Is Jesus God?

SPEAKER_1 (0:01)

Are you interested in the parts of history that remain a mystery? Do you want to learn more about the historical myths and misconceptions used to prop up belief today?

I'm Nathaniel Lloyd. In my podcast, Historical Blindness, I delve into all of these topics, sharing puzzling tales from the past and examining hoaxes, conspiracy theories and misremembered events that provide insight into modern politics and religion. New episodes every two weeks find historical blindness on most podcast players and platforms.

Dan McClellan (0:37)

And that's where they came up with what's called the hypostatic union, where Jesus is 100% God, but Jesus is 100% human.

How does that work? Shut up. Doesn't make a ton of sense. It makes enough sense that we can threaten people if they don't agree with it. And so it is that the institution of the church is the only reason that the concept of the Trinity survived, because without the Roman Empire and all of the might and the coercion and the force behind it, it would have gone the way of the Dodo long, long ago. Hey everybody, I'm Dan McClellan.

Dan Beecher (1:13)

And I'm Dan Beecher.

Dan McClellan (1:15)

And you are listening to the Data Over Dogma podcast, where we increase public access to the academic study of the Bible and religion and combat the spread of misinformation about the same. How are things, Dan?

Dan Beecher (1:27)

Rockin and rollin, man. I think this is... We're delving into one that's going to be a powder keg.

We're getting into the good stuff here.

Dan McClellan (1:38)

This is on social media. This is where I get the most pushback from folks.

Dan Beecher (1:43)

Oh really?

Dan McClellan (1:46)

It's surprising. It's not that it causes the biggest ruckus, but the people who are usually on my side about a lot of stuff when it comes to this will be like, but I'm still right.

Dan Beecher (2:00)

All right, everybody, prepare to push back. This is going to be a fun one. And we'll start with the first one. Look, I'm going to start us off with an idea, and it is an idea that is so fundamental to so many Christians, like religious cosmology, that to say otherwise seems absurd.

And so before I present that, maybe you should just say your line.

Dan McClellan (2:36)

All right, let's see it.

Dan Beecher (2:37)

OK, he said it. That means we're diving in.

Dan McClellan (2:42)

The monkey has danced.

Dan Beecher (2:45)

Dance, monkey.

Here's the idea. So you actually came to me when we were discussing...

Dan McClellan (2:54)

In the night.

Dan Beecher (2:54)

Yes, you came and visited me three times. Visions by night, yeah. Now I believe in Christmas.

No, what you said was...

Dan McClellan (3:06)

I thought you were going, now I'm digging up gold plates from a hill, but you took it a different direction.

Dan Beecher (3:11)

I went Dickens instead of Joseph Smith. So there we go. The idea...

What you said was, let's talk about the idea of if Jesus is God in the book of John.

So I took that to me. When I first thought about that, I was like, aha, Jesus is God in all the other books and John's the one that's like this crazy outlier that doesn't seem to think Jesus is God. And then I looked into it and I went, oh, oops, I'm completely wrong. John's the one. John is like the place. When you look up an article of is Jesus God, you're going to get citations to John all the way down. So I feel like, Dan, you've got a tall order in front of you in telling us how Jesus isn't God in the book of John.

Dan McClellan (4:08)

Yeah, it's going to be a ride.

Dan Beecher (4:10)

It's going to be a ride.

Let's start off with John chapter one, verse one. We're starting right at the top of John.

Dan McClellan (4:18)

As the great poet once said, Enarchi, or in the beginning. Let's start with the beginning, John 1.1, which in Greek is Enarchi in Hologos.

In the beginning was the word. Ke hologos in proston theon. And the word was, proston theon means next to, with, beside, God. And the word theon there has the definite article ton, which means the God. In Greek, you normally, if you're referring to a specific person or thing or place, you have to include a definite article. In English, we just have the.

In Greek, you had a few different ones. But anyway, that is God the Father. That is the God of Israel. And then you have the third clause in John 1.1, Ketheosino Logos, which is translated in the KJV in most translations, and the word was God.