Is Jesus God because of 1 Timothy 3:16?

February 17, 2012 - الجمعة 26 ربيع الأول 1433 Ibn Anwar

Does 1 Timothy 3:16 say Jesus is God?

by Ibn Anwar

“1 Timothy 3:16″ speaks of a personal manifestation of God – God in the second person was manifested” (The Impeccable Christ) [1]

The above and many other such similar remarks and statements are commonly found in Christian literature that favour Jesus’ divinity. In my own exchanges with Christians when discussing the alleged divinity of Jesus they would more likely than not reference 1 Timothy 3:16 as evidence for the incarnation of God into this world and that Jesus(the incarnation) is indeed God. Many of them do not realise however, that the reading that they so quickly grab and utilise is untenable. “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.”  This is the reading of 1 Timothy 3:16 that would be championed by so called KJV only Christian fundamentalists and those whose agenda is to deify Jesus. The evidence will show that their position and belief is unwarranted and without good foundation.

The reading which has “God manifested in the flesh”(theos ephanerothe en sarki) is found in the King James Version which is based on the Textus Receptus or Received Text which is the work done by Desiderius Erasmus and published in 1516. The standard position in modern Biblical studies is that the Textus Receptus is an inferior text as it is based on very late mss. of the Byzantine tradition(12th and 13th century) as Prof. Raymond Brown states, “Scholarship at the end of the 19th century finally won the battle to replace the inferior Textus Receptus by new editions of the Greek NT based on the great uncial codices and other evidence made available since Erasmus’ time…”[2] Michael A. Barber summarises the situation of the TR nicely in the following:

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Jesus was hungry

February 12, 2012 - الأحد 21 ربيع الأول 1433 Ibn Anwar

Was Jesus really hungry? Was it just a parable? What was it?

by Ibn Anwar

Before we delve into the topic proper we should briefly establish the relevant framework upon which the whole discussion will be built so as to get better clarity. For a long time Biblical scholars have noticed distinct similarities and dissimilarities between the first three Gospels Matthew, Mark and Luke. This relationship that is shared by all three Gospels gave rise to what is called Synoptic problem. The term “Synoptic” means that the three Gospels are interrelated and can be seen together. [1] Most New Testament scholars today subscribe to the Markan/Marcan priority hypothesis which was first proposed in 1863. What that means is that Mark was the first Gospel to be written which was then followed  by Matthew and Luke. Directly related to the Marcan priority is the idea that both Matthew and Luke employed Mark as a common source for their respective Gospels. The Marcan material present in Matthew and Luke is described as the “Triple Tradition” and in terms of statistics, eighty percent of Mark’s verses are found in Matthew while sixty five percent are found in Luke. [2] This position is called the “Two-Source hypothesis” which is according to Dr. L. Michael White “the most commonly used theory among New Testament scholars…”. [3] Writing about the Two-Source Hypothesis Mark Goodrace says:

“Right down to the present, this has remained the most popular way to solve the SynopticProblem. It has been finely tuned, has been given many variations, and has been challenged from many quarters, but this basic two-pronged hypothesis has remained fairly effectively intact. In Germany it is still very much what one might call ‘critical orthodoxy’. Famously, in the mid 1960s, one biblical critic spoke about abandoning use of the term ‘hypothesis’ to describe it altogether. ‘We can in fact regard it as an assured findings’, he said.” [4]

Thus, Mark was written first then the authors of Matthew and Luke employed the Gospel of Mark as a common source for their own productions. In this article we will analyse one out of many of the examples of how a story that was first produced in Mark is reproduced by the other two Synoptic Gospels with some modifications resulting in certain theological implications. The example that we will focus on in this discussion is the story of Jesus and the fig tree which is found in Mark 11, Matthew 12 and Luke 13 which is reproduced by the author in a rather different form as we shall see.

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Did Jesus really die on the cross?

February 4, 2012 - السبت 13 ربيع الأول 1433 Ibn Anwar

The Apparent Death Hypothesis according to Dr. William Lane Craig

by Ibn Anwar

This article is a response to a section of a debate that took place on the subject of the resurrection of Jesus between the Islamic scholar Shabir Ally and the Christian scholar Dr. William Lane Craig which can be viewed here. The following is a transcript of the section that this article aims at addressing:

“The first one, the crucifixion is universally agreed upon by all historians and here Shabir says that he doesn’t deny that Jesus was crucified but what he suggests is that he was taken down alive from the cross and God raised him out of the tomb into heaven. This is a fantastic hypothesis and an incredible concession on the part of an Islamic theologian to Christian claims about Jesus. Basically it is an attempt to resurrect the old Apparent Death theory which was popular among German rationalists during the late 17th hundreds and I’ve got to say no historian or New Testament scholar would defend this Apparent Death theory today. It’s sort of the theological equivalent of the flat earth theory. Why is this hypothesis abandoned? Well, one thing is that there is simply no doubt that the crucifixion was fatal. The Romans were professional executioners and they ensured the deaths of their victims by a spear thrust into the heart of the victim so that even if the victim had simply lapsed into a comatose state on the cross he would certainly be killed by the thrust of the spear into his heart and this is exactly what happened in Jesus’ case.”

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Hebrews 1:8

January 21, 2012 - السبت 28 صفر 1433 Ibn Anwar

Does Hebrews 1:8 prove Jesus is God?

by Ibn Anwar

     In my many discussions with Trinitarian Christians on the divinity of Jesus Christ one favourite passage that is often used as a proof text is Hebrews 1 with specific reference to verse 8 which reads as follows:

“Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever.”

One Christian apologist remarked, “Here we have God calling Jesus God which means he is indeed God.” If God calling someone “God” makes that person truly God himself, then I suppose Moses ought to be worshipped by these Christians too as we see him being called God by God:

“I have made you God over pharoah, and your brother Aaron will be your prophet.” (Exodus 7:1)

What is very apparent is that Moses isn’t just called God in the above verse, but is said to have his own prophet! Does that make him God? Following the Christian logic it apparently does. But I suppose Satan is God too as we read in the following verse:

“The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” (2 Corinthians 4:4)

The New Living Translation of the Bible identifies the identity of this god in its translation:

“Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.”

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Daniel 7:14 proves Jesus is God?

December 25, 2011 - الأحد 01 صفر 1433 Ibn Anwar

Is Daniel 7:14 evidence of Jesus’ divinity?

by Ibn Anwar

The verse reads as follows :

“He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.”

The Christian Jesus-worshiper will claim that the above verse shows Jesus as deity because it says that everyone will worship him. First of all, notice that the verse says that “all peoples, nations and men of every language worshiped him”. Does it say that they will worship him? No, it does not. It says that they DID worship him. So it’s not actually talking about everyone from time immemorial to the end of days. The Christian will claim that the verse says that all authority, glory and sovereign power is given to him so that makes him God. Notice that the verse says that authority was given to him. When was Jesus given authority? Authority was given to Jesus approximately 1920 something years ago as Matthew 28:18 says, “Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” When we take Matthew 28:18 into consideration and compare it to Daniel 7:14 we can safely confirm that the latter isn’t referring to the former. The person in Daniel 7:14 was given authority in Daniel’s time or before it, but Jesus was only given authority in his time centuries after Daniel. However, coming back to the first point, does Jesus being worshiped makes him God? First of all, the verse does not have to be translated as worshiped. The New Living Translation translates it as follows:

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