Some have noted, though, that this may differ from the date when Jews hold their Passover. Why?
21 The Hebrew day ran from sunset (about six o’clock) to the next sunset. God commanded that the Passover lamb be killed on Nisan 14 “between the two evenings.” (Exodus 12:6) When would that be? Modern Jews cling to the rabbinical view that the lamb was to be slaughtered near the end of Nisan 14, between the time when the sun began to descend (about three o’clock) and the actual sunset. As a result, they hold their Seder after sundown, when Nisan 15 has begun.—Mark 1:32.
22 We have good reason, however, to understand the expression differently. Deuteronomy 16:6 clearly told the Israelites to “slaughter the passover sacrifice, in the evening, at sundown.” (Jewish Tanakh version) This indicates that “between the two evenings” referred to the twilight period, from sunset (which begins Nisan 14) to actual darkness. The ancient Karaite Jewsb understood it this way, as do Samaritansc down to today. Our accepting that the Passover lamb was sacrificed and eaten “at its appointed time” on Nisan 14, not on Nisan 15, is one reason why our Memorial date sometimes differs from the Jewish date.—Numbers 9:2-5.
23 Another reason why our date may differ from that of the Jews is that they employ a predetermined calendar, which system was not fixed until the fourth century C.E. Using this, they can set dates for Nisan 1 or for festivals decades or centuries beforehand. Moreover, the ancient lunar calendar needed to have a 13th month added occasionally so that the calendar would synchronize with the seasons. The current Jewish calendar adds this month at fixed points; in a 19-year cycle, it is added to years 3, 6, 8, 11, 14, 17, and 19.
24 However, Emil Schürer says that “at the time of Jesus [the Jews] still had no fixed calendar, but on the basis of purely empirical observation, began each new month with the appearance of the new moon, and similarly on the basis of observation” added a month as needed. “If . . . it was noticed towards the end of the year that Passover would fall before the vernal equinox [about March 21], the intercalation of a month before Nisan was decreed.” (The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, Volume 1) The extra month thus comes in naturally, not being added arbitrarily.
Thursday 7 March 2024
Why the difference between our Nisan 14 and Judaism's Nisan 14?
Time to end the quest for engineerless engineering?
Time to end the quedt Engineering Innovation from Cuttlefish
Editor’s note: We are delighted to welcome Daniel Witt as a new contributor. In case you are curious about the background in his author photo, it was taken in a pyramid in Sudan, at Meroë.
Last month, Cambridge University’s science magazine, Bluesci, announced that researchers have developed a new camera based on cuttlefish eyes. Cuttlefish have unusual W-shaped pupils that allow them to see well in both dim and bright conditions as they navigate in deeper or shallower waters. The researchers successfully reverse-engineered the cuttlefish’s eye structure to create a camera that works better in conditions of highly variable luminosity.
Cuttlefish are extraordinary creatures, and this is not the first time engineers have learned from them. In 2013, the Washington Post reported that the Office of Naval Research was funding a project to mimic the cuttlefish’s color-changing skin, with potential application in submarine camouflage technology. In 2009, NBC reported that MIT scientists had studied cuttlefish skin to design a TV screen that used less than 1 percent of the power that other screens at the time used. The reverse-engineering opportunities just keep coming.
Usually, “reverse-engineering” implies that … well, engineering took place beforehand; design, in other words. And, as it happens, the news from Cambridge explicitly refers to cuttlefish eyes as “finely-designed.”
It was probably a slip-up. No doubt the writer would defend this as a mere convention of speech — I doubt that he was trying to imply that actual design took place in the creation of cuttlefish eyes. But isn’t it interesting that it’s so difficult to talk about these things without invoking the language of design?
Caught in the Weeds
Maybe it doesn’t seem so interesting. But that’s only because we’re so used to this reality. It can be easy to get caught in the weeds in the debate over whether Darwinian mechanisms are sufficient to explain life, and forget the reason the debate is going on in the first place. The debate only exists because these implausibly intricate engineering marvels exist. It did not have to be so. The universe could have been otherwise. It was never a given that when scientists looked deeper into life, they would find such exquisite designs; but they did.
As we gain the ability to look deeper and deeper into the inner workings of life, we seem to be entering a new renaissance of collaboration between biologists and engineers. Physicist Brian Miller recently noted this trend in the developing field of systems biology:
[W]hen you look at the design conversation, who controls it? It’s people who don’t have the expertise to really address it. They’re not engineers. They’ve been trained to see the world through this materialist grid, so they assume on faith that there’s no evidence of design, and then they find various reasons to justify that belief. In contrast, what you’re seeing in biology is really a revolution that’s at its early stages, because engineers are working more and more with biologists, and what you’re seeing is, when they do that they use design language, they use design assumptions.
An Engineering Marvel
As we all know, the prevailing theory insists that this appearance of design is mere illusion. But when engineers team up with biologists to learn how to copy the mechanisms of life, they aren’t thinking about that. Whether a cuttlefish eye is designed, or merely in every way appears to be designed, is irrelevant. The point is that it is an engineering marvel, and engineers can learn from it.
This fact is important, not because it is in-and-of-itself proof of design, but because it tells us something practical about the competing theories and their respective productivity.
Proponents of the neo-Darwinian model are fond of asserting that the naysaying arguments of ID-supporters (regarding irreducible complexity, non-traversable fitness landscapes, the probabilistic inability of Darwinian mechanisms to make meaningful changes to life within the lifespan of earth, lack of any confirmed observation of constructive mutations, etc.) make little difference to the actual research underway in biology. That is to say: Life only makes sense “in the light of evolution,” and the critics of that framework are just flies buzzing in the background.
A Verbal Gloss
The truth is something close to the opposite. Assumptions of macroevolution almost never have any practical bearing on research in biology. Darwinian evolution is invoked as a verbal gloss, not as a vital presupposition. Chemist and National Academy of Sciences member Philip S. Skell famously asked 70 distinguished researchers whether they would have done their work differently if they had believed Darwin’s theory was false. They all answered no.
Dr. Skell isn’t the only one to point this out; it’s the reality of the field. An assumption of design, by contrast, is quite often an essential foundation to successful research projects in biology — whether the design language is expurgated from the final presentation or not.
Biologists will continue to debate whether this design is real or only apparent. But in the meanwhile, intelligent design-based research will keep moving forward, untroubled by those debates — as it always has.
Zechariah Chapter 7 American Standard Version.
7.1 And it came to pass in the fourth year of king Darius, that the word of JEHOVAH came unto Zechariah in the fourth day of the ninth month, even in Chislev.
2 Now they of Beth-el had sent Sharezer and Regem-melech, and their men, to entreat the favor of JEHOVAH, 3 and to speak unto the priests of the house of JEHOVAH of hosts, and to the prophets, saying, Should I weep in the fifth month, separating myself, as I have done these so many years?
4 Then came the word of JEHOVAH of hosts unto me, saying, 5 Speak unto all the people of the land, and to the priests, saying, When ye fasted and mourned in the fifth and in the seventh month, even these seventy years, did ye at all fast unto me, even to me?
6 And when ye eat, and when ye drink, do not ye eat for yourselves, and drink for yourselves?
7 Should ye not hear the words which JEHOVAH cried by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and the cities thereof round about her, and the South and the lowland were inhabited?
8 And the word of JEHOVAH came unto Zechariah, saying, 9 Thus hath Jehovah of hosts spoken, saying, Execute true judgment, and show kindness and compassion every man to his brother; 10 and oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the sojourner, nor the poor; and let none of you devise evil against his brother in your heart.
11 But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they might not hear.
12 Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which JEHOVAH of hosts had sent by his Spirit by the former prophets: therefore there came great wrath from JEHOVAH of hosts.
13 And it is come to pass that, as he cried, and they would not hear, so they shall cry, and I will not hear, said JEHOVAH of hosts; 14 but I will scatter them with a whirlwind among all the nations which they have not known. Thus the land was desolate after them, so that no man passed through nor returned: for they laid the pleasant land desolate.
Acts 20:28 demystified.
Acts 20:28
Trinitarians, for obvious reasons, prefer this translation of Acts 20:28 - "... to shepherd ["feed" in some translations] the church of God which He purchased with His own blood." - NASB. This certainly seems to be excellent evidence for a "Jesus is God" doctrine.
But there are 2 major uncertainties about the proper translation of Acts 20:28. Either one of those uncertainties completely nullifies any trinitarian "evidence" proposed for this scripture!
First, even some trinitarian Bibles translate this verse, "the church of the Lord." - NEB; REB; ASV; Moffatt. Since Jesus was often referred to as "the Lord," this rendering negates any "Jesus is God" understanding for Acts 20:28.
Yes, even the popular trinitarian The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, p. 838, Vol. 2, Zondervan Publ., 1986, uses this translation for Acts 20:28 also: "to feed the church of the Lord"!
And the respected, scholarly trinitarian work, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, p. 480, United Bible Societies, 1971, explains about this first uncertainty concerning the translation of Acts 20:28. Although, for obvious reasons, preferring the rendering "the church of God" at this verse, this trinitarian work admits that there is "considerable degree of doubt" about this "preferred" rendering. They admit that "The external evidence is singularly balanced between `church of God' and `church of the Lord.'"
Second, even some trinitarian Bibles render this verse, "to care for the church of God which he obtained with the blood of his own Son." - RSV, 1971 ed.; NRSV; NJB; (also see TEV and GNB).
The New Testament Greek words tou idiou follow "with the blood" in this scripture. This could be translated as "with the blood of his own." A singular noun may be understood to follow "his own." This would be referring to God's "closest relation," his only-begotten Son.
Famous trinitarian scholar J. H. Moulton says about this:
"something should be said about the use of [ho idios, which includes tou idiou] without a noun expressed. This occurs in Jn 1:11, 13:1; Ac 4:23, 24:23. In the papyri we find the singular used thus as a term of endearment to near relations .... In Expos. vi. iii. 277 I ventured to cite this as a possible encouragement to those (including B. Weiss) who would translate Acts 20:28 `the blood of one who was his own.'" - A Grammar of New Testament Greek, Vol. 1 (Prolegomena), 1930 ed., p. 90.
