Many of us, Christian apologists, talk to unitarians every day, whether it be Jews, Muslims or even Unitarians that claim to be Christians. With that said we must be able to, at all times and in all places, provide a coherent response to anyone who denies the Biblical Doctrines, one of them being The Divinity of Christ.
In this post, I will take a look at the standard unitarian prooftext, John 17:3.Every single one of us has heard a Jehovah’s Witness try to say that John 17:3 destroys the Trinitarian position. But is that really so? Well, let’s take a look at it.
John 17:3:
“And this is eternal life: to know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent” —Jesus the Messiah. John 17:3 (ISV)
Now our dear unitarian friends will obviously jump on it and say that we are done, but that is indeed not so. In our Trinitarian Theology The Father is indeed The Only True God, so is The Son, and The Spirit! Jesus can easily say that Father is The Only True God yet not deny his divinity for The Son is THE SAME GOD as the Father! So in saying that The Father is The Only True God, Jesus is in fact, affirming HIS OWN divinity for he is the same God as The Father! Now our dear unitarian friends are also know for detailed eisegesis and out of context interpretation, so let’s see the context of verse 3! Verses 1-4(every verse quoted in this article is from the ISV):
After Jesus had said this, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, so that the Son may glorify you. For you have given him authority over all humanity so that he might give eternal life to all those you gave him. And this is eternal life: to know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent—Jesus the Messiah. I glorified you on earth by completing the task you gave me to do. Verse 5-“So now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world existed.
Now looking at these verses, tell me, which created creature can speak to God like that? I have glorified you, now you glorify me? The answer is simple, there is no such creature. Christ is not a creature. He is the Eternal One, as per John 17:5!
John 17:5 makes it clear that Jesus had the glory, with the Father, before the world even existed. The Expositor’s Greek New Testament puts it greatly:
“The precise character of the glorification He looks for is here presented. It is παρὰ σεαυτῷ, and it is a restoration to the glory He had enjoyed πρὸ τοῦ τὸν κόσμον εἶναι. By παρὰ σεαυτῷ it is *rendered impossible to understand παρὰ σοί of an “ideal” pre-existence;* because these two expressions are here *equivalents*, and Christ *cannot be supposed* to have prayed for an “ideal” glory when He asked that God would glorify Him παρὰ σεαυτῷ. “There is, consequently, here, as in John 6:62, John 8:58, a continuity of the consciousness of the historical Christ with the Logos.”
Furthermore, we shall demonstrate from another writing of John, namely 1 John 5:20,that Christ is indeed THE ONLY TRUE GOD!
1 John 5:20:
“We also know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know the true God. We are in union with the one who is true, his Son Jesus the Messiah, who is the true God and eternal life”. 1 John 5:20(ISV)
Now again, even tho clearly here THE SON is referred to as The True God, our unitarian friends would try to deny it so let’s just have fun with refuting their eisegesis. First of all, the nearest antecedent to God is Jesus Christ, that alone should get our unitarian friends to drop their eisegetical practices,however, most of them don’t, so let’s put a nail in the coffin of the unitarian interpretation here, that The True God, in fact DOES NOT refer to Christ. John is creating an inclusio here,
1 John 1:1-2 <(inclusio)> 1 John 5:20-21
What is inclusio now? In biblical studies, inclusio is a literary device based on a concentric principle, also known as bracketing or an envelope structure, which consists of creating a frame by placing similar or same (repeated) material at the beginning and end of a section. What existed from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we observed and touched with our own hands—this is the Word of life! This life was revealed to us, and we have seen it and testify about it. We declare to you this eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us. 1 John 1:1-2
Now we see that Christ,The Word is declared to be THE ETERNAL LIFE at the BEGINNING of the Epistle to prove that is the case at the end of the epistle and to prove that indeed John is creating an inclusio here,just as he did previously – John 1:1 <(inclusio)> John 1:18 – we are going to quote Prof. Stuart’s Letters to Dr. Channing, p. 83. It says:”There is no instance in the writings of John, in which the appellation life, and “eternal” life is bestowed upon the Father, to designate him as the author of spiritual and eternal life; and as this occurs so frequently in John’s writings as applied to Christ, the *laws of exegesis require* that both the phrase “the true God,” and “eternal life,” should be applied to him.”
