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Dave Burke, a well-known Christadelphian, and I will be debating the doctrine of the Trinity for six weeks beginning Sunday, April 11, 2010, here on Parchment and Pen. Over a thousand people voted for Dave to be the non-Trinitarian in this debate. He and I have agreed to limit our weekly statements to 5,000 words apiece (down from the 10,000 stated in the “challenge” post back in November).

In this post, I will list books and articles that are generally supportive of the approach I take to defending from the Bible the doctrine of the Trinity, as well as the books and articles that Dave recommends as generally supportive of the approach he takes in defending his non-Trinitarian theological position. Continue Reading »

If you consider yourself a non-Trinitarian believer in Jesus, do I have a challenge for you!

With the permission and support of Michael Patton, I am proposing a formal debate on this blog on the subject of the doctrine of the Trinity, to be conducted over a six-week period (beginning sometime after the New Year; scheduling is flexible). I am looking for one individual to argue for a position contrary to the Trinitarian position, while I will argue for the Trinitarian view.

Here is how I propose we proceed:

Week #1: My opponent and I would set forth our understanding of the nature of God (his attributes, e.g., omnipotent or not, omnipresent or not, incorporeal or corporeal) to make sure everyone understands what, if any, differences we have on that subject.

Weeks #2 and #3: The two of us would each set forth our understanding of the identity/person of Jesus Christ.

Week #4: The two of us would each set forth our understanding of the identity, status (person or non-person), and/or nature of the Holy Spirit.

Week #5: The two of us would each set forth a case for our position with regard to the Trinity (I would be for it, my opponent against it).

Week #6: Each of us will post one closing statement, with those blog entries open for questions from anyone.

Continue Reading »

I just received the third edition of Greg Stafford’s book Jehovah’s Witnesses Defended: An Answer to Scholars and Critics (Murietta, CA: Elihu Books, 2009). For those who are not familiar with Stafford, he is an unusually sophisticated Jehovah’s Witness who debated both me and James White earlier in the decade. The first edition of the book, published in 1998, ran 393 pages and was easily the best defense of Jehovah’s Witness theology ever published. (Page lengths cited here include front and back matter.) The second edition in 2000 was 654 pages in length and cemented Stafford’s reputation as the leading apologist for the Jehovah’s Witness religion. This third edition, which Stafford had announced was due out at least a couple of years ago, is 676 pages long.

Stafford’s first chapter, on the name Jehovah, has grown from 54 pages in the second edition to 126 pages in the third. This represents by far the most sizable addition to the book. He has added about 19 pages defending Christ’s real (though temporal) preexistence against the Unitarian position of Anthony Buzzard. Stafford’s already lengthy treatment of John’s “I am” sayings of Jesus now includes a 13-page discussion of the early interpretation of John 8:58. Perhaps of most interest to some is Stafford’s addition of a 50-page chapter that critiques a Reformed view of human will and predestination. Finally, Stafford’s chapter defending the Watchtower’s position on blood transfusions has been replaced with a chapter that, in part, critiques that position. The rest of the chapter urges a more tolerant approach on various issues of morality, notably “sexual orientation” (homosexuality), regarding which Stafford seems, well, ambivalent. In all, there are almost 200 pages of new material.

In order to add all of this new material to the third edition, Stafford has dropped almost as much material from the second edition. Continue Reading »

Alternate title: “Trinitarian Heresy 101″

“The doctrine of the Trinity is like an egg: three parts, one thing.” Ever heard that? How about this, “The doctrine of the Trinity is like a three leaf clover: three leaves, one clover.” Or how about THIS, “The doctrine of the Trinity is like water: three forms (ice, steam, liquid) one substance.” But the greatest I ever heard was by a guy in one of my classes. He said that he thought that the Trinity was like 3-in-1 shampoo: three activities, one substance.”

Stupid statements. Creative, but stupid. Don’t use them. Any of them. Ever.

Explanation coming… Hang with me.

