The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

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EastwardTraveler
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The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #1

Post by EastwardTraveler »

Here is a thread I started on another forum, but wanted to put it up here as well. I am new here, but I am already enjoying this forum much better. Less trolls and better discussion and attitudes.
*********************************************

This is a response to a tread about John 1:1 and how the New World Translation corrects this mistake about calling the Word "God". The NWT claims to fix this issue by calling the Word "a god". Next the assertion is there are many gods in the Bible and being a god is different than being God, implying that God is not a god. Being a god is said to be more of a title or status, and nothing could be further from the truth.

First there is a word play here does not exist in the Hebrew. There is no capitalization in Hebrew, so in English terms, there is no big or little g. The context of the scripture would have let the reader know which god is being talked about. Even from a grammatical point of view this changes nothing. Here is what I mean. It is grammatically correct and scripturally correct for me to say that "God is a god". God is just a proper pronoun letting us know which god we are talking about. A god is not a status but the nature of something. God is a god because he happens to be a spiritually divine being.

So changing John 1:1 does not change the problem of the Word being called God. You are still left with a big problem of the identity of Jesus if he was by nature an elohim.

The next tactic that will be used to to bring up that there are many gods in the Bible. This is a silly argument, because all of the other gods of the Bible are false gods or men calling themselves gods. Neither of the two pleases God, so I find it odd that this is used to justify the Word being called a god/elohim and he not be God. Lets break it down even further. Just because men made up gods and created images to them, does not make them a real god. Same if a man calls himself or another person a god, it does not make them a true god. Again this does not please God to do so.

Here is my beleif, that God/elohim is the only real god/elohim in the scriptures. All other gods/elohim are false gods/elohim. No where in scripture is it a good thing to be call a god/elohim if the thing being talked about is not God himself.

While I started off mentioning The NWT I am eager to hear from all who do not believe that Jesus is God, not just Jehovahs Witness. I prefer not to hear from Trinitarians and Unitarians on this post, but ultimately am not opposed to it.

My last request is that for those responding, try and keep it short. I do not want a page of verses quoted and a dissertation on each on. Lets try and keep it to a verse or two at a time so we can actually have a discussion that is meaningful.

Thanks and look forward to hearing from all of you out there.

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #2

Post by JehovahsWitness »

[Replying to post 1 by EastwardTraveler]

Tigger, it's for you!

(LOL just kidding).
EastwardTraveler wrote: So changing John 1:1 does not change the problem of the Word being called God. You are still left with a big problem of the identity of Jesus if he was by nature an elohim..
If I understand your point, you are saying even acknowleding that the second "G/god" of John 1:1c as not being the g/God previously mentioned doesn't IDENTIFY who each indivicual is.


Am I understanding your point correctly?


RELATED POSTS

Does the NWT take liberties by adding the indefinite article to certain passages?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 563#821563
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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #3

Post by onewithhim »

EastwardTraveler wrote: Here is a thread I started on another forum, but wanted to put it up here as well. I am new here, but I am already enjoying this forum much better. Less trolls and better discussion and attitudes.
*********************************************

This is a response to a tread about John 1:1 and how the New World Translation corrects this mistake about calling the Word "God". The NWT claims to fix this issue by calling the Word "a god". Next the assertion is there are many gods in the Bible and being a god is different than being God, implying that God is not a god. Being a god is said to be more of a title or status, and nothing could be further from the truth.

First there is a word play here does not exist in the Hebrew. There is no capitalization in Hebrew, so in English terms, there is no big or little g. The context of the scripture would have let the reader know which god is being talked about. Even from a grammatical point of view this changes nothing. Here is what I mean. It is grammatically correct and scripturally correct for me to say that "God is a god". God is just a proper pronoun letting us know which god we are talking about. A god is not a status but the nature of something. God is a god because he happens to be a spiritually divine being.

So changing John 1:1 does not change the problem of the Word being called God. You are still left with a big problem of the identity of Jesus if he was by nature an elohim.

