New Book Says All New Testament Docs Are Pre-70 AD

Last updated on: May 4, 2022 at 12:18 pm By Kermit Zarley

This book is by Jonathan Bernier (PhD, McMaster University) assistant professor of New Testament at Regis College, University of Toronto. It is entitled Rethinking the Dates of the New Testament: The Evidence for Early Composition (Baker Academic, 2022). And it is a game changer. How so?

The dating of New Testament books and letters has some affect on deciding whether or not the New Testament identifies Jesus as God. I did a 28-year study on the subject of Jesus’ identity and then published a 600-page book on it, citing over 400 scholars. It is entitled The Restitution of Jesus Christ (2008), and I show that the New Testament does not ever identify Jesus as “God.” Yet I was a Trinitarian Christian for 22 years before I made this extremely important change in my christology and theology proper. So-called “orthodox Christianity” says I am no longer a Christian because of that. Rather, it deems me “a heretic.” I beg to differ, and this Bernier book somewhat supports my position even though he himself remains a Trinitarian Christian.

The dating of New Testament literature went through a serious re-examination by especially historical-critical Bible scholars beginning in the latter part of the nineteenth century. It started especially with the ad hoc History of Religions School which was centered in Germany. Most of the best academic study of the Bible was conducted in two centers in the world following the Protestant Reformation: The Vatican and Germany. Eventually, the United Kingdom entered that picture and the U.S. somewhat in the twentieth century.

But the History of Religions School, which lasted from about 1880 to 1920, was king in determining the dates of origin of New Testament books and letters. But some of these determinations by these historical-critical scholars were affected by their christology. They believed there was an extended time period in which Christians went from believing Jesus was Savior and Lord and born of a virgin, yet no more than a man, to believing that he was both man and God.

Among Christian literature, the earliest documents that clearly say Jesus is “God” are the seven letters of Ignatius, written in either 110 AD or 117 AD. And they repeatedly state this most unambiguously. Ignatius of Loyola claimed to be the bishop of Antioch. Prior to 70 AD, Antioch had become one of the two main centers of the early Jesus Movement with Jerusalem being the other one (e.g., Acts 11). For we read that “it was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians” (Acts 11.26 NRSV). Antioch was located just outside Israel in Syria, thus in Gentile land.

During the latter part of the second century and all of the third century, church fathers increasingly identified Jesus as “God” as can be seen in their preserved writings. However, these “apologists” as they were so identified, which means “defenders of the faith,” were clear in distinguishing Jesus’ divinity or godness as lesser in quality than that of the God whom Jesus worshipped. The New Testament shows that Jesus clearly and often called God “my Father.”

Thus, all of these church fathers distinguished between Jesus as the Son of God and that God whom Jesus worshipped. The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) identifies God by name as yhwh, which most modern scholars translate as Yahweh. I refer to this apologist belief of the second and third century as “big God, little god,” meaning God the Father is the big God, and Jesus is the little god. Sometimes, it was stated similarly. Origin, generally recognized as the most academically astute church father of the third century, wrote multiple times that Jesus is “a second god.” And Philo identified the Logos as the same.

So, it was not until the the fourth century that the Catholic Church addressed officially the question of Jesus’ divinity. The so-called First Ecumenical Council of Nicea was held in 325 AD which was both called and officiated by the Roman Emperor Constantine. He demanded that the 318 bishops who attended the event, held over a period of weeks, conclude their deliberations by producing a public document which would state the nature of Jesus’ divinity. They did; it was called the Nicene Creed; and says Jesus is “very God of very God.”

This strange language to us moderns was borrowed from Greek philosophy. All 318 bishops spoke Greek because they were from the Eastern branch of the Roman Empire (no Latins attended from the Western branch of the empire). It meant that Jesus is just as much God as God the Father is God. Afterwards, many people, including especially religious Jews, accused Catholic Christians of believing in two Gods. The Catholic Church held its Second Ecumenical Council in Constantinople in 381 AD. It also was presided over by the Roman Emperor, and that is where the Catholic Church doctrine of the Trinity was made official even though the word “Trinity” was not used in its creed, which was an amplified Nicene Creed.

So, all historians and Christian scholars agree that there was a lengthy period of development in the Christian view of God and Jesus, a period of about 250 years. The best history book about this fourth century development is by R. P. C. Hanson entitled The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God: The Arian Controversy, 318-381.