Last week I taught a group of kids about the doctrine of the Trinity here at the Credo House as part of our Theology for Kids series. The ages were anywhere from 7 to 13. Though I regularly teach this subject to adults, this was the first time that I taught the doctrine of the Trinity to kids. I was surprised that it went well. It is confusing enough for adults, how much more for kids?

Teaching the Trinity, I have found, is more about giving basic principles of what it is and then shooting down illustrations about what it is not. Proper Trinitarianism is about a delicate balance between the unity and diversity in the Godhead. Christians believe in one God, i.e., one essence, who eternally exists in three separate persons, all of whom are equal.

We often employ illustrations that help us to make the ineffable, effable, the abstract, concrete. But when it comes to the nature of God, especially with regard to the Doctrine of the Trinity, illustrations should only be used to show what the Trinity is not.

Let me list the three major heresies or departures from orthodoxy with regard to the Trinity:

1. Modalism: The belief that God is one God who shows himself in three different ways, sometimes as the Father, sometimes the Son, and sometimes the Holy Spirit. It describes God in purely functional terms. When he is saving the world on the cross, he is called Jesus. When he is convicting the world of sin, he is called Holy Spirit, and when he is creating the world, he is called Father. The error here is that this is contrary to what we believe: one God who eternally exists in three persons, not modes of functionality. It is not one God with three names, but one God in three persons.

2. Tritheism: The belief that we have three Gods, all who share a similar nature, but not the exact same nature. In this, the nature of God is either distinguished or divided, which destroys the unity of God. We don’t believe in three persons who share in a species called “God,” but three persons who share in an identical, united nature. Continue Reading »

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Anti-Trinitarians commonly cross-reference John 10:30 and John 17:20-23 to try to prove that Jesus and the Father are only "one in purpose", since, as they point out, we cannot be considered one divine being with each other, yet Jesus prayed that we would be one as they are one. This may be the most common objection to the Trinitarian understanding of John 10:30. Let’s look at it.

Jesus, before he became a human being, existed without beginning as God. This is what John 1:1-2 tells us, for example. When creation began, the Word (Jesus) already existed, and he was God. As God, the Word or Son was one with the Father in a way that no human being is or ever can be. Even some anti-Trinitarians acknowledge this point, at least to some extent. For example, Mormons agree that Jesus Christ is part of the one Godhead, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, and most Mormons agree that we will never be part of that Godhead. So, in this sense at least, the Son is one with the Father in a way that we are not and never will be. I will return to this point shortly.

This eternal Word, the Son, then became a human being, known as Jesus Christ. As a human being, Jesus is now one of us. As a human being, Jesus’ oneness with the Father is a unity that no other human beings naturally have, but that Jesus offers to share with us by grace. This is not the same "oneness" that Jesus had (and still has) as God with the Father, but it has its source in that oneness. In effect, Jesus has two kinds or modes of oneness with the Father: the divine oneness with the Father that he has always had by virtue of being God, and a derived oneness with the Father that he enjoys as a perfect human being. (He can have the derived oneness with the Father only because he already had the divine oneness.) Jesus cannot share his divine oneness with us, but he can share his derived oneness with us. As I will argue below, this derived oneness is in a sense part of the Son’s divine oneness with the Father. It is not an entirely new oneness, but it is possible because the Son, who was already one with the Father, came so that we might experience that aspect of their oneness that creatures can share.

We see these two kinds of oneness in John 10 and John 17. Let’s take each passage one at a time.

I have commented on John 10:30 in context in depth, so I can be brief here. Recall that in John 10, Jesus lays claim to divine titles and functions that are unique to God. He is "the good shepherd" (vv. 11, 14), like "the LORD is my shepherd" in Psalm 23:1. The people of God in Israel, Jesus says, are his sheep, even though the Old Testament says they are God’s sheep (Ps. 100:3). Jesus says that he gives his sheep, his people, eternal life (v. 28); again, this is a prerogative of deity, not something you or I can ever claim to do. Jesus says that no one will be able to snatch his people out of his hand (v. 28 again). This claim by Jesus to give life to whomever he chooses, and that no one can snatch them out of his hand, echoes what the LORD God said in the Old Testament: "See now that I, even I, am he; there is no god besides me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and no one can deliver from my hand" (Deut. 32:39 NRSV; see also Is. 43:13). I think Mormons would have to agree with this, because they agree that Jesus was Jehovah, the LORD God of the Old Testament. Other anti-Trinitarians will balk at this point, but they can hardly deny that what Jesus is saying here about himself is not something that could be said about any of us. We do not have this sort of power over life and death.

