John 1:1 Perspectives from Other New Testament Authors

The crux of how the New Testament authors viewed the two Gods of John 1:1 really centers around an understanding of the hymn in Phil 2:5-11 which ends with the following: "That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."


What we have here is a clear distinction between the Lord Jesus Christ and God the Father.  The question at this point becomes, can we tell from the New Testament authors whether they identified Christ and God the Father as Yahweh and El Elyon, respectively, as was the case with both John the Beloved and the early Christian authors already examined.  As was mentioned previously, in the Greek texts, 'Lord' is translated from 'kyrios.'  To restate the question, what did the New Testament authors mean when they identified Jesus with the word kyrios.  To begin to answer this, one could examine the way in which the Hebrew Bible was translated into the Septuagint, which was a Greek translation.  The Septuagint most commonly translates Yahweh as kyrios (Lord) or ho kyrios (the Lord).  The title most commonly used for Yahweh in the Old Testament became that of Jesus in the New. 


Yahweh was one of the sons of El Elyon; and Jesus in the Gospels was described as a Son of El Elyon, God Most High. In other words he was described as a heavenly being. Thus the annunciation narrative has the term "son of the Most High" (Luke 1.32) and the demoniac recognized his exorcist as "son of the Most High God" (Mark 5.7). Jesus is not called the son of Yahweh nor the son of the Lord, but he is called Lord. We also know that New Testament authors translated the name Yahweh by Kyrios, Lord. (See, for example, the quotation from Deuteronomy 6.5: "You shall love Yahweh your God..." which is rendered in Luke 10.27 "You shall love the Lord [Kyrios] your God.") This suggests that the Gospel writers, in using the terms "Lord" and "son of God Most High", gave Jesus their version of the sacred name Yahweh.


Linguistics aside, there is further evidence that the New Testament authors viewed Jesus as Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, just as the post-apostolic writers had.  Return to the psalm in Phil 2:5-11 and compare it to the language of Isaiah 45:23 in which Yahweh is speaking and says: “That unto me every knee shall bow and every tongue confess.”  Phillipians is equating Jesus with Yahweh.  It is very common for Paul to quote the Old Testament Yahweh texts to describe Jesus.  For example:

·         Everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord (Rom 10:13) was originally said of Yahweh (Joel 2:32).

·         Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not reckon his sin (Rom 4:8) was originally said of Yahweh (Ps 32:2)

·         When he ascended on high he led a host of captives (Eph 4:8) was originally a description of Yahweh’s appearance in his holy place and then returning to heaven (Ps 68:18)

·         He wrote of Christ being present with the Israelites as they wandered in the wilderness (1 Cor 10:1-11).  In the Song of Moses (Deut 32) the Rock is one of the titles of Yahweh.

·         In Romans 10 he quotes Isaiah a number of times to demonstrate that the past rejection of Yahweh had been repeated in their present rejection of Jesus.

Also within the New Testament, the phrases 'Our God and Saviour Jesus Christ' and 'Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ' are interchangeable.  Even the term 'Saviour' is a title reserved within the Old Testament for Yahweh.  In the Old Testament, Yahweh was the Saviour.  The saving actions of Yahweh is its theme.  The psalmist’s most frequent prayer was ‘Yahweh save me.’ A major theme of the prophets was that Yahweh was Israel’s Saviour.  In Isaiah, the Saviour was Yahweh the King.  Likewise, Jesus was recognized as the Saviour.  The name itself was associated with the prophecy in Matthew 1: 21-23: “And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins….and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.”  Christ was expected to save.  Speeches attributed to Peter and Paul in Acts say that Jesus was the Saviour.  Then, demonstrating once again the distinction between Yahweh and God Most High, John 4:14 makes it clear that it was the Father who sent the Son as Saviour, yet Titus indicates that the Saviour was also known as God.  The teachings are clear.  It was Yahweh, the Lord Jesus Christ and Son of Elyon who had come to be the Saviour of his people. 

