Trinitarian-Unitarian Debate

I'll also post further parts of the series here under this new thread, as well as up on the Web.

And an additional word about this series—Phil apparently views it as a formal debate, but all I am really doing is giving my reasons why I don't find Phil's paper to be credible, as requested by both Steve M. and Eric H. I'm sure that Phil in turn will not find my reasons credible, but I don't have the time to continue writing further replies of my own to his replies, ad infinitum.

Sincerely,

Steve

Capitalization of the term ‘Word’ in most translations, as well as the aforementioned pronouns ‘He’ and ‘Him’ also contribute to the impression of the literal personhood and deity of the ‘word’ or ‘logos’, even though neither the Greek text nor the true meaning of ‘logos’ justifies this in the least. On the contrary, this reflects the assumption of personhood and corresponding doctrinal bias injected into the passage by translators, not the original thought of its author.

He asks, “How can an appeal to ‘the Greek text’ help Phil's case?” and then proceeds to express the interpretational bias I’ve contended is reflected by this feature, adding the brilliant observation, “[Phil] doesn't think the words in the text mean what nearly all translators think they do.”

This is true, and I contend that the Greek text itself does not specify whether these words should be capitalized or not. This point remains unchallenged.

Lastly Steve misstates my argument towards suggesting that I’ve applied the same sort of circular reasoning he has, writing, “The "true meaning" is what is being disputed here. You therefore cannot appeal to the ‘true meaning’ to settle the dispute.”

What I had actually written was that the [emphasis added] “neither the Greek text nor the true meaning of ‘logos’ justifies this in the least.” Since Steve is yet to show any evidence that the definition of ‘logos’ included a person of any sort at the time John’s gospel was written, I defer to the principles of interpretation most of recognized scholars assert: Words must be interpreted according to their meaning at the time they were used, not definitions added centuries later, as Steve and many of those same scholars would hypocritically argue. The logos was a small ‘i’ it, not a capital ‘H’ He or Him.

I was hoping to see more credible arguements about the substance of the topic. Thus far you haven't done this. Maybe when you have the time to actually engage in a more formal debate forum you can actually present something on the topic. This is actually what I requested, but thanks just the same.

Steve challenges that “both the passage from Vincent and the definition from the American Heritage Dictionary quite clearly show that the use of pros does in fact infer a relationship between persons.” Perhaps, but the correct understanding of the word doesn’t as readily evoke the erroneous picture of two beings sitting on thrones beside each other as the common misunderstanding does. Of course, it also aligns the thought of the personified logos with the considerable literary precedents already covered, such as the Targums saying ‘the word went with Joseph…’ instead of ‘Yahweh went with Joseph…’, etc.

Relational language describing personification is to be expected, as Phil makes quite clear in his thesis. Any language that speaks of "person" (Steve's position) equally applies to "personification" (Phil's position). One cannot, therefore, insist that relational language proves that the logos is a literal person. Relational language is equally applicable to both.

There are two examples I like to describe the difference between "with" and "toward".

The first picture: My dog is WITH me in the park. I am sitting at the picnic table reading. My dog is under the table, chewing on his tennis ball. We are with one another, but the relationship is subdued.

The second picture: I am holding the tennis ball in my hand. The dog's attention is riveted upon me waiting to sprint for the ball as soon as I throw it. He is not just with me, but his attention is focused raptly upon me - to hastily perform my will. Such is spoken of the word in Isaiah 55:11 - "So will My word be which goes forth from My mouth; IT will not return to Me empty, Without accomplishing what I desire, And without succeeding [in the matter] for which I sent IT." (Here the logos is an IT, personified)

In contrast, I have posted under one easy heading: 1) The entire article, including the introduction that has been ignored here, 2) Steve's rebuttals, and 3) My follow-up comments. The link for this is given below.

Steve adds the following qualification:

"Phil apparently views it as a formal debate, but all I am really doing is giving my reasons why I don't find Phil's paper to be credible, as requested by both Steve M. and Eric H."

Actually, since there has been no credible rebuttal to the article since its original publication on the internet three years ago, I find Steve's opposing views to add to the light cast on the subject for the sake of readers.

I'm sure that Phil in turn will not find my reasons credible, but I don't have the time to continue writing further replies of my own to his replies, ad infinitum.

