The word was...?

The writer of the Gospel of John was Jewish and therefore relied on an already established Hebraic way of thinking. This is reflected in the opening chapter to his Gospel where, in line with Jewish poetic prose, he personifies the concept of the logos.[1] A personification and not a person![2] This logos is identified with “God the Father” throughout the NT: “the God and Father of the lord Jesus Christ”[3].

Good evidence for this can be found in the “Hebrew prepositions im [‘with’, alone = in one’s consciousness, whether of knowledge, memory or purpose[4]] or et meaning ‘with’ [which can] describe the relationship between a person and what is in his heart or mind.”[5]

As a result, it comes as no surprise to find that other qualities of God are personified as well.[6] For example: wisdom[7]; the law[8] and so on. At times, these qualities/personifications of the one God are given “a quasi-existence” of their own[9]. Such is the case with God’s "word". For example, Dunn notes in his Christology in the Making [pp129f.] that “in Rabbinic Judaism…there was a clear tendency to hypostatize [personalize] the name of God[10] and the glory of God[11]. Here we might mention also the Memra [word] of Yahweh which is regularly named in place of Yahweh in the Targums …”[12]

In Ps 105.19 “the word of God” is said to have “tested” the patriarch Joseph whilst in captivity; in Isa 2.3; Micah 4.2 “the word goes out from Jerusalem”; in 2Chro 18.4 the king of Israel is told to “enquire [seek the council of] the word of God”[13]; and in Isa 55.11 God says “my word will not return to me empty without accomplishing what I desire, and without succeeding in the matter for which I sent it”. We also have modern-day expressions in English that personify “word”, for example “my word is my bond,” “I give you my word,” etc.

“…the characteristic force of its central term, ‘the Word’ or ‘Logos’, appears to be derived from Hebrew, not Greek, sources and from the atmosphere of Palestine rather than [the philosophical language] of Alexandria…[in the] early Jewish paraphrases on the Old Testament [the Targums],[14] the ‘word’ of Jehovah (‘Memra’, ‘Debura’) is constantly spoken of as the efficient instrument of divine action, in cases where the Old Testament speaks of Jehovah Himself. ‘The word of God’ had come to be used personally, as almost equivalent to God manifesting Himself, or God in action…this means that the phraseology of [John] has its roots not in Platonic or Stoic idealism, but in the Jewish belief in the word of God, the manifestation of His will in creation or in revelation.”[15]

From this we can understand how the writer is relying upon Jewish concepts that predate even his own. This extends across the NT and the way the writers portray the one God and Father of the lord Jesus Christ.

It is because of these simple facts that some Bible versions render the last phrase of John 1.1c as: “…and what God was the word was.”[16] The logos when taken in context should be identified as God. That is to say, the subject of the prologue is God’s word, which is obviously not independent of that very same God! To try and make a distinction where there is none loses not only the style of the prologue but most importantly the writer’s intention and original meaning.


Grammatical points
Most translations inappropriately introduce the male pronoun ‘he’ into John 1.1-2 where ‘he’ replaces ‘this one'[17]. This prompts the reader into the mistake of thinking “the word” is a distinct person from its subject/source, God. Although Greek uses grammatical gender [meaning nouns are masculine or feminine or neuter], this does not mean the reader should assign personhood to them. For example, just because “word” [logos] in Greek has to be accompanied by masculine pronouns, it does not mean it is a person! To render it this way would be grammatical suicide!

The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology notes that the phrase “in the beginning”[18] in relation to “the word”, refers to the “eternal pre-existence of the Word whose true sphere was not time but eternity”[19]. This should alert the reader to the simple fact that the writer has the person of God in view, since God is said to be the only One who is inherently immortal. This is in line with Jesus’ reference to God as “the living Father”[20] Who “has granted that same life-giving power to his Son”[21].

Furthermore, the word translated “with” [pros] in the phrase: “the word was with God” in John 1.1b “does not imply any movement or action on the part of the Logos”[22], as if it were talking about one person next to [“with”, para(23)] another, in this case God. Hence the translation above that best captures the meaning and intent of John 1.1c: “what God was the word was”; i.e. it was God’s word!

Apart from these grammatical points, the simple fact remains that in English “word” is an “it”, and not a “he”. The eight English translations from the Greek [not from the Latin Vulgate], before the 1611 KJV, all have “it” instead of “he”.

“It was the Roman Catholic Douay/Rheims version, translated from the Latin by Gregory Martin in 1582, which first rendered John 1:3, ‘all things were made by him,’ rather than ‘by it’ (the ‘word’)."[24]

J.D.G. Dunn in his Christology in the Making notes:

“…it is only with verse 14 [‘the word became flesh’] that we can begin to speak of the personal Logos. The poem uses rather impersonal language (became flesh), but no Christian would fail to recognize here a reference to Jesus—the word became not flesh in general but Jesus Christ. Prior to verse 14 we are in the same realm as pre-Christian talk of Wisdom and Logos…dealing with personifications rather than persons, personified actions of God rather than an individual divine being as such.

“The point is obscured by [translating the] masculine Logos as ‘he’ throughout the poem. But if we translated Logos as ‘God’s utterance’ instead, it would become clearer that the poem did not necessarily intend the Logos of vv. 1-13 to be thought of as a personal divine being. In other words, the revolutionary significance of v. 14 may well be that it marks…the transition from impersonal personification to actual person.”[25]

In John 1.1 “the word of God” is not a person apart from the one God. This would inevitably lead to a blurring of the One Person of God and a serious error on the part of the reader as to “how many” God is. As Prof. Dunn once again observes:

The point is that Christ is the incarnation of this Wisdom/Word. To speak of Christ as himself preexistent, coming down from heaven, and so forth, has to be seen as metaphorical; otherwise it leads inevitably to some kind of polytheism--the Father as a person, just like Jesus was a person...