So what do we have here? Well,the phrase True God and The Eternal Life have to be referring to Christ for the title “eternal life” is only used of HIM when talking about a person,if we affirm that,as there is no way around it,then clearly the inclusio here is affirmed and indeed Christ is The True God!
Christ is affirmed to be THE ETERNAL LIFE at the very BEGINNING of the Epistle and at its very END,A PERFECT INCLUSIO! So not only does John 17 itself prove that Christ preexisted all of creation,all of the world,but when taking into account all the writings of John,he is declared to be The True God himself! I have never met a unitarian who has been able to respond to this argumentation.
Use this,my brothers in Christ,to spread the message of salvation to our unitarian brothers in humanity,everyone needs Christ,so do they!
A Response to Trinitarian Claims on John 17:5, John 17:3 and 1 John 5:20
A really quick response to Vladimir Susic’s article on Pastor Boshoff’s Ad Lucem website.
Vladimir Susic wanted to show the Trinitarian viewpoint behind an oft-used text by Unitarian Christians. John 17:3 seems straight forward enough in showing Jesus not to be divine and disproving the Trinity idea.
Vladmir offers a Trinitarian response. I skimmed through his response. I don’t think his Trinitarian response is convincing.
Vladimir writes:
John 17:3:
“And this is eternal life: to know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent” —Jesus the Messiah. John 17:3 (ISV)
Now our dear unitarian friends will obviously jump on it and say that we are done, but that is indeed not so. In our Trinitarian Theology The Father is indeed The Only True God, so is The Son, and The Spirit! Jesus can easily say that Father is The Only True God yet not deny his divinity for The Son is THE SAME GOD as the Father! So in saying that The Father is The Only True God, Jesus is in fact, affirming HIS OWN divinity for he is the same God as The Father!
Vladimir is insisting John 17:3 fits into a Trinitarian framework. I think the reasoning he gives here is flawed and it opens Vladimir and other Trinitarians to the charge of making Jesus out to be a bad communicator. If I say David is the only true manager, what does that mean? Does it mean, I’m a manager on par to David too? Nope, I’ve excluded myself from being a true manager. So why is Vladimir overlooking the word ‘only’ here?
Just read Vladimir’s reasoning and ask yourself, is it convincing?
Vladimir wants to appeal to the context of John 17:3 but we should ask ourselves, is this not a standalone teaching? Not every teaching needs to be contexualised. Theological statements are stand-alone. For example, the Jews would point to the Shema (Deut 6:4) and verses such as ‘Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me,’ [Isaiah 46:9] for their theology concerning God.
The Jews won’t be talking about context here. Why is Vladimir appealing to context here? Simple, he has his motivations as a Trinitarian. He’s reading catholic tradition into the text. Catholic with a small ‘c’ as Dr Dale Tuggy would say.
Vladimir’s appeal to context hinges on John 17:5 where Jesus is asking the Father to glorify him. For Vladimir and other Trinitarians this is a big deal. They use this text to claim Jesus is equal to the Father – that’s to say he is God. It’s a big leap of faith. Vladimir and other Trinitarians stop short here but what about others who are given glory according to writing attributed to John? In John 17:22 the glory is given to others so it’s problematic for Trinitarians to use this type of argumentation to support the idea Jesus is the same substance as God.
There are other verses in John which cause further problems with the Trinitarian stance
John 14:28 teaches Jesus is lesser than the Father
“You heard me say, ‘I am going away and I am coming back to you.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.
In John 20:17 Jesus affirms he has a God
Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'”
What about Paul here?
Going back to John 17:3, the Trinitarians have another problem here in the form of Paul. Paul seems to repeat the same belief of the Father being the only God in 1 Cor 8:6. This is further supported in 11:3 in the same book.