The next tactic that will be used to to bring up that there are many gods in the Bible. This is a silly argument, because all of the other gods of the Bible are false gods or men calling themselves gods. Neither of the two pleases God, so I find it odd that this is used to justify the Word being called a god/elohim and he not be God. Lets break it down even further. Just because men made up gods and created images to them, does not make them a real god. Same if a man calls himself or another person a god, it does not make them a true god. Again this does not please God to do so.

Here is my beleif, that God/elohim is the only real god/elohim in the scriptures. All other gods/elohim are false gods/elohim. No where in scripture is it a good thing to be call a god/elohim if the thing being talked about is not God himself.

While I started off mentioning The NWT I am eager to hear from all who do not believe that Jesus is God, not just Jehovahs Witness. I prefer not to hear from Trinitarians and Unitarians on this post, but ultimately am not opposed to it.

My last request is that for those responding, try and keep it short. I do not want a page of verses quoted and a dissertation on each on. Lets try and keep it to a verse or two at a time so we can actually have a discussion that is meaningful.

Thanks and look forward to hearing from all of you out there.
First of all, "elohim" is not a title reserved for the one true God. Angels are referred to as "elohim," and pagan gods are called elohim---even gods that are not trinities, like Dagon of the Philistines.

In Greek, proper nouns are shown to be either one of a kind, or one of many, by using ARTICLES. There is no article in Greek for indefinite adjectives like "a" or "an." So when, in English, a translator wants to say "a cat," he sees that the word "cat" is alone and has no article there, and thus to be true to the way Greek has to be translated into English, he includes the qualifier "a." But when he wants to say that something is the only one, the translator sees the DEFINITE ARTICLE in front of the word and translates it as unique. For instance, if "cat" would have a definite article in front of it, the translator would know that it was special, and it would be "THE cat." There are no others. The second "god" in John 1:1 has no article and therefore is one of many.

This is the case with John 1:1. The first "god" mentioned is THE god. So to be honest, the translator would render it that way. The second "god" mentioned does not have the qualifying definite article, indeed, and no article at all. The translator knows that this "god" is NOT "THE" god, and since it has no article, it is to receive, in English, the qualifier "a." That is the way translators translate everywhere else in the Bible, except at John 1:1, except for a few honest translators, one of which is the Emphatic Diaglott by Benjamin Wilson.

The New World Translation is true to the way Greek is supposed to be translated
Last edited by onewithhim on Thu Mar 01, 2018 1:42 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #4

Post by EastwardTraveler »

[Replying to post 2 by JehovahsWitness]

So I looked at the thread and that is not the angle I am going for. My thread is not to attack the NWT or argue over the indefinite article as far transnational purposes. Most of what I saw was a bunch of side issue and other verses that have nothing to do with elohim.

Let me restate it. For arguments sake, I am going to accept the NWT of John 1:1 as the correct translation. My position is that the change does not affect the identity of the Word as God by how we use the word elohim in that verse. I am interested in discussing the word elohim and how it is used in the scriptures and how it is applied to the Word.

(For all of those who do not accept the NWT for whatever reason, this is not to validate that translation.)

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #5

Post by JehovahsWitness »

EastwardTraveler wrote:Next the assertion is there are many gods in the Bible ...
  • Well I'm sure you are aware that the bible does refer to many Gods other than YHWH/Jehovah the God of Israel. Molech, Zeus, Hermes, Baal, to name just a few, all identified in scripture as being G/gods. Indeed Satan himself is called "the god of this system"

EastwardTraveler wrote:...being a god is different than being God...

A GOD

When people use an indefinite article in English, they are implying that the noun has (a) characteristic(s) that could also be applied to other comparable nouns. So "a chair" implies that chair is not absolutely unique, that there are other chairs in existence that share certain of its characteristics . If I say Sarah is "a woman" I am implying that she is NOT the only woman that exists, that there are other individuals to which one can also apply this particular noun ("woman").

In scripture the word "god" is applied to something or someone considered to have a measure of power and influence. There may well be SOMETHING that makes that one G/god unique (Sarah may be the only child of my aunt) but the general word can in theory be applied to others (Sarah may be unique because she's the only child of a particular couple but she is still one of many women due to her XY chromosomes) .


