Why do Jehovah's Witnesses translate John 1.1 in a way not supported by the early Christian writers?

Question

Jehovah's Witnesses translate John 1:1, "...the Word was a god," rather than, "... the Word was God." But the earliest Church writers, who studied with John or his disciples, wrote that Jesus was God.

Polycarp, disciple of John, wrote in his Epistle at 12.2 that Jesus is God. Iranaeus, disciple of Polycarp, wrote in Adversus Haereses (Against Heresies), that Jesus Christ was “,,, perfect God and perfect man.” Pliny the Younger, in correspondence with the emperor Trajan, says that the Christians praise Jesus as God, and Justin Martyr says that Jesus is the Word incarnate.

The question is not what do you think about the Trinity. It's not even about what translation of John you prefer. It's about those whom John taught.

If you want to look at translations, try the Peshitta Aramaic.

Hortense: Justin Martyr was not born before Christ. He was born at Flavia, Neapolis, about 100 AD, and became a Christian in about 130 AD.

Achtung_Heiss: Not true that everybody agrees about the Sahidic Coptic translation. If you're interested in a different discussion, read:

http://forananswer.blogspot.com/2006/10/john-11-in-sahidic-coptic-translation.html

wudwudwud: About that book you rely on, please read this quote from the Lundquist evaluation: "The Watch Tower Society will want to selectively quote BeDuhn's book because he compliments portions of the New World Translation. On the other hand, considering what Truth in Translation also says about the New World Translation in areas of its weakness, the Watch Tower Society will need to proceed cautiously when quoting Truth in Translation."

Answer 1

This is a perfectly valid question. So far, none of the JW answerers have addressed the true issue -- they've all skirted it! Notice how they immediately ignored the question, then dove into the usual "the Trinity isn't real!" argument.

Folks, this is a serious but sincere challenge to your understanding of Scripture. Read whichever translation of these accounts that you like, but they ALL read the same: that the earliest Christians taught that Jesus IS God.

The WBTS can translate the Bible in whatever manner it chooses. However, it cannot erase the truth that's contained in the writings of the earliest Church fathers. Please, if you don't believe us when we beg you to reconsider being a JW, at least consider what these early writers had to say on the subject. How can you ignore the testimony of a man who was taught by the Apostle John himself?

Answer 2

First of all, the NWT is NOT the only Bible translation to render John 1:1 in that manner. NUMEROUS Bible translations that have nothing to do with Jehovah's Witnesses render that scripture in a way that shows that Jesus possess a divine quality, but is NOT the same as Almighty God. For some reason, unthinking individuals have it burnt into their minds that just because the King James Version renders John 1:1 in a way that suggests Jesus is God, then it must be so. These people who accept that are unthinking because they refuse to acknowledge or see that the KJV is a very unreliable, inaccurate Bible translation. In fact, it is a commonly held FACT within the circles of Bible scholars the the translators of the KJV injected their own personal views (or that of King James) into the translation in order to bolster support for teachings such as the "trinity". A classic example of this is how the KJV renders 1 John 5:7,8. The KJV blatantly added words to the scripture to make it seem like there's support for the trinity. The unthinking ones also somehow blind themselves to reading the exact wording of the verse in John 1:1, specifically where it says that Word "was with God". Now if I'm "with" another person in a room, how could that possibly mean that I and that other person are the same person? It couldn't possibly, and the idea of that being true is absurd and defies all logic. The Bible as a whole must be examined in context with who Jesus Christ is. The scriptures clearly show in passages such as Colossians 1:15 and Revelation 3:14 that Jesus Christ came into existence by means of God. In other words, God is the one who created Jesus. Logically therefore, Jesus CANNOT be God.

Answer 3

Earlier than any of the Church Fathers, and closest to the source, are the Apostolic Fathers - the apostles that lived during the time of Jesus.

It has been successfully argued and observed that none the Apostolic Fathers ever mentioned Trinity nor the idea of Trinity. That was a later development years after the death of the apostles.

One has to consider that the Trinity concept is quite a departure from the Jewish belief that God is One Himself. If Jesus and the Apostolic Fathers taught that God is not One Himself but, rather, Three Of Them As One, that would have generated no little controversy to Jews and non-Jews alike as Christian disciples preached the Christian message.

One would expect quite a bit of Trinity mention in the New Testament - arguments defending the Trinity, epistles of the apostles encouraging their churches with brilliant Trinity arguments, etc. As it stands, the New Testament is very curiously silent. As is the Old Testament.

Getting back to John 1:1.

It is significant that the first theos of John 1:1 does have the definite article but the second theos doesn't. So word usage makes the second "God" not a noun of identity of The Word but an adjective of description or quality of The Word.

Perhaps translations of the Greek should point this out but they often don't leaving the reader on their own to form an erroneous opinion - which has become the popular or orthodox opinion.