In light of this historical development of the identity of Jesus in the second through the fourth century, historical-critical Bible scholars beginning especially in the nineteenth century claimed that certain New Testament documents had to have been written later than had been thought in order to allow time for Christians to change their view from thinking Jesus was no more than a man to him being both fully God and fully man.

Most of these historical-critical scholars alleged that the first three gospels of the New Testament, called synoptics, did not say Jesus was God whereas the Gospel of John clearly and repeatedly does. Even most conservative scholars believed the same. These liberal, historical-critical scholars then appealed to their belief about the necessary time period that it took Christians to change their view about Jesus’ identity and used that partisan belief in determining the dates of origin of the four New Testament gospels. This resulted in them deciding that the three synoptics were written well before the Gospel of John. Most decided that the synoptics were written in the 70s and 80s, but the Gospel of John was written some time during the second century, thus after the letters of Ignatius.

But in the twentieth century, this belief by historical-critical scholars–that the Gospel of John was written many decades after the synoptics were written–declined in the academy until hardly any scholars believe that today. Rather, the prevailing view among New Testament (NT) scholars of all stripes, including most historical-critical scholars, is that the Gospel of John was written during the 90s, more precisely probably in the late 90s; Mark was written in the 70s, and Luke was written in the 80s.

But Bernier’s new book seeks to overthrow all of that by claiming that all NT documents were written prior to 70 AD. That was the year the Roman armies ended the First Jewish Revolt (66-70 AD) by besieging Jerusalem and then destroying the place, including the temple. Bernier has the facts to back up his case. He also stands upon the work of one of my favorite NT scholars–John A. T. Robinson. He generally is regarded as one of the two most accomplished NT scholars of the United Kingdom in the twentieth century.

Robinson wrote two books on this subject. I have them in my library. I’ve marked them up so much that most people would probably think I’ve absolutely ruined those books. They are entitled Redating the New Testament and The Priority of John.

So, both Robinson and Bernier convincingly assert that all NT docs were written before 70 AD. I firmly believe this and treat it briefly in my book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ. In doing so, I often cite and quote Robinson. I haven’t read Bernier’s book yet, but it apparently is an improvement on Robinson’s work on this subject. The main evidence that the NT indicates that all of its docs were written prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD is that they often mention Jerusalem and never say that it had been destroyed.

However, Robinson gets it right, and Bernier does not, on how this early dating of especially the Gospel of John supports the view that it does not claim anywhere that Jesus is God. This is what both the historical-critics and conservative Bible scholars get wrong–in my opinion and that of Robinson–that the Gospel of John does not identify Jesus as God, and an early origin of its date suggest as much. That is, it did take time for Christians to change from believing Jesus was not God to believing that he was God, and that time, contrary to Larry Hurtado, had to been many decades, thus into the second century.

[The Restitution of Jesus Christ is sold out. I expect it to become available this summer at amazon.com as an e-book and perhaps as a printed book. To view a list of about 150 posts that represent condensations of this book, click Christology in the menu bar on my blog’s home page. These posts usually focus on a particular scripture that traditionalists/Trinitarians assert indicate that Jesus is God, such as Isaiah 9.6; John 1.1c; 10.30; 20.28; Romans 9.5; Titus 2.13; Hebrew 1.8; 1 John 5.20.]

Why Has the Church De-Emphasized Jesus’ Obedience to God?

Last updated on: March 5, 2022 at 9:09 pm By Kermit Zarley

Baker has a new book out by Dr. Brandon Crowe of Westminster Theological Seminary entitled Why Did Jesus Live a Perfect Life? The Necessity of Christ’s Obedience for Our Salvation. Westminster is an Orthodox Presbyterian seminary in Phily. That church denomination is Calvinist, thus Reformed in theology. That means they are deterministic, sometimes viewed as fatalism, but what Christians usually call unconditional predestination. I am opposed to that viewpoint and believe more like Arminian-Wesleyans do, in which humans have real choice in deciding for salvation.

Dr. D. A. Carson, emeritus of the seminary Trinity Evangelical Divinity School near Chicago, has endorsed this book by saying (back cover), “In the extensive debates over justification that have captured a great deal of attention in the last quarter century, relatively little space has been allotted to the role of Jesus’s obedience. That lacuna has now been admirably filled by Crowe.” Carson is also Reformed.

