Here's an example: "Bill is the doctor."
Now, in Greek, if you put the article before both "Bill" and "doctor," then the statement would have to be fully reversible. You see, word order is not significant in Greek as in English (except for emphasis).
So in our example we'd have to be able to say not only, "Bill is the doctor," but "the doctor is Bill." IOW, all doctors must be named Bill! Ludicrous. How do you make it clear that you only intend to go one way? You guessed it - by NOT putting an article (if this was in Greek) with "doctor."
Similarly, if there had been an article before "God" in John 1:1c then we'd have to also be able to say, "The Word was God," but also, "God was the Word." Or, as my 15 y.o. daughter said when she was 3 y.o., "Jesus is God and God is Jesus."
But you see, that's not true. That's essentially modalism. And no, I didn't correct my daughter, I was very impressed that she could express it the way she did.
BTW, in the Greek THEOS ("God") appears 1st... you guessed it - for emphasis. So if John wanted to emphasize that the Word was God, what would he do? Ah, he could put THEOS first in the clause, right? Guess what? That's what he did.
So then, one more grammatical point: since koine Greek does not have the indefinite article as there is in English ("a" - "an"), context tells you when it should be supplied. And since the context for John 1 is that this Word created the world and contains life in Himself... the context is clear that THEOS in John 1:1c without the article was referring to deity. There are actually 3 possibilities here then:
The Word was God - definite
The Word was a god - indefinite
The Word was God. ("divine") - quality
FYI, the NET Bible is an excellent resource, found at http://www.bible.org. Also, Dr. Wallace, the editor of the NET Bible is one of the foremost recognized Greek scholars in the world. He'd be on any short list of such. His Greek grammar textbook, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics is the #1 Greek grammar used for advanced Greek studies in seminaries in the US. The point is - he's no slouch.
Oh, BTW, modalism is when we say that there is but one God who appears in different forms or modes. In this instance, an article with THEOS would have forced the statement that God is Jesus as well as Jesus is God. But that is not sound trinitarian blblical truth. Hence, one thing we know, John could NOT have placed an article before THEOS. It woiuld have forced him to make an inaccurate statement about the Godhead.
A Greek writer can express the definite force unambiguously by placing the noun after the verb and dropping the article - as was done here. By doing that he is saying something like "the Word was divine," meaning that Jesus has the quality of God - He has the characteristics of God. In English that does not always get read as saying that Jesus was God in essence or quality, so it wouldn't be a good translation. It is similar to what Colossians 2:9 says, "And in Him the full nature of God's dwells bodily."
The fact that he can also place the anarthrous ("no article") noun prior to the verb, and when doing so, the result - more often than not - lays stress on the quality of the noun - is a rather clear GRAMMATICAL distinction. Such nouns can also - in some cases - convey a definite semantic nuance (that is, be semanticaly equivalent to having the article - hence this could simply mean "the Word was God."). Thus, we cannot assume that simply because the noun is anarthrous that it must be indefinite ("a god"). In fact, context will be the key.
So what is the context here?
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God..."
The Word was with God from the very beginning. The first words of John’s Gospel, “In the beginning … ,†bring to mind the account of creation in Genesis 1, and they were intended to do just that. This is not coincidence The phrase, “in the beginning,†in Greek as in English and is the same as in Genesis 1:1 (OT -Greek septuagint compared) and John 1:1. "In the beginning God …" John is doing virtually the same thing in the first two verses of this Gospel. You see, the terms "Messiah" ("Christ"), "Son of God," and "Jesus" are only appropriate when referring to our Lord after His incarnation. Our Lord has always existed as God, and He has always existed in oneness and fellowship with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit, but He did not become God incarnate (Jesus - in the flesh) until He was "born" as described in Matthew and Luke. IOW the Son was always God, but He BECAME man at a point in time in history.
In fact, here in John we see that John doesn't even mention Jesus by name for several vss., but instead refers to Him as "the Word." Because Jesus Christ was God's expression of Himself to the world. Jesus was born at a point in time. He became a man at a point in time in history. But He was ALWYS God... has always existed... is the self-existant One. That is clearly a point that the Holy Spirit is making here through John.
"All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being."
So the Word is the creator of all things.
"In Him was life and that life was the light of men."
So the Word (Jesus) is life to all men. He is the One who enlightens the world.
"The light shines in the darkness, yet the darkness has not overcome it."
His sovereignty is implied here.
The context is clearly of one who is God. How could John have made that more clear?
Hope this helps.
Thx,
FG
