JOHN 17:3 ONCE AGAIN!
The following is taken from the monumental work titled The Incarnate Christ and His Critics: A Biblical Defense, authored by Robert M. Bowman Jr. & J. Ed Komoszewski, published by Kregel Academic, Grand Rapids, MI, 2024, Part 3: The Name of Jesus: Jesus’ Divine Names Chapter 20: Jesus as Distinct from “God” in the Johannine Writings, pp. 383-386.
In my estimation this is THE best and most comprehensive exposition and defense of the biblical basis for the Deity of Christ. Every serious Trinitarian Christian student of the Holy Bible, apologist, and/or theologian must have this book in the library.
THE FATHER IS “THE ONLY TRUE GOD” (JOHN 17:3)
In a lengthy prayer after the Last Supper, Jesus opened with these words: “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you” (John 17:1b). The Father had given the Son “authority over all flesh” with regard to the giving of eternal life (John 17:2), so that eternal life is dependent on our knowing both the Father and the Son (John 17:3). The earthly phase of Jesus’ mission is all but complete and the Father has been glorified in all that Jesus has done (v. 4). “Now” Jesus asks the Father to see to it that both of them are glorified, as Jesus, through his death and resurrection, is about to return to the Father (see John 13:3; 16:28). In this context Jesus prays, “So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed” (John 17:5 NRSV). The Father and the Son are two divine persons who seek to glorify each other, who are the source of eternal life to those who know them, and who shared divine glory even before creation (see pp. 237–45 for discussion of these texts).
Answering Critics’ Use of John 17:3 Against the Deity of Christ
Despite the rich implications of this passage for the deity of Christ, most non-Trinitarians think that John 17:3 is proof that the Father alone, and not Jesus Christ, is God in the full sense: “And this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” (NRSV). They argue that this text clearly denies that Jesus Christ is the true God. For example, Unitarian author Anthony Buzzard cites John 17:3 more than any other biblical text in his main book critiquing the doctrine of the Trinity (some twenty-five different pages throughout his book).11 Shabir Ally, though recognizing that the Gospel of John teaches that Christ existed as a heavenly figure prior to the creation of the world, cites John 17:3 three times as a proof text against the deity of Christ.12 Nabeel Qureshi, a convert from Islam to Christianity, recalls that John 17:3 was one of his favorite proof texts against Christianity when he was a Muslim. It seemed to him at the time to make a confession parallel to the shahada, the first pillar of Islam: “There is no god but Allah [God], and Muhammad is the messenger of Allah [God].”13
The seeming parallel between John 17:3 and the shahada is more a similarity in form than in substance, though both statements affirm a form of monotheism. Rodney Whitacre’s comment is especially on target:
Both religions claim to honor the only true God, a theme from the Old Testament as well (e.g., Ex 34:6 LXX; Isa 37:20), and both speak of the great revealer of God. But they differ radically in what is said of this revealer. Jesus is a prophet—indeed, the revealer of God par excellence. But this verse, in keeping with the whole of this Gospel, says Jesus is far more than just a prophet. For eternal life is not just a knowledge of God as revealed by the Son; it includes a knowledge of the Son himself.14
Simply reading John 17:3 in its immediate context amply confirms Whitacre’s point. Jesus refers to himself as “the Son” twice at the beginning of his prayer (v. 1) and addresses his prayer to the “Father” twice in the immediate context (vv. 1, 5) as well as four times more in the rest of the prayer (vv. 11, 21, 24, 25). He says that the Father gave him authority over all humanity (v. 2) and that eternal life “is” knowing the Father and him (v. 3). One can hardly imagine a prayer by Jesus more contrary to Muslim beliefs.
The affirmation that eternal life consists in knowing the Father and Jesus Christ is quite startling if Christ is just a creature, no matter how great a creature. Eternal life is all about knowing God—that is, about having a relationship with him in which we enjoy life with him forever. John 17:3 gives an expanded statement of this truth—without changing it—to say that eternal life consists in knowing both the Father and Jesus Christ.
Although critics claim that John 17:3 disproves the doctrine of the Trinity, in actuality what John 17:3 says is perfectly consistent with it. The fact is that the doctrine of the Trinity affirms that the Father is the only true God. This is not a concession—it is an essential element of the doctrine. After all, if there is only one true God, and the Father is really God, then the Father must be that God—that is, the only true God. It is also perfectly consistent with the doctrine of the Trinity to affirm that the Father sent Jesus Christ. Thus, the verse can be analyzed as expressing the following three propositions:
1. Eternal life consists in knowing the Father and Jesus Christ.
2. The Father is the only true God.
3. The Father sent Jesus Christ.
Orthodox Christianity agrees with all three of these statements; indeed, it insists on the truth of all three statements. So, what’s the problem?
