John 8:56-59

[Matthias]

“‘Abraham your father rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it and was glad.‘ The Jews said to him: ‘You are not yet fifty years old and have you seen Abraham?‘ Jesus said to them: ‘This is the truth I tell you - before Abraham was I am.’ So they lifted stones to throw at him, but Jesus slipped out of their sight, and went to the Temple precincts.”

In this thread I’ll be discussing how a believing Jewish monotheist understands this incident.

On one side, Jewish monotheists. On the other side, Jesus of Nazareth the Messiah, himself a Jewish monotheist.

On one side, Jewish monotheists who had believed in Jesus (v.30), but no longer did after what he said to them concerning truly becoming his disciples (v. 31). On the other side, the teacher, the rabbi, the Son of the living God.

This is an all-Jewish monotheist affair.

The tense confrontation begins in John 8:31. By the time we pick up the story (in verse 56) it has escalated to the boiling point. After a final word from the Messiah (v.58), comes the explosion (v.59). The conversation ends with those who had believed him finally resorting to violence to silence him.

 

[Matthias]

”ALL the previous lightening flashes pale into insignificance before the blaze of this passage. When Jesus said to the Jews that Abraham rejoiced to see his day, he was talking language that they could understand. The Jews had many beliefs about Abraham which would enable them to see what Jesus was implying. There were altogether five different ways in which they would interpret this passage.”

(William Barclay, The Gospel of John, Vol. 2, p. 34, Revised Edition, The Daily Study Bible)

Barclay is speaking here about what Jesus said in v. 56. My only disagreement with his setup is with his comment that what preceded in the conversation “pale into insignificance”. There’s nothing insignificant in the conversation.

If he were alive today I think he would probably agree and say that he is using hyperbole to dramatic effect.

Before continuing, a word about the translation. I quoted the passage as Barclay does in his commentary. I accept it as a valid translation. If someone objects and desires to discuss the passages using a different translation, I’m fine with doing that.

I’ll pause briefly for any questions or comments about what I’ve written thus far before continuing with Barclay’s commentary. He does an outstanding job proving us with the Jewish background.

 

[ScottA]

I am not sure what Barclay wrote, but it is completely understandable (and an important precedent for us to consider regarding our own circumstances) that the Jews were conditioned to believe that everything was physical--even the miracles of God. Because, as far as they knew, everyone who ever lived, lived and died in their own time; and history only moved forward in the way they themselves had experienced it for millennia.

What was unexpected then, was that things were about to become "spiritual", as He said, "But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, surely the kingdom of God has come upon you" (Matthew 12:28).

 

[Matthias]

Picking up now where I left off in Barclay’s commentary. The first, second and third of the five ways he mentioned:

”(a) Abraham was living in Paradise and able to see what was happening on earth. Jesus used that idea in the Parable of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:22-31). That is the simplest way to interpret this saying.

(b) But that is not the correct interpretation. Jesus said Abraham rejoiced to see my day, the past tense. The Jews interpreted many passages of scripture in a way that explains this. They took the great promise to Abraham in Genesis 12:3 : ‘By you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves,’ and said that when the promise was made, Abraham knew that it meant the Messiah of God was to come from his line and rejoiced at the magnificence of the promise.

(c) Some of the Rabbis held that in Genesis 15:8-21 Abraham was given a vision of the whole future of the nation of Israel and therefore had a vision beforehand of the time when the Messiah would come.”

(Ibid.)

 

[Matthias]

The fourth and fifth of the five ways:

”(d) Some of the Rabbis took Genesis 17:17, which tells how Abraham laughed when he heard that a son would be born to him, not as a laugh of unbelief, but as a laugh of sheer joy that from him the Messiah would come.

(e) Some of the Rabbis had a fanciful interpretation of Genesis 24:1. There the Revised Standard Version has it that Abraham was ‘well advanced in years.’ The margin of the Authorized Version tells us that the Hebrew literally means that Abraham had ‘gone into days.’ Some of the Rabbis held that to mean that in a vision given by God Abraham had entered into the days which lay ahead, and had seen the whole history of the people and the coming of the Messiah.

From all this we see clearly that the Jews did believe that somehow Abraham, while he was still alive, had a vision of the history of Israel and the coming of the Messiah. So when Jesus said that Abraham had seen his day, he was making a deliberate claim that he was the Messiah. He was really saying: ‘I am the Messiah Abraham saw in his vision.’

Immediately Jesus goes on to say of Abraham: ‘He saw it (my day) and was glad.’ …

To us these ideas are strange; to a Jew they were quite normal, for he believed that Abraham had already seen the day when the Messiah would come.”