But “little space has been allotted to the role of Jesus’s obedience” since the 4th century, when the church officially, and wrongly I believe, decided that Jesus is God. Many Christians who believe Jesus is God have asked, “How can Jesus be called to obey God when he himself is God?” Indeed, James, Jesus’s brother, writes, “God cannot be tempted by evil” (James 1.13). If one cannot be tempted by evil, then that one cannot sin, plain and simple. But the Bible tells us that Jesus certainly was tempted by the devil, and Jesus did not succumb to that temptation and thus sin (e.g., Matthew 4.1-10).

Thus, the church de-emphasized Jesus’s obedience to God because his obedience doesn’t make much sense if he was not tempted and did not sin. Many such Christians conclude that Jesus could not sin because he was God. I believe that is damaging to a person’s Christian faith. If Jesus could not have sinned, then the temptations he experienced were not real. In contrast, the book of Revelation quotes the risen, heavenly Jesus as challenging his people to overcome sin because he overcame sin. Jesus says, “I am coming quickly; hold fast to what you have, in order that no one take your crown. He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God” (Revelation 3.11-12 NASB). In vv. 12-13, Jesus says “My God” four times. How can Jesus have a God if he himself is God?

Jesus further states therein, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock, if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, and will dine with him, and he with Me. He who overcomes, I will grant to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father [God] on His throne” (Revelation 3.20-21). Jesus is so exalted in heaven right now because he overcome, thus living a perfectly obedient life before God, and that qualified him to go the cross and die for our sins if we truly believe. That is the salvation of God, that is, the God who sent Jesus to overcome and die for us.

(I was a Trinitarian Christian for 22 years before reading myself out of that in the Bible and writing a very extensive book about it entitled The Restitution of Jesus of Christ. The book is not available now but I expect it to be in perhaps 1-2 months as an e-book at amazon.com. In the meantime, readers can read about 150 1-2 page articles I’ve written on my blog that are condensations of this book by clicking on “Christology” in the menu bar of my Kermit Zarley Blog to view a list of the those article titles.)

Review of Jeff Deuble’s Book, “Christ Before Creeds”

Last updated on: December 3, 2021 at 10:48 am By Kermit Zarley

Jeff Deuble is the author of the recent book, Christ Before Creeds: Rediscovering the Jesus of History. It is a 176-page book about Jesus’ identity published by Living Hope International Ministries in 2021. I don’t know Jeff personally. I was asked to read and blurb his book because of its similarity to my book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ (2008). I am happy to oblige.

Jeff was a pastor for many years in the Churches of Christ denomination in Australia. He had a similar experience as I did in which he had been a Trinitarian Christian for decades. Then his brother challenged him to rethink his belief that Jesus is God and that God is three persons. For an average churchman to do this takes courage; for a pastor to do it may mean the end of his job. How so? For sixteen centuries now, the institutional church has declared that anyone who does not believe the doctrine of the Trinity, and thus that Jesus is both God and man, is not a Christian.

Dr. Richard E. Rubenstein of George Mason University has written the foreword in this book. I cite him in my Restitution book due to his important book, When Jesus Became God. Some Christian readers might object to this foreword since Rubenstein is Jewish and not Christian. But he writes that due to his book, “I had the opportunity to speak in many Christian churches and discovered, to my surprise, that controversy about the Trinity was very much alive” even in Trinitarian churches. He rightly says of Deuble’s book, “the author makes several points that seem difficult, if not impossible, to refute. To begin with, he states correctly that the belief that Jesus was God . . . was an innovation that took almost four centuries to establish . . . Christian leaders turned away from their (and Jesus’s) Hebrew roots in order to embrace a concept of the Godhead rooted in Greek philosophical traditions rather than Scriptures.”

In Chapter 1, Deuble briefly explains the doctrine of the Trinity and Unitarianism. He says, “I remember how defensive, upset, and angry I was when I first encountered a Non-trinitarian view that challenged ‘my Jesus’” (p. 14). He explains that in this book, “I do not want to comprehensively deal with every issue or passage of Scripture. There is a lot more depth and detail behind what is discussed here” (15). So, this book is an introduction to this vital subject.

I only disagree with two matters in this book, both being semantical issues. Jeff says three times in this chapter that Jesus is “divine” (19-20, also 113). He appeals to its Latin derivation, which can mean, “simply to be like God.” Indeed, but in biblical scholarship, calling Jesus divine is usually equated with calling him God. Both Jeff and I stress that there is a huge difference between Jesus being like God, which we both strongly affirm, and Jesus being God.