THE/'∅' GOD

In English and many languages, using the definite articles (or in English dropping it entirely '∅' God) indicates that from at least some perspective, the noun is unique in some way.
To illustrate: A grown son comes to visit and tells his parents: I've met somebody, I think she's THE one. He is not suggesting he has met a unique alien that belongs to no other discernable group, he is saying he has met a (let' say) a woman (with the usual XY chromosomes) but that for him she is unique in some way.
The take home point: You can be UNIQUE but STILL have characteristics that mean you belong to a discernable group. So is being "a god" different from being (THE) God? Yes. it means you are "a god" (part of a group of gods) but ALSO unique in some distinct way.

EastwardTraveler wrote:... implying that God is not a god.
IS [∅] GOD ALSO "A GOD"

Yes. God is also "a G/god" but He is "a god" that is unique in some way (see above). It is for this reason in the first of the 10 commandents YHWH states "you must have no other gods before my face" implying He too was "a god" but the other gods must not be worshipped. Again, we know Jehovah was considered "a god" (one amongt many) others (a god) because of the expression "The G/god of Israel" (the elohim of Israel, as opposed to the elohim of Babylon, or the other "elohim"s).

CONCLUSION: Jehovah's Witnesses hold the scriptural view that Almighty God YHWH/Jehovah is indeed also "a god". He is the mightiest of gods, and unique in that he is the Sovereign ruler of the universe. For this reason this particular god (Jehovah) can be referred to as ∅ God, it being fitting in English to go so far as remove the definite article (the) and capitalize the initial G.
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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #6

Post by onewithhim »

EastwardTraveler wrote: [Replying to post 2 by JehovahsWitness]

So I looked at the thread and that is not the angle I am going for. My thread is not to attack the NWT or argue over the indefinite article as far transnational purposes. Most of what I saw was a bunch of side issue and other verses that have nothing to do with elohim.

Let me restate it. For arguments sake, I am going to accept the NWT of John 1:1 as the correct translation. My position is that the change does not affect the identity of the Word as God by how we use the word elohim in that verse. I am interested in discussing the word elohim and how it is used in the scriptures and how it is applied to the Word.

(For all of those who do not accept the NWT for whatever reason, this is not to validate that translation.)
I wasn't cognizant of the fact that "elohim" is used by John in John 1:1. I thought he said "god" in Greek. If he did say that "with elohim" was the word, and the word was elohim, that still isn't a problem. The first "elohim" would be THE elohim---the only one---and the second elohim would be one of many. Therefore we have a definite variation of positions and authority......THE Elohim is the highest one, the most powerful one, over and above the lesser elohim, which are many.

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #7

Post by JehovahsWitness »

EastwardTraveler wrote: Let me restate it. For arguments sake, I am going to accept the NWT of John 1:1 as the correct translation. My position is that the change does not affect the identity of the Word as God by how we use the word elohim in that verse. ...

As OWH said, "elohim" isn't IN the verse, John1:1 is written in Greek. What we can do is look to verses that discuss ELOHIM, in the Hebrews bible. Or look to verses in the Greek scriptures that mention theos or lo theos (god in greek) and see how they relate to each other.

In the Hebrew Scriptures the same word (ʼElo·himʹ) is applied to Jehovah, the true God, and also to false gods, such as the Philistine god Dagon (Jg 16:23, 24; 1Sa 5:7) and the Assyrian god Nisroch. (2Ki 19:37) For a Hebrew to tell a Philistine or an Assyrian that he worshiped “God [ʼElo·himʹ]� would obviously not have sufficed to identify the Person to whom his worship went. ... The same is true of the Greek term for God, Theosʹ. It was applied alike to the true God and to such pagan gods as Zeus and Hermes (Roman Jupiter and Mercury).

SOURCE it vol II p. 8
EastwardTraveler wrote:I am interested in discussing the word elohim and how it is used in the scriptures and how it is applied to the Word.
Feel free. If you find a scripture that mentions ELOHIM (which as I said will be in the Hebrew scriptures) you can tell us if you interpret that to be applying to THE WORD. I 'm sure someone will respond, it might even be me.