Jesus then says that no one can snatch the sheep out of his Father’s hand, either (v. 29). This statement makes it clear that the imagery of sheep that no one can snatch from his hand is a way of speaking of Christ’s divine power in salvation. It is in this context that Jesus says, “I and the Father are one (John 10:30). Clearly, in this context, Jesus is talking about the unity that he has with the Father in their exercise of divine power in salvation of the sheep. This is not merely being fully in agreement with the Father (one in purpose ). It is a oneness that Jesus has with the Father because he is the LORD Jehovah, truly God, and therefore this is a oneness that Jesus cannot share with us.

Now let’s look at John 17:

"I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me" (John 17:20-23 NRSV).

The first thing to notice here is that Jesus prays that his disciples will be one “so that the world may know†that the Father sent Jesus and that he loves them just as he loved Jesus (v. 23). That means that Jesus is praying for a unity that is at least possible to realize here in our mortality. It obviously won’t do the world any good, as far as showing them that the Father sent Jesus, if we can’t be one in this sense until after we rise from the dead and become exalted in heaven. Jesus must, therefore, be talking about a way that human beings can be united now, while still mortal beings.

The second thing to notice is that the way this unity is expressed is in love (see also vv. 24-26). It is the love of Christians one for another that will convince the world that the Father sent Jesus (see also John 13:34-35). Jesus is obviously not talking about us becoming one with God in the sense of gaining divine powers; he is talking about us loving each other the way the Father and Jesus love each other. That is a "oneness" that Jesus can share with us. Obviously, Jesus and the Father were one in this sense long before Jesus became a human being; it is therefore, in a sense, part of the oneness that Jesus and the Father have always had as God. It is the aspect of the divine oneness that can be shared with those who are not divine.

In conclusion, John 17 does not prove that the Father and Jesus are one only in purpose. John 17 is not even talking about being one in purpose. It is talking about being one in the love that the Father and Jesus have for each other. That love is part of the divine oneness that the Father and Jesus have shared for eternity as God. Insofar as that divine unity is also a unity of divine power and prerogatives, it is a divine oneness that we will never have.

I have argued in previous installments of this series that in John 10:28-30 Jesus claims to be “one†with the Father in the exercise of the divine prerogative and power of giving eternal life to the people of God and preserving them against any spiritual attack. Christ’s use of the monotheistic statement of YHWH in the Old Testament that he alone is God because no one can snatch them from his hand (Deut. 32:39; see also Is. 43:13), which Christ applies to himself and to the Father, sets us up to understand "I and the Father are one" also as an allusion to the Old Testament’s most famous monotheistic affirmation, the Shema (Deut. 6:4).

Those who deny that Jesus Christ is one God with the Father point to certain elements of the context to show that such an interpretation is mistaken. Immediately before Jesus’ famous statement in John 10:30, he states, "My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all (v. 29 ESV, HCSB, NASB, NET). Jesus says two things here about the Father that anti-Trinitarians often understand as implying that Jesus is not God.