In Chapter 2, Jeff tells about his change of belief in Jesus’ identity. And he stresses the importance of getting this subject right—as to whether or not Jesus is God and God is triune. Like me, Jeff is strongly committed to knowing the truth about God and Jesus despite rejection by Christians. And we do not think that people who believe Jesus is God and God is triune are not Christians. After all, both Jeff and I believed that way for decades, and we are absolutely convinced in our hearts that we were born-again Christians. In other words, Jeff and I do not think this subject has anything to do with Christian conversion. Rather, we believe that being a Christian is about truly believing in Jesus Christ as Savior and making him Lord of our lives.

In Chapter 3, Deuble presents some brief explanation and history of the earliest church creeds. He thereby shows the development of thought about the identity of Jesus and God. Jeff rightly states that by the time of the Constantinople Creed of 381, “Jesus was considered to be co-eternal, co-equal, and co-essential with the Father” (45). Jeff then deals at some length with the common assertion of Trinitarians that their doctrine is a mystery that cannot be fathomed, yet must be accepted. He well says of it, “This claim is something of a non sequitur” (46). Jeff then makes an extremely important point about the New Testament that Trinitarians gloss over at their own peril. He states concerning the early Christians, “They didn’t shy away from controversies and potential points of friction. . . . Of all the conflicts between Christianity and traditional Judaism, this would have been the biggest of all, overshadowing everything else by far. Any attempt to dismantle or redefine strict monotheism would have been bitterly fought by the Jewish believers. Yet there is no mention of such a controversy anywhere” in the New Testament (49).

The Aussie author continues, “If all Trinitarians were to admit that their theological construct was a later development, subsequent to the New Testament writings, then this silence would be understandable. But many advocate that Trinitarian doctrine was inherent within the Christian faith from the very inception of the church, and that the Gospel writers and apostles bear witness to it” (49). Yes, and they don’t. The word Trinity isn’t even in the Bible. And nowhere in the gospel sayings of Jesus does he ever expressly claim to be God. Plus, the most distinguished Trinitarian scholars usually admit their doctrine was a later development. Jeff and I believe that is adding to the Scriptures, which they forbid (e.g., Deuteronomy 4.2).

In Chapter 4, “What Went Wrong?,” Jeff explains how church fathers went astray. As Christianity transitioned—from consisting mostly of Jews to almost entirely Gentiles—and then it spread throughout the Roman Empire, it became influenced somewhat by Greek philosophy.

Jeff says that as a pastor, “My doctrinal transition was a paradigm shift, and I experienced the inherent resistance that comes with such a crisis. . . . The turning point from this impasse came when one day I decided to read the New Testament, not through my usual ‘Trinitarian lens,’ but a traditional monotheistic and Jewish one, where the man Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God, but not himself God.

“I was amazed at how much more simply and clearly it read. There was no need to engage in internal mental gymnastics in order for the text to make sense. This new paradigm was exegetically and theologically a better fit” (71-72).

In Chapter 5, “What Does the Bible Teach?,” Jeff emphasizes from the Old Testament that the name of God, which is Yahweh (YHWH), indicates that God is a single being. And he rightly says the biblical expression “Son of God,” as applied to Jesus, is a messianic title that does not mean he is God since it is applied to others in the Bible, though to Jesus in a special sense. Jeff cites 1 John 4.12—“no one has ever seen God”—as evidence that Jesus is not God.

In Chapter 6, “Who Is Jesus?,” Jeff argues from scripture the uniqueness and sinlessness of Jesus, yet also his being tempted as we are, showing he cannot be God. For Jesus’ brother James declares, “God cannot be tempted by evil” (James 1.13). This is when Trinitarians pose their unscriptural construct “the hypostatic union of Christ,” claiming that Jesus was tempted in his human nature but not in his divine nature. But this idea that Jesus had two natures, a human nature and a divine nature, does not appear anywhere in the New Testament. Jeff and I both believed it, like all Trinitarians do, simply because it was created by church fathers in the 4th century and taught to us. Jeff further counters, “In evangelical circles we focus almost exclusively on ‘faith in Jesus,’ but the Scriptures also talk about the ‘faith of Jesus’” (111). Indeed, it was because of Jesus’ faith in God that he was able to overcome sin.

