"In firstness was The Word (ho logos). And The Word was (or existed) in relations with The God; and The Word was (a) God. This (Word) was in firstness, in relations with The God. All things came into being through Him (or it), and apart from Him (or it) became not one thing that did become. In Him (or it) was life, and the life was the light of men. And The Word became flesh, and tented among us, and we beheld his glory, glory as of an only Son from a Father—full of grace (favor) and truth." ~From Man and His Divine Father By John Caldwell Calhoun Clarke 1900
"John himself, also, in the same first chapter of his gospel, in which, he says, ver. 1, the word was a God, has provided ample means of preventing any construction of his language, different from the well-known and commonly received sense of it at that time, and in those parts of the world." Additional Essays on the Language of Scripture By John Simpson 1810
Mr. Grant observes, that “with respect to perspicuity, as arising from the use or omission of articles, the English language appears to be superior to most others, ancient or modern. Greek, Hebrew and Latin languages, have no word equivalent to our definitive a. In Greek, anthropos denotes indiscriminately man, as either the name of the whole species, or that of any individual. The French and Spaniards also have no mode of distinguishing between man and the man, both being represented by l'homme and el hombre. The two former, the Greek and Hebrew, have a definite article; and in the Latin, when the is equivalent to this or that, hic or ille may be employed. Thus, “Tues ille homo.” “Thou art the (that) man.” But when the devil said to our Saviour, “Situ es filius Dei,” the expression may denote, “If thou art a Son of God,” or, “If thou art the Son of God.” In addition to the observations of Mr. Grant, it may be remarked, that the words “In principio erat sermo, et sermo erat apud Deum, et Deus erat is sermo,” may either be translated “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God;” or they may be translated, “In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was a God,” that is, a superior being, but not the supreme God. I do not presume to say which of these two translations is most consonant with the meaning of the original Greek. ~ William Greatheed Lewis 1821 [A Grammar of the English Language]
"It further appears to me that these rules lead to the adopting of that translation of the last clause, on which Dr. Wardlaw has bestowed his most copious animadversions, viz. 'the Word was a God.' It is, as I have before observed, an established principle of interpretation, that from among the various senses, in which we know any word to be used, we ought in each case to select that, which affords a meaning, agreeable to the clear dictates of common sense and the admitted doctrines of Holy Scripture. We are assured by abundant and irrefragable proofs, both that the term God is used in Scripture to signify 'any person, who is authorised, commissioned, and inspired to declare the will of Jehovah to mankind,' and also that our Lord Jesus Christ was such a person. This explanation of the passage therefore is free from every objection." ~ James Yates 1850
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