"The Mighty God": Jehovah's Witnesses Betrayed by Their Own "Bible"

"For a child has been born to us, 
A son has been given to us; 
And the rulership will rest on his shoulder. 
His name will be called Wonderful Counselor,  
Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace."

This is Isaiah 9:6 in the New World Translation (2013 revision), the Bible published by the Watchtower Society, or, as they are commonly called, the Jehovah's Witnesses. Why am I quoting their version? Have I suddenly converted? No, of course not.

I am quoting it because  the Watchtower has accidentally made an important confession here.

If you discuss this verse with a Witness, he will agree that it refers to Jesus Christ. However, they claim that it only teaches that Jesus is a "mighty god" (note lower case), just as they say about John 1:1. He is not the Almighty God, Jehovah.

Their problem is that they forgot to amend the next chapter of Isaiah. In Isaiah 10:21, the NWT refers to Jehovah as "the Mighty God." So, if their interpretation of 9:6 is correct, then they must also teach that Jehovah is not "the Almighty God," but just "the mighty god." In other words, their interpretation of the their own version requires them to say that God is not God!

Why do they insist so strongly in this particular heresy? I have thought long on that question. The Watchtower won't give an honest answer to it, of course. But I think it is that our God, the incarnate I Am (John 8:58), is powerful for the complete salvation of all His people. But, by hiding that great salvation, the Watchtower Society keeps its members in bondage, looking to Brooklyn for salvation. The Catholic Church uses a similar strategy, not by denying the deity of Christ, but by denying the infallibility and perspicuity of the Bible. Different roads to the same goal!

Is It True that the New Testament Doesn't Mention Infant Baptism?

"For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea,  and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea,  and all ate the same spiritual food,  and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.<sup>"
- I Cor. 10:1-4</sup>

I have heard it repeated by Baptists, over and over, ad nauseum, that the New Testament never mentions the baptism of infants, as if that would settle the question. But, as often as it is stated, is it true? No, it's not!
 
Look at the passage quoted above, I Corinthians 10:1-4, referring to the people of Israel during the Exodus from Egypt. This is a familiar story. The Israelites had been given permission by Pharaoh to leave their bondage in Goshen. However, Pharaoh had had a change of heart, and set out in pursuit, intending to retrieve his unpaid workforce. When the Israelites approached the Red Sea (Hebrew, "Sea of Reeds"), their God, Jehovah, made a way for them, dividing the sea to the right and to the left. After they passed through, the Egyptians attempted to follow, but God sent the sea back, crushing the Egyptian troops between two walls of water. The account can be found in Exodus, chapter 14.

Paul uses this experience as a metaphor for baptism. Who was baptized? Adults? Believers? That's what Baptists would have us believe. But what is the actuality? Everyone among the covenant people, men, women, elderly, and children! And this is exactly the case that Presbyterians make. We do not advocate the baptism of those foreign to the covenant, the equivalent of the Egyptians. That is the red herring argument of baptists. Rather, we advocate the baptism of those with a relationship to the covenant, i. e., adult believers, if they haven't been previously baptized, as well as the children within their household. That is, the same that Paul described to the Corinthian Christians.

So, what is the answer to the question in my title? Is it true that the New Testament never mentions the baptism of infants (or children)? Obviously, the answer is no. And, though it isn't the subject addressed here, this text also undercuts the Baptist insistence that baptism must be by immersion. Who got immersed in the Exodus? The Egyptians!

It must be noted that the case I make here only applies to the Presbyterian (or Reformed) view of baptism. It isn't intended to support other views, such as that of the Catholic Church.

Who Are the Sons of God?

Before I start, I want to say that nothing I am about to say should be taken to refer to the only-begotten Son of God (John 1:14). That is a class that belongs to Jesus alone, and cannot be shared with any other human being.

This matter comes up because of a discussion I had recently over the issue of Hell. This was part of the same discussion that inspired my prior post on annihilationism. This Seventh-Day Adventist friend of mine stated that she thought that it was a violation of the Fatherhood of God to believe that He would consign some of His sons and daughters to eternal punishment. My friend was stunned when I objected that the damned are not the sons of God, for only believers can bear that title.

In the same hymn of the Incarnation that I quote above, we read (John 1:12), "To all who did receive Him, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become the children of God" [emphasis mine]. These believers are contrasted with those who "did not receive Him" in the verse before. So, the Apostle John clearly portrays the relationship of son to Father as the result of faith, not birth or creation.