Herein, Jeff also addresses the common argument posed by Trinitarians in which they assert, “Jesus had to be God to save us” (115). That is not true; the Bible never says that. Rather, this axiom was set forth by church father Athanasius who was so hostile to Arians in his defense of the Nicene Creed. Moreover, this concept of deity originates from Greek philosophy.

Jeff gets personal again by saying, “When I considered the Non-trinitarian perspective, I found that I no longer had to struggle with anomalies and inconsistencies in logic; no longer had to perform exegetical backflips; no longer had to ignore or explain away certain verses that didn’t fit the paradigm. The Bible just started making a whole lot more sense” (119).

Jeff continues, “I can appreciate that many Christians cannot contemplate the thought that Jesus is anything other than fully God. It’s how they were brought up in Christian faith. . . . It may seem like anything other than that perception is unacceptable and would amount to a denial of their faith in Christ or a reduction of his status.

“That’s where I stood for many years. But ultimately what was more important to me than my Christian heritage, what I thought, or how I felt, was what the Bible says. What do the Scriptures teach? What has Jesus declared, and what has God revealed?” (121-22). Right on!

Deuble concludes, “The Bible teaches that this Jesus came in flesh as a human being. He was born and lived as a man: completely human. He is not a Gnostic or Trinitarian Jesus with a composite nature, . . . Such a Jesus would not be genuinely and authentically human” (125). Indeed, the author of Hebrews negates the notion of a divine-human Jesus by saying, “he had to become like his brothers and sisters in every respect” (Hebrews 2.17). Neither possessing a divine nature nor eternally preexisting is compatible with being fully human.

In the final chapter 7, “What’s Essential,” Deuble addresses a subject that was of keen focus in his ecclesiastical tradition. (My mother was a member of The Christian Church which separated from the Churches of Christ.) He relates that his church denomination tried to focus on the essentials of Christian faith to achieve unity among its members (129).

Jeff then cites the dictum to which the Churches of Christ have subscribed and I have too nearly all of my adult life concerning Christian faith—“In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity (love)” (130). Jeff truly says again, “The focus of the New Testament is in Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah. There is no call anywhere for anyone to believe that he is God” (136). Jeff then concludes this chapter by calling for all Christians to investigate this subject while adhering to the apostle Paul’s admonition, “speak the truth in love (Eph. 4:15)” in order to “maintain genuine love, mutual respect, and Christian unity” (142).

Deuble explains early in this book concerning the main biblical texts that Trinitarians cite to support their doctrine, “I have decided to not include discussion around some of the more contentious passages in the main text, as it can get a little complicated or confusing. Instead, I have put this material in Appendix A” (15). Yet these pages (143-172) only scratch the surface. Those foremost texts are John 1.1; 18; 10.30-38; 20.28; Romans 9.5; Philippians 2.6-7; 2 Thessalonians 1.12; Titus 2.13; Hebrews 1.8-10; 2 Peter 1.1; John 5.20. And the major texts that Jeff and I would cite to support our position include John 17.3; Mark 12.29-32; Acts 2.22; 1 Corinthians 8.6; Ephesians 4.4-6.

My only other objection to Jeff’s book concerns his brief comment on John 20.28 in Chapter 4. He mentions “John 20:28, when Thomas declares to the resurrected Christ, ‘My Lord and my God!’ In what sense is he using these titles? . . . . Jesus is only clearly called ‘God’ twice in the whole New Testament (John 20:28; Heb. 1:8)” (65). Yet in Jeff’s treatment of John 20:28 in his Appendix (157-161) he says, “it seems highly improbable that Thomas is conferring deity upon Jesus” (158). Yes, but saying Thomas calls Jesus “God” muddies the water for me in our mutual effort to distinguish between the two beliefs that Jesus is God and God is merely in Jesus.

The best work I’ve done in my Restitution book is about Thomas’ Confession. By the time it was published, in 2008, I had not discovered any Johannine scholars who interpreted it as I did. I state in the book, “Thomas’ words to Jesus, ‘My Lord and my God,’ have been exceedingly misunderstood” (385). I continue, “The key to unlocking the true understanding of Thomas’ words ‘my God’ in Jn 20.28 is found in what Jesus said earlier to Thomas, in Jn 14.7, ‘If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him.’ And Jesus restates more precisely in v. 9, ‘He who has seen Me has seen the Father’” (393).

