One of the most common objections to Christianity is that the divinity of Jesus was “created” by later Christians long after the first century. No one in primitive Christianity believed Jesus was divine, we are told. He was just a man and it was later believers, at the council of Nicea, that declared him to be a God.
A classic example of this in popular literature can be found in the book The Da Vinci Code:
“My dear,” Teabing declared, “until that moment in history [council of Nicea], Jesus was viewed by His followers as a mortal prophet… a great and powerful man, but a man nonetheless. A mortal.” “Not the Son of God?” “Right,” Teabing said. “Jesus’ establishment as ‘the Son of God” was officially proposed and voted on by the Council of Nicaea.” “Hold on. You’re saying Jesus’ divinity was the result of a vote?” “A relatively close vote at that,” Teabing added.
Of course, there have been more sophisticated objections to the Christian belief in the divinity of Jesus. Bart Ehrman’s book, How Jesus Became God, argues that “It will become clear in the following chapters that Jesus was not originally considered to be God in any sense at all” (44).
Needless to say, there have been many responses to this claim by Ehrman (and The Da Vinci Code). A good place to start is the rebuttal volume to Ehrman, How God Became Jesus. And you can see my review of Ehrman’s book here.
But, it would still be helpful to revisit the question about when Christians began to conceive of Jesus as God. Was this belief “originally” (Ehrman’s word) part of early Christianity?
There are many ways to approach this question, but for the purposes of this short post, we will simply consider the teachings of the apostle Paul on this question. Why start with Paul? Larry Hurtado explains it best: “Pauline Christianity is the earliest form of the Christian movement to which we have direct access from undisputed firsthand sources” (Lord Jesus Christ, 85).
As we shall see, Paul didn’t simply believe Jesus was God in some marginal, semi-divine sort of way. Rather he viewed him as the one God of Israel, the pre-existent creator of the universe.
Let us consider just two examples that show that the highest of Christologies was present in our earliest sources. First, consider Paul’s language in 1 Cor 8:5-6:
For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”—yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
At heart of this statement—given in the context of food offered to idols—is Paul’s concern to uphold monotheism. There is only one God who is worthy to receive cultic worship, as opposed to the many false gods present in pagan worship.
Indeed, it is widely recognized that Paul is clearly drawing upon the core monotheistic confession of ancient Israel, the “shema” of Deut 6:4: “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is One.”
What is noteworthy, however, is that Paul has now included the Lord Jesus Christ within the shema, even using the same word (“Lord”) to describe him. Paul is not adding Jesus to the godhead, as if there were now two gods, but rather he is including Jesus in the divine identity of Yahweh.
This is confirmed by the fact that Paul attributes to Jesus the very same act of creation that he attributes to God: “through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” Jesus is not the recipient of a creative act, but the one who performs the creative act.
Thus, Bauckham concludes, “A higher Christology than Paul already expresses in 1 Corinthians 8:6 is scarcely possible, and…[is] the common character of all New Testament Christology” (2008:30).
The other passage, not surprisingly, is Phil 2:6-11, one of the clearest and most profound declarations that Jesus is Lord over all. Not only does Paul affirm the pre-existence and incarnation of Jesus—“though in the form of God…made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men”—but he describes the highest possible exaltation of Jesus: “So that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
This latter phrase draws explicitly on Is 45:23, where, in the original context, Yahweh declares, “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.” Paul takes the glory due to Yahweh alone and applies it to Jesus—showing that he considers the latter as fully part of the divine identity.
Thus, Hurtado has observed that when Phil 2:6-11 is viewed as a whole it describes the work of Christ in a “narrative sequence,” starting with his pre-existence, moving to his incarnation, then to his humiliation, and finally to his exaltation (Hurtado, 2003:123).
What is particularly noteworthy about both of these passages is that scholars have argued that each of them reflect even earlier Christian tradition that significantly predates Paul’s own letters. In the case of Phil 2:6-11, it is widely regarded as an earlier Christological “hymn” that Paul adapted for use within this particular letter. Likewise, 1 Cor 8:6 is considered to be one of the earliest creedal statements within the Pauline corpus.
Thus, not only do these passages show that the apostle Paul himself had a high Christology, but that this high Christology pre-dates Paul and appears in the very earliest layers of the Christian faith.