The Apostle Paul adds his own authority to this definition (Romans 8:14-15): "For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God... [Y]ou have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, 'Abba! Father!'" And in Galatians 3:26, "in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith." And in II Corinthians 6:18, "'I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,' says the Lord Almighty." So, again, we see that the relationship of human sons to the divine Father is based on faith, not nature. Only Jesus Christ is the Son of God by nature.

Often we see this "fatherhood of God" discussion, when liberals try to turn everyone into an implicit Christian. That isn't the problem with my friend. Rather, she was trying to justify a doctrine which I can only call a heresy, a misunderstanding of the status of unbelieving men and women.

In his book, A Theology  of the New Testament, Fuller Seminary Professor of New Testament Exegesis and Theology George Eldon Ladd says on this issue (p. 86), "It is not as Father that God cares for the birds [Matthew 6:26], and it is not as Father that God bestows His creaturely blessings on those who are not His children [Matthew 5:44-45]. The Fatherhood of God belongs to those who have responded to the divine seeking love and have submitted themselves to God's Kingdom. God seeks men, not because He is their Father, but because He would become their Father" [emphasis added].

Contra Annihilationism: "Destruction" is not the Same Thing as "Extinction"

As exemplified by the late John Stott, the philosophy of annihilationism has been spreading, even among professed evangelicals. Annihilationism is the belief that unbelievers do not suffer eternal punishment in hell, the traditional view, but rather are extinguished, either at death or at the final Judgment. While it has been connected historically to the Jehovah's Witnesses and Seventh-Day Adventists (and their Armstronist offshoots), this heresy has been gaining acceptance in more otherwise-traditional churches.

I am currently reading the book Hell under Fire, edited by Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A. Peterson. While the book deals with evangelical universalism as well as annihilationism, I am currently reading just the annihilationism portion. In it is a chapter by theologian Douglas Moo, entitled "Paul on Hell," pp. 104-5. In it, he addresses the argument of annihilationists that "everlasting" and its synonyms refer to irrevocable extinction, rather than to continuous punishment. The Greek words at issue are olethros and apollumi/apoleia. He says: "Leaving aside, for the moment, judgment texts, none of the key terms usually has this meaning [i. e., 'irrevocable'] in the Old and New Testaments. Rather, they usually refer to the situation of a person or object that has lost the essence of its nature or function... The key words for 'destroy' and 'destruction' can also refer to land that has lost its fruitfulness (olethros in Ezek. 6:14; 14:16 [LXX]); to ointment that is poured out wastefully and to no purpose (apoleia in Matt. 26:; Mark 14:4); to wineskins that can no longer function because they have holes in them (apollumi in Matt. 9:17); Mark 2:22; Luke 5:37); to a coin that is useless because it is 'lost' (apollumi in Luke 15:9); or to an entire world that 'perishes,' as an inhabited world, in the Flood (2 Pet. 3:6). In none of these cases do the objects cease to exist; they cease to be useful or to exist in their original, intended state."

Does "Whosoever Will" Mean that Anyone Can Become a Christian, Just by Willing?

I have watched a certain well-known TV evangelist make fun of Calvinists a number of times. One of his subordinates even said one time, "'Whosoever will,' that disproves it [i.e., Calvinism] right there!" And I suspect that the majority of American evangelicals would simply nod their heads in unthinking agreement.

But is that actually what the Bible says? I happen not to think so.

Let's begin with the words of Paul. Consider Romans 3:11 (quoting Psalm 14:2), "No one seeks for God." Why is that? Ephesians 2:1, for we "are dead in the trespasses and sins." A dead person cannot will or choose anything. Jesus makes the same point in John 6:44, "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him." For (Matthew 11:27), "No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal Him." So, whose will is the deciding factor? Not ours, but His (see also John 1:13)!

So, how does "whosoever will" (Revelation 22:17) fit in? Again, Paul explains (Philippians 2:13): "It is God Who works in you, both to will and to work for His good purpose." Thus, we see that it is true that "whosoever will may come," but it is only because God works in us to create that will! So, TV preacher, that settles it right there!

I Peter 5:2, More Testimony from Scripture Against Bishops in the Church

The first three verses of the fifth chapter of I Peter have some serious implications for church government.