1 Corinthians 11:3 teaches that Jesus is subordinate to God
But I want you to realize that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God.
1 Corinthians 8:6 teaches only the Father is God
yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.
I’d ask Vladimir and Trinitarian Christians to reflect on this information. Also pray about this to God Almighty. How can one love God with all their heart and mind if that love is being shared 3-ways when in reality it should be solely focussed on the One who created us all. The God of Jesus, Muhammad, Moses and Abraham (pbut). God Almighty.
Trinitarians and 1 John 5:20
Vladimir Susic then moves to 1 John 5:20 and argues this is calling Jesus the ‘true God’. I don’t find this convincing either. I would like to state, this does not seem to be a common Trinitarian argument. Perhaps I’m wrong. Vladimir, genuine question; do you have any audio or video of a Trinitarian scholar making this claim concerning 1 John 5:20? I have Dr James R White in mind here, has he made this argument before, do you know? If he has please link me to it. If not, why not? Thanks.
1 John 5:20:
“We also know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know the true God. We are in union with the one who is true, his Son Jesus the Messiah, who is the true God and eternal life”. 1 John 5:20(ISV)
Vladimir contends Jesus, and not the Father, is being called the true God here. This type of argument does not work in English either. It’s not convincing. Come on Vladimir, it says at the beginning Jesus came so people can know the true God; it’s suggesting Jesus and the true God are distinct beings. Here’s a video arguing responding to the Trinitarian efforts and arguing it’s the Father who is described as the true God.
Watch the video folks, he does a good job in breaking it down
Conclusion
Do you ever wonder why the Trinity is not explictly taught in the New Testament? If Jesus wanted us to believe in the Trinity, don’t you not think he would have just taught directly? Ponder upon it.
Comment from Valdimir:
A Response to Yahya Snow’s attempts to undermine the Divinity of Christ in John 17 and 1 John
Salam Al Masih,Rabb il Muslimeen
Our dear muslim friend Yahya Snow,claims to have responded to and refuted my article,that can be found here: https://adlucem.co/1319-2/ and his response can be found here: http://thefactsaboutislam.blogspot.co.uk/2016/03/a-response-to-trinitarian-claims-on.html
Now first off I want to note how our dear friend,Yahya completely chopped off half of my argument on 1 John 5:20,he conveniently did not include it in his article, but more on that later.
He writes: ” Vladimir is insisting John 17:3 fits into a Trinitarian framework. I think the reasoning he gives here is flawed and it opens Vladimir and other Trinitarians to the charge of making Jesus out to be a bad communicator. If I say David is the only true manager, what does that mean? Does it mean, I’m a manager on par to David too? Nope, I’ve excluded myself from being a true manager. So why is Vladimir overlooking the word ‘only’ here?”
If you say that David is the only true manager and you are the same being that David is (ie. You share the same nature as David) than you would not be excluded from the title of “The Only True Manager”. Jesus is very clear,he has made it clear in the previous chapters of John that he is The Almighty God and that there is only and exactly ONE GOD! And also that he is one with The Father,so clearly,by claiming that Father is the only true God,Jesus is in no way confusing us for he has made it clear that he is one God with the Father and thus this claim of his,that the Father is the Only True God in no way excludes him from the title. Moreover,he clears any possible misunderstandings in the verse 5.
Now about the verse 5,our dear friend Yahya writes:
” Vladimir’s appeal to context hinges on John 17:5 where Jesus is asking the Father to glorify him. For Vladimir and other Trinitarians this is a big deal. They use this text to claim Jesus is equal to the Father – that’s to say he is God. It’s a big leap of faith. Vladimir and other Trinitarians stop short here but what about others who are given glory according to writing attributed to John? In John 17:22 the glory is given to others so it’s problematic for Trinitarians to use this type of argumentation to support the idea Jesus is the same substance as God.”
This is a very,very poor strawman argument from our dear muslim friend.
