IS
JESUS YAHWEH?
Most Christians are used to relate only to Lord
Jesus Christ in their daily lives. They pray to Him, they sing songs for Him,
and without much thought on the matter, they live their relationship with God
based only on the known person of Jesus of Nazareth, most probably because
there is ample information about Him in the NT; without even paying attention
to the fact that their Sunday worship services are addressed mainly to the
Father and not to Jesus (See Roman Missal, Book of Common Prayer, Lutheran Book
of Prayer, etc).
This social phenomenon has even provoked certain
extreme groups to allege that the only true living God is Jesus, known at other
times as Yahweh or Holy Spirit, and that He is the same Jesus of the gospels,
and no one else. (See “Jesus only” groups, and the United Pentecostal Church).
But even though these are extreme circumstances,
more informed sources sustain that there is no substantial difference in coming
only to Jesus, since we have always alternated with Him, even in the OT, where God
YHWH, the God of the prophets, is no one else but Jesus Himself in his
pre-incarnated form.
WHO IS YAHWEH?
The first time we see God Yahweh in the Bible is in
Genesis 2:4; when we are told that Yahweh made the Heavens and the Earth, the
same divinity that is mentioned in the first chapter of Genesis, with the
generic plural of ‘Elohim’, translated simply as ‘God’ in all translations.
This God Yahweh is the only deity that related to
Adam (Genesis 2:15), Noah (Genesis 7:1), Abraham (Genesis 12:1) and Moses
(Exodus 3:7).
This God, Yahweh, is the only deity the Jews
understood as the ‘God of their parents’ (Exodus 3:6), the same God Jesus
called ‘My Father’ (Luke 1:26-27,31-32; 3:23, 38; Mark 14:61-62).
But it gets more complicated when the NT identifies
Jesus with the Yahweh of the OT, the same divine entity Jesus the man, called
‘Father’:
“He was in the beginning with God. All
things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was
made”
John 1:2-3
“No one has ever seen God; the only God,
who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.”
John 1:18
Judging by these verses, one unmistakably would
conclude, that Jesus is the God name Yahweh in the OT, and that the divinity
called ‘Father’ is an unknown God who we have never seen or heard before.
JESUS AND YHWH
On one side, there is no doubt that Jesus was the
same identity who created the universe, angels, and humans; and that He was the
one who manifested Himself as Yahweh in the OT all along (John 1:1,18; 10:30;
14:9), even to the point as to have his own name of Jesus written in ancient
manuscripts in a passage that the OT ascribes to God YHWH, alone:
“So I want to remind you, though you
already know these things, that Jesus first rescued the nation of Israel from
Egypt, but later he destroyed those who did not remain faithful.”
Jude 1:5
WHO THEN IS THE FATHER?
It is also clear that
there is another identity, to whom Lord Jesus called ‘Father’, whether we know
Him or not.
Jesus prayed to Him,
and expressed an independent identity from Him:
“Father, if you are
willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.”
Luke 22:42
“And now, Father,
glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world
began.”
John 17:5
But other verses
identify this mysterious ‘Father’ with the same YHWH known in the OT:
“Long ago, at many
times and in many ways, God (YHWH) spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in
these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of
all things, through whom also he created the world.”
Hebrews 1:1-2
That would also explain
why Jesus did not contradict the idea which all who heard Him had about whom He
was referring to every time He mentioned ‘God’ or ‘Father’ (Matthew 19:4).
The Bible is certain
that the Father and the Son are two different divine entities (Romans 8:32)
“Yet for us there is
but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and
there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through
whom we live.”
1Corinthians 8:6
JESUS AND YAHWEH
The only explanation is
that as 1Corinthians 8:6 and Hebrews 1:1-2 say; Jesus (The Word=Logos) in his
pre-incarnated state, spoke and acted in the Name of the Father, whom to Moses
He identified as YHWH.
It is true that every
time the Father spoke in the OT, as YHWH or otherwise, it was always the Word
who spoke, and never the Father Himself. From Adam to Moses, and even now,
every person that relates to the Father, deals with Jesus, and in this case, yes,
we can say that The Word, the Logos, called Jesus is the YHWH of the OT.
BUT at no moment, when
speaking as YHWH, Jesus spoke as a Son, or any other than the Supreme God from
Heaven (Hebrews 1:1-2; 3:5-6), the Father of Jesus, under whose command the
Word created everything.
JESUS clearly claimed
divinity, and He indirectly proclaimed to be the God who spoke under the Name
of YHWH; but He never claimed to be YHWH Himself, or his own Father.
Furthermore, Jesus
never ordered to pray to Himself, even when there is nothing wrong with it
(Acts 7:59), but claimed all worship and supplication to be directed to the
Father, who everyone understood to be the YHWH of the OT and the God of the Mosaic
Law:
“so that your giving
may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will
reward you.”
Matthew 6:4
“This, then, is how you
should pray: “’Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,”
Matthew 6:9
LAST WORD
None of the people of
the OT possessed the fulness of the revelation of God, even though they had an
idea that there was a lot more of what they knew and proclaimed (1Peter 1:12).
But now, under the
fulness of revelation, we relate to God as a whole, through his three different
manifestations.
We worship Elohim in
the person of YHWH, the Father.
We come to Him through
the intercession of his beloved Son, our Lord and Saviour JESUS CHRIST, the
Logos.
We come to the Father
and Jesus, guided by the sanctifying and comforting direction of the HOLY
SPIRIT of God.
Even though we can
still relate to God, whether we pray only to the Father or to Jesus or to the
Holy Spirit alone, if we do not relate with the three of them, it is an
imperfect relationship, since the way shown by Jesus was a direct contact with
the whole Trinity, where GOD YAHWEH is the Head of the divinity, and the
recipient of all worship, as the Eternal God, and of whom the Son and the
Spirit are the reflections of his glory
(Colossians 1:15)
Omar Flores
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