First, Jesus says that the Father gave him his sheep. Why would the Father need to give the Son anything if he possesses it necessarily by virtue of his being God? This kind of question comes up repeatedly with reference to statements throughout the Gospel of John that express the Son’s dependence on the Father. The Son does what he sees the Father doing (5:19-20). The Son cannot do anything on his own, independent of the Father (5:19, 30; 8:28). The Father gives the Son life in himself (5:26) and the authority to judge (5:22, 27) and to give eternal life (17:2). The Son does the works that the Father gave him to do (5:36; 17:4). The Father gives the Son his people, his sheep (6:37, 39; 10:29; 17:2, 6, 9, 24). The Son’s teaching is not his alone but is the Father’s (7:16-17). He does not speak on his own (7:17; 14:10). He speaks what he hears from the Father who sent him (8:26; 15:15), from God (8:40), what the Father instructs him (8:28), commands him (12:49), and gave him (17:8) to say. The Son’s speech is the Father dwelling in him doing his works (14:10). He did not come on his own (8:42). The Father gave his name (17:11, 12) to the Son. He gave him glory (17:22). He also gave him the cup of sacrificial death (18:11). In short, the Son is apparently dependent on the Father for everything he has, says, and does. How, then, can the Son be considered in any way equal to God?

Classically, orthodox Christians have understood these statements to reflect the dependence of the Son on the Father that characterized him in his humiliation”that stage of the Incarnation that extended from his conception to his resurrection. By becoming a human being (John 1:14), the Son humbled himself, taking a position that entailed utter dependence on the Father for everything he had, said, and did. In some sense, the Son had left behind the glory that he had alongside the Father since before creation, a glory to which he was to return following his death and resurrection (John 12:16; 17:5). (Since the risen Christ is still human, orthodox theologians regard the period following his resurrection as a second stage of the Incarnation" the stage of exaltation.) During this first phase of the Incarnation, the Son’s entire modus operandi was to glorify the Father (John 7:18; 12:28; 15:8; 17:4). Jesus therefore credited his miracles as well as his speech to the Father. Thus, even when Jesus performed acts that revealed in some way his divine glory, he did so that the Father might be glorified through and in him (John 1:14; 2:11; 11:4, 40; 13:31-32; 14:13; 17:1).

This explanation is consistent with the fact that these numerous statements in John all appear to refer to the Son’s dependence on the Father during his mortal life on earth. Although the Gospel of John explicitly teaches that the Son existed as a divine person before becoming a human being (John 1:1-3, 10; 8:58; 13:3; 16:28; 17:5), all of the references to the Son’s dependence on the Father are statements by Jesus focused on giving the Father credit for the things Jesus was saying and doing at the time.

This classical Trinitarian interpretation would therefore understand these Johannine passages in much the same way as Christians historically have understood the famous "Christ hymn" in Philippians, which says that although Christ existed in God’s form, he humbled himself as a servant, becoming a man, and dying on the cross, after which God highly exalted him above all creation (Phil. 2:6-11). As the divine Son, Christ was entitled to the recognition, honor, and glorious privilege of God (v. 6), but he humbled himself for the Father’s glory (v. 11). In that state of humiliation, Christ depended on the Father as a servant depends on his master, and was therefore dependent on the Father to exalt him (v. 9).

There is much to commend this line of thinking, and I think it is right, or at least mostly right. Some Trinitarians, however, think that a qualification is in order. They argue that it is a mistake to limit the force of all of these statements in John to the period of Christ’s humiliation. They suggest that the Son’s dependence on the Father in the Incarnation, though perhaps deepened or radicalized by his humiliation as a mortal human, should be understood as in some way revelatory of the eternal relationship of the Son to the Father. The theological maxim that expresses this view is that the economic Trinity reveals the ontological Trinity: how the incarnate Son relates to the Father in space-time reveals something of the relationship between the Son and the Father in eternity. We might put it this way: the fact that the Father sent the Son into the world, rather than the other way around, is not an accident. It is not as though the three persons of the Trinity drew straws to determine who would become a man and die on the cross. There is something appropriate and fitting about the Son coming on behalf of the Father. The very titles "Father" and "Son" indicate an asymmetrical relationship between the two persons, such that it is proper and fitting that the Father sent the Son, that the Son seeks to do the will of the Father, etc., and not the other way around.