There are many interpretations on what this glory is in John 17:5,22,however I won’t go into that since that IS NOT MY ARGUMENT. I am not arguing that Jesus is God for he receives glory here,rather I am arguing that he is ETERNAL for he has had this glory,whatever it may be,BEFORE THE WORLD WAS,and clearly our dear friend Yahya cannot argue that he misunderstood me for I clearly quoted an argument from Expositors Greek New Testament which goes on into why this preexistence cannot be ideal,but must be full,personal preexistence of our Lord Jesus.-“The precise character of the glorification He looks for is here presented. It is παρὰ σεαυτῷ, and it is a restoration to the glory He had enjoyed πρὸ τοῦ τὸν κόσμον εἶναι. By παρὰ σεαυτῷ it is *rendered impossible to understand παρὰ σοί of an “ideal” pre-existence;* because these two expressions are here *equivalents*, and Christ *cannot be supposed* to have prayed for an “ideal” glory when He asked that God would glorify Him παρὰ σεαυτῷ. “There is, consequently, here, as in John 6:62, John 8:58, a continuity of the consciousness of the historical Christ with the Logos.”
In the next section of his article,our dear friend Yahya makes some very,very big mistakes in trying to eisegete the texts of 1 Corinthians 8:6,11:3 and John 14:28,20:17.
Let’s get down to business.-1 Corinthians 8:6-ISV yet for us there is only one God, the Father, from whom everything came into being and for whom we live. And there is only one Lord, Jesus the Messiah, through whom everything came into being and through whom we live.
If our dear friend Yahya wants to claim that the text of 1 Corinthians 8:6 in saying that the Father is The Only One God,excludes the Son from being that one God then he should be consistent and argue that Jesus being the Only One Lord,excludes the FATHER from being the One Lord! But wait,Father is said to be One Lord in Ephesians 4,and all over the OT,hmm,our muslim friends have a problem here. Obviously the solution is simple. Father and The Son are one,they are one God,so by saying that The Father is The Only God,The Son is not excluded from this title,for indeed he is the same God. The same way with Only Lord,the Father is not excluded from the title for he is indeed,the same Lord as Jesus.(in nature of course,that should be clear,not in person)
Now what also should be clear is that Paul is expanding the Shema here.
As Richard Bauckham notes:
Paul has reproduced all the words of the statement about YHWH in the Shema…but Paul has rearranged the words in such as way as to produce an affirmation of both one God, the Father, and one Lord, Jesus Christ. It should be quite clear that Paul is including the Lord Jesus Christ in the unique divine identity. He is defining monotheism as christological monotheism. If he were understood as adding the one Lord to the one God of whom the Shema speaks, from the perspective of Jewish monotheism, he would certainly be producing not christological monotheism but outright ditheism (Bauckham, p. 38).
Paul has defined the “God” of the Shema as “One God, the Father,” and the “Lord” of the Shema as “One Lord, Jesus Christ.” As the context is that of religious devotion (whether eating food sacrificed to idols was acceptable or not) and the distinction between pagan deities on the one hand, and God the Father and Jesus Christ on the other, Paul’s appeal to the Shema as a proclamation of how the God of Israel was unique is understandable. What was unprecedented was his inclusion of Jesus in the formula – again it must be stressed in the context of devotion – which could only mean that the Lord God (YHWH) was now to be perceived as including both the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Other scholars who have written on Paul’s reliance on the Shema in this verse include: F.F. Bruce, 1 and 2 Corinthians; D. R. de Lacey, “‘One Lord’ in Pauline Christology,” in H. H. Rowden, ed., Christ the Lord; J. D. G. Dunn, Christology (though Dunn draws a somewhat different conclusion); L. Hurtado, One God, One Lord and At the Origin of Christian Worship; N. T. Wright, The Climax of the Covenant and What St. Paul Really Said; D. A. Hagner, “Paul’s Christology and Jewish Monotheism” in M. Shuster and R. Muller ed., Perspectives on Christology; N. Richardson, Paul’s Language about God; B. Witherington, Jesus the Sage; P. Rainbow, “Monotheism and Christology in 1 Corinthians 8:4-6 [unpublished D.Phil. Thesis, Oxford University]; W. A. Elwell, “The Deity of Christ in the Writings of Paul,” in Hawthorne, ed., Current Issues in Biblical and Patristic Interpretation.