And for the above reason noted trinitarian NT scholar and translator William Barclay rendered Acts 20:28:
"... the Church of God which he has rescued through the blood of his own One."
Highly respected trinitarian New Testament scholars Westcott and Hort present an alternate reason for a similar rendering:
"it is by no means impossible that YIOY [huiou, or `of the Son'] dropped out [was inadvertently left out during copying] after TOYIDIOY [tou idiou, or `of his own'] at some very early transcription affecting all existing documents. Its insertion [restoration] leaves the whole passage free from difficulty of any kind." - The New Testament in the Original Greek, Vol. 2, pp. 99, 100 of the Appendix.
And A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, p. 481, tells us:
"Instead of the usual meaning of dia tou haimatos tou idiou [`through the blood of the own'], it is possible that the writer of Acts intended his readers to understand the expression to mean `with the blood of his Own.' (It is not necessary to suppose, with Hort, that huiou may have dropped out after tou idiou, though palaeographically such an omission would have been easy.) This absolute use of ho idios is found in Greek papyri as a term of endearment referring to near relatives. It is possible, therefore, that `his Own' (ho idios) was a title which early Christians gave to Jesus, comparable to `the Beloved'."
Therefore, we can see that a rendering similar to RSV's "the church of God which he obtained with the blood of his own son [or `beloved']" is obviously an honest, proper rendering.
Although the UBS Committee didn't actually commit itself one way or another on this rendering of tou idiou at Acts 20:28, it did mention that "some have thought [it] to be a slight probability that tou idiou is used here as the equivalent of tou idiou huiou [`his own Son']." - p. 481. Obviously this includes those trinitarian scholars who translated the Revised Standard Version (1971 ed.) and Today's English Version.
Note the the even more certain conclusion of trinitarian scholar, Murray J. Harris, after an extensive analysis of this passage:
"I have argued that the original text of Acts 20:28 read [THN EKKLHSIAN TOU THEOU HN PERIEPOIHSATO DIA TOU AIUATOS TOU IDIOU] and that the most appropriate translation of these words is 'the church of God which he bought with the blood of his own one' or 'the church of God which he bought with the blood of his own Son' (NJB), with [HO IDIOS] construed as a christological title. According to this view, [HO THEOS] refers to God the Father, not Jesus Christ.
"If however, one follows many English versions in construing [IDIOS] adjectivally ('through his own blood'), [HO THEOS] could refer to Jesus and the verse could therefore allude to 'the blood of God,' although on this construction of [IDIOS] it is more probable that [THEOS] is God the Father and the unexpressed subject of [PERIEPOIHSATO] is Jesus. So it remains unlikely, although not impossible, that Acts 20:28 [HO THEOS] denotes Jesus." - p. 141, Jesus as Theos, The New Testament Use of Theos in Reference to Jesus, Baker Book House, Grand rapids, Michigan, 1992.
Since so many respected trinitarian scholars admit the possibility (and even the probability) of such honest alternate non-trinitarian translations for Acts 20:28, this scripture can't honestly be used as proof for a trinity concept.
Posted by Elijah Daniels
Isaiah6:3 demystified.
Isa. 6:3 "Holy, Holy, Holy"
Some trinitarians have claimed that this invocation of three "Holy"s for the one Jehovah must indicate the "three-in-oneness" of Him.
But trinitarian Dr. Young tells us: "The repetition of a word denotes the superlative degree, e.g. ... Isa 6:3." - Young's Analytical Concordance, "Hints and Helps to Bible Interpretation," #18, Eerdmans, 1978 printing. (Examine Jer. 22:29 and Ezek. 21:27. How would the trinitarian 'proof' method work in these scriptures?)
Even if we chose to ignore such explanations of triple-stated words (as the footnote for Is. 6:3 in the trinitarian The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 1977 ed.) that this is done for emphasis, we certainly wouldn't, I hope, insist that anyone (like Daffy Duck finding a treasure cavern) who said "Mine! Mine! Mine!" is really proclaiming his own 3-in-one triunity!
If we're really going to play such a silly game, let's look at Matt. 7:22 and Matt. 25:11: Jesus is addressed as "Lord, Lord"! We see, then, that either the "Godhead" is composed of only two persons (a "binity") or, more "likely," the Messiah is composed of two persons (David and Jesus, judging from many other scriptures – see `Quadrinity' study paper.
In the same vein we see at Matt. 23:7 (King James Version; NKJV; KJIIV; MKJV; Young's; Darby; Webster; Revised Webster; and other Bible translations based on the Received Text) that the Pharisees wanted to be called "Rabbi, Rabbi"! It is beyond the bounds of credibility that these individuals were teaching that they were part of a 2-in-one "Rabbinity"!
To continue this obviously ridiculous type of reasoning let's look at the use of "Hallelujah" in Revelation 19. This phrase, which means "praise Jehovah," is used only in this single chapter out of the entire NT. And in this one event the single God on the throne is praised with four hallelujahs. Surely this is "proof" (trinitarian-style) of a four-in-one Jehovah, a "quadrinity." (See Quadrinity paper mentioned above.)
Further such "proof" of the "Quadrinity" can be found at Ps. 107 where this prayer is called out four times: "Let them thank Jehovah for His mercy; and His wonders to the sons of men" - Ps. 107:8, 15, 21, 31, The Interlinear Bible.
Or, what could be "clearer" than the testimony of Rev. 4:5 and 5:6 that God is actually composed of seven spirit persons! Sure "proof" (trinitarian-style) that God is a septinity.
Or, maybe we could actually go with the many hundreds of instances where God is merely called Holy. Wouldn't these hundreds of instances of single usage outweigh the once or twice he's praised as "Holy, Holy, Holy"? Doesn't the overwhelming "testimony" of single "Holy" usages show by a margin of hundreds to one that Jehovah is composed of only a single (Holy) person?
Posted by Elijah Daniels
A match made in heaven?
Can the Laws of Nature Design Life? Emily Reeves Considers the Compatibility of Evolution and ID
Can intelligent design and evolution work together? It’s an intriguing idea that is welcomed by some, but does the scientific evidence support it? On a new episode of ID the Future, host Casey Luskin speaks with Dr. Emily Reeves to discuss her contribution to a recent paper critiquing theologian Rope Kojonen’s proposal that mainstream evolutionary biology and intelligent design have worked in harmony to produce the diversity of life we see on earth.
Dr. Reeves starts by summarizing the Compatibility of Evolution and Design (CED) argument before also summarizing her team’s response to it. “CED is a great work of scholarship,” says Reeves, “but I think its relevance really hinges on whether empirical evidence supports Kojonen’s version of how the design is implemented within evolutionary theory, and then, of course, whether design arguments…are really compatible with evolutionary theory.”
Reeves and Luskin go on to critique Dr. Kojonen’s conception of design. His model posits that the laws of nature have been front-loaded with design by an intelligent designer. But laws are not creative forces on their own – they only describe forces already in action. There’s no empirical evidence that the laws of nature could do the type of heavy lifting required to steer evolutionary processes toward success. As an example, Dr. Reeves describes how the law of gravity interacts with a growing plant. Gravity is used as a cue in the plant’s biology, but it doesn’t power the plant’s ability to grow. Download the podcast or listen to it here.
Wednesday 6 March 2024
ID is superstition masquerading as science?
Are Proponents of ID Religiously Motivated, and Does It Matter?
Recently, someone asked me to comment on an article, published in 2017, by John Danaher, a lecturer in the Law School at the University of Galway, Ireland. He is widely published on legal and moral philosophy, as well as philosophy of religion. In his article, Danaher alleges that proponents of intelligent design (ID) are religiously motivated. He also asserts that the argument for ID from irreducible complexity has conceptual problems, and that systems that we deem to be irreducibly complex can be adequately explained by co-optation of components performing other roles in the cell. In two articles, I will address his concerns about our supposed religious motives, and then tackle his specific objections to irreducible complexity.
Do We Have Religious Motives?
Danaher opens his essay by reminiscing about his days as a student when he first encountered ID.
When I was a student, well over a decade ago now, intelligent design was all the rage. It was the latest religiously-inspired threat to Darwinism (though it tried to hide its religious origins). It argued that Darwinism could never account for certain forms of adaptation that we see in the natural world.
What made intelligent design different from its forebears was its seeming scientific sophistication. Proponents of intelligent design were often well-qualified scientists and mathematicians, and they dressed up their arguments with the latest findings from microbiology and abstruse applications of probability theory. My sense is that the fad for intelligent design has faded in the intervening years, though I have no doubt that it still has its proponents.
These paragraphs betray the fact that the author is quite out of touch with the literature on ID.
Stronger than Ever
First, ID has come a long way since the early 2000s. Far from having faded, it is now stronger than ever, having more academic proponents (and many more peer-reviewed publications) than at any time in its history. Its arguments are far more developed and sophisticated than in the early 2000s and this trend is likely to continue.
Second, it is unclear in what sense Danaher refers to the “religious origins” of ID. It is certainly true that having a religious perspective, predisposing one towards theism, creates a plausibility structure that opens one’s mind to the possibility of there being measurable evidence of design in the universe, including in living organisms. Thus, being independently persuaded of the truth of a theistic religion (in my case, Christianity) is positively relevant to one’s assessment of the prior probability (or, intrinsic plausibility) of ID. However, even if one is not persuaded of theistic religion, the evidence of design in the natural world is, in my opinion, sufficient to overwhelm even a very low prior. Indeed, the cosmological evidence that our universe has a finite history; the fine-tuning of the laws and constants of our universe; the prior environmental fitness of nature for complex life; the optimization of the universe for scientific discovery and technology; and the biological evidence of design all point univocally and convergently in the direction of a cosmic creator. Thus, ID has attracted support from scholars who are not themselves adherents of any religion, including Michael Denton, David Berlinski, and Steve Fuller. Paleontologist and frequent Evolution News contributor Günter Bechly, though a Christian believer now, was not sympathetic to Christianity when he first came to be persuaded of ID.