First, those who deny the deity of Christ argue that the words “you, the only true God,” spoken to the Father, identify the Father exclusively as the true God. Although this interpretation seems like common sense to the point of obviousness to non-Trinitarians, from a Trinitarian perspective their argument misreads the text. There is an important, if subtle, difference between saying that only the Father is the true God (to the exclusion of the Son) and saying that the Father is the only true God. John 17:3 says the latter, not the former. Unfortunately, the New English Bible (NEB) mistranslates the line as “to know thee who alone art truly God.”15 John 17:3 does not say, as Ally, for example, claims, that “the Father alone is the only true God.”16 Here’s why this difference is significant. If we knew in advance that the true God is unipersonal (a singular, undifferentiated divine person), then it would follow from what John 17:3 says that the Father alone, to the exclusion of the Son (or the Holy Spirit), is the only true God. However, that is precisely what is at issue here! In short, anti-Trinitarians are assuming that the doctrine of the Trinity is false when they infer from John 17:3 that Christ is not the true God.
Second, non-Trinitarians claim that the sentence in John 17:3 creates a disjunction between “the only true God” and “Jesus Christ,” implying that Jesus Christ is not the only true God. But this is not quite correct. John 17:3 does distinguish between the Father (“you”) and “the one whom you have sent” (named in the text as “Jesus Christ”). This distinction does militate against the Oneness view, according to which Jesus Christ is the Father incarnate. On the other hand, the text does not clearly assert that Jesus Christ is not the true God. Although this idea may seem a reasonable inference from the text, it is not required by the text, nor is it consistent with the rest of what John teaches about Christ.
Throughout this chapter we have emphasized that Jesus, the incarnate Son, spoke of the Father as God and humbly acknowledged his dependence on the Father. John 17:3 must be understood in this context. Christ’s affirmation that the Father was “the only true God” was an expression of honor made in the context of the Son’s humility in becoming a man for the Father’s glory. We are not reading into the passage this idea of Jesus being humble; the idea is explicit in the immediate context. Jesus immediately goes on to affirm that he had devoted his time on earth to glorifying the Father (v. 4) and to ask the Father in turn to glorify him (v. 5). Frederick Dale Bruner, after noting that John calls Jesus Christ “God” (1:1, 18; 20:28) and that John quotes Jesus as affirming his oneness with the Father (10:30), explains that Jesus humbly avoided speaking directly of himself as God but instead consistently honored the Father as his God:
But throughout his incarnate historical ministry Jesus, for his part, consistently points away from himself to his Father as his Source, Superior, and now as the only True God (see, e.g., Matt. 19:17; Mark 10:17–18; esp. John 5:19–47 and passim). There is mystery here and, so, appropriate human mystification, but the outcome is clear: Jesus Christ, the one God’s full revelation in human form, is himself fully one with God and so, himself, fully God. But in his incarnate ministry he often points to his one and only Source, his Father.17
John 17:3 as a Problem for Critics
Not only is John 17:3 consistent with orthodox Christian theology, it poses a serious problem for most non-Trinitarian views of Jesus Christ. Here’s why. John 17:3 reveals that there is only one true God. Yet other texts in John and elsewhere in the New Testament reveal that Jesus Christ is God. This poses no problem for the doctrine of the Trinity, but it creates a serious problem for anyone who wishes to affirm everything Scripture teaches while denying that Jesus is truly God. The argument may be set out formally as follows:
1. There is only one true God (from Jer. 10:10; John 17:3; 1 John 5:20; etc.).
2. Either someone is the true God or that someone is not the true God (law of excluded middle).
3. Any God that is not the true God is a false God (by definition of “false” as meaning “not true”).
4. Any God that is not a false God is therefore the true God (from [1] and [3]).
5. Jesus is God and is not a false God (from John 1:1, 18; 20:28; Rom. 9:5; Titus 2:13; Heb. 1:8; 2 Peter 1:1; 1 John 5:20).
6. Therefore, Jesus is the only true God (from [4] and [5]).
11. Buzzard and Hunting, Doctrine of the Trinity, esp. 38–40. Sidney Hatch comments in his foreword, “If there is a key text to the book, it is John 17:3” (xiii). See also Buzzard, Jesus Was Not a Trinitarian, 49–51, and elsewhere.
12. Ally, Is Jesus God? The Bible Says No, 11, 21, 29.
13. Qureshi, No God but One, 223–24.
14. Rodney A. Whitacre, John, IVPNTC 4 (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 1999), 407; similarly, Ernst Haenchen, John: A Commentary on the Gospel of John, trans. Robert W. Funk, ed. Robert W. Funk and Ulrich Busse, Hermeneia (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 151.
15. The Watchtower appeals to this mistranslation in Reasoning from the Scriptures, 411.
16. Ally, Is Jesus God? The Bible Says No, 29.
17. Frederick Dale Bruner, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), 970–71.
FURTHER READING
REV. 3:14 REVISITED… ONE MORE TIME!
FIRSTBORN OF CREATION REVISITED… AGAIN!
CHRIST: THE GOD OF THE SACRIFICE