19) …and the Word was with God: A Commentary on John 1:1b

In this episode we continue a discussion interpreting the first verse of the Gospel of John. Today’s episode is called “… and the word was with God”, a Commentary on the Gospel of John 1:1b.

We look at how the phrase “with God” is used in the Gospel of John and in other biblical literature to determine what the author meant by the phrase.

Even though John 1:1 is a favorite proof text for Trinitarians, there is no Trinity described in John 1:1. The word or title “God” in John 1:1, does not mean the Trinity. In fact, nowhere in John’s Gospel does the word “God” mean a Trinity. This is very strange for the book that is often appealed to as the main text as evidence that God is a Trinity. “God” in the Gospel of John is never a Trinity.

It will benefit the listener to know these two phrases in Greek. “with God” in Greek is pros ton theon. “with the Father” is pros ton patera.

Rivers explains why the Greek preposition pros, which normally means “toward” is best understood and translated in John 1:1 as “with” – “and the word was with God.”

A main point of our discussion is that the phrase “the Word was with God” refers to a human person, and not to either an abstract attribute, or to a 2nd deity along with God. The phrase occurs over 100 times in the Bible and in each case involves a person on earth relating to God in heaven.

Another point Rivers makes is that pros ton theon is not the language that is used of something that is in God’s mind, like wisdom, that is then personified as “with God”. In other words, pros ton theon does not describe something or someone that is “within God”. The grammar of “personified wisdom” in Proverbs 8 and other literature (biblical and non-biblical) is different than what we have here in John 1.

We suggest two options for understanding the phrase “and the word was with God”, and a third option that somewhat overlaps the first two.

Rivers suggests seeing the phrase “and the word was with God” as resurrection or ascension text, parallel to John 1:18, which describes the unique one who “is in the bosom of the Father.” He refers to the occurrences of pros ton theon in the Gospel of John (13:1-3, 3; 14:6, 12, 28; 16:10, 17, 28; 20:17) which in each case describe the person of Jesus going “to the Father”.

Bill suggests another possibility, focusing on the past tense of John 1:1b “the word was with God”. The author introduces his Gospel by declaring that in a parallel way to Moses, the one he describes in his Gospel, Jesus, was with God in a unique way. Jesus is directly compared to Moses in John 1:17. Jesus, like Moses, gained knowledge by being uniquely “with God”. How did Jesus get his great understanding? How did he know his unique calling as the Messiah? Like Moses, who was with God at the burning bush and on Mt. Sinai, the human Jesus was with God. Jesus said in John 8:38 “I speak of what I have seen with my Father”. In this interpretation, “the Word was with God” refers to the unique relationship Jesus had with God while he was on earth, before his death and resurrection.

The two options mentioned above are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Indeed, the third option we suggest somewhat overlaps the previous two. We suggest John may have had in mind the mediatorial role that Jesus had and has, as a priest who is said to be in God’s presence, “with God”.

The similar language in the First Epistle of John 1:1-3 shows that the eternal life which was with the Father is not an abstract idea, but is a description of the real human person, Jesus the Messiah, who the author saw, heard and touched.