Misguided on Many Levels
Later in the essay, Danaher further remarks
The claim is not that God must have created the bacterial flagellum but, rather, that an intelligent designer did. For tactical reasons, proponents of intelligent design liked to hide their religious motivations, trying to claim that their theory was scientific, not religious in nature. This was largely done in order to get around certain legal prohibitions on the teaching of religion under US constitutional law. I’m not too interested in that here though. I view the intelligent design movement as a religious one, and hence the arguments they proffer as on a par with pretty much all design arguments.
These comments are misguided on many levels.
First, the claim that we ID proponents are not clear about our personal religious persuasions is patently false. Speaking for myself, I have been very clear that I am a Christian theist, though my grounds for being persuaded of that conclusion are wholly independent of the science of ID. And I am by no means unusual. Virtually every leading ID proponent — from Michael Behe to William Dembski to Stephen Meyer to Phillip Johnson to David Klinghoffer to Casey Luskin to Brian Miller to Ann Gauger and many others — has been totally open about his or her personal religious beliefs. In the world of intelligent design, no one is hiding anything about religious beliefs, including those who lack religious beliefs.
Second, ID is a scientific argument, and when evaluating a scientific argument, the motives of its proponents are irrelevant. As Casey Luskin writes,
[I]n science, the motives or personal religious beliefs of scientists don’t matter; only the evidence matters. For example, the great scientists Johannes Kepler and Isaac Newton were inspired to their scientific work by their religious convictions that God would create an orderly, rational universe with comprehensible physical laws that governed the motion of the planets. They turned out to be right — not because of their religious beliefs — but because the scientific evidence validated their hypotheses. (At least, Newton was thought to be right until Einstein came along.) Their personal religious beliefs, motives, or affiliations did nothing to change the fact that their scientific theories had inestimable scientific merit that helped form the foundation for modern science.
To attack an idea because of the alleged religious motives of its proponents is to commit the genetic fallacy, and that is exactly what Danaher has done here.
Third, ID is not a religious argument. Though ID provides strong evidence for a broadly theistic perspective, the argument itself is grounded in the scientific method. ID does not aid in evaluating the merits of one particular religious tradition over another. ID does not even technically commit one to theism, though I would contend that God is the best candidate for the identity of the designer (as Stephen Meyer argues in his recent book, Return of the God Hypothesis). Thus, ID rightly attracts people of all religious persuasions and none (including Orthodox Jews, Muslims, and agnostics). This is important because it shows that ID is not about supporting one particular religion. We, therefore, strive to be honest about the limitations of ID while being careful not to overstate what the scientific evidence alone can tell us.
What About Evolution?
Finally, if Danaher wants to scrutinize the religious motives of ID proponents, we have to consider what such a line of attack would do to evolution. Casey Luskin has documented (see here or here) the extensive anti-religious beliefs, motives, and affiliations of many leading evolution-advocates. While I (and Luskin) would maintain that evolution is science, one must ask what would happen to evolution if the religious (or anti-religious) beliefs of its proponents suddenly became relevant to assessing its merits.
“Teach the Controversy”
Danaher’s statement that the claim that ID is scientific and not religious “was largely done in order to get around certain legal prohibitions on the teaching of religion under US constitutional law” is historically incorrect. Discovery Institute (the leading organization funding research into, and promoting the public understanding of, ID) does not support attempts to legally protect the teaching of ID in public schools. In fact, since Discovery Institute’s earliest involvement in major public education debates in the U.S. (in Ohio in 2002), it has not supported mandating the teaching of ID in public schools. This is not because we feel that ID is unconstitutional. ID, much like the Big Bang in cosmology, may be friendly to a broadly theistic perspective. However, this does not make the idea itself a religious one, just as the Big Bang theory is not a religious idea. Thus, there is nothing intrinsic to ID that would render it unconstitutional under the First Amendment. However, attempts to legislatively protect the teaching of ID tend to politicize the theory, and we believe that the merits of ID ought to be debated in the scientific journals, not in the courtroom. Rather, Discovery Institute advocates a “teach the controversy” model, where the strengths and weaknesses of scientific theories (including evolution) are presented and discussed. All of this is stated clearly and openly on our Science Education policy page:
As a matter of public policy, Discovery Institute opposes any effort to require the teaching of intelligent design by school districts or state boards of education. Attempts to require teaching about intelligent design only politicize the theory and will hinder fair and open discussion of the merits of the theory among scholars and within the scientific community. Furthermore, most teachers at the present time do not know enough about intelligent design to teach about it accurately and objectively.
Instead of recommending teaching about intelligent design in public K-12 schools, Discovery Institute seeks to increase the coverage of evolution in curriculum. It believes that evolution should be fully and completely presented to students, and they should learn more about evolutionary theory, including its unresolved issues. In other words, evolution should be taught as a scientific theory that is open to critical scrutiny, not as a sacred dogma that can’t be questioned.
Thus, Danaher is ill-informed about Discovery Institute’s long-standing education policy. In a second article, I shall address his specific concerns regarding the argument from irreducible complexity.
Tuesday 5 March 2024
When is one not one?
When ever a Trinitarian requires that it be so.
ECHAD (א ח ד)
Echad (‘Plural’ Oneness) and Yachid (‘Absolute’ Oneness)
I have seen Deut. 6:4 - “YHWH [Jehovah] our God, YHWH [Jehovah] one [Echad, א ח ד in Hebrew]” - rendered in several ways. (I prefer "Jehovah [is] our God, Jehovah alone.") Some trinitarians misinterpret this. They usually say something like this: “At Deut. 6:4 the word ‘one’ is echad [1] in Biblical Hebrew, which means ‘composite unity’ or ‘plural oneness’.”
The examples that they cite which are supposed to verify this understanding for echad are usually either Gen. 2:24 - “They [two persons] shall be one [echad] flesh,” or Gen. 1:5 - “the evening and the morning were the first (or one) [echad] day,” or Numbers 13:23 - “one [echad] cluster of grapes.”
In addition to insisting that echad means “plural oneness” some of them also insist that, if God had intended the meaning of “absolute oneness” (singleness, only one individual) at Deut. 6:4, he would have used the word yachid (or yacheed).
So let’s examine the intended meanings of echad and yachid and the scriptures cited above.
First, it certainly wouldn’t be surprising to find that some recognized trinitarian authority on Biblical Hebrew had written somewhere that echad means “united or plural oneness.” but I haven’t found one yet!
Here is what I have found written about echad by authorities on Biblical Hebrew:
The only definition given for echad in the very trinitarian New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance is: “a prim[ary] card[inal] number; one”. We find no “plural oneness” there!
The highly respected Biblical Hebrew authority, Gesenius, says that echad is “a numeral having the power of an adjective, one.” He then lists the various meanings of echad as:
“(1) The same,”
“(2) first,”
“(3) some one,”
“(4) it acts the part of an indefinite article,”[2]
“(5) one only of its kind,”
“(6) when repeated [echad ... echad] ‘one ... another’,”
“(7) [K echad] AS one man.” [The initial consonant of this word, “K,” actually means “as” or “like,” so in this special form the meaning is close to that of a plural oneness. But this is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 !! ]
Gesenius also lists a plural form of the word (achadim, or /*miiydxa in Hebrew script) which means “joined in one, united.” This, too, is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 which context shows, instead, to have meaning #5 above. - See Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, #259, Baker Book House. Surely, if God (Jehovah) were really a union of persons, a united one, this form which truly means “united one” would have been used to describe “Him” repeatedly in the Holy Scriptures. But it and all other words with similar meanings were never used for God (or Jehovah)!
By using a good Bible Concordance (such as Strong’s or Young’s) we can find all the uses of echad in the Bible. Unfortunately (due to space limitations),Young’s and Strong’s both list the rare plural form (achadim, or /*miiydxa in Hebrew letters) and the “AS one” (Kechad, or dxak in Hebrew script) form along with the common singular form (echad) without distinguishing among them.
Nevertheless, since both the plural form achadim and the kechad form are used quite rarely (see Ezek. 37:17 and 2 Chronicles 5:13 for examples), we can see that the overwhelming majority of the uses of echad listed in these concordances (over 500) obviously have the meaning of singleness just as we normally use the word “one” today.
If you should find a scripture listed as using echad in your concordance that definitely has the meaning “plural oneness” or “together,” or “as one,” you should check it out in an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible. If the word in question is really the echad form of the word (as at Deut. 6:4), then it will end with the Hebrew letter “d” (similar to '7') in the Hebrew portion of your interlinear. If, however, it is really the plural form of the word (achadim), then it will end in the Hebrew letter “m” (similar to 'D'). And if the word is really Kechad (“AS one”), it will begin with the Hebrew letter “k” (similar to a backward 'C'). Remember, though, that Hebrew reads from right to left (so the LAST letter of a Hebrew word is really the letter at the extreme LEFT.)
Using your concordance along with an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible in this manner, I don’t believe you will ever find echad (as used at Deut. 6:4) literally meaning “plural oneness”!
Further emphasizing the impropriety of this “plural oneness” interpretation of echad are the many trinitarian renderings of Deut. 6:4. In the dozens of different trinitarian Bible translations that I have examined none of them have rendered Deut. 6:4 (or Mark 12:29 in the Greek NT) in such a way as to show anything even faintly resembling a “plural oneness”!!
Even the highly trinitarian The Living Bible, which, being a paraphrase Bible, is able to (and frequently does) take great liberties with the literal Greek and Hebrew meanings in order to make better trinitarian interpretations, renders Deut. 6:4 as “Jehovah is our God, Jehovah alone.” Notice that there’s not even a hint of a “plural oneness” Jehovah!
The equally trinitarian (and nearly as “freely” translated as The Living Bible) Good News Bible (GNB) renders it: “The LORD - and the LORD alone - is our God.” - Compare the equally “free-handed” (and trinitarian) The Amplified Bible.
And even among the more literal trinitarian translations of Deut 6:4 we find:
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - New Revised Standard Version.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone!” - New American Bible.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - The Holy Bible in the Language of Today, Beck (Lutheran).
“Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh.” - New Jerusalem Bible.
“Yahweh is our God, - Yahweh alone.” - The Emphasized Bible, Rotherham.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - An American Translation (Smith-Goodspeed).
“The Eternal, the Eternal alone, is our God.” - A New Transation, Moffatt .
