Wednesday, March 3, 2021

Nicholas J. Frederick on D&C 93, John 1:1, and the Eternal Personal Pre-Existence of Jesus and All of Humanity

  

In Johannine studies of 1:1, the linking verb ην has drawn a great deal of attention. Keener notes that “For John, the Word was not only ‘from the beginning,’ but ‘in the beginning.’ Many commentators have laid heavy stress on the verb ην: in contrast to many Wisdom texts which declare that Wisdom or Torah was created ‘in the beginning’ or before the creation of the rest of the world. John omits Jesus’ creation and merely declares that he ‘was.’ The verb (ην) may thus suggest the Word’s eternal preexistence” (Keener, The Gospel of John, 1:369). Joseph Smith's point in D&C 93 seems to be something similar. First, note the clear, if not awkward, presence of “was” in D&C 93:8, as if the author went to pains to emphasize the “was” by altering the expected word order of John 1:1, “in the beginning was the word.” If we allow the meaning of the Greek verb ην to be carried over to the “was” of D&C 93:8, it again re-enforces not only a pre-earthly but also an eternal existence for the Word. Note as well D&C 83:29, that “Man was also in the beginning with God.” This repetition of “in the beginning” takes the reader back to verses 7 and 8 and suggests that humanity shared a similar pre-earthly existence as the Word did, by implication “eternal” rather than just “pre-earthly.” (Nicholas J. Frederick, The Bible, Mormon Scripture, and the Rhetoric of Allusivity [Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2016], 125 n. 45)

 

Further Reading


Is Latter-day Saint Christology "Arian"?


The Christological Necessity of Universal Pre-Existence

 

Blog Archive