I think there is some support for this qualification to the classical view in something that Jesus in the Gospel of John says about the Holy Spirit: "When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you" (John 16:13-14). Here Jesus says that the Holy Spirit "will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears." This statement says about the Holy Spirit exactly what Jesus had earlier stated about himself: "Anyone who resolves to do the will of God will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own" (John 7:17). "The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own" (John 14:10). "I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father" (John 15:15). Jesus also says that the Holy Spirit will glorify him (that is, glorify Jesus, the Son), rather than the Spirit glorifying himself" just as Jesus came not to glorify himself but to glorify the Father. Yet the Holy Spirit clearly does not become incarnate or otherwise experience a "humiliation" comparable to the Son becoming a human being. Thus, it may well be that the "dependence" language in John is not merely or exclusively a function of the humiliation of Jesus’ coming in the flesh, but more broadly reveals the Son as acting on the Father’s behalf.

The instructive parallel of the Holy Spirit also shows that this dependence language does not imply inferiority of nature. We cannot plausibly understand Jesus to mean that the Holy Spirit remains ignorant of some truth until Jesus imparts it to him, or that the Spirit is inferior to Jesus. Rather, when Jesus says that the Holy Spirit does not speak on his own but speaks what he hears from Jesus, he means that the Holy Spirit’s ministry of revelation will be performed for the purpose of revealing and glorifying the Son. Jesus’ coming into the world as a mortal human being is indeed a special act of humiliation, but it appears that humility is a virtue or moral attribute that characterizes the divine persons of the Trinity. The Son comes to glorify the Father, the Father for his part glorifies the Son, and the Holy Spirit comes to glorify the Son.

The second thing we need to discuss that Jesus says in John 10:29 (according to most scholars) is that the Father is greater than all. (There are textual variants here, and the NRSV adopts the strange reading “What my Father has given me is greater than all else."If this reading turns out to be correct, the statement would be describing the sheep as greater than anything else" an odd statement, but one that clearly could not pose any objection to viewing Christ as God. I will, however, for the sake of argument assume that the majority view is correct here.) Anti-Trinitarians assume that Jesus is including himself in saying that the Father is greater than everyone" that is, that the Father is greater than Jesus. And that may well be. We know that Jesus could make such a statement, since he does so explicitly in John 14:28, "the Father is greater than I." If so, Jesus in both of these passages would be saying that the Father was greater than he was. Does this contradict the idea that he is God? Again, not necessarily, if we understand these statements in the context of the Son’s humiliation in becoming a mortal human being. On the other hand, it is probably not the case that the two statements should be equated in this way.

In John 14, Jesus looks forward to his return to the Father’s presence and to the sending of the Holy Spirit to the disciples, through whom even "greater" things would take place than the miracles Jesus had performed in the ministry of his earthly humiliation (v. 12). This statement clearly does not mean that the disciples would be greater than Jesus or even that they would do greater works than Jesus, because it would in fact be Jesus, through the Holy Spirit he was going to send to them, working within them to do those greater works, bringing glory to the Father and the Son (vv. 13-21). It is in this context of the Son’s exaltation and return to heaven and of the Spirit’s descent to the disciples that Jesus encourages his disciples to rejoice that he was going to the Father, "because the Father is greater than I" (vv. 26-28). Jesus’ ministry was limited by virtue of his living in mortal flesh; he was about to expand his ministry immeasurably by returning to the Father, whose greatness was not limited by the Incarnation, and sending the Spirit. Thus, Jesus affirms the relative greatness of the Father not as a denial of Jesus’ own divine identity but as an expression of his humiliation and radical dependence on the Father in the period leading up to his death.

When we look again at John 10:29, it is evident that Jesus is not denying divine power or identity. Jesus has just affirmed that no one could snatch the sheep from his hand (v. 28), and he now affirms that likewise no one can snatch them from the Father’s hand. In this context Jesus reminds his hearers that of course the Father is greater than everyone. No one can snatch the sheep from the Father’s hand because there is no one greater than the Father who could pull off such a feat. But then Jesus, far from drawing the supposedly obvious conclusion that he was inferior in power to the Father, makes the opposite assertion: "I and the Father are one" (v. 30). In context this can only reasonably mean, at the very least, that Jesus and the Father are perfectly one in their exercise of divine power to preserve the sheep and repel all attacks against them. "The Father is greater than all, so that no one can withstand him" but Jesus is one with the Father, so that no one can withstand him, either. Thus, in context, Jesus in John 10:29 is not saying that the Father was greater in divine power than he, but that the Father’s unparalleled greatness in power is his power, too. Far from disproving Christ’s equality with God, the logic of his argument in this passage strongly proves that he was claiming to be no less than God.