The trinitarian ASV (also the RSV) gives 4 different possible renderings of Deut. 6:4. One of them is identical with The Living Bible, and none of them includes an understanding of a “plural oneness” God!
The paraphrased The Living Bible also renders Mark 12:29 (where Jesus quotes Deut. 6:4 and an excellent spot for him to reveal a “trinity” God --- or even just a “plural oneness” God) as: “The Lord our God is the one and only God.” Notice the further explanation of the intended meaning of this scripture at Mark 12:32, 34. “’... you have spoken a true word in saying that there is only one God and no other...’ Realizing this man’s understanding, Jesus said to him, ‘You are not far from the Kingdom of God.’”
Why doesn’t this highly interpretive trinitarian paraphrase Bible (or any other Bible for that matter) bring out a “plural oneness” meaning at these scriptures (Deut. 6:4; Mark 12:29) if that can be a proper interpretation for echad?
Surely, if the trinitarian scholars who made this Bible had thought there was even the slightest justification for an echad = “plural oneness” interpretation, they would have rendered it that way: “Jehovah is a composite unity;” or “Jehovah is the United One;” or “Jehovah is a plural oneness;” etc.
Instead they have clearly shown that God (who inspired it), Moses (who wrote it under inspiration), and even Jesus himself (who taught that it was part of the most important commandment of all - Mark 12:28-29, LB; GNB; etc.) intended this scripture to show God as a single person only!
Similarly, the three annotated trinitarian study Bibles I own would certainly explain any intended “multiple-oneness” meaning for echad at Deut. 6:4 (if there were any possibility of such an interpretation). But the extremely trinitarian New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., gives no hint of such an understanding of echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And the trinitarian The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 1977 ed., likewise gives no hint of such an understanding in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And that trinitarian favorite: The NIV Study Bible, 1985, also gives no hint of such a meaning for echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). The only possible reason for all these trinitarian study Bibles ignoring this “proof” is that it simply is not true!
The examples given by some trinitarians to show a “plural oneness” meaning for echad don’t stand up either. The Gen. 2:24 example of a man and wife becoming “one (echad) flesh” certainly does not mean one literal body of flesh is composed of two people.
A man and wife becoming “one flesh” also doesn’t mean that two different persons suddenly become equal or identical. They are still two distinct individuals (one is lord and head over the other according to the Bible) and do not share nervous, circulatory, skeletal, etc. systems. They both did not have to (and, in fact, did not) come into existence at the same time, nor do they both have the same minds, personalities, nor even equal authority!
So, then, how did the Bible writers understand that the two became “one”? It should be enough to show that being “one” with someone else merely shows how two (or more) people are “united in purpose” as though they were one person in that respect only (purpose). - See the ONE study.Notice how the following scripture uses the very same “one flesh” reference:
Echad (‘Plural’ Oneness) and Yachid (‘Absolute’ Oneness)
I have seen Deut. 6:4 - “YHWH [Jehovah] our God, YHWH [Jehovah] one [Echad, א ח ד in Hebrew]” - rendered in several ways. (I prefer "Jehovah [is] our God, Jehovah alone.") Some trinitarians misinterpret this. They usually say something like this: “At Deut. 6:4 the word ‘one’ is echad [1] in Biblical Hebrew, which means ‘composite unity’ or ‘plural oneness’.”
The examples that they cite which are supposed to verify this understanding for echad are usually either Gen. 2:24 - “They [two persons] shall be one [echad] flesh,” or Gen. 1:5 - “the evening and the morning were the first (or one) [echad] day,” or Numbers 13:23 - “one [echad] cluster of grapes.”
In addition to insisting that echad means “plural oneness” some of them also insist that, if God had intended the meaning of “absolute oneness” (singleness, only one individual) at Deut. 6:4, he would have used the word yachid (or yacheed).
So let’s examine the intended meanings of echad and yachid and the scriptures cited above.
First, it certainly wouldn’t be surprising to find that some recognized trinitarian authority on Biblical Hebrew had written somewhere that echad means “united or plural oneness.” but I haven’t found one yet!
Here is what I have found written about echad by authorities on Biblical Hebrew:
The only definition given for echad in the very trinitarian New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance is: “a prim[ary] card[inal] number; one”. We find no “plural oneness” there!
The highly respected Biblical Hebrew authority, Gesenius, says that echad is “a numeral having the power of an adjective, one.” He then lists the various meanings of echad as:
“(1) The same,”
“(2) first,”
“(3) some one,”
“(4) it acts the part of an indefinite article,”[2]
“(5) one only of its kind,”
“(6) when repeated [echad ... echad] ‘one ... another’,”
“(7) [K echad] AS one man.” [The initial consonant of this word, “K,” actually means “as” or “like,” so in this special form the meaning is close to that of a plural oneness. But this is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 !! ]
Gesenius also lists a plural form of the word (achadim, or /*miiydxa in Hebrew script) which means “joined in one, united.” This, too, is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 which context shows, instead, to have meaning #5 above. - See Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, #259, Baker Book House. Surely, if God (Jehovah) were really a union of persons, a united one, this form which truly means “united one” would have been used to describe “Him” repeatedly in the Holy Scriptures. But it and all other words with similar meanings were never used for God (or Jehovah)!
By using a good Bible Concordance (such as Strong’s or Young’s) we can find all the uses of echad in the Bible. Unfortunately (due to space limitations),Young’s and Strong’s both list the rare plural form (achadim, or /*miiydxa in Hebrew letters) and the “AS one” (Kechad, or dxak in Hebrew script) form along with the common singular form (echad) without distinguishing among them.
Nevertheless, since both the plural form achadim and the kechad form are used quite rarely (see Ezek. 37:17 and 2 Chronicles 5:13 for examples), we can see that the overwhelming majority of the uses of echad listed in these concordances (over 500) obviously have the meaning of singleness just as we normally use the word “one” today.
If you should find a scripture listed as using echad in your concordance that definitely has the meaning “plural oneness” or “together,” or “as one,” you should check it out in an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible. If the word in question is really the echad form of the word (as at Deut. 6:4), then it will end with the Hebrew letter “d” (similar to '7') in the Hebrew portion of your interlinear. If, however, it is really the plural form of the word (achadim), then it will end in the Hebrew letter “m” (similar to 'D'). And if the word is really Kechad (“AS one”), it will begin with the Hebrew letter “k” (similar to a backward 'C'). Remember, though, that Hebrew reads from right to left (so the LAST letter of a Hebrew word is really the letter at the extreme LEFT.)
Using your concordance along with an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible in this manner, I don’t believe you will ever find echad (as used at Deut. 6:4) literally meaning “plural oneness”!
Further emphasizing the impropriety of this “plural oneness” interpretation of echad are the many trinitarian renderings of Deut. 6:4. In the dozens of different trinitarian Bible translations that I have examined none of them have rendered Deut. 6:4 (or Mark 12:29 in the Greek NT) in such a way as to show anything even faintly resembling a “plural oneness”!!
Even the highly trinitarian The Living Bible, which, being a paraphrase Bible, is able to (and frequently does) take great liberties with the literal Greek and Hebrew meanings in order to make better trinitarian interpretations, renders Deut. 6:4 as “Jehovah is our God, Jehovah alone.” Notice that there’s not even a hint of a “plural oneness” Jehovah!
The equally trinitarian (and nearly as “freely” translated as The Living Bible) Good News Bible (GNB) renders it: “The LORD - and the LORD alone - is our God.” - Compare the equally “free-handed” (and trinitarian) The Amplified Bible.
And even among the more literal trinitarian translations of Deut 6:4 we find:
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - New Revised Standard Version.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone!” - New American Bible.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - The Holy Bible in the Language of Today, Beck (Lutheran).
“Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh.” - New Jerusalem Bible.
“Yahweh is our God, - Yahweh alone.” - The Emphasized Bible, Rotherham.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - An American Translation (Smith-Goodspeed).
“The Eternal, the Eternal alone, is our God.” - A New Transation, Moffatt .
The trinitarian ASV (also the RSV) gives 4 different possible renderings of Deut. 6:4. One of them is identical with The Living Bible, and none of them includes an understanding of a “plural oneness” God!
The paraphrased The Living Bible also renders Mark 12:29 (where Jesus quotes Deut. 6:4 and an excellent spot for him to reveal a “trinity” God --- or even just a “plural oneness” God) as: “The Lord our God is the one and only God.” Notice the further explanation of the intended meaning of this scripture at Mark 12:32, 34. “’... you have spoken a true word in saying that there is only one God and no other...’ Realizing this man’s understanding, Jesus said to him, ‘You are not far from the Kingdom of God.’”
Why doesn’t this highly interpretive trinitarian paraphrase Bible (or any other Bible for that matter) bring out a “plural oneness” meaning at these scriptures (Deut. 6:4; Mark 12:29) if that can be a proper interpretation for echad?
Surely, if the trinitarian scholars who made this Bible had thought there was even the slightest justification for an echad = “plural oneness” interpretation, they would have rendered it that way: “Jehovah is a composite unity;” or “Jehovah is the United One;” or “Jehovah is a plural oneness;” etc.
Instead they have clearly shown that God (who inspired it), Moses (who wrote it under inspiration), and even Jesus himself (who taught that it was part of the most important commandment of all - Mark 12:28-29, LB; GNB; etc.) intended this scripture to show God as a single person only!
Similarly, the three annotated trinitarian study Bibles I own would certainly explain any intended “multiple-oneness” meaning for echad at Deut. 6:4 (if there were any possibility of such an interpretation). But the extremely trinitarian New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., gives no hint of such an understanding of echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And the trinitarian The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 1977 ed., likewise gives no hint of such an understanding in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And that trinitarian favorite: The NIV Study Bible, 1985, also gives no hint of such a meaning for echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). The only possible reason for all these trinitarian study Bibles ignoring this “proof” is that it simply is not true!
The examples given by some trinitarians to show a “plural oneness” meaning for echad don’t stand up either. The Gen. 2:24 example of a man and wife becoming “one (echad) flesh” certainly does not mean one literal body of flesh is composed of two people.
