One In The Greek

[Michael The Disciple]

Originally Posted by Evang.Benincasa

It means ONE.

Again, this isn't rocket science. The ancients didn't believe God as a plurality. If they did they would of been the same as their pagan counterparts. Throughout the entire Hebrew Bible ONE God was to be SHEMA! They were to hear that God was literally ONE, and besides Him there was no other. Therefore the language in the Greek must always reflect the same as was believed by the ancient Hebrew.

Well sure. That is the way I approach it. The problem is when the many people I have discussed/debated this with begin their very complicated (to those of us who dont speak it) teaching of how ONE does not mean ONE as an absolute.

Thats why I am asking for help. To me and you, what you said in this post makes perfect sense. But when the crowd of listeners hear a guy saying I am totally wrong because I dont know the Greek therefore they are teaching the truth and I a lie they tend to believe the "educated" or scholarly person.

[Evang.Benincasa]

Originally Posted by Michael The Disciple

Well sure. That is the way I approach it. The problem is when the many people I have discussed/debated this with begin their very complicated (to those of us who dont speak it) teaching of how ONE does not mean ONE as an absolute.

Thats why I am asking for help. To me and you, what you said in this post makes perfect sense. But when the crowd of listeners hear a guy saying I am totally wrong because I dont know the Greek therefore they are teaching the truth and I a lie they tend to believe the "educated" or scholarly person.

Michael, the person who tells you that you don't know Greek doesn't know Greek themselves. Basically they learned their Greek in some Pentecostal hall of higher learning. Where they were taught by some minister who had a basic Christian understanding of Greek. Christian understanding. Not an understanding of how Greek was employed by the Alexandrian Judeans, and also the Romans of the empire during the first century A.D. The Greek ἕν has other meanings in how its used in a sentence. Yet, plurality, or unity isn't one of them. The ancient Greeks who used koine "vulgar Greek" would of thought it foreign to use ἕν as to denote plurality.

[Michael The Disciple]

Originally Posted by Evang.Benincasa

Michael, the person who tells you that you don't know Greek doesn't know Greek themselves. Basically they learned their Greek in some Pentecostal hall of higher learning. Where they were taught by some minister who had a basic Christian understanding of Greek. Christian understanding. Not an understanding of how Greek was employed by the Alexandrian Judeans, and also the Romans of the empire during the first century A.D. The Greek ἕν has other meanings in how its used in a sentence. Yet, plurality, or unity isn't one of them. The ancient Greeks who used koine "vulgar Greek" would of thought it foreign to use ἕν as to denote plurality.

So what about hen/heis controversy?

Is it irrelevant?

[Evang.Benincasa]

Originally Posted by Michael The Disciple

So what about hen/heis controversy?

Is it irrelevant?

Pretty much, and I have seen it debated over and over, where eyes just roll.
Look, we are English speakers, and we read English. Are birth language is English. One is one, I and the father are the same is actually what Jesus is saying to His audience. In Spanish, Yo y el Padre uno somos. Jesus and the father are the same. In French, Moi et le Père nous sommes un. All the way to modern Greek ἐγὼ καὶ ὁ πατὴρ ἕν ἐσμεν. The father and I we are one. We are the same, the same being. It has more to do with the sentence, then it does with just a word. Literally, Jesus is telling His audience that He and His father are the same person. I know I know that sounds a bit far out, but it is what is being said. In Matthew 28:18 ἐξουσία, meaning authority is what Jesus was given through His death, burial and resurrection. Not by some other deity, but through His works. But I would like to point out that no verse stands by itself, but is reinforced by all other verses which Trinitarianism falls short to prove with Bible alone. Matthew 28:18 is a home run, because if there were two other separate persons other than Jesus, then they lose all authority. Namely the father. So, heis/hen debate can be hashed out by those who are true scholars. But as far as MeMaw and Aunt Bitty Joe, who speak common English, ONE means just that, ONE.

[Costeon]

Originally Posted by Michael The Disciple

So what about hen/heis controversy?

Is it irrelevant?

I'm not really sure what I think about it right now. I haven't studied it enough.

Here are some verses that probably need to be considered:

John 17.11: And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one (hen), even as we are one ["one" here is not actually in the Greek but is implied from the context].

John 17:21-23: 21 that they may all be one (hen), just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one (hen) even as we are one (hen), 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one (hen), so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me."

Here when Jesus says he and the Father are one it does not seem that he is saying they are the same person, but are in the closest possible relationship. Jesus even describes him and the Father as "us." He prays that the believers would have the same kind of unity.

Here is an example where "hen" is used of two people who are working together: 1 Cor 3.8: He who plants and he who waters are one (hen), and each will receive his wages according to his labor.

[Evang.Benincasa]

Again, everything is based on context within the sentence. The Bible is taught in a whole, not in bits and pieces. Jesus speaks as Himself as God, and that He is the father. In Revelation 21:7 Jesus calls Himself the father who is God and that the Church is His son.

In koine and modern Greek one means one, and from Byzantine Greek ἕν became ἕνα, still meaning one. The accusative εἷς. Again, One God the mighty God in Jesus is taught to us in KJV English (that's how I came to learn it) and in every language the Bible has be interpretaly translated into, all can see Jesus as literally ONE GOD.

[Costeon]

Originally Posted by Evang.Benincasa

Again, everything is based on context within the sentence. The Bible is taught in a whole, not in bits and pieces. Jesus speaks as Himself as God, and that He is the father. In Revelation 21:7 Jesus calls Himself the father who is God and that the Church is His son.

I agree very much that everything is based on context. But it was after reading the Gospel of John many times over a short period of time, and so feeling the weight of how often and how thoroughly John and Jesus distinguish Jesus from the Father, that made me doubt that Jesus was simply conflating himself with the Father without qualification in John 14.9 or 10.30.