Answer 4

"The Sahidic is probably the earliest of the translations, and also has the greatest textual value. It came into existence no later than the third century, since a copy of 1 Peter exists in a manuscript from about the end of that century. Unlike the Bohairic version, there is little evidence of progressive revision." --"Versions of the New Testament" (on-line)

Translating John 1:1:
The Coptic Evidence;
& Coptic Gospel of John 1:1-18
with Interlinear and English Translation
www.jehovah.to/exe/translation

"In the beginning there existed the Word. And the Word existed in the presence of God, and the Word was a god. This one existed in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and apart from him nothing that exists came into being." --John 1:1-2 www.copticjohn.com

ADDITIONAL:

Justin Martyr was born 110 BC.
For refusing to worship pagan gods, second-century Christians were considered atheistic.
"“We are not atheists,” countered Justin, “worshipping as we do the Maker of the universe . . . Our teacher of these things is Jesus Christ . . . He is the Son of the true God.”

"He is the SON of the true God.”

That's just 1 example of this Qs inherent 'errors'.

Answer 5

Read below, it may surprise you. The author is not a JW

"TRUTH IN TRANSLATION: ACCURACY AND BIAS IN
ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT"
Author: Jason David BeDuhn (associate professor of religious studies at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. He holds a B.A. in Religious Studies form the University of Illinois, Urbana, an M.T.S. in New Testament and Christian Origins from Harvard Divinity School, and a Ph.D. in Comparative Study of Relig-ions form Indiana University, Bloomington.)
The Eight English Translations Compared in BeDuhn's book are:
- The King James Version (KJV)
- The Amplified Bible (AB)
- The Living Bible (LB)
- The New American Bible (NAB)
- The New American Standard Bible (NASB)
- The New International Version (NIV)
- The New World Translation (NW)
- The (New) Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
- Today's English Version (TEV)

Excerpt from his book:

Chapter Eleven: A discussion of John 1:1
Surprisingly, only one, the NW, adheres to the literal meaning of the Greek, and translates "a god." "Translators of the KJV, NRSV, NIV, NAB, NASB, AB, TEV and LB all approached the text at John 1:1 already believing certain things about the Word... and made sure that the translations came out in accordance with their beliefs. . Ironi-cally, some of these same scholars are quick to charge the NW translation with "doctrinal bias" for translating the verse literally, free of KJV in-fluence, following the sense of the Greek. It may very well be that the NW translators came to the task of translating John 1:1 with as much bias as the other translators did. It just so happens that their bias corresponds in this case to a more ac-curate translation of the Greek" "Some early Christians maintained their monotheism by be-lieving that the one God simply took on a human form and came to earth -- in effect, God the Fa-ther was born and crucified as Jesus. They are entitled to their belief, but it cannot be derived legitimately from the Gospel according to John."
"John himself has not formulated a Trinity con-cept in his Gospel." "All that we can ask is that a translation be an accurate starting point for ex-position and interpretation. Only the NW achieves that, as provocative as it sounds to the modern reader. The other translations cut off the exploration of the verse's meaning before it has even begun."

Answer 6

If John 1:1 means that Jesus is the one true God, just as Christendom believes that the fundamental doctrine of her teachings is the Trinity, then there are certain problems that are created. By Trinity she means a triune or three-in-one God. That means a God in three Persons, namely, "God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost." Since this is said to be, not three Gods, but merely "one God in three Persons," then the term God must mean the Trinity; and the Trinity and God must be interchangeable terms. On this basis let us quote John 1:1, 2 and use the equivalent term for God, and let us see how it reads:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with the Trinity, and the Word was the Trinity. The same was in the beginning with the Trinity." But how could such a thing be? If the Word was himself a Person and he was with the Trinity, then there would be four Persons. But the Word is said by the trinitarians to be the Second Person of the Trinity, namely, "God the Son." But even then, how could John say that the Word, as God the Son, was the Trinity made up of three Persons? How could one Person be three?

However, let the trinitarians say that in John 1:1 God means just the First Person of the Trinity, namely "God the Father," and so the Word was with God the Father in the beginning. On the basis of this definition of God, how could it be said that the Word, who they say is "God the Son," is "God the Father"? And where does their "God the Holy Ghost" enter into the picture? If God is a Trinity, was not the Word with "God the Holy Ghost" as well as with "God the Father" in the beginning?

Suppose, now, they say that, in John 1:1, 2, God means the other two Persons of the Trinity, so that in the beginning the Word was with God the Father and God the Holy Ghost. In this case we come to this difficulty, namely, that, by being God, the Word was God the Father and God the Holy Ghost, the other two Persons of the Trinity. Thus the Word, or "God the Son," the Second Person of the Trinity, is said to be also the First Person and the Third Person of the Trinity. It does not solve the difficulty to say that the Word was the same as God the Father and was equal to God the Father but still was not God the Father. If this were so, it must follow that the Word was the same as God the Holy Ghost and was equal to God the Holy Ghost but still was not God the Holy Ghost.