(Ibid., pp. 34ff)

That’s good background information. It takes us up to the question the unbelieving Jewish monotheists ask that leads into the Messiah’s final word in the conversation. I’ll post that next, unless I receive comments or questions to respond to first.

 

[Matthias]

“The Jews, although they knew better, chose to take this literally. ‘How,’ they demanded, ‘can you have seen Abraham when you are not yet fifty?’ Why fifty? That was the age at which Levites retired from their service (Numbers 4:3). The Jews were saying to Jesus: ‘You are a young man, still in the prime of life, not even old enough to retire from service. How can you possibly have seen Abraham? This is mad talk.’

It was then that Jesus made the most staggering statement: ‘Before Abraham was, I am.’ We must note carefully that Jesus did not say: ‘Before Abraham was, I was,’ but, ‘Before Abraham was, I am.’”

(Ibid., p. 36)

I’m stopping here for a reason. I’m able to agree with Barclay up to, and including, this point. I’ll post the remainder of what he says for my readers but this is where he stops before offering his trinitarian perspective. While I’m able to agree with some of what he goes on to say, I won’t be able to agree with all of it (and some trinitarians may not be able to either.) I’ll explain why.

It’s my supper time. I’ll pick up where I left off in his commentary in my next post.

 

[Matthias]

“… Jesus did not say: ‘Before Abraham, I was’ but ‘Before Abraham, I am.’”

An important point, and one that I fully agree with.

Barclay continues:

”Here is the claim that Jesus is timeless. There never was a time when he came into being; there never will be a time when he is not in being.”

(Ibid.)

This is a trinitarian, a binitarian, even a unitarian (sometimes) perspective. It isn’t the perspective of a Jewish monotheist, regardless of whether or not the Jewish monotheist is a believer. I’ll come back to this shortly.

Barclay continues:

”What did he mean? Obviously he did not mean that he, the human figure Jesus, had always existed. We know that Jesus was born into this world at Bethlehem; there is more than that here. Think of it this way. There is only one person in the universe who is timeless; and that person is God.”

I fully agree with that. That is exactly what a Jewish monotheist believes.

The Trinity isn’t only one person; the Trinity is three persons. If I were a trinitarian, I would balk at this comment of Barclay’s.

Continuing:

”What Jesus is saying here is nothing less than that the life in him is the life of God; he is saying, as the writer of Hebrews put it more simply, that he is the same yesterday, today and forever.”

I agree with that and I’ll come back to it later.

“In Jesus we see, not simply a man who came and lived and died; we see the timeless God, who was the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, who is before time and who will be after time, who always is. In Jesus the eternal God showed himself to men.”

That is precisely what I believe about him as a Jewish monotheist. That is not what unbelieving Jewish monotheists thought / think about him.

This concludes Barclay’s commentary on the incident.

 

[Matthias]

“‘I am he’ is a claim to be the Messiah and implies neither divinity nor preexistence: ‘Before Abraham’s coming, I am he,’ that is, the promised Messiah. The simple phrase ‘I am’ is used by Jesus 15 times, and in every case (but the present, John 8:58) it is rendered in the Common Version ‘I am he’ or ‘It is I.’ See Matt. 14:27; Mk. 6:50; 24:62; Lk. 21:8; 22:70; 24:39; John 4:26; 6:20; 8:24,28; 13:19; 18:5,6,8.”

(Robert Young, Young’s Concise Commentary, on John 8:58)

Is John 8:58 an exception trinitarians, binitarians and some unitarians say that it is - Dr. Young is a trinitarian who suggests that it isn’t) or is John 8:58 consistent with the other 14 “I am” (Gk. ego eimi) statements made by Jesus? I believe it is consistent with the others. Jesus is claiming to be the Messiah.

This fits precisely with what John writes in John 20:31 - “But these have been recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and so that through believing you may have life through his name.” (ISV)

A small point but I think an important one: many people besides the Messiah say ego eimi (“I am”) and we understand that the phrase - in and of itself - has nothing to do with preexistence and / or a claim of deity.

 

[Matthias]

“That the absolute use of ‘I am’ need not have connotations of divinity is clear from its usage by the man born blind at John 9:9, Jesus’ words, then, were not an unambiguous asseveration of divinity.”

