B. Secondly, Jesus Christ is very God. Again and again New Testament Chnstology bears witness to this second' form of the doc trine of the divine, nature of the Christ,— namely, to the fact that Jesus Christ is very God.
In the tradition of John, Jesus identifies him self absolutely with God: °He that seeth me, seeth the Father° (John. xiv, 9). The very purpose of the Gospel of John is °that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God* (John xx, 31). The opening of the prologue it a grand summary of the fundamental facts of "In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was in relation to God the Father, and the Logos was God° (John i, I). • From all eternity was the Logos, the Word. And the Logos of John is Jesus the Christ. For the Logos is he of whom the Baptist bears witness: °This is he of whom I said,— He who is come after me, is before me° (John i, 15). But he of whom the Baptist hears this witness is Jesus the Christ (John i, 30). Therefore the Logos is Jesus the Christ. Hence the Christ was from all eternity.
Moreover, 'the. Logos was in relation to God the Father.* This translation is correct. The words 6 0e6C (with the article) mean, in Johannine Hellenistic, °God the Father." The preposition irti4r is the Platonic, as well as Aristotelian, way of expressing relation. Neo Platonic ideas and forms had got a vogue in Alexandria. Alexandrian philosophy had been brought over the sea to Ephesus. It was the influence of this Alexandrian philosophy in Ephesus and elsewhere that John set himself to combat. Quite naturally, then, he adopted some of the expressions of the hostile school, and adapted them to his Christology. To stem the inrushing tide of Gnosticism, he clearly set it down that Jesus the Christ, the Logos of his Gospel, was from eternity, was in nature God, was in relation to God the Father from all eternity, and therefore a distinct divine Person. And to drive home by irresistible clearness of statement, the teaching of the divine nature of Jesus, John immediately added: "All things by him came into being, and apart from him came into being not one thing that is" (John i, 3).
Jesus is the very God, who °in the beginning created heavens and earth° (Genesis i, 1).
Similarly in his Epistles, Johngives certain witness to the very Godhead of Jesus: eWe know that the Son of God is come. And he bath given us understanding that we may know the true God, and may be in his Son. This is the true God and life eternal° (1 John v, 20). The Patristic interpretation down the centuries refers this to the Christ: "Jesus is the true God, and life eternal.° Saint Paul is as absolute in his witness of the Deity of Jesus as are the evangelists. To the great Apostle, Jesus is the Christ, °who is over all things, God blessed for ever° (Romans ix, 5). The Christ is Jahweh of the Exodus: "And all drank the same spiritual drink; yea, they drank of the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was the Christ* (1 Corin thians x, 4). It was Jesus whom some of the Israelites tempted; and they perished by ser pents (ibid. x, 19). It was he, against whom °some of them murmured; and they were de stroyed by the destroyer" (ibid. x, 10). "In him dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead cor poreally° (Colossians it 9). Men should not go so low as to give to angels, that they see not,. the adoration due only to the Christ (ibid. it, 18). °For in him all things were created . . . all things were created by him and for him' (ibid. i, 16). "Although he was in the nature of God, yet did he not look upon equality with God as above all things to be clung to; but he emptied himself by taking the nature of a slave and by becoming like men. And having appeared among us in outward bearing as mere man, he still further humbled himself by submitting even to death,— even to death on a cross. And that is why God the Father raised him to the very highest place, and freely gave him THE NAME which stands above all other names; so that in THE NAME of Jesus (at the Jahwistic power of Jesus) every knee should bend in heavens, on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Jahweh in the glory of God the Father* (Philippians ii, 6-11).