I think most interesting, however, are the 'Son of Man' sayings.  Son of Man was a title referring to the manifested second God, tied closely to but not limited in scope to the vision of Daniel 7.  In Daniel, the Son of Man had risen on the clouds of heaven and received the kingdom from the Ancient of Days, a tradition reminiscent of El.  In 2 Esdras, he had risen from the sea, destroyed the wicked with his fiery breath and had been named as the hidden son of God Most High.  Several passages from the Gospels are based upon these references:

• The Son of Man comes on the clouds (Matt 24:30, 26:64 and Mark 13:26 and 14:62)
• The Son of Man is enthroned (Mat 19:28, 25:31)
• The Son of Man is the heavenly judge (Mat 25:32)
• The Son of Man comes with his holy angels (Matt 16:27, 25:31, Mark 8:38 and Luke 9:26)
• The Son of Man sends his agents of judgement (Matt 13:41, 24:31 and Mark 13:27)

Parallel sayings also illuminate who the Son of Man refers to.  The Kingdom of God (Mark 9:1) is also known as the Kingdom of the Son of Man (Matt 16:28).  The Son of Man has a Day like the Day of Yahweh.  The time of the Day of the Son of Man is not known, but it will come like a thief in the night (Matt 24:43, Luke 12:39), and the same is said regarding the coming of the Day of the Lord (1 Thess 5:2) and of the time of the coming of Jesus (Rev 3:3, 16:14015).  It would be very difficult to argue that the Day of the Lord, the Day of the Son of Man and the coming of Jesus were not identical, especially since the Day of the Son of Man is described using Old Testament language also descriptive of the Day of Yahweh (Isaiah 13:10, Ezek 32:7, Joel 2:10-11 and Zeph 1:14-16).  The obvious reason would be that they are describing the same event.

Furthermore, the coming of the Son of Man resembles closely the coming of Yahweh for the judgement as described in Deut 32, Zech 14:5 and Hab 3.  It is also depicted in 1 Enoch 1, which is referenced by Jude.  The events are consistent.  The Son of Man comes with his angels and takes his place on the throne as judge.  He is the King acting for another whom he names as his Father (Matt 25:34).  All of these encompass the role of Yahweh the King of Kings, equating Him within Christianity as the Son of Man. 

Within his own Gospel, John expands a bit upon the Son of Man relative to the synoptic Gospels, adding elements beyond those linked to the vision in Daniel.  John's Son of Man comes from heaven (3:13) and will return there (6:62).  He is the viceregent (5:25-27) and the angels of God will descend on him as they did on Yahweh when he appeared to Jacob at Bethel.  The total picture of Jesus in John's Gospel is consistent with the earlier exposition of John 1:1.  Here are a few more examples from John's Gospel on this point:

• He shared the Father's glory (17:5)
• The second God had come from heaven (3:13, 6:38, 8:23)
• He had been in the Father's bosom (1:18)
• He alone had seen the Father. The prophets had not heard the Father's voice or seen his form (5:37)
• The one represented in the scriptures had been the Yahweh, the second God.  'They bear witness to me.' (5:39)
• If you believed in Moses you would believe in me, for he wrote of me (Yahweh) (5:46)
• He it was whom Abraham had known (8:56-8)
• He was the one Isaiah had seen enthroned in the temple (Isaiah 12:41)

There are more, but I think this will suffice to demonstrate the point.  The language of the New Testament bears constant witness that Jesus was believed to by Yahweh.  I like the way Maraget Barker sums up the situation:

"The earliest statement of their faith was 'Jesus is Lord,' and 'Lord' must have meant in this context what it already meant to these people.  If it meant that Jesus is the manifestation of Yahweh, then all the beginnings of Christology can be explained.  The quotations from the Old Testament will not have to be applied to Jesus with a whole series of mental caveats and theological scruples; the texts about Yahweh were about Jesus....The worship of Jesus and his designation as God is no longer a problem if the Christians were proclaiming him to be a manifestation of Yahweh.  Much of the imagery and theology assumed by New Testament writes is explained: the plurality of the ancient Yahweh accounts for the plurality of the body of Christ; the high priestly theme of Hebrews is drawn from the center of the older tradition; Revelation is no longer an embarrassing difficulty which cannot be positioned in the scheme of things, but it is the Christian's version of the Day of the Lord.  The roots of Christianity can be seen to go deep into the religion of Israel, and will not be properly understood simply by reading the authorized version of what that religion was."