Evidence · Case 12 · Jehovah’s Witnesses
Greek grammar of John 1:1c, the qualitative reading
One exhibit from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
The construction is a predicate noun before the verb without the article. Grammarians such as Daniel Wallace and Philip Harner argue it is normally qualitative, stressing that the Word has the full nature of God, which makes “a god” the least likely option. Honest limit: the older claim that Colwell’s Rule proves the noun is definite is now generally set aside, so rest the case on the qualitative reading, not on that rule.
Sources
- Philip B. Harner, “Qualitative Anarthrous Predicate Nouns: Mark 15:39 and John 1:1,” Journal of Biblical Literature 92 (1973) (opens in a new tab)
Journal of Biblical Literature 92, no. 1 (1973): 75-87
- Daniel B. Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics (Zondervan, 1996), pp. 266-69 (opens in a new tab)
Daniel B. Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament (Zondervan, 1996), pp. 266-69, on the qualitative reading of John 1:1c
Objections & responses
- John 1:1 distinguishes “the God” (with the article) from “the Word.” If the Word were identical to the God he was with, the sentence would be incoherent. So mustn’t John mean the Word is divine in a lesser sense?
This is the Witnesses’ best point, and the Trinitarian reply is that the qualitative reading (the Word was what God was, as the New English Bible has it) is exactly what preserves the distinction. The Word is not the same person as the Father he was with, but shares the same nature. That is the Trinity in one verse, which is why both sides fight over it. The with God and was God structure is not a problem for the doctrine; it is an expression of it, and a god in a lesser sense is the reading that has to explain how a strict Jewish monotheist could write the next clause.