…searching
…searching
…searching

Okay, so there isn’t any, so let me instead address Steve’s contention that John “could have given it a new meaning of his own”. Perhaps Steve can (though he hasn’t) find an acknowledged authority who contends that interpreting the words of Scripture based on non-existent definitions at the time they were written is good practice. Since he has put so much stock in the doctrinal conclusions of such “authorities” (who are not by any means silent on the subject of Biblical interpretation) this would seem reasonable. Perhaps he could even give us a reason to accept what seems to me and all the “authorities” I’ve consulted an absolutely unreasonable approach to Biblical interpretation.

That said, Steve’s contention against all the literary evidence already presented remains harmonious with “orthodox theology”: That John intended us to understand his prologue to mean that the word of God (logos) was literally the person of God.

Skipping over the ad hominem wrappings of Steve’s empty challenges, we are left with an argument that completely evades the point: “A personification is not the same thing as a substitution of one word for something else.” The profundity of the argument is truly mind boggling! Not that it really matters, but the substitution of a thing for a person in a literary work would generally also qualify as a personification. More to the point, it would not qualify as a new definition of the thing as a person.

Steve regards this as a distortion of historical and linguistic evidence, which, it would seem we are to accept on the same basis we are to accept a definition of the word ‘logos’ that didn’t exist at the time John wrote his gospel – because Steve says so.

Next we are to accept that my contention that “in the minds of John’s contemporaries, it was perfectly appropriate to refer to God as ‘the word,’ or vice-versa” is “staggering nonsense” on the same basis. His argument is that my previous well-qualified reference to Philo’s philosophical usage of the term negates my connection with the directly parallel substitution (and simultaneous personification) of ‘the word’ or ‘memra’ in the Jewish Targums read regularly in the synagogues. The only “staggering nonsense” represented here is Steve’s resort to a frivolous argument instead of acknowledging the obvious connection between common Jewish representations of the word of God and John’s.

Though Steve is perfectly willing to completely disregard the commonly held principle of hermeneutics regarding using word definitions current with the time of writing, he now wants to inappropriately apply another common principle in its stead. According to Steve, we should interpret the definition of ‘logos’ according to the context rather than the meaning the word actually had to John and his contemporaries!

Of course, having taken such license, it is no great reach for him to also unequivocally represent his own doctrinal bias as the “context” by which we should further pervert the text of John’s gospel. According to Steve, we are to accept his interpretation of other passages in John’s Gospel as fact (I won’t chase those red herrings at the moment) and, therefore, accept his definition of ‘logos’ as the person of God who became the man Yahshua Christ based on those "facts". Notably absent in this thin line of circular reasoning is the fact that none of the other 60+ usages of the word ‘logos’ in John’s Scriptures infer such a definition. Round and round we go.

Steve concludes by suggesting that the diverse connotations of the word ‘logos’ at that time somehow gives us a reason to buy his contention that John simply made up a new definition for himself. What he fails to see is that the different usages of the word were rooted in different fundamental views of who and what God was and how He and His works related to the material universe, not so much what the word itself meant. They were religious and philosophical differences, not grammatical ones. As I wrote in a previously covered section, “The overwhelming testimony of such resources indicates that whatever else may be said of the connotations of the ‘logos’ in John’s day, it was universally regarded as a thing, not a person, even when used in close connection with God, His will, and His works.” Even the 7 definitions Steve listed from the Anchor Bible, useful information though that is, affirm the same.

If that is not "evidence" to you, what would you consider to be evidence?

Although I can’t really say that I fully understand Brown’s distinction between use of the word as “a buffer for divine transcendence” and its usage as at least a virtual personification of Yahweh, it seems to fall way short of corroborating John’s alleged “new meaning” as the literal person of God.

Either Mr. Brown's statement can be used as valid evidence in evaluating those claims, or it cannot. You appeared to reject it as evidence for that use. Is that true? If so, I am wondering on what greater knowledge of language and literature you are relying, and from what sources you will accept evidence.

…while the actual text of Gen 39:21 reads, “But Yahweh was with Joseph….”, what was read in the synagogues was, “But the Memra [Word] was with Joseph…”; likewise, Ps 110:1 was read as “The Memra [Word] says to my Lord…”, while the actual text says, “Yahweh says to my Lord…”.

I’m sure that such examples were in view in Brown’s definition, but I’m not sure that he intended to negate the characterization of such usages as a personification. Are you? More likely, it would seem to me, that he was simply distinguishing between the definition of the word and its common usage. For instance, the examples above show usages of the ‘memra’ or word of God as ‘a surrogate for God Himself’, but inasmuch as the literal definition of the word ‘memra’ was not understood to actually be God Himself (as I have also shown), these also represent personifications of it. At least that’s how I understand an abstract literary representation of the word of God – a thing – as God Himself, whether a substitution for the name of Yahweh in Scripture text or not.