...what a Wisdom/Word christology claims is that Jesus is the person/individual whom God's Word became. Even to speak of the incarnation of the Son of God can be misleading, unless the Son christology of John is seen as it was probably intended, as an expression of the same Wisdom/Word christology; otherwise, there is the danger of a too literal translation of Father-Son language once again into a form of polytheism...[26]

Footnotes

[1] Understood as “God manifesting His power in the world of matter or mind; a term used especially in the Targum as a substitute for ‘the Lord’ when an anthropomorphic expression is to be avoided.” Memra, jewishencyclopedia.org.

[2] “Philo's ‘divine thought,’ ‘the image’ and ‘first-born son’ of God, ‘the archpriest,’ ‘intercessor,’ and ‘paraclete’ of humanity, the ‘arch type of man’…paved the way for the Christian conceptions of the Incarnation (‘the Word become flesh’) and the Trinity.” The Logos, jewishencyclopedia.org.

[3] 2Cor 1.3; Rom 15.6; 1Pe 1.3; John 20.17; Rev 1.6.

[4] Brown, Driver and Briggs, Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, p. 768.

[5] Im: Num. 14:24; 1 Kings 11:11; 1 Chron. 28:12; Job 10:13; 15:9; 23:10; 23:14; 27:11; Ps. 50:11; 73:23. Et: Gen. 40:14; 2 Kings 3:12 (cp. John 17.5; 2 John 2; Gal. 2:5; Isa. 59:12; Jer. 12:3; 23:28; 27:18; 14:5; Prov. 2:1; 11:2. Buzzard, Hunting, Doctrine of the Trinity, pp. 195-96.

[6] Cp. Isa 40.10; 62.11; cp. Rev 22.12.

[7] Job 12.13, 16; Pro 1.20-23; 8.1-9, 12, 22-31.

[8] Isa 2.3; 51.4; Micah 4.2.

[9] Doctrine, p. 284.

[10] Yoma 3.8; 4.2; 6.2; and strikingly also in the Similitudes of 1 Enoch—39.7, 9, 13; 41.2, 6; 43.4; 45.2f.; 46.6-8; 47.2; 48.7, 10; etc.

[11] The Shekinah—e.g. Sanh. 6.5; Aboth 3.2; Targ. Onkelos on Ex. 33.14f.; 34.6, 9.

[12] G. H. Box, ‘The Idea of Intermediation in Jewish Theology: A Note on Memra and Shekinah’, JQR 23, 1932-33, pp. 103-19. Examples in Strack-Billerbeck 2, pp. 303f. Details of the usage in Targ. Neofiti and its possible significance may be found in R. Hayward, ‘The Memra of YHWH and the Development of its Use in Targum Neofiti 1’, JJS 25, 1974, pp. 412-18.

[13] Cp. Ps 33.4 “the word of God is right and true, He is faithful in all He does”.

[14] “In the Targum the Memra figures constantly as the manifestation of the divinepower, or as God's messenger in place of God Himself…” Memra, jewishencyclopedia.org.

[15] “In regard to this idea it must not be forgotten that, as found in some of the [Church] fathers, e.g. Justin and the Alexandrians, it has much closer affinities to Greek philosophy than it has in St. John.” Charles Gore, The Incarnation of the Son of God: being the Bampton lectures for the year 1891, p. 69-70. Emphasis added.

[16] New English Bible [NEB]; Revised English Bible [REV].

[17] houtos, see the TEV, LB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NAB, AND the AB.

[18] “It is not by accident that the Gospel begins with the same phrase as the book of Genesis. In Genesis 1:1, ‘In the beginning’…In both works of creation the agent is the Word of God.” F.F. Bruce, The Gospel of John (William B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, MI, 1983) pp. 28-29.

[19] Brown, ed., New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, 4 vols; pp. 1204-05.

[20] John 5.36, New Living Translation.

[21] Cp. “the living God”, Deut 5:26; Joshua 3:10; Psalm 42:2; Jer 10:10; Daniel 6:20; Hosea 1:10; Mat 16.16; Acts 14:15; 2 Cor 3:3; 1 Tim 4:10.

[22] “Support for this view may be found in the NT parallels where pros with the acc. often following the verb einai denotes the linear motion but punctiliar [i.e, not moving] rest (Matt. 26.18, 55 vl.; Mk. 6.3 ( =Matt. 13.56); 9.19 ( = Lk. 9.41 but Matt. 17.17 has meth’ hymon); 14.49; 1Cor 16.6f.; 2Cor 5.8; 11.9; Gal 1.18; 4.18, 20; Phil 1.26; 1Thess 3.4; 2Thess 2.5; 3.10; Phlm 13; Heb 4.13; 1Jn 1.2).” ibid., Brown, NIDNT, p 1204. Emphasis added.

[23] “…elsewhere John uses para tini to express the proximity of one person to another (Jn. 1.39; 4.40; 8.38; 14.17, 23, 25; 19.25; cf. 14.23; note also meta tinos in Jn. 3.22, 25 f. etc.) or the nearness of the Son to the Father (Jn 8.38; 17.5), never pros tina.” Ibid., Brown, NIDNT, p 1205. Emphasis added.