A man and wife becoming “one flesh” also doesn’t mean that two different persons suddenly become equal or identical. They are still two distinct individuals (one is lord and head over the other according to the Bible) and do not share nervous, circulatory, skeletal, etc. systems. They both did not have to (and, in fact, did not) come into existence at the same time, nor do they both have the same minds, personalities, nor even equal authority!
So, then, how did the Bible writers understand that the two became “one”? It should be enough to show that being “one” with someone else merely shows how two (or more) people are “united in purpose” as though they were one person in that respect only (purpose). - See the ONE study.Notice how the following scripture uses the very same “one flesh” reference:
Ephesians 5:31 "For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh." 32 This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church. - NKJV.
This could be understood as in the “one in purpose” interpretation above, and/or it could be understood in the “close relationship” understanding below. But it clearly is speaking of Jesus and his followers being “one flesh.”
Another way a man and wife can be considered “one flesh” has to do with what the word “flesh” (basar) meant in ancient Biblical Hebrew. Any good concordance will show you that “flesh” (basar) in Bible usage often means a close relative. Gen. 37:27 is an example of this: “for he is our brother and our flesh.”
And the equivalent NT Greek word for “flesh” (sarx) could be used in the same manner. At Ro 11:14, “my flesh (sarx)” - KJV is also rendered: “my fellow Jews” - RSV; “my own race” - MLB, TEV, GNB, NEB; “my own people” - NIV; “my fellow countrymen” - NASB.
The King James Version even translates this OT Hebrew word (basar) as “KIN” at Lev. 18:6 and 25:49. The New English Bible translates it “blood-relation.” With this common understanding for “flesh” it is clear that the expression “one flesh” at Gen. 2:24 can simply mean that the two married people are now to be considered as closely related as “blood-relatives.” In other words, their closest “flesh” (relatives) used to be their parents. Now they are to consider their new relationship to one another as being even stronger than that with their parents: “therefore shall a man leave his mother and father” - Gen. 2:24.
To argue that a man and woman somehow, in some mysterious supernatural way, literally become one flesh, is simply not what was intended in the original language.
It is no more mysterious than my saying that my wife Karen and I (and our children, Randy and Robin) have become a single (or “one”) family (“relationship,” “kin”). I certainly don’t mean to imply some “mysterious” plurality by the word “single” even though there happen to be two (or four) members in that one family (relationship, “flesh”). Or, a person could have dozens of members in his one, single family (“flesh”). Or, a person might be the sole surviving member (“absolute mathematical oneness”) of his one family - it’s still only one family and the singularity or plurality of its composition has nothing whatsoever to do with its being one single family!
It’s no different from talking about two families, three families, etc. We are talking about a definite mathematical number of families, not the numerical composition within those families. The “one flesh” example works exactly that same way.
A few “echad = multiple oneness” trinitarians even claim that a man and woman becoming “one flesh” means “they are one in nature ... one in human nature as the Father and Son are one in the God-nature.”
This kind of reasoning would mean that the man (or the woman) before marriage (before they “became one flesh”) was not by himself already equally “one” in human nature with the rest of mankind! Then what kind of nature did this person possess before he married?
Each person (whether they ever marry and become “one flesh” or not) obviously already possesses human nature equally with any other human being. But when they marry, they are supposed to become one in purpose, goals, etc., the closest of relatives, not suddenly become human beings and thereby gain human nature!
Strangely, one recent anti-Watchtower letter sent by a relative to a local Witness used the above example for “one” in marriage being “one” in nature and then said:
“‘the marriage relationship portrays the mystical oneness and union of Jesus, the Bridegroom with His Bride, His Church’ just as it portrays that the man and his wife ‘are ... one in nature ... as the Father and Son are one in the God-nature.’”
Yes, this writer was actually saying, then, that just as the Father and Son are one, so the man and wife are one, and so Jesus and his Church (all his true followers) are one! In other words, in trinitarian terms, Jesus and his Father are equally God; and Jesus (God in every sense, they would say) and his Church (also equal in nature with Jesus) must then be equally God also!!
Clearly it means, instead, that Jesus, the bridegroom, and his bride, his church (of “brothers”) are one in purpose only (as are God and his Son). -
“That they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they may also be in us ... that they may be one even as we are one.” - John 17:21, 22, ASV.
Even if the Hebrew echad were used here at John 17:22 for “one” (as the famous Lutheran trinitarian scholar, Franz Delitzsch translated it in his Hebrew New Testament), it is obvious that it does not mean some mysterious plural oneness wherein the individuals are all equally the Father, or equally the Son, and certainly not all equally God! (In any case, John would have used the masculine form of “one” in the NT Greek, heis, at John 17:22 if he had intended any of the above “trinitarian” meanings. Instead, he used the neuter form, hen, in NT Greek which signifies a union of purpose - see the ONE study).
Delitzsch also translates the NT Greek heis at 1 Cor. 9:24 (“only one” - NIV, NEB, TEV, GNB, RSV; “only one person” - The Living Bible) as echad ! There is certainly no “plural oneness” intended here! - Hebrew New Testament, Delitzsch, The Trinitarian Bible Society, 1981.
If a person will not acknowledge the obvious figurative meaning of “one” as “united in purpose,” then he is saying that as man and wife become absolutely equal in nature by marriage (and as Jesus and the Father are “absolutely equal in nature” and are, therefore, equally God) so do Jesus and his Church become “one” or “equal in nature” and, therefore, the Church (Jesus’ “brothers”) is equally God!
Such reasoning is obviously ludicrous and illustrates what was really figuratively intended by “one” in marriage and other relationships: they are as though they were literally “one” in only one respect: unity of purpose!
As the bride is to become “one” in purpose with her husband (although he is designated to be head over his wife - 1 Cor. 11:3; Eph. 5:23), so, too, those chosen ones are to become “one” in purpose with Jesus (although he is to be their head - Eph. 5:23; 1 Cor. 11:3 - so he does not conform to their will and purpose, nor are they equal to him, but they willingly conform to his purpose so that they may be “one”), and so, in like manner, Jesus has become “one” in purpose with his Father (the only true God - John 17:3) who is his head. The Father does not conform to the will and purpose of Jesus, nor is Jesus in any way equal to the Father, but Jesus willingly and perfectly conforms to his Father’s purpose and will! - “The head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman (wife) is the man; and the head of Christ is God [not ‘Christ is equal to God’].” - 1 Cor. 11:3, ASV.
So, why couldn’t the absolute mathematical oneness of echad at Deut. 6:4 be describing a figurative unity of purpose just as the Greek “one” (hen) does at John 17:21, 22?
That is, if Jesus can describe certain chosen men, and his Father (God alone), and himself figuratively as all being “one” (in purpose only), why couldn’t God be telling us at Deuteronomy 6:4 that he is more than one person, all of whom are united in purpose? One reason is that the word used for “one” in this sense is neuter (hen). But the word used for “one” at Deut. 6:4 in the ancient Greek Septuagint (and at Mk 12:29 in the New Testament) is the masculine heis! - cf. Mk 2:7.
We also know that such an interpretation is ridiculous because of the clear context of Deut. 6 (and the clear statements of the rest of the Bible). Nowhere in Old or New Testament is God said to be more than one person. No one would have possibly understood Deut. 6:4 as meaning “Jehovah is a ‘many persons united in one purpose’ God” at that time or for thousands of years thereafter (certainly not until hundreds of years after Jesus’ death - see the HIST study, parts 2-5).
The context of Deut. 6:4 and 6:13-15 shows that God is not speaking of all persons who could be considered to be “united in purpose” with the Father (this would have included the Father and the Word, of course, but it would also have included the millions of faithful angels, and today it would include a large number of faithful Christians!). Remember that when “one” is used figuratively for “united in purpose” it is always describing a relationship between certain individuals or groups who are identified in context. There is no such identification (nor even the slightest suggestion of such an identification) found in Deut. 6.
We cannot believe that Deut. 6:4 is saying that all those who are “united in purpose” with Jehovah are Jehovah! But that is the only figurative use we could possibly have for echad at Deut. 6:4. Otherwise we are left with the literal meaning (mathematical oneness, a single individual) of echad (which is obviously intended in the vast majority of uses of echad and which is obviously intended at Deut. 6:4, 13-15 and further explained at Mark 12:29, 32.)
Just as no Bible translation (including all the many trinitarian translations I have examined) renders Deut. 6:4 with any kind of suggestion that “Jehovah is a multiple unity,” no translation suggests it should be rendered with the understanding that “Jehovah is united in purpose.”
It is also clear from other Bible statements that God is a single person: the Father in heaven. (Jehovah is never described as “the Son,” “the Messiah,” “the Holy Spirit,” or any other individual but the Father - Deut. 32:6; Is. 63:16; 64:8; Jer. 3:4; 3:19 - and conversely, no heavenly person except Jehovah is ever called the Father! - Matt. 23:9.)
Notice how Jesus used the word monos (“only,” “alone”) to describe God (Jehovah, the Father) at John 17:1, 3. “Father ... they should know thee the only [monos] True God.” Or, “Father ... who alone art truly God” - NEB.
But let’s look at another example where echad is supposed to literally mean “plural oneness.”
Almost anything we can name is composed of different elements or parts. If I should say, “Randy was the first (another way echad may be rendered into English) runner to cross the finish line,” I am not referring to the fact that he has two legs (or flesh, blood, and bones) which together help compose the whole of that one (or “first”) individual. I am saying (as everyone well knows) that, at the time he crossed the finish line, Randy was the only one who had done so (whether he had one or two legs, etc.). In the same sense of absolute mathematical order I would say that the very next runner (whether it should happen to be a woman, horse, octopus, snail, etc.) is the second individual runner to cross the finish line regardless of how many legs, arms, etc. that racer has. So, Robin, the second runner to cross the finish line is no more a “plural twoness” than Randy, the first one, is a “plural oneness”!
Therefore, “the evening and the morning were the first [echad] day [‘one day’ - RSV]” - Gen. 1:5, KJV - means exactly what it says, just as “the evening and the morning were the second [sheni] day” - Gen. 1:8 - means exactly what it says and so on through six days!
“The first [echad] day” does not in any sense refer to the individual parts which compose that day (or a “plural oneness”) any more than “the sixth day” refers to a “plural sixness” making up that single day! They are absolute mathematical numbers and do not refer to internal composition but, instead, to single, individual things.