5. Targums: Finally in the Targums, which were popular interpretations or paraphrases of the Old Testament Scripture, there was a tendency to avoid anthropomorphic terms or such expressions as involved a too internal conception of God's nature and manifestation. Here the three doctrines of the Word, the Angel, and Wisdom are introduced as mediating factors between God and the world. In particular the chasm between the Divine and human is bridged over by the use of such terms as me'mera' ("word" ) and shekhinah ("glory" ). The me'mera proceeds from God, and is His messenger in Nature and history. But it is significant that though the use of this expression implied the felt need of a Mediator, the Word does not seem to have been actually identified with the Messiah.

And Vincent adds,
 

After the Babylonish captivity the Jewish doctors combined into one view the theophanies, prophetic revelations and manifestations of Jehovah generally, and united them in one single conception, that of a permanent agent of Jehovah in the sensible world, whom they designated by the name [Memra] ("word," logos (NT:3056)) of Jehovah. The learned Jews introduced the idea into the Targums, or Aramaean paraphrases of the Old Testament, which were publicly read in the synagogues, substituting the name "the word of Jehovah" for that of Jehovah, each time that God manifested himself. Thus, in Ge 39:21, they paraphrase, "The Memra was with Joseph in prison." In Ps 110. Jehovah addresses the first verse to the Memra. The Memra is the angel that destroyed the first-born of Egypt, and it was the Memra that led the Israelites in the cloudy pillar.

The average Jew of John’s day, who relied on public readings for their knowledge of the Scripture, was accustomed to having ‘the memra’ meaning ‘the word’ read in place of not only ‘the word of Yahweh’, but of Yahweh Himself. Thus, while the actual text of Gen 39:21 reads, “But Yahweh was with Joseph….”, what was read in the synagogues was, “But the Memra [Word] was with Joseph…”; likewise, Ps 110:1 was read as ‘The Memra [Word] says to my Lord…”, while the actual text says, “Yahweh says to my Lord…”

ISBE calls this the “deified law”, and, again, associates it with the logos:
 

(5) Logos, memra' (memera') and angels.-This process of abstraction had gone farthest in Alexandria, where Jewish thought had so far assimilated Platonic philosophy, that Philo and Wisdom conceive God as pure being who could not Himself come into any contact with the material and created world. His action and revelation are therefore mediated by His Powers, His Logos and His Wisdom, which, as personified or hypostatized attributes, become His vicegerents on earth. But in Palestine, too, many mediating agencies grew up between God and man. The memra', or word of God, was not unlike Philo's Logos. The deified law partly corresponded to Alexandrian Wisdom.

The important thing to note here, again, is that none of these valid precedents regarding the logos or word of Yahweh either indicated reality or personality, according to ISBE:
 

The Bible, on the other hand, while speaking of Him as invisible, and unknowable through merely human effort (Job 11:7-8; Jn 1:18 ) , yet reveals Him in Christ, who is God and man. Jewish mysticism endeavored to solve the problem of creation by the invention of the 'Adham qadhmon (archetypal man), and earlier by Philo's Logos doctrine and the Memra' of the Targums. But these abstractions have neither reality nor personality.

Under the article on Logos, ISBE also comments:
 

As a Palestinian Jew familiar with current Jewish ideas and forms of devout expression, it would be natural for him [John] to adopt a word, or its Greek equivalent, which played so important a part in shaping and expressing the religious beliefs of the Old Testament people. Many scholars consider that we have here the probable source of Johannine language. In the Old Testament, and particularly, in the Targums or Jewish paraphrases, the "Word" is constantly spoken of as the efficient instrument of Divine action; and the "Word of God" had come to be used in a personal way as almost identical with God Himself. In Rev 19:13, we have obviously an adoption of this Hebrew use of the phrase.

…it has been pointed out by Weizsacker (Apostolisches Zeitalter) that the Word of God is not conceived in the Old Testament as an independent Being, still less as equivalent for the Messiah, and that the rabbinical doctrine which identifies the memra with God is of much later date.

The UBS Scholars offer some interesting insights regarding the phrase ‘the word was God’ (Jn. 1:1):
 

…Since "God" does not have the article preceding it, "God" is clearly the predicate and "the Word" is the subject. This means that "God" is here the equivalent of an adjective, and this fact justifies the rendering he (the Word) was the same as God. John is not saying that "the Word" was God the Father, but he is affirming that the same divine predication can be made of "the Word" as can be made of God the Father, and so "the Word" can be spoken of as God in the same sense.