"So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly, not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock." [Emphasis mine]

The words translated here as "elder" and "fellow elder" are forms of the Greek word presbuteros. The word translated "exercising oversight" is episkopountes, a form of episkopos, from which we get the English word "bishop." So, it can be taken to be a message from the Apostle Peter to elders to "bishopize," if I may be allowed to make up a new word. The Apostle goes even further in II Peter 1:1, where he addresses Christians as "those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours..." While the Pope claims "the power of the keys" to include or exclude from the body of Christ whomever he chooses, the true apostle eschews any monarchical pretensions. If only the equality of all believers was the motto of the supposed heir of the throne of Peter, I would possibly give his faith a little benefit of doubt.

This seems to me to be a fatal blow to the episcopalian view of church government, as held by Anglicans, Eastern Orthodox, and Roman Catholics, all of whom hold to an office of bishop that rules over the church in a certain district.

This passage is especially destructive to the views of the Roman Catholic Church, which claims Peter himself as the beginning of their line of popes, the bishops of Rome. Rome claims that Paul was appointed by Christ in Matthew 16:13-20 to be the head of the Church, an office which he supposedly passed on to his heirs, the popes. However, in the passage here, we have Peter's own words stating that bishopizing is the work of elders. The New Jerusalem Bible, a Catholic translation, uses "elder" in  the passage, but then instructs the elders to "watch over" the church. The New American Bible, the main translation used by American Catholics, says "presbyters," refusing even to translate the term, with "overseeing." To my mind, that is a tacit admission that the American bishops are fully aware of the implications of this passage.

In addition to the positive assertions in Paul's letters, especially I Timothy 3:1-7 and Titus 1:5-9, we have here in I Peter the biblical basis for the system of church government commonly referred to as "presbyterian." It is neither "episcopalian" nor democratic. Church government is not an issue of choice. The Head of the Church has laid out how He intends to rule in His body, the Church. And the Pope of Rome is clearly the enemy of Christ's rule over that Church.

Jehovah's Witnesses and John 1:1

Most Christians can say this verse by heart: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." In their New World Translation of the Bible and polemics, Jehovah's Witnesses change the last phrase to "and the word was a god."

Their justification for that change is that theos, the Greek word for "god," has no article in that phrase. And in that, they are correct. However, the problem comes when they go on to say that the absence of the definite article (Greek having no indefinite article) means that "god" here should be taken indefinitely.

But that is wrong.

While it is true that that would be the significance of the lack of an article (called anarthrous in formal grammar) in some places, it is not its significance here. What makes this funny is that "beginning" in this verse is also anarthrous, but the Watchtower doesn't make any quibble about it there. Also, in Mark 1:1, the Greek for "Son of God," "uiou theou," contains no article before theos. So, is Jesus the Son of "a god"? Zeus perhaps? Or Ganesh? Oddly enough, the New World Translation translates Mark 1:1 as "Son of God" with capitals.

Greek (and we are talking about ancient Greek; the modern language may be different) doesn't depend on word order in the way English does. Rather, grammar is determined by variations in the form of the words themselves. Instead, word order determines emphasis. Furthermore, in a predicate nominative, as in the phrase before us, since both the subject and the predicate are in the nominative case, the article is used to distinguish the subject.

So, the grammar here is properly explained thusly: the use of the article with "Word" indicates that it, and not "God," is to be taken as the subject of the sentence. In addition, "God" placed before "Word" is to be taken for emphasis, as if John were shaking us by the shoulders and yelling it in our faces to make sure that we get his point: the Word, i. e., Jesus, is the very God of the universe! In other words, the Greek grammar is intended to express the exact opposite of the meaning that Jehovah's Witnesses force upon it!

Thus, "and the Word was God" is the proper translation of the Greek, not as it is misrepresented by the Jehovah's Witnesses. And, since this is Greek 101, so to speak, I don't for a second believe that the leadership of the Watchtower Society doesn't know this. In addition, as can be seen with Mark 1:1 above, the Watchtower has no problem translating an anarthrous theos as "God" when they have nothing to gain from it. That is why I consider the Watchtower Society to be a cult, and the average Jehovah's Witness a victim of deception. It is also why I am posting this here, in the hope that some sincere Witness will see it and be set free from the bondage of the Watchtower.

Please, to any Witness reading this: The Watchtower Society is lying to you about the teachings of the Bible regarding Jesus. I beg of you to take the step, as scary as it surely is, to free yourself from that deception, and ask the real Jesus to reveal Himself to you.