And so it is with the example of “one [echad] cluster of grapes” at Numbers 13:23. Here again “one” [echad] obviously means only one (singleness, absolute mathematical oneness) for whatever word it is applied to.
It is the word “cluster” in this scripture which means “one thing composed of many individual items,” but there is only one single (absolute mathematical oneness) “cluster”!
This is no different from one (echad) single tribe (whether composed of one single, last person or millions of persons) at Judges 21:3, 6 and two tribes (whether each is composed of one person or millions) at Joshua 21:16. Echad literally means “single,” “only” as can plainly be seen at Exodus 12:46, “one house;” Ex. 33:5, “one moment;” Numbers 7:21, “one bullock, one ram, [etc.].”
Yachid
A few trinitarians insist that not only does echad mean “plural oneness,” but that, if singleness were intended by the Bible writer, the Hebrew word yachidwould have been used at Deut. 6:4.
Here is how it was presented to me by one trinitarian:
“The word for ‘one’ in this great declaration [Deut. 6:4] is not Yachid which is an absolute oneness but rather echad which means ‘united one.’ Had the Holy Spirit desired to state absolute mathematical oneness in this all-important declaration, He could have easily used the word yachid, couldn’t He?”
We have already seen the absolute falsity of the “echad-means-’plural-oneness’” idea. But what about yachid? Did the Bible writers really use it whenever they meant “absolute mathematical oneness”? We have already seen that they really used echad for “absolute mathematical oneness,” and a good concordance will show they did this consistently—many hundreds of times!
Yachid, on the other hand, is only used about 12 times in the entire Bible and then only in a narrow, specific sense.
The Old Testament language authority, Gesenius, tells us that yachid is used in three very specialized ways: (1) “only” but primarily in the sense of “only begotten”! - Gen. 22:2, 12, 16; Jer. 6:26; and Zech. 12:10. (2) “solitary” but with the connotation of “forsaken” or “wretched” ! - Ps. 25:16; 68:6. (3) As yachidah (feminine form) meaning “only one” as something most dear and used “poet[ically] for ‘life’ - Ps. 22:20; 35:17.” - p. 345 b.
We find yachid is never used to describe God anywhere in the entire Bible! But it is used to describe Isaac in his prefigured representation of the Messiah: Gen. 22:2, 12, 16. It is also used at Judges 11:34 for an only-begotten child. The ancient Greek Septuagint translates yachid at Judges 11:34 as monogenes (“only-begotten”): the same NT Greek word repeatedly used to describe Christ (even in his pre-human heavenly existence - 1 John 4:9). Monogenes, however, like the Hebrew yachid, is never used to describe the only true God, Jehovah (who is the Father alone).
So, if Jehovah were to describe himself as “forsaken” or “wretched,” or were speaking poetically about his “dear life,” or were describing himself as the “only-begotten son” (which he never does anywhere in the Bible!), then he might have used yachid.[3]
But since he was describing his “mathematical oneness” at Deut. 6:4, he properly used echad!
As we pointed out at the beginning, there are Hebrew words that mean “plural oneness,” but echad is not one of them. As another example, notice the clear meaning of echad as “absolute mathematical oneness” at Gen. 42:11 where the sons of Jacob say, “we are all one [echad] man’s sons.” They certainly weren’t saying “we are all sons of different men who together make up a ‘plural oneness’ man.”! Instead, the inspired Bible writer wrote that they were all sons of one [echad not yachid] single, solitary man.
We see the same thing at Malachi 2:10 even though we find two different interpretations by trinitarian translators.
Some translate it:
“have we not all one [echad] father? Has not one [echad] God created us?” -RSV.
The meaning of this rendering seems to be that everyone has a single person as his earthly father and, by comparison, we also all have a single [echad] person as our God and Creator in heaven.
Other trinitarian scholars translate Malachi 2:10 as:
“Have we not all the one Father? Has not the one God created us?” - NAB (1970 and 1991).
“Is there not one Father of us all? Did not one God create us?” - NJB.
“Have we not all one Father? Did not one God create us?” - JB.
“Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us?” - NKJV.
“Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us?” - The Amplified Bible.
“Is there not one Father to us all? Has not one God created us?” - MKJV, Green.
“Don’t all of us have one Father? Hasn’t one God created us?” - In the Language of Today, Beck.
“Do we not all have one Father? Has not one God made us?” - NLV.
We clearly see in these trinitarian translations that the common Hebrew use of parallelisms was intended by the inspired Bible writers. That is, the first half of the verse is differently worded but parallel in meaning with the second half. Therefore, the first half refers to God just as the second half does, so the translator has capitalized “Father” to make such an interpretation unmistakeable. The meaning in this interpretation, then, is:
“We all have one [echad] Father (the only person who is God),” and, in parallel meaning,
“We all have one [echad] Creator (a single person as God).” - Compare 1 Cor. 8:6; Eph. 4:6.
No matter which interpretation you prefer, it is clear that the comparison with (or parallel with) a single individual father (whether we interpret it as the single male human parent or the single person, God the Father), who is called “one [echad] father/Father,” is a single individual who is called “one [echad] God”! The comparison (or parallel) would be senseless if echad meant one single person for “father/Father” (as it must) in its first half and “plural oneness” persons for “God” (as it clearly doesn’t) in its second half!
The inspired Bible writers at Gen. 42:11, Malachi 2:10, and Deut. 6:4 could easily have used a word that really means “united one”[4] - but they didn’t! The inspired Bible writer at Deut. 6:4 could also have easily said (and definitely should have said if it were true) that “God is three persons who together make up the one God” or even just “the one God is three persons,” but he didn’t, and neither did any other Bible writer! He should also have used yachid repeatedly in the Bible for God if Jehovah is ever to be understood as being Jesus (“the only-begotten”), but no Bible writer describes Jehovah that way, ever!
A footnote for Deut. 6:4 in the very trinitarian The New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., 1970, says:
“this passage contains the basic principle of the whole Mosaic law, the keynote of the Book of Deuteronomy: since the Lord [Jehovah] alone is God, we must love him with an undivided heart. Christ cited these words as ‘the greatest and the first commandment,’ embracing in itself the whole law of God (Mt 22:37f and parallels [especially see Mark 12:28-34]).”
As the ASV renders it in a footnote for Deut. 6:4 - “Jehovah is our God; Jehovah is one”. Yes, the great distinction between Israel and all the nations around them was that they worshiped only one [”absolute mathematical oneness”] person as God (as they always have, and as they still do today - see the ISRAEL study).
The only honest interpretations of “this great declaration” of Deut. 6:4 are “Jehovah our God is only one [echad] person” or “Jehovah our God is only one God”!
Judging by the literal meanings of both the Hebrew Scriptures and the Greek (NT and Septuagint OT) Scriptures Deut. 6:4 actually says: “Hear Israel, Jehovah the God of us, Jehovah is one” (Sept. Greek) and “Jehovah our God, Jehovah [is] one” (Hebrew - Interlinear Bible). But in any case echad clearly refers to a single, solitary [absolute mathematical oneness] being, not a “multiple oneness”!
So even the very trinitarian literal translation, the New King James Version[5], (like the very trinitarian ETRV [6] paraphrase Bible) translates echad at Deut. 6:4 correctly as: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD [Jehovah] our God, the LORD [Jehovah] is one!”
The meaning is clear. It is expressed perhaps even more clearly in the popular trinitarian paraphrase Bible, The Living Bible: “Jehovah is our God, Jehovah alone.”
Another way a man and wife can be considered “one flesh” has to do with what the word “flesh” (basar) meant in ancient Biblical Hebrew. Any good concordance will show you that “flesh” (basar) in Bible usage often means a close relative. Gen. 37:27 is an example of this: “for he is our brother and our flesh.”
And the equivalent NT Greek word for “flesh” (sarx) could be used in the same manner. At Ro 11:14, “my flesh (sarx)” - KJV is also rendered: “my fellow Jews” - RSV; “my own race” - MLB, TEV, GNB, NEB; “my own people” - NIV; “my fellow countrymen” - NASB.
The King James Version even translates this OT Hebrew word (basar) as “KIN” at Lev. 18:6 and 25:49. The New English Bible translates it “blood-relation.” With this common understanding for “flesh” it is clear that the expression “one flesh” at Gen. 2:24 can simply mean that the two married people are now to be considered as closely related as “blood-relatives.” In other words, their closest “flesh” (relatives) used to be their parents. Now they are to consider their new relationship to one another as being even stronger than that with their parents: “therefore shall a man leave his mother and father” - Gen. 2:24.
To argue that a man and woman somehow, in some mysterious supernatural way, literally become one flesh, is simply not what was intended in the original language.
It is no more mysterious than my saying that my wife Karen and I (and our children, Randy and Robin) have become a single (or “one”) family (“relationship,” “kin”). I certainly don’t mean to imply some “mysterious” plurality by the word “single” even though there happen to be two (or four) members in that one family (relationship, “flesh”). Or, a person could have dozens of members in his one, single family (“flesh”). Or, a person might be the sole surviving member (“absolute mathematical oneness”) of his one family - it’s still only one family and the singularity or plurality of its composition has nothing whatsoever to do with its being one single family!
It’s no different from talking about two families, three families, etc. We are talking about a definite mathematical number of families, not the numerical composition within those families. The “one flesh” example works exactly that same way.
A few “echad = multiple oneness” trinitarians even claim that a man and woman becoming “one flesh” means “they are one in nature ... one in human nature as the Father and Son are one in the God-nature.”
This kind of reasoning would mean that the man (or the woman) before marriage (before they “became one flesh”) was not by himself already equally “one” in human nature with the rest of mankind! Then what kind of nature did this person possess before he married?
Each person (whether they ever marry and become “one flesh” or not) obviously already possesses human nature equally with any other human being. But when they marry, they are supposed to become one in purpose, goals, etc., the closest of relatives, not suddenly become human beings and thereby gain human nature!