…"God" completely characterizes "the Word," and all that is true of God is true of the Word. This does not mean, however, that the two elements can be inverted, and that one can translate "God was the Word" any more than one can make "Love is God" an inversion of the biblical statement "God is love." It is difficult for some people to recognize that this equational sentence in Greek belongs to the second class because in the predicate the term "God" refers to a unique object. Since this type of equational sentence may be misleading with "God" in the predicate, it is better to translate it "The Word was the same as God" or "Just what God was that is what the Word also was."3

In other words, the same reasoning seems to apply here that did in the substitution of ‘memra’ for Yahweh in the Targums, though the idea of a personal being apart from God was never in view. While many of our generation imply that John was making a profound statement of identifying a distinct being as the logos, those of John’s day were well accustomed to literary references that represented Yahweh as His word and vice versa. Thus, for John to say, ‘the logos was the same as God’ to them was no different than any number of similar statements and implications by philosophers and religionists of that generation. It was a statement about the nature of the word of God, which embodied of all of God’s will, works, manifestations, and revelations in the world.

“…an inane principle, said to be from hermeneutics, but in reality from his own willful ignorance, that no author can mean more by a word than what it already meant ‘in the minds of his contemporaries’ …So let us therefore challenge Phil, and ask him the source of his principle - in what book or article can we find it listed among the other principles of hermeneutics? I confess I suspect that Phil has created this principle especially for this case by distorting several of the others.”

Since this challenge provokes me to digress somewhat from the point at hand, I’ve opted to deal with it separately. I’ll respond to whatever fragments of Steve’s arguments remain after this in another post.

To begin with, let me briefly outline the different principles of Bible interpretation between Steve and I: The central point is how do we correctly define the words of Scripture. It is noteworthy that Steve’s current position differs somewhat with his original contention. At the onset of these proceedings, he argued that John was using an existing definition of the word ‘logos’, saying,
 

“…The point at stake, however, is not whether a new or unique definition is being used, but whether John is using an existing definition of a term to illuminate an aspect of something (or somebody) else upon which he wants to focus.”

To which I responded (and later explained),
 

“Begging to differ, the ‘point at stake’ is indeed regarding the true definition of the word ‘logos’, Steve’s effort to change the subject notwithstanding. I happen to agree that John’s purpose in the Prologue goes to illuminating something new, though not in the same way as Steve.”

This is relevant because it was only later, after numerous challenges failed to elicit any corroborating evidence that anyone of or before John’s time actually perceived the logos to be a person and not a thing (the word of God, not the word as God), Steve’s position changed. Then came forth the notion that we should interpret the word logos without regard to definitions current with John’s time and instead take John’s usage as a “new meaning” of the word, as he wrote:
 

“Phil's bottom line seems to be we can pick any one, or all, of the definitions current in the ancient world, just as long as we don't say John could have given it a new meaning of his own.”

As I will show, contrary to Steve’s unqualified opinion, I am far from alone in regarding word definitions as the most basic element of Scripture interpretation, and, further, that those definitions must be real and not contrived. In contrast, Steve’s method is well described in an article titled “Language” (http://www.robibrad.demon.co.uk/Language.htm) by Robert Bradshaw as “The Humpty-Dumpty effect”, which he explains:
 

“…named after a famous speech by the fore-mentioned character in ‘Alice Through The Looking Glass’. Humpty Dumpty declared that ‘When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean, nothing more, nothing less.’ Alice told him that he was wrong, and she was right to do so, because no one can play fast and loose with words and get away with it. A series of words cannot mean anything you wish them to mean.”

While this method of word usage may seem plausible on the basis of the numbers and credentials of those who accept it with regard to the logos in John 1, it begs the question, was the Apostle John saying to himself as he wrote by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, ‘When I use a word, it means what I want it to mean…’? The very notion defies another of the most obvious, commonly accepted, and basic principles of interpretation – common sense. As I said elsewhere already, just as it would be wrong to read an 18th century account of a ‘gay’ man as referring to his sexual orientation, so is it wrong to apply more recent definitions of the Greek word ‘logos’ to Scriptures written in the 1st century. This seems rather self-evident to me, but I still have Steve’s challenge to contend with, so I’m compelled to digress into demonstrating that this concept is not a principle derived from my own alleged “willful ignorance”. In the process, I will also show that Steve is actually guilty of the very thing he flippantly accuses me of.