[24] Buzzard, “John 1 and the word”, Focus on the Kingdom, v.9 n.12, Sept. 2007.

[25] J.D.G. Dunn, Christology in the Making, p. 243.

[26] Dunn, The Christ & the Spirit: Collected Essays, p. 47.

Hebrews 1:10 and the Age to Come [reload]

By Anthony Buzzard

On the recent radio discussions with Drs. James White and Michael Brown we learned how Trinitarians hope to persuade us. They turn to Hebrews 1:10. Here in a catena (chain) of proof texts, the Hebrews writer seeks to prove that Jesus, the Son of God, is superior to angels. This approach ought really to show immediately that the writer did not think Jesus was Jehovah! You don’t need 7 verses to prove that Jesus is better than all angels or better than Moses, if you believe that Jesus is God Himself. All you have to say is “Jesus is God.” That would be the end of the argument. And one really ought not to imagine that Jesus was ever an angel, after reading Hebrews 1!

The whole point of the argument is that Jesus is not and never was or will be an angel!

The whole point is missed if we do not grasp that Jesus is the begotten Son of God as predicted by the overarchingly important Ps. 2:7.

Hebrews 1:10 says of the Son of God that he “laid the foundation of the heaven and the earth.”

There are three “proof texts” addressed to the Son in Hebrews 1:8-13. These three make the same important point about how the Son began. There is no hint in the text that they refer to someone other than the Son. Verse 8 begins, “But of the Son He [God] says…” (Heb. 1:8) Then follow three different corroborating quotes. The series ends in verse 13 with a final proof that Jesus was not an angel:

“But to which of the angels did He [God] ever say…”

Psalm 110:1 is then quoted as referring to the Son, Jesus. That Son is the adoni of Psalm 110:1 who is not Yahweh. Psalm 110: 1 frames the whole discussion and shows that Jesus cannot be Yahweh. (though Jesus is of course His agent—see Anthony Harvey, Jesus and the Constraints of History and James McGrath, Early Jewish and Christian Monotheism, and James Dunn, Did The First Christians Worship Jesus? (2010)

Much of chapter 1 of Hebrews compares the Son of God with angels, showing that the Son was never an angel and is superior to them. This proves that the Son cannot be God! It is not necessary to prove God superior to the angels. It is obvious. Equally clear is the fact that the Son cannot be an angel or archangel as maintained by Jehovah’s Witnesses. Both angels and archangels (chief angels) are angels! Jesus was never an angel, because high priests are “chosen from among men” (Heb. 5:1). And holy angels are immortal (Luke 20:36), which would make the death of Jesus the Son of God impossible. The Son of God came into existence in Mary (Luke 1:35), his origin (genesis) is described in Matt. 1:18, 20. He was begotten, not just conceived, as stated in the Greek of Matt. 1:20. No angels were begotten in that way!

What then of Hebrews 1:10? In what sense is the Son the founder of the heavens and earth? How can this be since Jesus nowhere claimed to be the Creator and it was not Jesus, but God who rested on the seventh day (Heb. 4:4)? Did Jesus do all the work and yet not rest on the seventh day?

“God [not Jesus] made them male and female” (Mark 10:6) and “The Lord God [not Jesus] formed man of dust from the ground” (Gen. 2:7). Fifty texts say that God, the Father, created the heavens and the earth. Luke 1:35, Matthew 1:18, 20 and 1 John 5:18 (not KJV) say that the Son did not exist until he was created/begotten in Mary. Heb. 1:1-2 tell us that God did not speak in a Son during OT times. This is because the Son did not yet exist.

Was Jesus both six months younger than John the Baptist and billions of years older? Was Jesus 30 years old when he began his public ministry and yet really billions plus 30 years old? What part of Jesus was 30 and what part was billions of years old?

Jesus cannot be so divided up, split in two. Mary bore a human being. She did not bear an angel. She did not bear GOD. She did not bear “impersonal human nature,” as Trinitarian theory says. She did not take in a person from the outside. She conceived and bore a baby. Mary bore a lineal, biological son of David. Otherwise Jesus does not qualify to be the Messiah. Romans 1:1-4 says that God’s Son was a descendant of David, and he was later installed as Son of God with power at the resurrection, but he was not Son of God for the first time when resurrected. He was begotten as predicted by Ps. 2:7, in time, today, not in eternity.

God cannot be begotten, and the Son of God was begotten. Even the Dead Sea Scrolls speak of an expected time when God will beget (bring into existence) the Son of God. They too used 2 Samuel 7:14 and Psalm 2:7 to indicate the beginning of the expected Messiah. The immortal God (1 Tim. 6:16) cannot die. The Son of God died (Rom. 5:10). God cannot be tempted (James 1:13), yet the Son of God was tempted. Not to observe these category differences is to throw away precious biblical instruction.

Hebrews 1:1-2 says that God did not speak through a Son in the Old Testament times. Verse 2 also says that God made the ages through Jesus. This could refer to the ages of the new creation which Jesus introduced or it may refer to Jesus, as Wisdom, being the reason for God’s creation of everything. Hebrews 1:5, quoting the prophecy of Psalm 2:7, speaks of the coming into existence of Jesus, the Son:

“Today I have begotten you”
(so also the LXX of Ps. 110:3 and many Hebrew manuscripts).