Strangely, one recent anti-Watchtower letter sent by a relative to a local Witness used the above example for “one” in marriage being “one” in nature and then said:
“‘the marriage relationship portrays the mystical oneness and union of Jesus, the Bridegroom with His Bride, His Church’ just as it portrays that the man and his wife ‘are ... one in nature ... as the Father and Son are one in the God-nature.’”
Yes, this writer was actually saying, then, that just as the Father and Son are one, so the man and wife are one, and so Jesus and his Church (all his true followers) are one! In other words, in trinitarian terms, Jesus and his Father are equally God; and Jesus (God in every sense, they would say) and his Church (also equal in nature with Jesus) must then be equally God also!!
Clearly it means, instead, that Jesus, the bridegroom, and his bride, his church (of “brothers”) are one in purpose only (as are God and his Son). -
“That they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they may also be in us ... that they may be one even as we are one.” - John 17:21, 22, ASV.
Even if the Hebrew echad were used here at John 17:22 for “one” (as the famous Lutheran trinitarian scholar, Franz Delitzsch translated it in his Hebrew New Testament), it is obvious that it does not mean some mysterious plural oneness wherein the individuals are all equally the Father, or equally the Son, and certainly not all equally God! (In any case, John would have used the masculine form of “one” in the NT Greek, heis, at John 17:22 if he had intended any of the above “trinitarian” meanings. Instead, he used the neuter form, hen, in NT Greek which signifies a union of purpose - see the ONE study).
Delitzsch also translates the NT Greek heis at 1 Cor. 9:24 (“only one” - NIV, NEB, TEV, GNB, RSV; “only one person” - The Living Bible) as echad ! There is certainly no “plural oneness” intended here! - Hebrew New Testament, Delitzsch, The Trinitarian Bible Society, 1981.
If a person will not acknowledge the obvious figurative meaning of “one” as “united in purpose,” then he is saying that as man and wife become absolutely equal in nature by marriage (and as Jesus and the Father are “absolutely equal in nature” and are, therefore, equally God) so do Jesus and his Church become “one” or “equal in nature” and, therefore, the Church (Jesus’ “brothers”) is equally God!
Such reasoning is obviously ludicrous and illustrates what was really figuratively intended by “one” in marriage and other relationships: they are as though they were literally “one” in only one respect: unity of purpose!
As the bride is to become “one” in purpose with her husband (although he is designated to be head over his wife - 1 Cor. 11:3; Eph. 5:23), so, too, those chosen ones are to become “one” in purpose with Jesus (although he is to be their head - Eph. 5:23; 1 Cor. 11:3 - so he does not conform to their will and purpose, nor are they equal to him, but they willingly conform to his purpose so that they may be “one”), and so, in like manner, Jesus has become “one” in purpose with his Father (the only true God - John 17:3) who is his head. The Father does not conform to the will and purpose of Jesus, nor is Jesus in any way equal to the Father, but Jesus willingly and perfectly conforms to his Father’s purpose and will! - “The head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman (wife) is the man; and the head of Christ is God [not ‘Christ is equal to God’].” - 1 Cor. 11:3, ASV.
So, why couldn’t the absolute mathematical oneness of echad at Deut. 6:4 be describing a figurative unity of purpose just as the Greek “one” (hen) does at John 17:21, 22?
That is, if Jesus can describe certain chosen men, and his Father (God alone), and himself figuratively as all being “one” (in purpose only), why couldn’t God be telling us at Deuteronomy 6:4 that he is more than one person, all of whom are united in purpose? One reason is that the word used for “one” in this sense is neuter (hen). But the word used for “one” at Deut. 6:4 in the ancient Greek Septuagint (and at Mk 12:29 in the New Testament) is the masculine heis! - cf. Mk 2:7.
We also know that such an interpretation is ridiculous because of the clear context of Deut. 6 (and the clear statements of the rest of the Bible). Nowhere in Old or New Testament is God said to be more than one person. No one would have possibly understood Deut. 6:4 as meaning “Jehovah is a ‘many persons united in one purpose’ God” at that time or for thousands of years thereafter (certainly not until hundreds of years after Jesus’ death - see the HIST study, parts 2-5).
The context of Deut. 6:4 and 6:13-15 shows that God is not speaking of all persons who could be considered to be “united in purpose” with the Father (this would have included the Father and the Word, of course, but it would also have included the millions of faithful angels, and today it would include a large number of faithful Christians!). Remember that when “one” is used figuratively for “united in purpose” it is always describing a relationship between certain individuals or groups who are identified in context. There is no such identification (nor even the slightest suggestion of such an identification) found in Deut. 6.
We cannot believe that Deut. 6:4 is saying that all those who are “united in purpose” with Jehovah are Jehovah! But that is the only figurative use we could possibly have for echad at Deut. 6:4. Otherwise we are left with the literal meaning (mathematical oneness, a single individual) of echad (which is obviously intended in the vast majority of uses of echad and which is obviously intended at Deut. 6:4, 13-15 and further explained at Mark 12:29, 32.)
Just as no Bible translation (including all the many trinitarian translations I have examined) renders Deut. 6:4 with any kind of suggestion that “Jehovah is a multiple unity,” no translation suggests it should be rendered with the understanding that “Jehovah is united in purpose.”
It is also clear from other Bible statements that God is a single person: the Father in heaven. (Jehovah is never described as “the Son,” “the Messiah,” “the Holy Spirit,” or any other individual but the Father - Deut. 32:6; Is. 63:16; 64:8; Jer. 3:4; 3:19 - and conversely, no heavenly person except Jehovah is ever called the Father! - Matt. 23:9.)
Notice how Jesus used the word monos (“only,” “alone”) to describe God (Jehovah, the Father) at John 17:1, 3. “Father ... they should know thee the only [monos] True God.” Or, “Father ... who alone art truly God” - NEB.
But let’s look at another example where echad is supposed to literally mean “plural oneness.”
Almost anything we can name is composed of different elements or parts. If I should say, “Randy was the first (another way echad may be rendered into English) runner to cross the finish line,” I am not referring to the fact that he has two legs (or flesh, blood, and bones) which together help compose the whole of that one (or “first”) individual. I am saying (as everyone well knows) that, at the time he crossed the finish line, Randy was the only one who had done so (whether he had one or two legs, etc.). In the same sense of absolute mathematical order I would say that the very next runner (whether it should happen to be a woman, horse, octopus, snail, etc.) is the second individual runner to cross the finish line regardless of how many legs, arms, etc. that racer has. So, Robin, the second runner to cross the finish line is no more a “plural twoness” than Randy, the first one, is a “plural oneness”!
Therefore, “the evening and the morning were the first [echad] day [‘one day’ - RSV]” - Gen. 1:5, KJV - means exactly what it says, just as “the evening and the morning were the second [sheni] day” - Gen. 1:8 - means exactly what it says and so on through six days!
“The first [echad] day” does not in any sense refer to the individual parts which compose that day (or a “plural oneness”) any more than “the sixth day” refers to a “plural sixness” making up that single day! They are absolute mathematical numbers and do not refer to internal composition but, instead, to single, individual things.
And so it is with the example of “one [echad] cluster of grapes” at Numbers 13:23. Here again “one” [echad] obviously means only one (singleness, absolute mathematical oneness) for whatever word it is applied to.
It is the word “cluster” in this scripture which means “one thing composed of many individual items,” but there is only one single (absolute mathematical oneness) “cluster”!
This is no different from one (echad) single tribe (whether composed of one single, last person or millions of persons) at Judges 21:3, 6 and two tribes (whether each is composed of one person or millions) at Joshua 21:16. Echad literally means “single,” “only” as can plainly be seen at Exodus 12:46, “one house;” Ex. 33:5, “one moment;” Numbers 7:21, “one bullock, one ram, [etc.].”
Yachid
A few trinitarians insist that not only does echad mean “plural oneness,” but that, if singleness were intended by the Bible writer, the Hebrew word yachidwould have been used at Deut. 6:4.
Here is how it was presented to me by one trinitarian:
“The word for ‘one’ in this great declaration [Deut. 6:4] is not Yachid which is an absolute oneness but rather echad which means ‘united one.’ Had the Holy Spirit desired to state absolute mathematical oneness in this all-important declaration, He could have easily used the word yachid, couldn’t He?”
We have already seen the absolute falsity of the “echad-means-’plural-oneness’” idea. But what about yachid? Did the Bible writers really use it whenever they meant “absolute mathematical oneness”? We have already seen that they really used echad for “absolute mathematical oneness,” and a good concordance will show they did this consistently—many hundreds of times!
Yachid, on the other hand, is only used about 12 times in the entire Bible and then only in a narrow, specific sense.
The Old Testament language authority, Gesenius, tells us that yachid is used in three very specialized ways: (1) “only” but primarily in the sense of “only begotten”! - Gen. 22:2, 12, 16; Jer. 6:26; and Zech. 12:10. (2) “solitary” but with the connotation of “forsaken” or “wretched” ! - Ps. 25:16; 68:6. (3) As yachidah (feminine form) meaning “only one” as something most dear and used “poet[ically] for ‘life’ - Ps. 22:20; 35:17.” - p. 345 b.
We find yachid is never used to describe God anywhere in the entire Bible! But it is used to describe Isaac in his prefigured representation of the Messiah: Gen. 22:2, 12, 16. It is also used at Judges 11:34 for an only-begotten child. The ancient Greek Septuagint translates yachid at Judges 11:34 as monogenes (“only-begotten”): the same NT Greek word repeatedly used to describe Christ (even in his pre-human heavenly existence - 1 John 4:9). Monogenes, however, like the Hebrew yachid, is never used to describe the only true God, Jehovah (who is the Father alone).
So, if Jehovah were to describe himself as “forsaken” or “wretched,” or were speaking poetically about his “dear life,” or were describing himself as the “only-begotten son” (which he never does anywhere in the Bible!), then he might have used yachid.[3]
But since he was describing his “mathematical oneness” at Deut. 6:4, he properly used echad!
As we pointed out at the beginning, there are Hebrew words that mean “plural oneness,” but echad is not one of them. As another example, notice the clear meaning of echad as “absolute mathematical oneness” at Gen. 42:11 where the sons of Jacob say, “we are all one [echad] man’s sons.” They certainly weren’t saying “we are all sons of different men who together make up a ‘plural oneness’ man.”! Instead, the inspired Bible writer wrote that they were all sons of one [echad not yachid] single, solitary man.