(H.H. Rowden, Christ the Lord, p. 172)

 

[Matthias]

“The identification of Jesus’ I am statements with the I am of Exodus I believe to be a misreading of the text. Of the I am sayings in this Gospel, those with the predicate ‘I am the bread of life,’ ‘the door,’ ‘the way,’ ‘the good shepherd, etc. certainly do not imply that the subject is God. As Barrett rightly says, ego eimi does not identify Jesus with God, but it does draw attention to him in the strongest possible terms. ‘I am the one - the one you must look at, and listen to if you would know God.’”

(J.A.T. Robinson, Commentary on John, p. 342)

This is consistent with Jewish monotheism.

 

[Matthias]

Let’s look again at what Jesus said in 8:56 -> “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it, and was glad.”

Jesus didn’t say that he had seen Abraham. He said only that Abraham had seen his day.

But what did the angry unbelieving Jewish monotheists say in 8:57? -> “… and have you seen Abraham?”

Jewish monotheists - believing and unbelieving - don’t believe that Jesus of Nazareth (born many centuries after Abraham lived and died) had ever seen Abraham. In Jewish monotheism it doesn’t fit with the constraints of history.

This question was asked mockingly, not seriously. It’s a put down. They think they’ve got him. It would be utter madness if he were to say that he had seen Abraham. Abraham is one of Jesus of Nazareth’s ancient ancestors. (God himself - Yahweh, the God of Jewish monotheism - has no ancestors.)

Did Jesus reply that he had seen Abraham? No.

Trinitarians, binitarians, and (sometimes) unitarians believe that Jesus replied that he is God. That’s an escalation from his claim to be the Messiah.

Jewish monotheists believe that he never wavered from the position he had maintained throughout the conversation - I am the Messiah.

The unbelieving Jewish monotheists didn’t say anything that would cause Jesus of Nazareth (remember, he too is a Jewish monotheist) to go beyond what he had claimed all along. The put down that was supposed to shut him down didn’t. It is at this point that the angry and frustrated unbelieving Jewish monotheists resorted to picking up stones to kill a fellow Jewish monotheist.

The unbelieving Jews did not believe that their God, the God of Jesus of Nazareth, had sent him. They did not believe that he is the Messiah promised by his God and their God. That Jesus would persist in claiming that he was was viewed as blasphemy - Jesus of Nazareth was, they concluded, lying about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

Yahweh - the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - is the God and the Father of Jesus of Nazareth.

The choice in Jewish monotheism is to believe or not to believe that is so.

Jewish monotheists who rejected him did not believe it is so.

Jewish monotheists who accepted him did believe it is so.

That’s an entirely different perspective than that of trinitarians, binitarians and the majority of unitarians.

 

[Matthias]

“There never was a time that he came into being.” Trinitarians, binitarians and the majority of unitarians hold this to be true.

The position of believing Jewish monotheists is that he was brought into being when he was miraculously begotten by his God and Father and conceived in the womb of the virgin Mary, as described in the birth narratives in Matthew 1 and Luke 1.

The position of the Ebionites (an early Jewish Christian group) is that he was brought into being through Mary having sexual relations with Joseph. (I reject their position.)

The position of unbelieving Jewish monotheists is that he was brought into being when Mary had sexual relations with either Joseph or someone else and became pregnant. A common belief of theirs is that she had sexual relations with a Roman soldier named Pantera. (I reject their position.)

”There never will be a time when he is not in being.” Trinitarians, binitarians and the majority of unitarians believe this is true.

The position of believing Jewish monotheists is that it is true from the time of his resurrection from the dead. Jesus of Nazareth has been resurrected to immortal life; changed from mortal to immortal.

The position of unbelieving Jewish monotheists is variable. I’ve spoken with some unbelieving Jews who have said that he is still dead. Others among them have said that he is presently, and always will be, alive and burning in hell fire.

 

[Matthias]

I have one more item that I need to address, and that is how I believe, as a Jewish monotheist, that Jesus of Nazareth, a fellow Jewish monotheist, is before Abraham. I’ll do that sometime tomorrow.

Of course I will also reply to any questions that members of the forum may want to ask me.

 

[Matthias]

In John 8:58 Jesus doesn’t say that he saw Abraham; he claims to be superior to Abraham.

I skipped over the bulk of the conversation to get to the last three verses but we should keep in mind that the unbelieving Jews had placed a great deal of emphasis on how they were descendants of Abraham - Abraham is a key figure in their identification. Jesus had told them that they weren’t acting like Abraham, that they didn’t have the faith of Abraham, that they were rejecting what Abraham had seen in vision - and that infuriated them.

Now he is telling them that he is greater than Abraham - which is consistent with his constant claim that he is the Messiah.

