What the Jehovah’s Witnesses
Teach About God and the Son

"a god" and the God?

   The following clearly shows that the Jehovah’s Witnesses believe in both “a god” (“the Word”) and “the God” (whom they would identify as “Jehovah”). This is page 401 of The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures (©1985 WATCH TOWER BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETY OF PENNSYLVANIA):

Photo 1.

This reference can be found at: Archive.org's Copy of 1985 Edition, page 401.   Return to Triunity 2 text.

"All [other] things"?

   The following page, containing Colossians 1:16-20 in The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures (©1985 WATCH TOWER BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETY OF PENNSYLVANIA) clearly shows the word "other" does not exist in the Greek text. Is that because Greek does not have a word for other? No! Greek has at least two words which could have been used to mean other here: ἄλλος (allos) or ἕτερος (heteros). For example, see John 15:24a (“If I had not done among them the works that no one else did” ESV, literally: no other [oudeis allos; οὐδεὶς ἄλλος]). So John could have easily used allos in John 1:3 (see Photo 1 above, where John states “All things came into existence through...” the Word, yet the NWT does not insert "[other]" there). If they are attempting to say John 1:3 is about the Father; not the Word, that would deny the Jehovah Witnesses' belief that the Father directly created only the Word/Son and everything else was made through (or by means of) the Word/Son. They cannot have it both ways!

Or here in Colossians, Paul could have easily used the word heteros if he taught that Jesus (the Word) had been used by the Father to make "all other things [panta heteros; πάντα ἕτερος]; with the added benefit of stating that everything else was different in some way from him, since heteros often means not only "other, or another" but "different" in some way too! For example, in Galatians 1:6, where Paul wrote: “...turning to a different gospel”; ESV (ἕτερον εὐαγγέλιον; heteron euaggelion); not simply the true Gospel taught by someone else, but something that was different, a false teaching. But that's not what Paul wrote, because he taught that the Father and the Son, being the same in nature, can both be referred to as the Creator of everything!

Photo 2.

This reference is from: Archive.org's Copy of 1985 Edition, page 880.   Return to Triunity 2 text.

First Posted on: 8 JUL 2019 (2019.07.08).
Revised: June 20, 2021 (2021.06.20); added material on Colossians 1:16-20.

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