I now turn to what is without a doubt the most popular interpretation of John 10:30 other than the traditional Trinitarian understanding, namely, the view that Jesus was asserting only that he and the Father were one in purpose. I should state at the outset that everyone agrees that from a New Testament perspective Jesus and the Father are one in purpose. The issue is whether the unity of which John 10:30 speaks is specifically a unity of purpose rather than a unity of divine power, nature, or identity. In other words, the claim to be considered here is whether John 10:30 means nothing more than that Jesus is united in purpose with the Father.

Those who promote the œone in purpose view in order to combat Trinitarian theology can point out that some mainstream Christian scholars have also interpreted John 10:30 in this way. J. H. Bernard, in the older ICC commentary on John, explicitly takes this position: A unity of fellowship, of will, and of purpose between the Father and the Son is a frequent theme in the Fourth Gospel (cf. 5:18,19; 14:9,23 and 17:11,22), and it is tersely and powerfully expressed here; but to press the words so as to make them indicate identity of OUSIA, is to introduce thoughts which were not present to the theologians of the first century (A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to St. John, International Critical Commentaries [Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1928]). Similarly, R. V. G. Tasker, in his commentary on John, says that although the orthodox church fathers cited this verse in support of the doctrine that Christ was of one substance with the Father, the statement seems however mainly to imply that the Father and the Son are united in will and purpose (The Gospel According to St. John, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1960], 136). Other commentators make similar statements.

Anti-Trinitarians often quote John Calvin in support of the same point. However, Calvin really does not agree with the one in purpose view. He writes:

He intended to meet the jeers of the wicked; for they might allege that the power of God did not at all belong to him, so that he could promise to his disciples that it would assuredly protect them. He therefore testifies that his affairs are so closely united to those of the Father, that the Father’s assistance will never be withheld from himself and his sheep. The ancients made a wrong use of this passage to prove that Christ is (homoousios) of the same essence with the Father. For Christ does not argue about the unity of substance, but about the agreement which he has with the Father, so that whatever is done by Christ will be confirmed by the power of his Father (Commentary on the Gospel According to John, trans. William Pringle [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1949; orig. 1847], 416).

Calvin nuances his position here rather finely. On the one hand, he points out that in context Christ is speaking of his unity of power with the Father his claim that the power of God did truly belong to him†so that he could guarantee the eternal salvation of his people despite all manner of spiritual attacks against them. This is, then, for Calvin a oneness of power, not merely a oneness of purpose. The Son’s power to preserve his people is the power of God, not the power of a lesser, weaker creature. On the other hand, Calvin argues that the church fathers went beyond the point of the passage by trying to deduce from it the technical theological concept of homoousios that the Father and the Son are of one essence or being. His point seems to be that the words are one, in and of themselves, are not sufficient to establish that doctrine; such an implication goes beyond the demonstrable meaning of the text.

One may agree with Calvin without abandoning a Trinitarian interpretation of the passage. After all, Calvin was himself a Trinitarian, and his way of reading the passage as a whole is patently Trinitarian: the Father and the Son are distinct persons, yet the Son wields the power of God no less than the Father. Calvin goes on to comment on the reaction of the Jewish opponents of Jesus in John 10:33 as follows:

They argue therefore that Christ is a blasphemer and a sacrilegious person, because, being a mortal man, he lays claim to Divine honor. And this would be a just definition of blasphemy, if Christ were nothing more than a man. They only err in this, that they do not design to contemplate his Divinity, which was conspicuous in his miracles.