Their God is greater than Abraham? That wouldn’t upset a Jewish monotheist in the slightest. The Messiah is greater than Abraham? That also wouldn’t upset a Jewish monotheist in the slightest.

”I am [he],” ”I am the Messiah Abraham saw.”

He had told them that because they didn’t believe him their god is the devil, not the Father.

Now he is holding fast - not shut down by their mocking question - continuing to insist that he is the Messiah sent by the God of Jewish monotheists, the Father. Nothing they said pushed him off that course. The claim isn’t escalated to “I am God”; it’s underscored, “I am the Messiah promised, raised up and sent by God”.

The Messiah is superior to the patriarch Abraham. The God of believing Jewish monotheists - Yahweh, the God and Father of the Messiah - is superior to the Messiah and superior to Abraham.

As Paul would write, “God is the head of the Messiah.”

 

[Matthias]

“Jesus has been emphasizing his Messianic claim. He does not say that before Abraham was born the logos existed; he says ‘I am.’ It is Jesus the Messiah, Jesus the man whom the Father had consecrated to the Messianic work who speaks. Just before this he had spoken of ‘my day,’ which Abraham saw (John 8:56), by which we must understand the historical appearance of Jesus as Messiah. Abraham had seen this, virtually seen it in God’s promise of a seed (Gen. 12:3; 15:4,5) and had greeted it from afar (Heb. 11:13). And now it is this one who consciously realizes the distant vision of Abraham who says, ‘Before Abraham was born, I am.’ Jesus therefore, seems to affirm that his historic Messianic personality existed before Abraham was born. If that is the case, then its existence before Abraham must be thought of as ideal.L

(G.H. Gilbert, The Revelation of Jesus, A Study of the Primary Sources of Christianity, pp. 214,215)

 

[Matthias]

Jesus had spoken of resurrection as conferring endless life, the life of the coming age, on those who follow him (John 8:51). It is possible that Jesus counters their question about him seeing Abraham - as if the Messiah were a contemporary of Abraham, which both he and they knew the Messiah wasn’t - with the claim that he will precede Abraham in the resurrection. Before Abraham gains immortality in the resurrection, Jesus will already be alive and immortal; the firstfruits of the resurrection. This would also justify his claim to be superior to Abraham.

 

[Matthias]

”Within the Christian tradition the New Testament has long been read through the prism of the later conciliar creeds ... Speaking of Jesus as the Son of God had a very different connotation in the first century from that which it has had ever since Nicea. Talk of Jesus’ preexistence [in the Bible] ought probably in most, perhaps in all cases, to be understood, on the analogy of the preexistence of the Torah, to indicate the eternal divine purpose being achieved through him [Jesus of Nazareth] rather than preexistence of a fully personal kind.”

(Maurice Wiles, The Remaking of Christian Doctrine, pp. 52,53)

All scripture is written by Jewish monotheists, not by Nicene Christians (i.e. trinitarians).

Trinitarians and Jewish monotheists read the same passages of scripture but understand the meaning differently.

Trinitarians are reading what Jewish monotheists wrote (the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament - the scriptures) through the prism of the Council of Nicaea (325 AD), the Council of Constantinople (381 AD) and the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD). This is the lens of trinitarianism.

Jewish monotheists are reading what Jewish monotheists wrote through the prism of Jewish monotheism. This is the lens of Jewish monotheism.

The Jewish monotheist has to decide whether or not to believe what Jewish monotheists wrote about the Messiah, who himself is a Jewish monotheist.

What I’ve presented is the view of a believing Jewish monotheist, a primitive 1st century Christian living in the 21st century.

When set side by side with the view of trinitarianism (or binitarianism, or even some forms of unitarianism) a distinctly minority view - that of primitive Christianity, left undeveloped in post-biblical times - is given its place on the historical timeline of Christianity.

 

[Matthias]

“When the Jew said something was ‘predestined,’ he thought of it as already ‘existing’ in a higher sphere of life. The world’s history is thus predestined because it is already, in a sense, preexisting and consequently fixed. This typically Jewish conception of predestination may be distinguished from the Greek idea of preexistence by the predominance of the thought of ‘preexistence’ in the Divine purpose.”

(E.C. Dewick, Primitive Christian Eschatology, pp. 253,254)

In Jewish monotheism, people, events, places and things exist in the foreknowledge of the mind of God before they literally come into existence.

”For [the Messiah] was foreknown before the foundation of the world …”

(1 Peter 1:20)

“… of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.”

There was a divine purpose for the Messiah to be crucified.