The same first chapter of Hebrews speaks of 2 Samuel 7:14’s marvelous promise, given a thousand years before Jesus’ birth, that God “will be a father to him and he will be a son.” That promise was given to David and it referred to the Messiah who was to come. The beginning of Messiah’s existence is the moment when God becomes the Father of the Messiah. Acts 13:33 refers also to the beginning of Jesus’ existence, his "raising up" (not "raising up again" as wrongly translated in the KJV), and verse 34, by contrast, to his resurrection. The same beginning of the Son is exactly what we find in Luke 1:35 and Matthew 1:20 (“that which is begotten in her is from the holy spirit”).

Isaiah 44:24 says that God, unaccompanied, unaided, created the Genesis heavens and earth. He was entirely alone. “Who was with me?” At the time of the Genesis creation there was no Son with Him (cf. Heb. 1:1-2).

God spoke first in a Son in the New Testament. So then who said, “Let there be light”? It would be a flat contradiction of Hebrews 1:1-2 to say it was the Son. The God of the Old Testament is quite distinct from His unique Son. The latter had his genesis in Matthew 1:18 (“The origin of Jesus the Messiah was like this”, TNIV).

The Bible becomes a book of incomprehensible riddles if God can have a Son literally before He brings him into existence! Luke 1:35 describes how the Son of God came to exist. He was begotten. To beget in the Bible and in English is a word which of all words denotes a before and after. Therefore the Son had a beginning. There was a time before he was begotten, before he was. If he already existed, these testimonies in Matthew 1 and Luke 1 are nonsense. Mary bore a human being, not God or an angel. Human mothers bear humans. Mary certainly did not just bear “human nature,” and “human nature” as Mary’s son would not be the descendant of David and thus not the Messiah. (The creeds try to frighten us away from this beginning of the Son, telling us that if we say “there was a time when the Son did not exist” we are heretics and anathematized — see the anathemas at Nicea, 325 AD. No one wants to be cursed by the Church).

The notion that the Son of God was in fact God would strongly reduce the meaning of his whole struggle in obedience to God and on our behalf as Savior and model. The whole point of a High Priest is that he must be “selected from among men” (Heb. 5:1). He is the “man Messiah Jesus” in contrast to his Father (1 Tim. 2:5). The Father in John 17:3 is “the only one who is God,” as distinct from His Son who is excluded from that category. If God is the only one who is God, no one else is God except the Father, which is exactly what Paul declared when rehearsing the creed in 1 Corinthians 8:

“There is no God except the one God the Father”
(combining vv. 4 and 6).

He added, not “splitting the Shema" or expanding it as Tom Wright and others say, that Jesus is the one Lord Messiah! All that had been well said by Luke, who agreed with Paul when he spoke of the Lord Messiah (Luke 2:11) who is “the Lord’s Messiah” (Luke 2:26).

If the Son were God, there would be two Gods. To call Jesus God and the Father God is not strict monotheism, however much the label may be applied. The Bible nowhere uses “God” to mean a triune or biune God.

In Hebrews 1:10, there is a complication (requiring detailed study) due to the fact that the writer quotes Psalm 102 from the Greek version (LXX) and not the Hebrew version. The LXX (Septuagint) has a different sense entirely in Psalm 102:23-25. The LXX reads differently from the Hebrew text. LXX gives us God’s reply to the suppliant. The LXX, quoted in Hebrews 1:10, says:

“He [God] answered him [the suppliant]…Tell me [God speaking to the suppliant]…Thou, lord [God addressing someone else called ‘lord’].

But the Hebrew text has:

“He [God] weakened me…I [the suppliant] say, ‘O my God…’”

Thus the LXX speaks of a second "lord" who is addressed by God:

“At the beginning you founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands” (v. 25).

The writer to the Hebrews had open before him the LXX and not the Hebrew (rather as today someone might quote the NIV instead of the KJV). The New Testament often cites the LXX Greek. F.F. Bruce in the New International Commentary on Hebrews explains:

"In the Septuagint text the person to whom these words [“of old you laid the foundation of the earth”] are spoken is addressed explicitly as “Lord,” and it is God who addresses him thus. Whereas in the Hebrew text the suppliant is the speaker from the beginning to the end of the psalm, in the Greek text his prayer comes to an end with v. 22, and the next words read as follows: “He [God] answered him [the suppliant] in the way of his strength:

‘Declare to Me the shortness of My days: Bring Me not up in the midst of My days. Thy [the suppliant’s] years are throughout all generations. Thou, lord [the suppliant, viewed here as the Messiah by Hebrews], in the beginning didst lay the foundation of the earth.’”

This is God’s answer to the suppliant; He bids him acknowledge the shortness of God’s set time (for the restoration of Jerusalem, as in v. 13) and not summon Him [God] to act when that set time has only half expired, while He [God] assures him [the suppliant, called lord by God] that he and his servants’ children will be preserved forever.

(Bacon suggested that the Hebrew, as well as the Greek, text of this psalm formed a basis for messianic [i.e. future Kingdom] eschatology, especially its reference to the “shortness” of God’s days, i.e., of the period destined to elapse before the consummation of His purpose [the arrival of the yet future Messianic Kingdom on earth]; he found here the OT background of Matt. 24:22, Mark 13:20 and Ep. Barn. 4.3 (“as Enoch says, ‘For to this end the Master [God] has cut short the times and the days, that his Beloved [Jesus] should make haste and come to his inheritance’”).

But to whom (a Christian reader of the Septuagint might well ask) could God speak in words like these? And whom would God himself address as “Lord,” as the maker [or founder] of earth and heaven?

