Answering Christanity مع Ina Sukinah و٦ آخرين.
Before Abraham was, I am
John 8:58 is one of the most misused verses of the Bible. Because Jesus in that verse says “Before Abraham was, I am,” two implications, one unnecessary, and the other false, are drawn from that verse. The unnecessary implication is that since Jesus existed before Abraham that means he existed always. This is a preconceived notion that people force into the text. “Before Abraham” does not mean “always”. Melchezidek in the Bible is shown to have existed before #Abraham (Hebrews 7:3). Does that mean that Melchezidek is God? Obviously, we cannot take a created being as God.
The false implication is that Jesus by saying “I am” was uttering God’s name which God declared to Moses in #Exodus 3:14-15.
The Bible is confusing on this point because it gives three versions of God’s calling Moses, and the three versions do not agree with each other. The best that can be said is that the name of God announced there is Yahweh.
Compare the three versions below:
1. The Yahwist version (Exod 6:28 - 7:7) says nothing about the name of God being revealed because for the Yahwist editors the name Yahweh was already known among the Israelites. They say that this name was being used since the time of Enosh, the grandson of Adam (Genesis 4:26).
2. The priestly version (Exod 6:2-13) contradicts this by saying that this name was not known before (Exod 6:2). God’s command to Moses here is
So say to the Israelites, “I am Yahweh . . .” (Exod 6:6),
and #Moses repeated this to them (6:9).
3. But in the Elohist version (Exod 3:13-22) God’s instruction to Moses is different:
This is what you are to say to the Israelites. “I am has sent me to you” (Exod 3:15).
It would appear from this that God’s name is “I am,” but it is clear upon careful study that in this passage the Elohist scribes substituted “I am” for “Yahweh” in the same instruction given in (Exod 6:6).
Even if God really did announce his name to be “I am” as in Exodus, chapter 3, verse 15, this still does not prove that Jesus applied the name “I am” to himself. Jesus never said his name is “I am”. He is quoted as saying “Before Abraham was I am” (John 8:58). If “I am” is Jesus’ name, then we should be able to replace the “I am” in this passage with “Jesus,” since these are both names of Jesus. The passage would then read as follows: “Before Abraham was, Jesus.” This, of course, makes no sense because the idea that Jesus called himself “I am” is not there in the text, but it is someone’s own interpretation forced into the text. Notice that we would have no difficulty replacing the “I am” in Exodus 3:15 with either “God” or “Yahweh”, as follows:
This is what you are to say to the Israelites. “God has sent me to you” (Exod 3:15).
This is what you are to say to the Israelites. “#Yahweh has sent me to you” (Exod 3:15).
Another point worth paying attention to is this: the writer of the fourth gospel never believed Jesus to be God. This proves that Jesus never said he is God. Otherwise, how could it be possible that the author of the fourth #gospel never knew it? He believed that the Father is the only true God, and that Jesus is the Christ and messenger of God (see John 17:3).
Furthermore, a distinction which is present in the Greek version of the Bible is lost from the English versions. In the Septuagint Greek version of the Old Testament, the phrase translated “I am” is “ho on” in the Greek. If the author of the fourth Gospel wanted to show his readers that Jesus repeated the phrase, he would no doubt have quoted Jesus as saying, “Before Abraham was, ho on.” But he did not. Instead, he quoted Jesus as saying, “Before Abraham was, ego eimi.” Readers of his Greek manuscript, then, would have seen that Jesus’ statement in John 8:58 is different from God’s statement in Exodus 3:15. And this, of course, is what the author of the fourth Gospel intended.
Furthermore, the Syriac Peshitta version of the Bible, one of the old versions of the Bible, reads in John 8:58, “Before Abraham was, I was.” Was this changed from what the author wrote? How can we know? Suppose this was the original phrase, then those who rest their case on the common rendering will be disappointed on the Day of Judgement. Why not rest our case on a much more plain verse of the Bible — one in which Jesus clearly differentiates between himself and God? Take this one for example, where Jesus says to his enemies:
You are determined to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God” (John 8:31).
Who is Jesus then? A man who told the truth which he heard from God. In other words, he was a messenger of God. When a clear statement like this is issued from the lips of Jesus, why wrangle with the passages that are not so clear, and try to twist them to mean the opposite of what Jesus has been saying in other clear verses all along?
Anyone who wishes to convince himself/herself that Jesus is God should look for clear evidence in the Bible to show that Jesus is #God. But the clear evidence is to the contrary. The Bible teaches again and again that Jesus is not God, but a #Servant of God (e.g. #Matthew 12:18).
In the very next chapter of #John, chapter 9, v.35, #Jesus declares that he is the son of man (RSV). And anyone who knows the Bible as the Israelites to whom Jesus spoke will know that a son of man cannot be God. The #Bibledeclares that God is neither a man nor a son of #man (Numbers 23:19).
How can he be called clean that is born of a #woman? Behold even the moon, and it shineth not; yea, the stars are not pure in his sight. How much less man, that is a worm? and the son of man, which is a worm? (Job 25:4-6)
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S.A
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