This is one of the clearest and most provocative statements I have heard in regards to the suggestion that God is many, not a single
entity. The Old Testament, however, clearly states the matter a little differently. "Hear, O
The English word "one" in this passage is the Hebrew "echad, Strong's 259 from 258. A numeral from 258; prop. united, i.e. one; or (as an ordinal) first:- a, alike, alone, altogether, and, any (-thing), apiece, a certain,
each (one),+ eleven, every, few, first + highway, a man, once, one, only, other, some, together." Yahweh is The Most High God
and Jesus is his son (Mk.5:7).
Clearly, one thing the passage is saying is that God is the first or foremost among other gods, or foreign
gods, since bowing down to many gods and deities was normal in the nations back then. "You shall utterly destroy all the places
where the nations which you shall dispossess served their gods, on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree. And you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and burn their wooden images with fire; you shall cut down the carved
images of their gods and destroy their names from that place" (Deut.12:2-3; cf. Ex.34:13-17; Deut.8:19).
To differentiate between Yahweh
and the other common gods of the nations around them, the Israelites were told that Yahweh your God is singular and supreme. The passage of Deut.6:4 does not suggest that two Gods were present and they are being spoken of in a familial, husband/wife/marriage
sense (that is, in the sense that two persons are joined as in a marriage, yet are separate persons). Surely, if two equal Gods
were present at the time the Deuteronomy passage was being written, this fact would have been noted and clearly recorded.
Word and
Logos. The Greek word "logos" is supposed to define Jesus as a preexistent God-being called the "Word."
Strong's G3056—logos:
"Something said (including the thought); by implication a topic (subject of discourse), also reasoning (the mental faculty) or motive;
by extension a computation; spec. (with the article in John) the Divine Expression (i.e. Christ):- account, cause, communication,
× concerning, doctrine, fame, × have to do, intent, matter, mouth, preaching, question, reason, + reckon, remove, say (-ing), show,
× speaker, speech, talk, thing, + none of these things move me, tidings, treatise, utterance, word, work." Reference 3004 essentially
echoes the above. James Strong suggests it is defined figuratively "to lay forth" or "relate" in words of systematic or set
discourse.
Carl Franklin writes, "both God the Father and God the Son were known in Old Testament times as Jehovah. The Hebrew
text also refers to the two Jehovahs individually as El and together as Elohim. Thus, Jehovah Elohim is a plural name that refers
to both divine Beings. The Old Testament prophets proclaimed that one of the two Jehovah Elohim would become flesh and would
dwell among men." This sounds logical, but careful study of his material does not bear out his false claims.
Another example
is the universality of the "God is a family of gods" doctrine and how broadly it is taught in some Sabbatarian (7th day) Churches.
"Genesis chapter one tells about the re-shaping of this earth after it had been covered with water. It tells about the forming
of the land masses, about the dividing of the day from the night, about the formation of the heaven that the birds fly in, about the
creation of all the land, sea, and air creatures. It tells us HOW God created and brought into existence all these things. It was all accomplished by 'the spirit of God' and by 'the spoken word' (Gen.1:2,3). The gospel of John, chapter one, shows
that the one who did all this was the person of the Godhead that became Jesus Christ. There were TWO eternal beings from the
beginning, who had no beginning, who were eternal and who were God --one God, but two persons, just as husband and wife are
Here, the writer takes a page from the Trinitarian
handbook. He lectures that God is one, thus safely (he thinks) agreeing with
If there were two separate eternal beings in the beginning (or three), then plainly the biblical notion
of God as one eternal being must be wrong. To avoid such a dispute, religious people created eternal persons who
are not eternal persons and fashioned familial doctrines in the "Godhead" where there are none.
Jesus Christ does not claim to be God,
nor does he claim that God is a "family of Gods" or "God-beings." Jesus the Christ clearly claims that God is a singular being. "And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent" (Jn.17:3). (Continued...)