Reading the LXX the Hebrews writer sees an obvious reference to the new heavens and earth of the future Kingdom and he sees God addressing the Messianic Lord in connection with the prophecies of the rest of Psalm 102 which speak of “the generation to come” (v. 18) and of the set time for Yahweh to build up Zion and appear in His glory [the Parousia]. The fact that the One YHVH addresses another “lord” proves that the second lord cannot be YHVH.

The important article by B.W. Bacon (alluded to by Bruce above) stresses the fact that “The word ‘lord’ is wholly absent from the Hebrew [and English] text of Psalm 102:25.” But it appears in the LXX cited by Hebrews. Yahweh addresses another, who is not Yahweh, but another lord, in this case the Messiah. “He [Yahweh] answered him,… at the start you, lord, laid the foundation…” (LXX Ps. 101:24; Heb. Ps. 102):

[With the translation in the LXX “he answered him”] the whole passage down to the end of the psalm becomes the answer of Yahweh to the suppliant who accordingly appears to be addressed as kurie [lord] and creator of heaven and earth...Instead of understanding the verse as a complaint of the psalmist at the shortness of his days which are cut off in the midst, LXX and the Vulgate understand the utterance to be Yahweh's answer to the psalmist’s plea that he will intervene to save Zion, because “it is time to have pity on her, yea, the set time is come” (v. 13). He is bidden acknowledge (or prescribe?) the shortness of Yahweh’s set time, and not to summon Him when it is but half expired. On the other hand he [the Messianic lord] is promised that his own endurance shall be perpetual with the children of his servants.

This is exactly the point, and it can only be made clear when we see that ...

1) the Hebrews writer is reading the LXX, not the Hebrew text, and finding in the second half of the psalm a wonderful prophecy of the age to come (Kingdom, restoration of Israel, new creation) which fits his context in Hebrews 1 exactly, and that...

2) there is a Messianic Lord addressed by Yahweh and invited to initiate a founding of the heaven and earth, the new political order in Palestine, exactly as said in Isaiah 51:16. This is precisely the message the Hebrews writer wants to convey about the superiority of Jesus over angels. Jesus is the founder of that coming new Kingdom order. The Hebrews writer in 2:5 tells us expressly that it is about “the inhabited earth of the future that we are speaking.” (See also Isa. 65:17ff., 66:22, new world-order. Restored Israel, with the church by then immortalized will enjoy the new system, cp. Isa. 65:9, Ps. 69:35, 36: “For God will save Zion and build the cities of Judah, that they may dwell there and possess it. The descendants of His servants will inherit it [cp. Matt. 5:5], and those who love His name will dwell in it” (so also Ps. 37:9, 11, 18, 22, 29, 34).

The important points are these:

1) Psalm 102 is about the new creation and the “generation to come.” It is a Kingdom psalm and points to the great Messianic future. The psalm speaks of the time coming to build up Zion, when the nations will fear God’s name, and when God’s glory will appear, what we know as the Parousia of Jesus, God’s agent. Verse 19 of the LXX of Ps.102 speaks of a new generation, and a people who are going to be created. This is all about the new creation in Christ, of which we are now already a part. That new creation began with the ministry of the historical Jesus, who announced it and died to inaugurate the new covenant, to do with the new creation.

All this is really not so difficult when this difference in the LXX is explained. Both Psalm 102 and Hebrews 2:5 and indeed the whole of Hebrews 1 refer to the new order of things initiated by Jesus and it would not matter whether we think of the new order as initiated at the ascension (“All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me,” Matt. 28:18), or at the second coming.

The best option is that new creation began when Jesus ministered the Gospel of the Kingdom. Thus the new creation was initiated by Jesus even in this present age and it will of course be brought to a new stage of perfection in the coming age of the millennium, which is the first stage of the manifested, worldwide Kingdom of God.

Psalm 102 is all about the coming age of the Kingdom and the restoration of Jerusalem in the millennium (see vv. 13-22). The writer looks forward to the restoration of the city when God appears in His glory (v. 16). The Psalm is written for the “generation to come” (v. 18) and a newly created people of the future Kingdom on earth. Hebrews 1-2 is speaking not of the Genesis creation but the “economy to come” (2:5).

Hebrews 2:5: “The Economy, World to Come about Which We Are Speaking.”

The Oxford Bible Commentary (2000) is helpful when it notes that right up to Hebrews 2:5 the topic is the new creation in Christ. Hebrews 1:10 is included in that main subject: The writer should be allowed to tell us what he is talking about. It is not the Genesis creation but the new creation and covenant in Christ. Ps. 102 is also about the new creation.

“The text at the center of Heb. 2:5ff. is Ps. 8:4-6 and it exhibits thematic connections to the scriptural catena [chain] of the first chapter [i.e. Heb. 1:10 is all part of the same reference to the new creation]…Heb. 2:5 [“the inhabited earth to come of which we speak”] is an introductory comment continuing the contrast between the Son and angels. Its reference to the “world to come” reinforces the notions of imminent judgment and cosmic transformation intimated by Ps. 102, cited at 1:10-12.”