ALL ÊMIN EIS THEOS hO PATÊR, EX OU TA PANTA KAI hMEIS EIS AUTON, KAI EIS KURIOS IÊSOUS XRISTOS, DI OU TA PANTA KAI hMEIS DI AUTOU
ALLA: This conjunction sets up a strong contrast with the LEGOMENOI THEOI (so-called gods) of the preceding verse. Both the Father and Son form the compound subject (nominatives) as contrasted over against the false deities of paganism. Note the triple contrast Paul makes. First he contrasts the Father and Son against the “so-called gods” with LEGOMENOI and ALLA ÊMIN. Then he separates both the Father and Son from “all things [PANTA]” by priority of existence, but note the different prepositional relationship between the Father and “all things” (out of EK), and between the Lord Jesus and “all things (through DIA)”, thereby Paul maintains a personal distinction within the Godhead. (Ray Goldsmith)
It is rather clear,so the text you tried to use,my dear friend,as a refutation to my argument,actually,beyond a shadow of a doubt,teaches the pure divinity of Christ.
Jesus can have a god over himself for he is a man also,and every man has his God,so John 20:17 and in no way shows that he is not God,rather that he is a man also.
As for 1 Cor. 11:3
Christ is equal in nature, but Christ submitted Himself to the Father. Here the principle of headship and submission established by God is displayed both in marriage and in the Trinity. Now my muslim friends, the head of the woman is man. “Does this mean that the husband is a superior being to his wife?” The answer is obviously, “No.” The husband is greater than his wife by way of position but not by nature. The same applies to the Father and the Son. The Father is greater by position, but not better by nature.
Since the Father and The Son always perfectly agree and the Son does all that the Father does (John 5:19) we Trinitarians face absolutely no problems here.
In John 14:28 it says:
“You heard that I said to you, ‘I go away, and I will come to you ‘ If you loved Me, you would have rejoiced because I go to the Father, for the Father is greater (meizon) than I.”
Let us deal with what Jesus intended to convey to his disciples that the Father was greater than he. In the first place, the term for “greater” (Greek – meizon) does not necessarily imply one who is greater in nature or essence. It can refer to someone or something being greater in position and/or authority, just as the following passages show:
“I tell you the truth: Among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater (meizon) than John the Baptist; yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.” Matthew 11:11
John being greater than all those born of women does not imply that the rest were less human than John, or that they were inferior to John in nature. Here, the term must mean that John was greater in position and rank.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater (meizon) than his master, nor is one who is sent greater (meizon) than the one who sent him.” John 13:16
Both the slave and the one sent are just as human as the master and the sender, having the same human essence and nature that the master and sender have. Thus, greater here must mean in position and authority, not in essence and nature.
“I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater (meizona) things than these, because I am going to the Father.” John 14:12
Jesus’ disciples did not perform better works, but performed a greater number of works than Christ since they reached far more people than Jesus did while he was on earth. Hence, the term “greater” refers to quantity, the amount of works, as opposed to quality since the disciples performed the same type of works but in far greater number.
Now let’s address your dishonesty Yahya,I gave a link to my article in the top of this page,anyone can clearly see that you ignored the bulk of my argument on 1 John 5:20 so let’s first wreck your dear unitarian friend,TD’s response to the nearest antecedent argument and then again,represent my argument for you did not refute it,nor has any unitarian ever managed to,which further proves the concluding remarks in my article.
First TD argues that Christ must be satan if we use this argument as stated in his video. However that is purely delusional,if the context to which something is referred is clear than this argument cannot be applied,however if it is not clear to whom something is addressed,the writer most likely is addressing the last mentioned person,thus we use the nearest antecedent. This is just basic interpretation rules. And yes TD,the word “This” would be the nearest antecedent,your wild imagination is not accepted as grammatical rules,let’s look at some examples of the nearest antecedent.