Thus, Calvin clearly supports the one in power view, although he cautiously warns against trying to prove too much from the words are one in John 10:30. This is a respectable and thoughtful position. As I explained in Part II, I think the recognition that in verse 28 Christ speaks of himself as God, using the wording of Deuteronomy 32:39, puts the words are one in verse 30 in a somewhat different light, strongly suggesting (at least) an allusion to the Shema in Deuteronomy 6:4. With this additional information regarding the context of John 10:30—which Calvin does not mention or seem to have noticed we are on stronger ground in seeing Jesus’ statement as a claim to be one God with the Father. That is not an explicit or simply direct proof of homoousios, but it is a short step indeed to that implication.

The point may be made in a different way. Calvin clearly understands John 10:30 in its context in the Gospel of John in a Trinitarian way, as speaking of his oneness of divine power with the Father, but is simply being careful not to read off œone substance from the simple word one. Rather, Calvin sees the deity of the Son implicit in the statement given its context. Furthermore, Calvin places the focus or emphasis in John 10:30 on the Son’s divine activity the concrete expression of his deity in our salvation rather than on the metaphysical or ontological definition of the Son’s nature. According to Calvin, Christ was not seeking to explain his nature but to respond to the unbelieving Jews’ attacks against him. Thus, Calvin comments on John 10:36, Christ does not now argue what he is in himself, but what we ought to acknowledge him to be, from his miracles in human flesh. For we can never comprehend his eternal Divinity, unless we embrace him as a Redeemer, so far as the Father hath exhibited him to us.

Some contemporary commentators likewise caution us against reading too much explicitly into the word one or this single sentence on its own, while at the same time arguing that Jesus’ statement in the larger context of the Gospel of John does connote or imply a claim to deity. For example, Andrew Lincoln observes that the force of John 10:30 in its immediate context is that Jesus and the Father are one in securing the safety of the sheep in their care. There may be two agents but their protecting hand is one. This indication of Jesus’ full unity with the Father in his divine work of salvation has further implications for Jesus’ identity, and so later Christians who used this text in Christological debates and formulations about the metaphysical unity of the Father and the Son need not be faulted as totally misguided.†Lincoln points out that such further implications are confirmed by the rest of what the Gospel says about Christ’s relation to God, especially in the Prologue. “Father and Son are united in the work of salvation because they are united in their being (Andrew T. Lincoln, The Gospel According to Saint John, Black’s New Testament Commentaries 4 [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson; New York and London: Continuum, 2005], 306).

D. A. Carson likewise argues that John 10:30 read in the broader context of what the rest of the Gospel says about John including its explicit affirmations that Christ is God (John 1:1, 18; 20:28). As for the immediate context, Carson comments that “the oneness of will and task, in this context, is so transparently a divine will, a divine task (viz. the saving and preserving of men and women for the kingdom) that although the categories are formally functional some deeper union is presupposed (D. A. Carson, The Gospel According to John, Pillar NT Commentary [Leicester, England: Inter-Varsity Press; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991], 394-95).

The point here is this: One can agree that the focus of John 10:30 is practical or even “functional†without ignoring or denying that the statement has ontological implications for our understanding of the person of Christ. I agree with those commentators who argue that the statement has clear implications in context of the deity of Christ even if one does not recognize John 10:30 as an explicit claim to deity. Nor is this way of reading John 10:30 dependent on or original with the orthodox church fathers embroiled in the Arian controversy. Almost a century before the Arian controversy, the biblical scholar Origen of Alexandria had this to say about John 10:30:

Our Savior and Lord in his relation to the Father and God of the universe is not one flesh or one spirit but something higher than flesh and spirit, namely, one God. The appropriate word when human beings are joined to one another is flesh. The appropriate word when a righteous person is joined to Christ is one spirit. But the word when Christ is united to the Father is not flesh or spirit but more honorable than these God. This then is the sense in which we should understand “I and the Father are one” (Origen, Dialogue with Heraclides 3-4, quoted in Joel Elowsky, ed., Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: John 1-10 [Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2007], 358).