Isaiah 51:16 confirms this explanation. It speaks of an agent of God in whom God puts His words and whom He uses “to plant the heavens and earth.” The Word Biblical Commentary says:

"Yahweh introduces Himself again, but this time in terms of His control of the raging sea. He addresses the one He is using to put His words into his mouth and protecting him very carefully. The purpose of this care is to allow him to plant heavens and earth. That makes no sense if it refers to the original [Genesis] creation. It uses the word NaTaH [Jer. 10:12 + 10 times], stretch out, while the verb here is NaTA, plant [establish people]. In the other instances God acts alone, using no agent [Isa. 44:24]. Here the one he has hidden in the shadow of his hand is his agent. Heavens and land here must refer metaphorically to the totality of order in Palestine, heavens meaning the broader overarching structure of the Empire, while land is the political order in Palestine itself. The assignment is then focused more precisely: to say to Zion, you are my people.”

Thus both in Psalm 102 (LXX) and in Isaiah 51 the Messiah is the agent whom God will use to establish the new political order of the age to come. Hebrews 1:10 is a prophecy, written in the past tense (as customarily prophecies are), but referring to the “inhabited earth of the future about which we are speaking” (Heb. 2:5). That is the concern in Hebrews 1:10. Jesus is the “father of the age to come” (Isa. 9:6, Alexandrian version of the LXX).

Finally, in Hebrews 9:11 the writer speaks of “the good things to come” as the things “not of this creation.” By this he means that the things to come are of the new, future creation (see Heb. 2:5, the new creation). That creation is under way since Jesus appeared as the minister of the new covenant. Jesus as exalted (Ps 110:1 is now co-creator, under the Father, of the new creation, and has “all authority in heaven and earth” (Matt. 28:18). Even the millennial age of the future will be replaced by a further renewed heaven and earth (Rev. 20:11; 21:1). The present system will be “changed” (Heb. 1:10) but the Messiah will continue forever. Revelation 21:1 speaks of the heavens and earth as undergoing a further and presumably final change.

It is interesting that the writer of Hebrews, when mentioning “the age to come” (2:5 and 9:11) connects it with the new creation, i.e not this present Genesis creation. Heb. 1:10 is placed within that context. 9:11 reads:

“When Christ appeared as the High Priest of the good things to come (or the good things which have come), he entered in through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is not of this creation”–but of the new creation.

The book of Hebrews is all about the exalted Christ as head of the new creation and the writers speaks constantly of the “covenant of the coming age”(aionios)...

“...salvation of the coming age, judgment of the coming age, High Priest for the age, redemption of the coming age, spirit of the coming age, inheritance of the coming age.”

The Son is heir of this new creation (Heb 1:2-3).

Once again, eschatology is the great factor in revealing the truth. The Gospel of salvation is based on eschatology, what God has done and is doing and is yet going to do in Christ and in the saints of all the ages, the new community of the New Covenant, addressed as those who go by the canon of love, “the Israel of God” of Galatians 6:16. In this community there are no differences in nationality but all are “one in Christ.” God has a new creation in Jesus and we are to be new creatures in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17). We are to join the one “new man” of the commonwealth of Israel (Eph. 2:12-13). The presently unconverted Israel will itself be renewed, at least a remnant (Mic. 2:12; Rom. 11), through the great tribulation and Jesus’ deliverance at his post-tribulation Parousia (Matt. 24:29-31).

The saints of all the ages will be immortalized at the resurrection after the end of the Great Tribulation which is still ahead.

There is of course no pre-tribulation gathering. Nor has the Great Tribulation been going on continuously since AD 70. The Great Tribulation is a future short period of agony just before the return of the Messiah to the earth. This event is not a drive-by episode. Jesus is coming back to the earth where as son of David he belongs installed on the throne of David.

Dan. 8:14 even tells us that the time for the temple to be finally set in order will be some 2 years, 8 months and five days into the millennium.

The world is going to be reborn and it will come under the supervision of Jesus and his followers (Matt. 19:28, Rev. 5:10; I Cor. 6:2, Dan. 7:14, 18, 22, 27, etc.)

We must resist the temptation to be looking backwards to Genesis when the whole book of Hebrews bids us look forward to the “inhabited earth of the future” (Heb. 2:5).

We have noted that in several places Hebrews speaks of the eternal redemption, inheritance, covenant, judgment, salvation and spirit “of the age [to come]” (aionios). Aionios refers to the Kingdom age to come and not just to eternity. Christians receive now the “holy spirit of the promise” (Eph. 1:13, NJB). We are to experience something of the future Kingdom age even now in the midst of trials and in a hostile world. Christians should not give away their inheritance to unconverted Jews! The church will inherit the land (Matt. 5:5; Rom. 4:13) and those who bless “the seed of Abraham” (Gen. 12) are those who bless the believers.

“If you belong to Christ [and only then] you are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise” (Gal. 3:19).

What a heritage is in store for those who endure to the end.

Meanwhile should we not have a heart for the billions of human beings who have not been exposed to the great truths about God and the Messiah and the Kingdom in process of restoration?

Matthew 24:14 is most relevant.

Christology in the Making quotes

A New Testament Inquiry Into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation, 2nd Edition, 1996.

J.D.G. Dunn

Is then thought of Jesus’ birth as the incarnation of a pre-existent Son of God implied here [in Gal 4.4]? Would Paul’s readers have drawn such an inference? Could Paul have expected his readers to recognize such an implication? …there seems to have been little real precedent for such an idea of incarnation, very little which might have prompted such an inference or invited such an implication[1]...such language only appears in Christian writings of the second century subsequent to the ideas of virginal conception in Matthew and Luke and the sending of the pre-existent Logos in John and as the harmonization of them (Ignatius, Eph. 7.2; Aristides, Apology 15.1; and especially Justin, Apol. 1.21.1[2]; 32.10-14[3]; 63.15f.[4]; Dial. 45.4[5]; 84.2[6]; 85.2[7]; 127.4[8]). It follows that if Paul intended to imply what we now call the doctrine of incarnation in Gal 4.4 he would have been taking a radically new step, something his readers could hardly have expected to come from a Jew.