We see the same thing at Malachi 2:10 even though we find two different interpretations by trinitarian translators.
Some translate it:
“have we not all one [echad] father? Has not one [echad] God created us?” -RSV.
The meaning of this rendering seems to be that everyone has a single person as his earthly father and, by comparison, we also all have a single [echad] person as our God and Creator in heaven.
Other trinitarian scholars translate Malachi 2:10 as:
“Have we not all the one Father? Has not the one God created us?” - NAB (1970 and 1991).
“Is there not one Father of us all? Did not one God create us?” - NJB.
“Have we not all one Father? Did not one God create us?” - JB.
“Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us?” - NKJV.
“Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us?” - The Amplified Bible.
“Is there not one Father to us all? Has not one God created us?” - MKJV, Green.
“Don’t all of us have one Father? Hasn’t one God created us?” - In the Language of Today, Beck.
“Do we not all have one Father? Has not one God made us?” - NLV.
We clearly see in these trinitarian translations that the common Hebrew use of parallelisms was intended by the inspired Bible writers. That is, the first half of the verse is differently worded but parallel in meaning with the second half. Therefore, the first half refers to God just as the second half does, so the translator has capitalized “Father” to make such an interpretation unmistakeable. The meaning in this interpretation, then, is:
“We all have one [echad] Father (the only person who is God),” and, in parallel meaning,
“We all have one [echad] Creator (a single person as God).” - Compare 1 Cor. 8:6; Eph. 4:6.
No matter which interpretation you prefer, it is clear that the comparison with (or parallel with) a single individual father (whether we interpret it as the single male human parent or the single person, God the Father), who is called “one [echad] father/Father,” is a single individual who is called “one [echad] God”! The comparison (or parallel) would be senseless if echad meant one single person for “father/Father” (as it must) in its first half and “plural oneness” persons for “God” (as it clearly doesn’t) in its second half!
The inspired Bible writers at Gen. 42:11, Malachi 2:10, and Deut. 6:4 could easily have used a word that really means “united one”[4] - but they didn’t! The inspired Bible writer at Deut. 6:4 could also have easily said (and definitely should have said if it were true) that “God is three persons who together make up the one God” or even just “the one God is three persons,” but he didn’t, and neither did any other Bible writer! He should also have used yachid repeatedly in the Bible for God if Jehovah is ever to be understood as being Jesus (“the only-begotten”), but no Bible writer describes Jehovah that way, ever!
A footnote for Deut. 6:4 in the very trinitarian The New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., 1970, says:
“this passage contains the basic principle of the whole Mosaic law, the keynote of the Book of Deuteronomy: since the Lord [Jehovah] alone is God, we must love him with an undivided heart. Christ cited these words as ‘the greatest and the first commandment,’ embracing in itself the whole law of God (Mt 22:37f and parallels [especially see Mark 12:28-34]).”
As the ASV renders it in a footnote for Deut. 6:4 - “Jehovah is our God; Jehovah is one”. Yes, the great distinction between Israel and all the nations around them was that they worshiped only one [”absolute mathematical oneness”] person as God (as they always have, and as they still do today - see the ISRAEL study).
The only honest interpretations of “this great declaration” of Deut. 6:4 are “Jehovah our God is only one [echad] person” or “Jehovah our God is only one God”!
Judging by the literal meanings of both the Hebrew Scriptures and the Greek (NT and Septuagint OT) Scriptures Deut. 6:4 actually says: “Hear Israel, Jehovah the God of us, Jehovah is one” (Sept. Greek) and “Jehovah our God, Jehovah [is] one” (Hebrew - Interlinear Bible). But in any case echad clearly refers to a single, solitary [absolute mathematical oneness] being, not a “multiple oneness”!
So even the very trinitarian literal translation, the New King James Version[5], (like the very trinitarian ETRV [6] paraphrase Bible) translates echad at Deut. 6:4 correctly as: “Hear, O Israel: The LORD [Jehovah] our God, the LORD [Jehovah] is one!”
The meaning is clear. It is expressed perhaps even more clearly in the popular trinitarian paraphrase Bible, The Living Bible: “Jehovah is our God, Jehovah alone.”
Alpha and omega demystified.
Elijah Daniels
Trinity 'Proof' Texts RefutedJesus and JEHOVAH God do NOT share the same title of "Alpha and Omega"
Some trinitarians attempt to prove their "JEHOVAH is Jesus" idea by pointing to Rev. 1:8 where God is clearly called "Alpha and Omega" and then saying that Jesus claims the same title at Rev. 22:13. They point to Rev. 22:16 in the KJV as proof that it is Jesus who is claiming to be the Alpha and Omega of verse 13. Since JEHOVAH is clearly Alpha and Omega (Rev. 1:8), they say, and Jesus is Alpha and Omega (Rev. 22:13), then Jesus IS JEHOVAH!
As you probably know, the original Bible writers didn't use any punctuation or capitalization and frequently ran the words of one speaker right into those of another speaker without any warning or indication. Eerdmans 1978 edition of Young's Analytical Concordance to the Bible, for example, warns Bible readers:
"The language of the MESSENGER frequently glides into that of the SENDER ..." and, "what a SERVANT says or does is ascribed to the MASTER." - "Hints and Helps to Bible Interpretation" - Preface.
There is another thing that helps show the originally-intended meaning here. Although it is very common that the words of one speaker slide right into those of another speaker (e.g., Is. 10:4, 7), it also happens that sometimes the writer identifies the new speaker. As we see in Daniel, for example, Daniel nearly always identifies himself as the new speaker when he uses the words "I, Daniel" whenever it might be confusing to the reader (especially after a different person has been speaking) - Dan. 7:15, 28; 8:15, 27; 12:5.
If we then examine Revelation (which is recognized as being similar to, patterned after, and frequently referring to, the Book of Daniel), we find that John also uses this technique. "I, John" identifies a new speaker in every instance John uses it: Rev. 1:9; 22:8. So Rev. 1:9 is merely the statement of a new speaker.
Now look again at Rev. 22:8-16.
John is identified as the speaker in 22:8. The angel speaks in (:9). The angel apparently continues speaking in (:10). The angel may be still speaking in (:11) --- or it could be John or even someone else (as implied in verse 10 in the NAB,1970 ed.).
Now is the angel still speaking in (:12) or is it God, or is it Jesus, or even John?
There is simply no way of telling who the speaker is from any of the early Bible manuscripts. It's entirely a matter of translator's choice. Some translators have decided it is the angel who continues to speak, and they punctuate it accordingly.
So the NASB, JB, and NJB use quotation marks to show that these are all words spoken by the angel.
However, the NKJV, NEB, REB, RSV, and NRSV show by their use of quotation marks that someone else is now speaking in verse 12.
Most Bibles indicate that the person who spoke verse 12 (whether God, angel, Jesus, or John) also spoke verse 13 ("I am Alpha and Omega").
So the big question is: Is it clear that the speaker of verses 12 and 13 continues to speak? Some Bibles indicate this. But other highly respected trinitarian translations do not!
The RSV, NRSV, NASB, NEB, REB, NKJV, and NAB (1991 ed.) show (by quotation marks and indenting) that Rev. 22:14 and 15 are not the words of the speaker of verses 12 and 13 but are John's words. (The Jerusalem Bible and the NJB show us that the angel spoke all the words from verse 10 through verse 15.)
Then they all show Jesus as a new speaker beginning to speak in verse 16.
So, if you must insist that the person speaking just before verse 16 is the same person who is speaking in verse 16, then, according to the trinitarian NEB, RSV, NKJV, and NASB Bibles, you are saying John is Jesus! (According to the JB and NJB you would be insisting that the angel is Jesus!)
Remember, "I, John" indicated a new speaker in Revelation.
So Rev. 22:16 - "I, Jesus" also introduces a new speaker. This means, of course, that the previous statement ("I am the Alpha and Omega") was made by someone else!
Even the KJV (and NKJV ) translators have shown by their use of the word 'his' ('His' in the NKJV ) in verse 14 that they didn't mean that Jesus was the same speaker as the Alpha and Omega. The speaker of verse 13 is Almighty God. The comment in verse 14 of these Bibles (as literally translated from the Received Text ) explains the importance of doing "His Commandments" (not "My Commandments")! Therefore, the speaker of verse 14 is obviously not God as clearly stated by those Bibles which were translated from the Received Text , e.g., KJV; NKJV; KJIIV; MKJV; Young's Literal Translation; Webster Bible (by Noah Webster); and Revised Webster Bible .
So we can easily see that there is no reason to say Jesus spoke the words recorded at Rev. 22:13 (or the above-named trinitarian Bibles would surely have so translated it!) and, in fact, the context really identifies the speaker as being the same person who spoke at Rev. 1:8, God Almighty, JEHOVAH, the Father.
The only other use of the title "Alpha and Omega" confirms this understanding.
"And He who sits on the throne said, `Behold, I am making all things new.' .... And He said to me, `It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. .... He who overcomes shall inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son.'" - Rev. 21:5-7, NASB .
"Revelation 21:6, 7 indicates that Christians who are spiritual conquerors are to be `sons' of the one known as the Alpha and the Omega. That is never said of the relationship of spirit-anointed Christians to Jesus Christ. Jesus spoke of them as his `brothers.' (Heb. 2:11; Matt. 12:50; 25:40) But those `brothers' of Jesus are referred to as `sons of God [the Father].' (Gal. 3:26; 4:6)." - pp. 412-413, Reasoning from the Scriptures , WBTS, 1985.
So Rev. 21:6, 7 confirms the understanding that the Alpha and Omega is the Father, not Jesus.
Furthermore, The only one "seated on the throne" in Rev. is the Father, JEHOVAH alone. (See, for example, Rev. 4 & 5 where the "Lion that is of the tribe of Judah," the lamb [the Son] approaches the one seated on the throne!)
In short, there is no reason, other than a desire to support the trinity tradition, to believe that Jesus is being called "Alpha and Omega" in Rev. 22. And there is good evidence to believe that it is his Father only who uses this title for himself.
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