The Messiah, is a human person, the event was his birth, his life, his ministry, his crucifixion, his resurrection and it was, in the thought of Jewish monotheism, done before the foundation of the world.

Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, the Son of God, is before everyone else - including, of course, his ancestor Abraham - in the thought of Jewish monotheism, in that he is the beginning of the new creation.

 

[APAK]

“… Jesus did not say: ‘Before Abraham, I was’ but ‘Before Abraham, I am.’”

An important point, and one that I fully agree with.

Barclay continues:

”Here is the claim that Jesus is timeless. There never was a time when he came into being; there never will be a time when he is not in being.”

(Ibid.)

This is a trinitarian, a binitarian, even a unitarian (sometimes) perspective. It isn’t the perspective of a Jewish monotheist, regardless of whether or not the Jewish monotheist is a believer. I’ll come back to this shortly.

Barclay continues:

”What did he mean? Obviously he did not mean that he, the human figure Jesus, had always existed. We know that Jesus was born into this world at Bethlehem; there is more than that here. Think of it this way. There is only one person in the universe who is timeless; and that person is God.”

I fully agree with that. That is exactly what a Jewish monotheist believes.

The Trinity isn’t only one person; the Trinity is three persons. If I were a trinitarian, I would balk at this comment of Barclay’s.

Continuing:

”What Jesus is saying here is nothing less than that the life in him is the life of God; he is saying, as the writer of Hebrews put it more simply, that he is the same yesterday, today and forever.”

I agree with that and I’ll come back to it later.

“In Jesus we see, not simply a man who came and lived and died; we see the timeless God, who was the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, who is before time and who will be after time, who always is. In Jesus the eternal God showed himself to men.”

That is precisely what I believe about him as a Jewish monotheist. That is not what unbelieving Jewish monotheists thought / think about him.

This concludes Barclay’s commentary on the incident.

And this is clearly how many, many folks get confused, especially those that have a different view of who is truly the Christ; and then especially without them looking at the local context of Hebrews 13:8.

Yahshua is the rock of their salvation, the anchor to live by so to ward off following false teachings, or knowing or believing in a false gospel. Yahshua is dependable, as he said then and true in his immediate future. His words and teachings are indelibly recorded as trustworthy, they are permanent because of his life in his Father, his God, indeed!

note: the Greek word for yesterday, and tomorrow indicate they are a close, short period of time, not a longer era or eons of time...

 

[Matthias]

And this is clearly how many, many folks get confused, especially those that have a different view of who is truly the Christ; and then especially without them looking at the local context of Hebrews 13:8.

Yahshua is the rock of their salvation, the anchor to live by so to ward off following false teachings, or knowing or believing in a false gospel. Yahshua is dependable, as he said then and true in his immediate future. His words and teachings are indelibly recorded as trustworthy, they are permanent because of his life in his Father, his God, indeed!

note: the Greek word for yesterday, and tomorrow indicate they are a close, short period of time, not a longer era or eons of time...

I often ask trinitarians (and binitarians and unitarians) this question: Is it reasonable for a Jewish monotheist to read the writings of Jewish monotheists through the prism of Jewish monotheism?

I very seldom receive a direct answer to the question.

A followup question along the same line of thinking can be asked: Is it reasonable for trinitarians to read the writings of Jewish monotheists through the prism of post-biblical trinitarian doctrine, creeds and dogma?

I’m grounded in and by the constraints of history. I can’t be persuaded by anyone who says “Moses the Nicene Christian ...” or “Isaiah the trinitarian ….” - that’s historical revisionism.

I can’t be persuaded by anyone who says “Jesus the trinitarian …” or “John, Paul and Peter the Nicene Christians …” - that’s more historical revisionism.

What gets my attention and causes me to (re)think are trinitarian theologians and scholars who allow people living in biblical times to be what they actually were. Men like Edmund Fortman and Harold Brown do that, and they have my attention.

How we got from the Jewish monotheism of primitive Christianity to the trinitarianism of 4th century Christianity isn’t difficult to trace. Anyone who denies that history has no chance whatsoever of persuading me. Dr. Brown’s crucial question about the validity of the gradual shift that occurred is where it’s still possible that a trinitarian might persuade me. That’s where I spend my time considering and reconsidering trinitarianism.

I’m shining a spotlight on where trinitarians could / should focus if they really want to try to reach me. Do they want to? No.

“Have you ever read the Bible?” -> not a serious question to pose to someone with my background.

It’s like an echo of the unbelieving Jewish monotheists. They picked up stones and he turned and walked away.