John 1 and the Word

Stub. Grammar matters here, and a stub will not finish a fight about the Greek article. It can keep both of you in the paragraph instead of on a meme.

The question

John 1:1 says, in the translations most churches use, that the Word was with God and the Word was God. The New World Translation, the Bible Jehovah’s Witnesses use, says the Word was with God and “the Word was a god.” The rest of the prologue says all things came into being through the Word, and that the Word became flesh. The verse is a hinge for who Jesus is.

A fair statement of the Witness reading

Jehovah’s Witnesses are determined not to make Jesus into a second Almighty. They note that the first “God” in the verse has the Greek article and the second, describing the Word, does not. Their translation supplies “a god” to mark that difference. They also point to Colossians 1:15 (“firstborn of creation,” in their reading a created being) and to Revelation 3:14 (“beginning of the creation”). In their teaching, Jesus is divine in a lesser sense: a god, not Jehovah. They will often add John 17:3, where the Father is “the only true God,” and John 14:28, “the Father is greater than I.”

Those texts are in the Bible. A Christian who will not open them looks evasive.

A Christian starting point

Agree to read John 1:1–18 in the New World Translation and in another translation, side by side, out loud. The question is not which cover you prefer. It is whether “a god” fits the paragraph. Verse 3 says all things came to be through the Word, with nothing excepted. A created “god” through whom every created thing came to be is a hard fit, which is why Nicene readers hear the second theos as qualitative: what God was, the Word was, while still being “with God” and so not the Father.

John 20:28 is the other end of the same book. Thomas says “my Lord and my God,” and the narrative does not correct him. Ask how “a god” at the start and “my God” at the end are supposed to sit together in one Gospel.

Colossians 1:15–17 and Revelation 3:14 deserve their own careful reading, not a victory lap. “Firstborn” is a title of rank in Scripture as well as a word about birth order (Israel is called God’s firstborn). The same Colossians sentence says everything was created in him. Put the whole sentence on the table.

This page will not teach you Greek in an afternoon. If neither of you reads Greek, say that, and do not fake a parsing. The English context is already enough to have a serious hour. For the wider confession, go to the deity of Christ and the Trinity.

Scripture to open together

• John 1:1–18 in two translations, including the New World Translation if that is the Bible your guest carries.
• John 20:24–29.
• Colossians 1:15–20.
• Revelation 3:14, then the descriptions of Jesus in Revelation 1, so 3:14 is not the only line.

Keep reading

• The Watch Tower and Scripture
• The deity of Christ