And yet the trinitarians teach that the God of John 1:1, 2 is only one God, not three Gods! So is the Word only one-third of God?

Since we cannot scientifically calculate that 1 God (the Father) + 1 God (the Son) + 1 God (the Holy Ghost) = 1 God, then we must calculate that 1/3 God (the Father) + 1/3 God (the Son) + 1/3 God (the Holy Ghost) = 3/3 God, or 1 God. Furthermore, we would have to conclude that the term "God" in John 1:1, 2 changes its personality, or that "God" changes his personality in one sentence. Does he?

The Trinity teaching confuses the meaning of John 1:1, 2; it does not simplify it or make it clear or easily understandable.

After writing 1:1 and everything that follows, did John conclude that Jesus was GOD or the SON OF GOD? Let's allow John to answer this:

"To be sure, Jesus performed many other signs also before the disciples, which are not written down in this scroll. But these have been written down that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God, and that, because of believing, you may have life by means of his name." - John 20:30, 31.

In addition to that, consider this: I have often wondered why proponants of the KJV decry our use of the term "a god" at John 1:1. There are other passages of very similar Greek construction the are consistentently rendered by the KJV translator with the indefinite article, which does not appear in the Greek. (It does not EXIST in the GreeK.)

English word-for-word of John 1:1c = god was the word. KJV renders this, of course, as the Word was God.

Now consider Acts 28:4 of the KJV -- "And when the barbarians saw the venomous beast hang on his hand, they said among themselves, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, yet vengeance suffereth not to live."

This was speaking of the apostle Paul. Let's focus on the pertinant phrase: "this man is a murderer." In Greek this is "murderer is the man."

This is the same construction and word order as John 1:1, but here KJV adds the "a" and there are many other similar instances where they do the same, but they fail to do so in John 1:1.

Since the reason is obviously NOT grammatical, it has to based solely in a theological trinitarian bias.

Answer 7

Human philosophy is of no interest to godly Christians.

(Colossians 2:6-8) Therefore, as you have accepted Christ Jesus the Lord... Look out: perhaps there may be someone who will carry you off as his prey through the philosophy and empty deception


Ironically, as biblical and archaeological evidence has increased, it has steadily tended to show that Jehovah's Witnesses have had the most accurate translation of John 1:1 for decades.

The discovery of an early (about 200 C.E.) Coptic translation of John's gospel is particularly interesting because it was translated during a time when biblical Greek was still a living language and by the hands of Christians perhaps just two generations from those who walked with Christ. Unlike biblical Greek, the Coptic language uses definite articles ("the"), indefinite articles ("a", "an"), and so-called "zero article" sentence structure. So how did those early Christians choose to translate John 1:1?

Secular scholars UNANIMOUSLY agree that the Coptic manuscript plainly shows that the early Christians believed John 1:1 to read "...and the Word was a God."

http://copticjohn.com/
http://jehovah.to/exe/translation/coptic.pdf
http://depts.washington.edu/cartah/text_archive/coptic/coptjohn.shtml

Learn more:
http://watchtower.org/e/ti/index.htm?article=article_05.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/rq/index.htm?article=article_03.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/pr/index.htm?article=article_04.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/dg/index.htm?article=article_03.htm
http://watchtower.org/e/lmn/index.htm?article=article_04.htm

Answer 8

Ya know it's funny, I just read 3 different translations of Polycarp to the Philippians 12:2 and in each of those, it mentioned two separate persons. Jesus and his FATHER.
Roberts-Donaldson English Translation states:
" But may the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ Himself, who is the Son of God, and our everlasting High Priest, build you up in faith and truth, and in all meekness, gentleness, patience, long-suffering, forbearance, and purity; and may He bestow on you a lot and portion among His saints, and on us with you, and on all that are under heaven, who shall believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and in His Father, who "raised Him from the dead."

I found it interesting on Wikipedia that 'Iranaeus refers to the Word as the "Son" who he says, "was always with the Father," which sharply opposes the unitarian view of God. There are parts of his writings that some people believe indicates he held a "binitarian belief" So does that mean he worshiped a twinity? As I was reading about him, I found there are some of his theories do not agree with Bible teachings.

There were other "Apostolic Fathers" that you might want to check into besides Polycarp, such as Clement of Rome, Ignatius, Hermas, and Papias. As far as I can see, they did not teach the trinity doctrine either.

Answer 9

They come in with some preconceptions and try to make the Bible fit them. They overlooked a strong Greek literary device used to emphasize a point.
The point they are wanting to underline is that Jesus is God.

Answer 10

How does anyone know what the early Christian writers supported?

And referring to Polycarp and Iranaeus is not conclusive either, because your quotes are not in harmony with the rest of the Bible.

The Bible, John's Gospel, 3:16 says that Jesus is the son of God, and thus can not be God. Jesus is the great high priest and thus can not be God.