Hopefully, most people need no further proof that interpreting words according to their connotations at the time they were written is the only sensible approach to interpreting any literature, especially the Scriptures. Likewise, I trust the underlying point that is somewhat obfuscate by this ridiculous challenge is obvious to the readers: Steve is proposing that the ‘logos’ in John 1 be defined by a definition that was contrived long after John’s death, which reason alone shows to be an untenable position. Nevertheless, let’s see what the “authorities” Steve puts so much stock in say:

In the same article referenced above, Bradshaw goes on to affirm my premise, explaining the common sense principle with much more technical precision than I:
 

“The meanings of words are not static; language changes and develops as the people who use it change and develop. Over the centuries the range of meanings a word has (its semantic range) changes, a process known as diachronic change.”
“…Related to this is the mistake of reading a later meaning back into a biblical word, known as semantic anachronism.”
“… It is the meaning at the time of writing (the synchronic meaning) that is most important for the correct exegesis of a passage.”

Then, in an article titled, “How To Read The New Testament Letters” (http://www.robibrad.demon.co.uk/NTLetters.htm), Bradshaw lists as the first general guideline,
 

“1. ) A TEXT CANNOT MEAN SOMETHING TO US THAT IT COULD NOT HAVE MEANT TO ITS ORIGINAL READERS.(4) This is a very important principle and is the best test of whether you have applied the text correctly.”

Obviously, John’s readers would have understood the term ‘logos’ according to their understanding of the term (which I have discussed at length already), not what was later assigned to the word based on “doctrinal statements” supposedly made in John’s Prologue, as Vine’s Expository Dictionary declares. Others echo the same thought (emphasis mine):
 

“Interpreting the Bible correctly is a two-step process. We must first discover what the passage meant in the day and age of the author. …Why are these two steps important? First, the Bible was not actually written directly to us, and it makes sense to put ourselves in the shoes of the original audience if we are to understand its message properly”…

(“BIBLE, INTERPRETATION OF” from Nelson's Illustrated Bible Dictionary, Copyright (c)1986, Thomas Nelson Publishers)

“The meaning of a piece of writing is seldom clearly self-evident to anyone who happens to read it. Especially is this true if the writing is a very old document, written for someone who lived in a very different cultural-historical setting. If we want to interpret a piece of literature, we must ask at least five questions: 1) Who was the writer and to whom was he writing? 2) What was the cultural-historical setting of the writer? 3) What was the meaning of the words in the writer's day?…”

“…The interpreter needs to know as much as possible about the writer and his cultural-historical setting. If we know nothing concerning who wrote a passage, when it was written, or under what conditions it was written, we are almost left to guess what its meaning might be. Knowing what an author has experienced and what the thought forms of his day were aids us in understanding his writing.”

(Note that Steve has conveniently rejected the considerable evidence brought forth regarding the “thought forms of [John’s] day” on the word ‘logos’, telling us rather that we should interpret the word as though John pulled a Humpty-Dumpty on his readers by assigning a “new meaning” to the word.)
 

“…Lexical study is the next phase of your literary study of the Bible. You must consult a lexicon or dictionary to find the meaning key words had when the original writer used them. His words may have a different meaning today, and you must know what they meant when originally used.

(“BIBLE, HERMENEUTICS” from Holman Bible Dictionary. (c) Copyright 1991 by Holman Bible Publishers. All rights reserved.)

While Holman’s spells out the obvious reasons for looking beyond English translations in order to discern the original meaning of the words of Scripture, the point is implicit in many others simply by their urgings to refer to dictionaries and lexicons. While Steve charges that I have just made this principle up out of my own “willful ignorance”, one must wonder why virtually every published work in existence regarding Bible interpretation or study directs people to take advantage of such resources. Obviously, most published “authorities” on the subject seem to think that the definitions of the original words of Scripture matter. However, in contrast, Steve’s twisted Humpty-Dumpty hermeneutics don’t require any such references, for we can just interpret the passage and assign whatever definitions we want according to our interpretation of the passage and our general doctrinal bias. That may work in Wonderland, but here in the real world, most people figure the first step of understanding what someone means is to know what the words they used mean.

