John 1:1c

"and the Word was God"

Observation 1: Here is the completion of the triad of statements about Jesus, the Word. Vital is to follow the progression of thought and expectations, esp. Jewish expectations. First, "in the beginning" set up the expectation that "God" (Yahweh) was this Word. Then the Word being "with God" suddenly clarified that this "Word" was not the same person as "God", yet he was "in the beginning" with God. Only God was "in the beginning", so what does this mean? Two gods? But this third statement answers all the questions (and raises many others!). This Word "was/ is" God. Here is the theologically difficult concept that there is One God who exists in More Than One Person. In this text, we see Two Persons, One God, what has been called a "binitarian" formulation and conceptual subset of the later Trinitarian formulation. After all, in the course of Jesus' ministry, the main issue was the Father-Son relationship. Only later did the Third person, the Spirit, enter the scene.

Observation 2: In the Greek, the construction reads "kai theos ein ho logos". There has been much controversy over how to read the anarthrous (no article) predicate nominative. Usually, the absence of the article serves to indicate the subject when there are two nouns. When the predicate is an adjective, the absence of the article is consistent with the nature of the adjective as not-equivalent to the subject but an attribute of it. This has led some to conclude that this can be the function of some anarthrous nouns as well. And there is ample evidence that this is true. Whether it can be parlayed into a full blown "Rule" or not is debatable. That such a function exists in the Greek is very plausible. Certainly in this case it not only makes sense but is nearly required–not given a preconceived theology but given the narrative anticipation set up by vv. 1a & 1b. Because 1b has made a clear distinction between "God" and the "Word", setting up a construction that would read: "And the Word was the God", putting the article with "God" would be at the least confusing, as it would seem to reassert an equivocation between "God" and "Word" and thus contradict 1b. Theologically, it might introduce a kind of confusing modalism. Simply put, it's far easier and consistent with the theological set up to retain "theos" as anarthrous. It accomplishes 3 things: (1) clearly distinguishes subject from predicate (since both are nouns); (2) retains the person distinction between "theos" and "logos" by NOT equivicating the two; (3) puts the predicate in a position and function similar to a predicate adjective; hence the "Word" is NOT the same person as Yahweh (the Father) but yet is still fully and completely God-by-nature.

Observation 3: Many have said that there is no trinitarian formulation in the Bible and certainly there isn't one that exists in the wording and form of later Councils. But that there is a clear "threeness & oneness" of God theology in the NT is clear. And John 1:1 presents the clearest formulation of distinction between persons (1b) yet with a simultaneous unity of nature (1c).

Observation 4: Attempts to make the anarthrous "theos" the theological equivalent of "a god" fall short for several reasons: (1) It fails to acknowledge that in Koiné Greek, the absence of the article does NOT function as it does in English. It does not necessarily or usually indicate indefiniteness (though it can on some occasions where the context demands it). It is common to see anarthrous Greek words which any competent translator would translate it into English as with the article (as definiteness is intended). And there are words that have the article (like most proper names) but are not translated into English with "the". (E.g., "The Paul", "The Jesus") Nor does their absence make the person's name indefinite (E.g., "a Jesus", "a Peter"). The most salient example in John's case is 1:6 where it reads, "And there was a man sent from God...." Here even the JW Bible translates it "God" but there is no article (anarthrous)! Why not translate it: "And there was a man sent from a god" if we want to be consistent? That's because it's bad translation and a failure to understand the function of the article in Greek. (And one cannot argue that words are anarthrous in prepositional phrases, b/c they're not. And both 1:6 and 1:1c are prespositional phrases. Either render them both as "a.." or neither. Neither.)