[The closest parallels would mislead rather than illuminate Paul's meaning. In particular, if the language had indeed suggested the idea of a 'miraculous' birth, anyone familiar with the Jewish scriptures would presumably have thought of births to women who were barren or past child-bearing age, like Sarah (Gen. 17.15f. – ‘God said to Abraham...“I will give you a son by he’”') or Rachel (Gen.30.22 – ‘God opened her womb’.]

And if he [Paul] intended to take that step we would have expected his earliest recorded intimation of it to be a much more explicit and careful exposition (cf. the care he takes to expound his understanding of who the seed of Abraham really are – Gal. 3).

Had Paul indeed taught a doctrine of incarnation (the pre-existence of the Son of God, the man Christ Jesus) in his mission it would inevitably have been open to misunderstanding and abuse…so that a greater clarification and fuller exposition of it would almost certainly have appeared elsewhere in his writings. It does not seem a very sound basis for an exegesis of Gal 4.4 to argue both that Paul had already taught an explicit doctrine of incarnation, and also that such a novel teaching caused scarcely a ripple in the often troubled waters of the Pauline mission. In short, it would appear unwise…that Paul’s readers would have at once recognized an allusion to a specific and already well established Christian teaching on Jesus as the incarnate Son of God.
One further and rather surprising consideration seems to emerge from all this. Since what certainly became the Christian idea of incarnation would probably have sounded strange to Paul’s hearers (and to Paul?), perhaps Christian keenness to find an incarnation interpretation here has pushed exegesis in the wrong direction. Perhaps indeed ‘born of woman’…is to be understood as a denial of a simplistic view of Jesus as a divine being come to earth. The one sent as God’s Son was one ‘born of woman’, (simply) a man, not a divine being metamorphosed into or appearing as a human being…perhaps the Christological thrust is simply that ‘God sent forth (directly, not by an angel) his Son (not some heavenly being, but one) born of woman, born under the law…’

It has become steadily clear that Gal 4.4 cannot be taken, as it so often is, as making a straightforward assertion or embodying an obvious presupposition that Jesus was the incarnation of a pre-existent divine being, the Son of God in that sense…In short, we cannot safely conclude from Gal 4.4 that Paul believed in or was already teaching a doctrine of incarnation. [pp. 42-44]



§6. JESUS’ DIVINE SONSHIP IN THE POST-PAULINE WRITINGS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT

§6.2 Matthew…Son of God is the most important Christological affirmation for Matthew [14.33; 16.16]…confirmed by the considerable expansion of talk of God as Father in the sayings of Jesus…

At two points Matthew perhaps comes closer to attributing pre-existence to Jesus as Son of God than any Christian writer before him…by appending 11.28-30 to the Q passage (11.25-7/Luke 10.21f.), he identifies Jesus as Wisdom, and though thought of pre-existence is not present in this context it is but a step away, since Wisdom was already familiarly thought of as pre-existent…though here too it should be noted that [in Mat 28.19] the idea of pre-existence is absent…

One of the oddest features [in the account of the virgin birth] is the absence of Son of God terminology; in the birth narratives Jesus is called ‘son (of God)’ by implication only at 2.15, where the flight to Egypt is taken as a step towards his fulfillment of Hos. 11.1…But closer analysis of Mat 1-2 makes it quite clear, as R. E. Brown’s masterly study shows, that Matthew’s intention in chapter 1 is to give an account of the divine origin of Jesus—not mere Son of David, but also Son of God; descended from David sure enough (1.1-17), but more important, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit (1.18-20)[9]…this was an unheard of step to take, for, as Justin Martyr rightly insisted long ago (Apol. 1.33), it claimed for Jesus a unique conception—the offspring of a human mother, but through an act of God’s creative power, not through sexual intercourse with a divine being. The point which bears upon our study is that Matthew presumably understands this as Jesus’ origin, as the begetting (= becoming) of Jesus to be God’s Son (1.16, 20). As Brown notes, there is in Matthew ‘no suggestion of an incarnation whereby a figure who was previously with God takes on flesh’.[10]

In short…Matthew has extended the understanding of Jesus’ divine sonship by dating it from his conception and attributing that to the (creative) power of the Spirit… [pp. 48-50]


The desire to find and maintain a single Christian orthodoxy always tempts the Christian to harmonize and synthesize where possible…That might be argued…on the ground of some dogmatic premise, but not into terms of exegesis. [‘Son of God’, pgs. 61-62]


Now Adam was certainly not thought of as pre-existent though perhaps strictly speaking as pre-historical, or, being the first man on the earth, as transhistorical/typical….If Christ walks in Adam’s footsteps then Christ need be no more pre-existent than Adam…Nor indeed is there any implication that Christ was contemporaneous with Adam, acting in a similarly transhistorical situation…Christ always presupposes Adam, Christ’s odyssey presupposes the plight of Adam, of Adam’s offspring. As 1 Cor 15:45ff insists, the temporal order is clear: Adam first, Christ second – Christ is last Adam, Adam precedes Christ. Adam was not a copy of a pre-existent Christ, but a “type of him who was to come” [Rom. 5:14]…The Philippian hymn does not intend to affirm that Jesus was as historical or as pre-historical as Adam, but that the choice confronting Christ was as archetypal and determinative for mankind as was Adam’s; weather the choice was made by the pre-existent Christ or the historical Jesus is immaterial to the Philippian hymn.” [‘The Last Adam’, pgs. 119-120]