The need to understand the words of Scripture in their original languages is even implicit in the short article by Hank Hanegraaff that Steve cited. Beginning with the first point, “Literal Interpretation”, Hanegraaff wrote (emphasis mine):
 

“In simple terms, this means that we are to interpret the Word of God just as we interpret other forms of communication — in its most obvious and literal sense. …And where the biblical writers express their ideas in literal statements, the interpreter must take those statements in a literal sense. In this way, the interpreter will grasp the intended meaning of the writer.”

Of course, this only indirectly applies to the point in dispute, but it is evident that the only way to discern a literal understanding of any passage necessarily involves having a literal understanding of what the words meant. This point is more clearly evidenced in the third of five principles outlined by Hanegraaff, “Grammatical Principles”:
 

“…If you do not know Greek or Hebrew, however, don’t panic. Today there are a host of eminently usable tools to aid you in gaining insights from the original languages of Scripture. Besides commentaries, there are “interlinear” translations that provide the Hebrew and Greek text of the Bible in parallel with the English text. As well, Strong’s concordance has a number-coding system by which you can look up the Greek or Hebrew word (along with a full definition) behind each word in the English Bible. Moreover, there are dictionaries of Old and New Testament words that are keyed to Strong’s concordance. Tools such as these make it easy for the layperson to obtain insights on the original Hebrew or Greek of the Bible without being fluent in these languages.”

It is interesting that Steve skipped right over this, the most pertinent of the five points of Hanegraaff’s article, in order to argue that the next one (“Historical Context”) did not support my premise. Even in that, his argument is weak, to say the least. Although Steve would like to completely discard the historical context of the thought associated with the word ‘logos’ in the first century, sufficient evidence has been provided to surmise that either John was a complete buffoon, or he took this into full account in his usage of the word. In fact, if the principle of regarding historical context has any bearing on anything in the Bible, it would surely apply to John’s use of the word ‘logos’ (which was loaded to the hilt with contemporary thought at the time) in his Prologue. As Hanegraaff wrote,
 

“The biblical text is best understood when one is familiar with the customs, culture, and historical context of biblical times.”

From this, Steve attempts to perpetuate his table turning by suggesting that the historical context “does NOT mean that a Biblical author can't use a word in his own way or is limited by past usage.” Notice how the implication here is that I must prove that John didn’t use the word ‘logos’ according to new, different, and unheard of definition, not that Steve must support his contention that John employed a “new meaning” for the word. This misapplication of the burden of proof is unacceptable: The fact that Steve cannot validate his own assertion does not compel me to disprove it. I might as well try to disprove the notion that the word ‘logos’ meant ice cream.

Then, going even further into Wonderland, Steve suggests a reverse application of the principle by arguing that his “new meaning” of the ‘logos’ must be correct since it is at odds with the historical context and “unique [even] to the New Testament”! How bizarre is that! Lest someone think I’m making that up, here’s his own words:
 

“It is historical context that in fact allows us to decide that "the Logos" is not being used in the same way by John as it was used by others. We know a lot about the historical context of the other philosophies and religions for which the term logos was significant, and one immediately sees that John is not speaking from their world in his use of logos, but rather in a way unique to the New Testament.”

Next, Steve explains himself by rendering the same circular argument he’s been applying throughout this debate: That we should interpret John’s Prologue right down to the definition of the word ‘logos’ according to the doctrinal bias that was established over 100 years after John’s death, rather than using sound exegesis to draw the meaning out of the passage. This is a classic example eisegesis (injecting one’s own thoughts into Scripture), which is universally portrayed as the wrong way to interpret Scripture. Steve feebly attempts to draw justification for this from Hanegraaff’s last point (“Scriptural Harmony”) as follows:
 

“ This is because of another of CRI's principles of hermeneutics: Scriptural Harmony. Hanegraaff explains this to mean that, ‘Individual passages of Scripture must always be in harmony with Scripture as a whole.’ In the case of the Logos, this means it is consistent with the rest of Scriptures, in which Christ is continually pictured as possessing a sonship in relation to God that goes beyond mere human sonship to include divine characteristics such as eternal existence, power, and glory.”

Before responding to this, it bears mentioning that the specific point of “The De-Mystified Logos” pertains to the correct interpretation of John’s Prologue with particular focus on the word ‘logos’, not the deity of Christ and related doctrines. As I wrote in the Introduction,
 

“Although I make no pretense regarding my own bias, this contention is specifically against the typical arguments raised from John 1 in support of the deity of Christ doctrine, not the doctrine itself. Whether or not the deity of Christ doctrine is true, John wrote ‘logos’, not ‘Christ’, and meant it according to the common usage of the word in his time, not ours.”

Now, to Steve’s point, let