I then add, “Thomas’ Confession thus indicates more than a mere recognition that God raised Jesus from the dead. Rather, Thomas’ words ‘my God’ also indicate that this previously doubting apostle now understands what Jesus had taught ten days earlier, that God the Father fully indwells, and therefore completely permeates, the life of Jesus. Thus, the Father is spiritually seen, that is, comprehended, in Jesus Christ. So, Thomas’ words ‘my God,’ while addressed to Jesus, represent a faith response to the God who revealed Himself to Thomas in the risen Jesus” (394). And all of these italics are in my book.

Despite these two rather semantical differences, I admire Jeff Deuble’s irenic style in how he writes about what can be a divisive subject among Christians. So, I highly recommend his lucid book, Christ Before Creeds: Rediscovering the Jesus of History. It is an excellent introduction to this vital subject–the identity of God and Jesus. And I think it is a good primer for those who may want to afterwards dig more deeply into the critical texts of Scripture by reading my 600-page book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ, and especially to have it in one’s library as a reference book.

Must Evangelicals Believe Jesus Is God?

Last updated on: November 15, 2021 at 11:42 am By Kermit Zarley

In recent years, there has been much print about, What is an Evangelical? It’s largely because Donald Trump became president partly due to his large political support from evangelicals. That was quite ironical since Trump seemed to be anything other than a Christian or an evangelical. I believe that Trump has used evangelicals for his political purpose. And one way he did it was to choose the very evangelical Mike Pence as his vice president. About 25% of all adult Americans during the 2010s claimed to be “evangelical.” So, Trump merely tapped into a huge voting bloc that had been growing for decades and that previously had been ignored by politicians.

Trump’s relationship with evangelicals was transactional. That is, he promised them he would try to overturn Roe v. Wade even though he previously had been pro-choice. And he promised them he would try to install conservative judges on the Supreme Court. But this evangelical support of Donald Trump as the U.S. president has hurt evangelicals’ reputation and their message not only in the U.S. but in the world. My next book, What Happened to Trump Was in that Bible, will be published next week and available on amazon.com

I’ve blogged over a dozen times about U.S. evangelicals and sometimes about their political support of Trump. Here are just two such posts: here and here. The first one is about whether or not I should still call myself an evangelical since the 2008 publication of my book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ (600 pp.). It is a thorough examination of the Bible that cites over 400 scholars in which I show that the Bible does not say Jesus is God. I have written and published eight theological books now, and this is my magnum opus.

I was a Trinitarian Christian and an evangelical for twenty-two years. (I still worship in evangelical churches.) I therefore believed Jesus is God because that is what I was taught. But in the winter of 1979-1980, I had a moment of enlightenment in my study room in my home while reading Jesus’ Olivet Discourse. Therein, he says of his future second coming, “But of that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son,” referring to himself, “but only the Father” (Matthew 24.36; cf. Mark 13.32 NRSV).

I also believed in the hypostatic union, which I also had been taught in my church. It means that Jesus is both man and God by having two natures–a human nature and a divine nature. Thus, I was also taught that when Jesus said this, he meant he did not know in his human nature the time of his return, but he really did know in his divine nature because that makes him God, and God knows everything.

So, when I read this saying of Jesus that day, and I knew it quite well, I thought of something I had never noticed before. And because of it, I blurted out verbally while I was there alone in my office, “That makes Jesus look like a liar! He said he didn’t know when he would return, but he really did know because he is God.” After pondering this for a while, I said out loud again to myself, “I WILL stand on the integrity of Jesus. I must look into this.”

That was quite an understatement. I estimate that for the next 28 years, I read about a thousand books on the identity of Jesus and scoured libraries all over this country, much of the time as I competed as a professional golfer on the PGA Tour. I visited libraries to read the critical texts on this subject in perhaps thousands of Bible commentaries. The end result of this massive study was my book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ. When my friend Dr. Dale Allison read the manuscript, in about 2007, a year before it was published, and he made recommendations for some minor changes which I then incorporated, he first said, “you have done a lot of work.” And that comes from a professor who supervises the theological dissertations of doctoral students.

(This is the first time I have stated publicly about Dale having read and critiqued this book manuscript. I have withheld this information for nearly fifteen years now. Dale had been one of our guest speakers at the annual Kermit Zarley Lectures held at North Park University.)