In the end, there are two choices for skeptics intent on rejecting the divinity of Jesus. On the one hand, they could argue that Christians were simply wrong about Jesus being God. And, on the other hand, they could argue that Christians never really believed that Jesus was God.
Based on the evidence above, it seems the former is a much better option than the latter. People are free to disagree with early Christians about what they believed about Jesus. But, there is little doubt that early Christians believed it.
dirk says
ok but why take Paul as being representative of some broader/general trend, what could be the sociological/demographic evidence? Seems he could well have been a kind of theological genius of invention of a kind (obviously not singular) new divinity for all we can ever know…
Nemo says
By his own admission, Paul was “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.” (Philippians 3:5,6). There is no evidence that contradicts his claim. So Paul was representative of a learned and observant Jew of the Second Temple period, as least before his Damascus experience.
If Paul had invented the divinity of Jesus, one would expect to find some strong objections from the Jewish community, both inside and outside the early Church. But there is no record of such objections, not one. By contrast, we have written record (in the NT) that some Jewish believers did object to his way of admitting Gentiles into the Church, which was mostly composed of Jews at the time.
In sum, to the extent that we can know anything at all about the long past, we know that Paul didn’t invent the divinity of Jesus. Like other earliest believers, he was persecuted for worshipping Jesus, but the divinity of Jesus was not his invention.
grh says
I don’t see how this can even be a question of any serious scholar. A simple look at John 10 shows that the crowds Jesus preached to understood him to be claiming divinity to himself, and the scriptures make it clear that the Jesus of the Bible is fully God. This isn’t even debatable.
Stephen L Holley says
I’ve never quite figured out what Bible the esteemed Bart Ehrman reads. Indeed, perhaps his great learning is driving him out of his mind! A brief review of the Apostle Paul’s letter to Titus provides the following excerpts of 1st century belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ:
1:11-15 11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, 12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 13 waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works. 15 Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you.
3:3-7 3 For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another. 4 But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 5 he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, 6 whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, 7 so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Nemo says
Dr. Ehrman isn’t the only (nor the first) NT scholar who holds the view that “Jesus was not originally considered to be God”, though he has certainly popularized it.
About two decades before Ehrman published his book, the late Prof. Larry Hurtado, who was Dr. Kruger’s doktorvater and cited in his post, had articulated the view that the historical Jesus neither claimed to be divine nor demanded worship, and that it was God who raised Jesus from the dead, exalted Jesus to “divine status” and required the worship of Jesus “with reference to God” and to the glory of God.
(For a brief summary of Prof. Hurtado’s view in his own words, see this video clip; When I asked him for clarifications at his blog, he was gracious enough to answer my questions directly. See comments on his blogpost Engaging Bauckham on Early Christology)
mary beth shipley says
Totally agree with commenter grh. Praise be to God.
Chsd says
Mr. Kruger: my son attends a classical Christian school and is in 8th grade. He is writing a brief paper defending that the deity of Christ is not a 2-3rd century invention. Are there any books you can recommend that might be fitting for his grade level? It is ok if the books are over his head but a purely scholarly work is probably too much. Or, if a scholarly work, something brief or written as plainly as possible?
Jim says
Ignatius of Antioch
“Ignatius, also called Theophorus, to the Church at Ephesus in Asia . . . predestined from eternity for a glory that is lasting and unchanging, united and chosen through true suffering by the will of the Father in Jesus Christ our God” (Letter to the Ephesians 1 [A.D. 110]).
“For our God, Jesus Christ, was conceived by Mary in accord with God’s plan: of the seed of David, it is true, but also of the Holy Spirit” (ibid., 18:2).
“[T]o the Church beloved and enlightened after the love of Jesus Christ, our God, by the will of him that has willed everything which is” (Letter to the Romans 1 [A.D. 110]).
Aristides
“[Christians] are they who, above every people of the earth, have found the truth, for they acknowledge God, the Creator and maker of all things, in the only-begotten Son and in the Holy Spirit” (Apology 16 [A.D. 140]).
Tatian the Syrian
“We are not playing the fool, you Greeks, nor do we talk nonsense, when we report that God was born in the form of a man” (Address to the Greeks 21 [A.D. 170]).
Rob says
Colossians 1:15-20
Jeff Downs says
Chad, see also: https://www.equip.org/article/what-really-happened-at-nicea/
You’ll also want to look at Dr. Kruger’s book Christianity at the Crossroads.