The exposition of the Editor must render John 1:1, directly contradictory of Deut. 32:39, "I am he, and there is no God with me." Here Jehovah himself expressly denies having another real God with him in the universe, for he is often said to have had fictitious Gods with him, and, therefore, Jehovah's denial, in this verse, must be referred and confined to real Gods. Psalm 82:1: "God standeth in the congregation of the mighty, he judgeth among the Gods." He then addressed himself to those nominal Gods of Israel, among whom be stood, "I said, ye are Gods" (inverse 6). But we firmly believe that John, an inspired writer, could not utter any thing that might contradict the express declaration of Jehovah, though the Editor and others, from a mistaken notion, ascribe this contradiction to the Evangelist. They thus render the last sentence of the verse "the word was God,"' without the indefinite article "a" before "God," while they translate Exod. 7:1, "I have made thee (Moses) a God to Pharoah," though, in the original Hebrew, there stands only the word Elohim or "God," without the indefinite article "a" before it. If regard for the divine unity induced them to add the article "a" in the verse of Exodus, "a God to Pharoah," why did not the same regard, as well as a desire of consistency, suggest to them to add the article "a" in John 1:1, "the word was a God"? We may, however, easily account for this inconsistency. The term "God," in Exodus, is applied to Moses, the notion of whose deity they abhor; but as they meant to refer the same term in John 1:1, to Jesus, (whose deity they are induced by their education to support,) they leave the word "God" here without the article "a," and carefully write it with a capital G. If eternity be understood bv the phrase "In the beginning," in John 1:1, and Jesus Christ be literally understood by the "word," then we shall not only be compelled to receive Christ as an eternal being, but also his apostles; since Luke (ch. i. 2) speaks of himself and his fellow-disciples, as "eye-witnesses and ministers of the word from the beginning."
I shall now quote the interpretation of this passage, by searchers after truth, who have been enabled to overcome their early-acquired prejudices. See Improved version, for which the Christian world is indebted to its eminently learned authors.
The Word. 'Jesus is so called because God revealed himself or his word by him.' Newcome. The same title is given to Christ, Luke 1:2. For the same reason he is called the Word of life, I John 1:1, which passage is so clear and useful a comment upon the proem to the gospel, that it may ho proper to cite the whole of it. 'That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled of the Word of life: for the Life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal Life which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us: that which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you.' By a similar metonymy Christ is called the Life, the Light, the Way, the Truth, and the Resurrection. See Cappe's Dissert. Vol I. p. 19.
In the beginning. Or, from the first, i. e. from the commencement of the gospel dispensation or of the ministry of Christ. This is the usual sense of the word in the writings of this evangelist. John 6:64, Jesus knew from the beginning, or from the first: ch. 15:27, 'Ye have been with me from the beginning.' See ch. 16:14, 2:24, 3:11; also 1 John 1:1, 2:7, 8; 2 John 6, 7. Nor is this sense of the word uncommon in other passages of the New Testament. 2 Thess. 2:13; Phil. 4:15; Luke 1:2.
The Word was with God. He withdrew from the world to commune with God, and to receive divine instructions and qualifications, previously to his public ministry. As Moses was with God in the mount, Exod. 34:28, so was Christ in the wilderness, or elsewhere, to be instructed and disciplined for his high and important office. See Cappe, ibid, p. 22.
And the Word was a God. 'Was God.' Newcome. Jesus received a commission as a prophet of the Most High, and was invested with extraordinary miraculous powers. But in the Jewish phraseology they were called gods to whom the word of God came. (John 10:35.) So Moses is declared to be a god to Pharoah. (Exod. 7:1.) Some translate the passage, God was the Word, q. d. it was not so properly he that spake to men as God that spake to them by him. Cappe, ibid. See John 10: 30, compared with 17:8, 2:16, 3:34, 5:23, 12:44. Crellius conjectured that the true reading was QEW, the Word was God's, q. d. the first teacher of the gospel derived his commission from God. But this conjecture, however plausible, rests upon no authority.
Was in the beginning with God. Before he entered upon his ministry he was fully instructed, by intercourse with God, in the nature and extent of his commission.
All things were done by him. 'All things were made by him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.' Newcome; who explains it of the creation of the visible, material world by Christ, as the agent and instrument of God. See his notes on ver. 3 and 10. But this is a sense which the word EGENETO will not admit, GINOMAI occurs upwards of seven hundred times in the New Testament, but never in the sense of create. It signifies, in this gospel, where it occurs fifty-three times, to be, to come, to become, to come to pass; also, to be done or transacted, ch. 15:7, 19:36. It has the latter sense, Matt. 5:18, 6:8, 21:4?, 26:6. All things in the Christian dispensation were done by Christ, i. e. by his authority, and according to his direction; and in the ministry committed to his apostles nothing has been done without his warrant. See John 15:4, 5, 'Without me ye can do nothing.' Compare vers. 7,10, 16; John 17:8; Col. 1:16, 17. Cappe, ibid.
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