Footnotes:

1. Cf. G. Dalman, The Words of Jesus, ET 1902: 'The statements as to preexistence in the Similitudes of Enoch, of 2 Esdras, and in Pesikta Rabbati, do not presuppose any human birth of Messiah. He is to make his appearance upon earth as a fully developed personality. And this is quite distinct from the later Jewish doctrine of the pre-existence of the souls of all men. Judaism has never known anything of a pre-existence peculiar to the Messiah antecedent to his birth as a human being. Baldensperger, [Das Selbstbewusstein Jesu im Lichte der messianischen Hoffnungen seiner Zeit2 (1892), 85. In other points, too, the statements of this book on Jewish matters require careful revision.] nevertheless, holds that from the date of the Similitudes of Enoch, “the heavenly pre-existence of the Messiah” attained the position of a “dogma in apocalyptic circles.” But we have seen that after the Similitudes of Enoch the only representatives of the idea independent of Enoch are 2 Esdras in the first Christian century, and the Appendix to Pesikta Rabbati, independently of both these sources, in the seventh or eighth century. The dominance of the idea in any Jewish circle whatever cannot seriously be upheld.’ (p. 131-32)

2. “…we say also that the Word, who is the first-birth [first born] of God, was produced without sexual union…”

3. “…those men who believe in Him [Jesus] in whom [abides] the seed of God, the Word…He who should appear would have blood, though not of the seed of man, but of the power of God. And the first power after God the Father and Lord of all is the Word, who is also the Son…He took flesh and became man…the blood should not be of human seed, but of divine power…And Isaiah, another prophet, foretelling the same things in other words, spoke thus: ‘A star shall rise out of Jacob, and a flower shall spring from the root of Jesse; and His arm shall the nations trust.’ And a star of light has arisen, and a flower has sprung from the root of Jesse—this Christ. For by the power of God He was conceived by a virgin of the seed of Jacob…”

4. “Now the Word of God is His Son, as we have before said. And He is called Angel and Apostle… so much is written for the sake of proving that Jesus the Christ is the Son of God and His Apostle, being of old the Word, and appearing sometimes in the form of fire, and sometimes in the likeness of angels; but now, by the will of God, having become man for the human race…The Jews, accordingly, being throughout of opinion that it was the Father of the universe who [spoke] to Moses, though He who [spoke] to him was indeed the Son of God, who is called both Angel and Apostle…the Father of the universe has a Son; who also, being the first-begotten Word of God, is even God. And of old He appeared in the shape of fire and in the likeness of an angel to Moses and to the other prophets; but now in the times of your reign, having, as we before said, become Man by a virgin, according to the counsel of the Father…”

5. “…Christ, Son of God, who was before the morning star and the moon, and submitted to become incarnate, and be born of this virgin of the family of David…”

6. “…the prophecy, 'Behold, the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son,' was uttered respecting Him. For if He to whom Isaiah referred was not to be begotten of a virgin, of whom did the Holy Spirit declare, 'Behold, the Lord Himself shall give us a sign: behold, the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son?' For if He also were to be begotten of sexual intercourse, like all other first-born sons, why did God say that He would give a sign which is not common to all the first-born sons? But that which is truly a sign, and which was to be made trustworthy to mankind,—namely, that the first-begotten of all creation should become incarnate by the Virgin's womb, and be a child…as if great events were to be inferred if a woman should beget from sexual intercourse: which indeed all young women, with the exception of the barren, do; but even these, God, if He wills, is able to cause [to bear]. For Samuel's mother, who was barren, brought forth by l the will of God; and so also the wife of the holy patriarch Abraham [Sarah]; and Elisabeth, who bore John the Baptist, and [others]. So that you must not suppose that it is impossible for God to do anything He wills. And especially when it was predicted that this would take place, do not venture to pervert or misinterpret the prophecies, since you will injure yourselves alone, and will not harm God.”

7. “For every demon, when exorcised in the name of this very Son of God—who is the First-born of every creature, who became man by the Virgin…”

8. “Therefore neither Abraham, nor Isaac, nor Jacob, nor any other man, saw the Father and ineffable Lord of all, and also of Christ, but [saw] Him who was according to His will His Son, being God, and the Angel…whom also it pleased Him to be born man by the Virgin; who also was fire when He conversed with Moses from the bush.”

9. Brown, Birth, §5; see also, K. Stendahl, ‘Quist et Unde? An Analysis of Matt. 1-2’, Judentum, Urchristentum, Kirche, 1964, pp. 94-105; R. Pesch, ‘Der Gottessohn im mattaischen Evangelienprolog (Matt. 1-2)’, Biblica 48, 1967, pp. 395-420 (particularly pp. 408-19); Kingsbury, Matthew, pp. 42-53.

10. Brown, Birth, p. 141; Fuller, ‘Christological Moment’, p. 39. Matt. 1.23, ‘”His name shall be called Emmanuel” (which means, ‘God with us’), does not affect this conclusion, since the child of whom Isaiah speaks would have been understood to be simply a symbol of God’s purpose for Judah. Matthew would see it fulfilled in complete measure by Jesus, but not in a literal sense as though he were identifying Jesus with God, only in the sense that Jesus is the full (fulfilled) expression of God’s presence [purpose] with His people (Brown, Birth, p. 150 n. 52).