1.-Willy- said *he* likes chocolate. ——-Willy is the nearest antecedent to he,so this most clearly he refers to Willy.
2.Mark,truly does play football well. John scored 5 goals in 2 matches. This is a true football player. Most clearly,*This* refers to John.
Now I think TD argues that Christ came to reveal the Father (John 1:18) MOST CERTAINLY TD! And tell me,in John 1:18,who is proclaimed to be the monogenes theos? Aha,Jesus! So Jesus,who is the unique God also reveals to us God the Father. Perfect! So Jesus,again,says that The Son is the True God here,the true God reveals the True God,perfect,2 powers in heaven,Jewish,pre-Christian concept,perfectly reflected in both John 1:18 and in 1 John 5:20. Both are proclaimed to be God,so no,in no way does this prove your position,yes,The Son reveals this true God,but he is God himself also,thus this can be referring to him. Now let’s put the unitarian position into its grave,where it belongs,and restate my argument that no unitarian dares to address.
Now my main argument:It is much different,actually,I wrote only one sentence about the nearest antecedent and our dear friend Yahya,correctly concluding that he could not refute the second argument,tried to divert all the attention to the first one.
Here we go,I will quote my main argument again,this is copy-paste from my article,let’s hope that our dear unitarian friends will gather some courage to admit that they are WRONG,and accept Christ as their True God and savior who loves them so much that he came to die for them!
1 John 5:20:
“We also know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding so that we may know the true God. We are in union with the one who is true, his Son Jesus the Messiah, who is the true God and eternal life”. 1 John 5:20(ISV)
Now again, even tho clearly here THE SON is referred to as The True God, our unitarian friends would try to deny it so let’s just have fun with refuting their eisegesis. First of all, the nearest antecedent to God is Jesus Christ, that alone should get our unitarian friends to drop their eisegetical practices,however, most of them don’t, so let’s put a nail in the coffin of the unitarian interpretation here, that The True God, in fact DOES NOT refer to Christ. John is creating an inclusio here,
1 John 1:1-2 <(inclusio)> 1 John 5:20-21
What is inclusio now? In biblical studies, inclusio is a literary device based on a concentric principle, also known as bracketing or an envelope structure, which consists of creating a frame by placing similar or same (repeated) material at the beginning and end of a section.
What existed from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we observed and touched with our own hands—this is the Word of life! This life was revealed to us, and we have seen it and testify about it. We declare to you this eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us. 1 John 1:1-2
Now we see that Christ,The Word is declared to be THE ETERNAL LIFE at the BEGINNING of the Epistle, to prove that is the case at the end of the epistle and to prove that indeed John is creating an inclusio here,just as he did previously – John 1:1 <(inclusio)> John 1:18 – we are going to quote Prof. Stuart’s Letters to Dr. Channing, p. 83. It says:”There is no instance in the writings of John, in which the appellation life, and “eternal” life is bestowed upon the Father, to designate him as the author of spiritual and eternal life; and as this occurs so frequently in John’s writings as applied to Christ, the *laws of exegesis require* that both the phrase “the true God,” and “eternal life,” should be applied to him.”
So what do we have here? Well,the phrase True God and The Eternal Life have to be referring to Christ for the title “eternal life” is only used of HIM when talking about a person,if we affirm that,as there is no way around it,then clearly the inclusio here is affirmed and indeed Christ is The True God!
Christ is affirmed to be THE ETERNAL LIFE at the very BEGINNING of the Epistle and at its very END,A PERFECT INCLUSIO! So not only does John 17 itself prove that Christ preexisted all of creation,all of the world,but when taking into account all the writings of John,he is declared to be The True God himself! I have never met a unitarian who has been able to respond to this argumentation.”
God bless you brothers,may our unitarian friends,know The True God and Eternal Life,Jesus Christ our Lord!
Special thanks to Answering-Islam.org and ForAnAnswer.org!
Answering John 1:1 . – Answering Christianity
www.answering-christianity.com/
john1_…
17 Nov 1996 … John 1:1 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God was with …