Regards,

JW



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Last edited by JehovahsWitness on Thu Mar 01, 2018 2:47 pm, edited 3 times in total.
INDEX: More bible based ANSWERS
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 81#p826681


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Romans 14:8

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #8

Post by EastwardTraveler »

[Replying to post 6 by onewithhim]

You are absolutely right. I am so used to going into the Old Testament that I should have made that clear. Elohim isn't in but theos/theon is and that makes it just as bad because theos/theon is not defined as a person of authority, but a divine spiritual being and that is exactly how an ancient Hebrew or pagan for that matter would have used the word el/elohim. The author of John would have very familiar with this.

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #9

Post by EastwardTraveler »

A GOD

When people use an indefinite article in English, they are implying that the noun has (a) characteristic(s) that could also be applied to other comparable nouns. So "a chair" implies that chair is not absolutely unique, that there are other chairs in existence that share certain of its characteristics . If I say Sarah is "a woman" I am implying that she is NOT the only woman that exists, that there are other individuals to which one can also apply this particular noun ("woman").

Grammatically there does not have to be a second god in the verse since using the indefinite article could be use to talk about the Words nature or characteristic as you put.

In scripture the word "god" is applied to something or someone considered to have a measure of power and influence. There may well be SOMETHING that makes that one G/god unique (Sarah may be the only child of my aunt) but the general word can in theory be applied to others (Sarah may be unique because she's the only child of a particular couple but she is still one of many women due to her XY chromosomes) .

In scripture the word "god" is not applied to something or someone that has power and influence. The gods of the Bible do have power and authority but that is not the context is always of a spiritual and divine creature.
THE/'∅' GOD

In English and many languages, using the definite articles (or in English dropping it entirely '∅' God) indicates that from at least some perspective, the noun is unique in some way.

To illustrate: A grown son comes to visit and tells his parents: I've met somebody, I think she's THE one. He is not suggesting he has met a unique alien that belongs to no other discernable group, he is saying he has met a (let' say) a woman (with the usual XY chromosomes) but that for him she is unique in some way.


The take home point: You can be UNIQUE but STILL have characteristics that mean you belong to a discernable group. So is being "a god" different from being (THE) God? Yes. it means you are "a god" (part of a group of gods) but ALSO unique in some distinct way.

I agree with you, but here is the million dollar question. Are you saying that all of these other gods(members of this discernible group) real? I believe scripture says they are not. Just because these made up gods exist in our minds, does not mean they are real, hence the term "false god".

EastwardTraveler wrote:... implying that God is not a god.


IS [∅] GOD ALSO "A GOD"

Yes. God is also "a G/god" but He is "a god" that is unique in some way (see above). It is for this reason in the first of the 10 commandents YHWH states "you must have no other gods before my face" implying He too was "a god" but the other gods must not be worshipped. Again, we know Jehovah was considered "a god" (one amongt many) others (a god) because of the expression "The G/god of Israel" (the elohim of Israel, as opposed to the elohim of Babylon, or the other "elohim"s).


CONCLUSION: Jehovah's Witnesses hold the scriptural view that Almighty God YHWH/Jehovah is indeed also "a god". He is the mightiest of gods, and unique in that he is the Sovereign ruler of the universe. For this reason this particular god (Jehovah) can be referred to as ∅ God, it being fitting in English to go so far as remove the definite article (the) and capitalize the initial G.
[/quote]

So I agree with you here that God is a god. This is just grammar at work describing what Jehovah's nature is or what he is. Again here is the million dollar question, are these other gods of the Bible real? Are any of you suggesting that Zues, Ba'al, or any of these other gods are real and hanging out at Olympus or the heavens or where ever. Or are they just vain imaginations of men trying to make something that replaces God.

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Re: The New World Translation does not change John 1:1

Post #10

Post by Overcomer »

I hope this isn't getting off-topic, but I was wondering if you could clarify something for me, please, Eastward Traveler.

Who or what is "a god"? Do you think that's referring to Jesus? If so, are you suggesting there is a pantheon of gods with Jehovah at the top and the other "gods", like Jesus, with a small "g" are lesser ones? Or are you saying Jesus is a false god?

Or if Jesus isn't the "god" referred to in that verse, who is that god? And where does he fit in the scheme of things?

Thanks! O.

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