The Gospel begins in John 1 with Jesus as the Word incarnate who will reveal the Father. No one has seen the Father, but the only Son who is at the side of the Father will reveal him. From chapter 1 to 10 and 14, Jesus over and over distinguishes himself from the Father while revealing him, and even in the very contexts of 10 and 14 thoroughly distinguishes himself from the Father, and continues to do so throughout the rest of the Gospel. In ch 14 we have one of the examples of Jesus describing Jesus and the Father as "we": "23 Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him" (14.23). This is an unusual example: Jesus says he and the Father will indwell people together.

So when I read 14.9, I understand him to be saying, "How can you say show us the Father? I've been showing you. I've been revealing who he is and what he is like. The Father can't be seen, but he can be seen in my actions and words, because I only do what the Father has taught me to do and say." I do not, and right now cannot, read it as, "Despite everything I have said about me being the Son and distinguishing myself from the Father, well actually, I am the Father."

Anyway, as far as Oneness goes, I do think the Scripture is against the idea that God's being consists of three divine persons. I noted in a post to BCsenior that any doctrine of God and Christ has to be built on the OT foundation and harmonize with this concept of God. But I have not read a Oneness Christology yet that I found compelling and persuasively explained the distinctions we see in John's works between the Father and Son, and I haven't been able to come up with anything myself. :-) It's frustrating. All I can say confidently right now is that there is one God and he has a Son. The Son is not merely a human being like us. He is divine and human.

If there are any books you could recommend that you have found useful on the subject, I would appreciate any recommendations.

[Esaias]

Originally Posted by Costeon

I agree very much that everything is based on context. But it was after reading the Gospel of John many times over a short period of time, and so feeling the weight of how often and how thoroughly John and Jesus distinguish Jesus from the Father, that made me doubt that Jesus was simply conflating himself with the Father without qualification in John 14.9 or 10.30.

The Gospel begins in John 1 with Jesus as the Word incarnate who will reveal the Father. No one has seen the Father, but the only Son who is at the side of the Father will reveal him. From chapter 1 to 10 and 14, Jesus over and over distinguishes himself from the Father while revealing him, and even in the very contexts of 10 and 14 thoroughly distinguishes himself from the Father, and continues to do so throughout the rest of the Gospel. In ch 14 we have one of the examples of Jesus describing Jesus and the Father as "we": "23 Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him" (14.23). This is an unusual example: Jesus says he and the Father will indwell people together.

So when I read 14.9, I understand him to be saying, "How can you say show us the Father? I've been showing you. I've been revealing who he is and what he is like. The Father can't be seen, but he can be seen in my actions and words, because I only do what the Father has taught me to do and say." I do not, and right now cannot, read it as, "Despite everything I have said about me being the Son and distinguishing myself from the Father, well actually, I am the Father."

Anyway, as far as Oneness goes, I do think the Scripture is against the idea that God's being consists of three divine persons. I noted in a post to BCsenior that any doctrine of God and Christ has to be built on the OT foundation and harmonize with this concept of God. But I have not read a Oneness Christology yet that I found compelling and persuasively explained the distinctions we see in John's works between the Father and Son, and I haven't been able to come up with anything myself. :-) It's frustrating. All I can say confidently right now is that there is one God and he has a Son. The Son is not merely a human being like us. He is divine and human.

If there are any books you could recommend that you have found useful on the subject, I would appreciate any recommendations.

If Jesus is a genuine human being, then the descriptions and statements in John make perfect sense. Including John 14:9.

So honestly I'm not seeing where any difficulty exists. The distinctions between the Father and the Son are the distinctions between God and the human being named Jesus. Which John ch 1 explains that the Son is the Word become flesh. 1 John 1 explains that this Word is basically the eternal life of God.

There is one God and He has a Son. But that Son is not merely "divine" unless He is also that One God. Otherwise you have two gods.

The great mystery of the faith is that GOD was manifested in the flesh etc. Putting all the data together, we have God taking on for Himself a genuine human existence which we call the Son of God. The distinctions are between God and the man, not God and another divinity or "divine person".

[Michael The Disciple]

Originally Posted by Costeon

I'm not really sure what I think about it right now. I haven't studied it enough.

Here are some verses that probably need to be considered:

John 17.11: And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one (hen), even as we are one ["one" here is not actually in the Greek but is implied from the context].

John 17:21-23: 21 that they may all be one (hen), just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one (hen) even as we are one (hen), 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one (hen), so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me."

Here when Jesus says he and the Father are one it does not seem that he is saying they are the same person, but are in the closest possible relationship. Jesus even describes him and the Father as "us." He prays that the believers would have the same kind of unity.

Here is an example where "hen" is used of two people who are working together: 1 Cor 3.8: He who plants and he who waters are one (hen), and each will receive his wages according to his labor.

The verses you posted I believe by context is Jesus talking to God in his humanity. Indeed describing the close relationship he had/has with the Father and what he desires with the saints.

[Costeon]

Originally Posted by Michael The Disciple

The verses you posted I believe by context is Jesus talking to God in his humanity. Indeed describing the close relationship he had/has with the Father and what he desires with the saints.

How can Jesus and the Father be one person yet Jesus be in close relationship with and talk with the Father? How can Jesus be described as "he" in distinction from the Father, when he and the Father are one person?

Do you think of or refer to the Father and Jesus as "they" since Jesus describes his relationship with the Father as "We" and "us"? Jesus in one place even likens he and the Father to two witnesses giving testimony: "16 But if I do judge, my decisions are true, because I am not alone. I stand with the Father, who sent me. 17 In your own Law it is written that the testimony of two witnesses is true. 18 I am one who testifies for myself; my other witness is the Father, who sent me" (John 8.16-18).