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NASB | Matthew 28:19 "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Matthew 28:19 "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations [help the people to learn of Me, believe in Me, and obey My words], baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, |
Subject: The Name /One Lord |
Bible Note: Hi Mark, John 1:1 is solid textual evidence that Jesus is in fact God. Compare what your Watchtower claims about that verse to the Greek construction of John 1:18. The Watchtower claims that since "theos" appears without the direct article in John 1:1, it is indefinate, thus declaring that Jesus is "a god". Not only does this render the Watchtower polytheistic, but if you apply the same interpretive reasoning to verse 18, you have a serious conflict. Because while verse 18 says that no one has seen God at any time, this is another instance of "theos" without the direct article. So according to how the Watchtower would have you to understand Greek grammer, vs. 1 is saying that Jesus is "a god", while verse 18 would be saying that no one has seen "a god" at any time. John also describes Jesus as "that which we have seen. . ." "kai theos en ho logos" "and God was the Word" While you could say in English "and the God was the Word", this does not work in Greek. "ho" logos, the word, is in the nominative case, while theos, God, is also in the nominative case. These terms are botn naming someone. "Ho", the, is the direct article, which must appear in the same case as the noun it refers to. But "ho" also indicates the subject of the sentence, or in this case, the clause. If we were to write this sentence with the direct article appearing with theos, God, then it would be: kai ho theos en ho logos and the God was the Word The problem with this is that it renders the clause as having two subjects, and that is just bad grammer. So when the Watchtower claims that there would have to be a direct article before theos in order for it to be truly saying that Jesus is "the" God, it is in reality demanding that John write with bad grammer that would actually render his sentence meaningless and circular. The reality is that John names the subject, ho logos, the Word, and tells us something about this subject, the Word was God. Now, whether this is "a god" or "the God", the context gives us all we need. In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with the God, and God was the word. Now, immediately you'll notice that there is an article in the first use of "God" - the Word was with "the God". This is because this is in the "Accusative" case, that is, the direct object. The Word was with - what? The God. But as "God" next appears in the Nominative, there is no direct article. But one must ignore the immediate context to argue that the second appearance of "theos" is any less definate than the first. Not to mention that they don't apply their own rule just a few verses later. Not to mention that many times the Bible declares the diety of Jesus. I hope this clears things up a bit. Love in Christ, Mark |