So, nearly three years later, in June, 1982, while I was playing in the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach Golf Club–my favorite golf course and favorite tournament–I made my decision that the Bible does not say Jesus is God. Yet I have always adhered to all else the church has proclaimed about our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, including his virgin birth, miracles, sinless life, atoning death for our salvation, and his resurrection from the dead and heavenly ascension. And I have a fairly conservative view of the Bible.

I maintain that what makes a person a genuine Christian is believing Jesus is the Christ/Messiah (=the Son of God), that he died for your sins, that God raised him from the dead, and you make Jesus Lord of your life. That’s what it means to believe in Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and that’s what evangelicalism is supposed to be about. It’s about having a personal conversion experience, called being “born again,” due to this faith in Jesus as Lord and Savior, not about faith that Jesus is God.

Dr. Thomas Kidd, a professor of Church History at Baylor University, wrote a book published in 2019 entitled What Is an Evangelical? (Yale University Press, 200 pp.). I haven’t read the book, but soon after its publication he spoke near where I live, at Phoenix Seminary. The school’s president, Dr. Brian Arnold, interviewed Dr. Kidd about this book, and the interview is available online. Both men regard themselves as evangelicals. I often study at the Phoenix Seminary library.

Dr. Arnold began the interview by saying that due to Donald Trump Republican politics, “Christians are not uniting around the gospel as much as I would hope.”

Kidd agreed, and the discussion soon turned to the definition of an evangelical type of Christian. Kidd said, “evangelion in Greek just means good news,” which is quite right. He soon added, “there’s some professing Christians that we [evangelicals] cannot be unified with because they’re doctrinally aberrant or whatever. . . . you know, if they don’t believe in the resurrection [of Jesus], they don’t believe in the trinity, or something like that. I mean, you can’t partner with people over those sorts of issues.”

But Dr. Kidd, the gospel, meaning “good news,” is about Jesus dying for our sins and being raised from the dead. That’s how the apostle Paul explains the gospel when he writes to the Corinthian believers, “Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news [=gospel] that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand, through which also you are being saved, if you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you–unless you have come to believe in vain. For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15.1-4 NRSV).

There is nothing in the New Testament about the gospel being that God is a Trinity of persons or that Jesus is God. And notice that Paul says that the Christians before him handed to him this message “of first importance.” Indeed, this is what is essential to being a Christian and not believing God is a three persons or that Jesus is one of those three persons and therefore God. Not at all! Yes, you will find that in church creeds, but not in the Bible. And it is the Bible that is supposed to be most important to evangelicals. If church creeds contain any declarations that are contrary to the Bible, then those church creeds are wrong, plain and simple!

Regarding Dr. Kidd’s assertion not to partner with people like me, whom he seems to regard as not only a non-evangelical but a non-Christian as well, the apostle Paul further states, “if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10.9). Nothing here about Jesus being God. It’s plain and simple. Truly believe this–and I would add keep on believing it as Paul says in 1 Cor 15–and you are saved.

Now, let’s take it a step further and consider what the author of 1 John says about Christian fellowship. He writes, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God” (1 John 5.1). Again, nothing about Jesus being God here. For Dr. Kidd to say that evangelicals can’t partner with non-Trinitarians, is that some kind of hatred of the brethren? For, the author of 1 John also writes, “Those who say, ‘I love God,’ and hate their brothers and sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen” (1 John 4.20).

Of course, I don’t mean to pick on only Dr. Kidd since almost all Christians have been taught, and therefore believe, that God is three persons and Jesus is one of them. It’s just that Dr. Kidd has written this book, What Is an Evangelical? and that also gets into what is a Christian. I really don’t care that much whether or not I’m called an evangelical, but I care a lot about whether or not I’m called a Christian.

For example, when I was in the Army Reserves in my twenties, I processed through a two-week summer camp at the Yakima Firing Range. The sergeant at the desk, who was merely filling out forms, asked me what my religion was. I said, “Christian, sir.” He said, “Zarley, you can’t be a Christian. You have to be a Catholic, or a Baptist, or a Methodist, or something like that.” I said, “Sir, I’m none of those things. I’m a Christian.” He looked at me as if disgruntled and wrote down “Christian.”

The main feature about evangelicalism is that it has always claimed to be based on the Bible more than on church creeds. And I further maintain that the thesis of my book is what the early Christians, most of whom were Jews, believed about God and Jesus, that God is a single person and that Jesus is Savior and Lord, but not God. Furthermore, the word “trinity” isn’t even in the Bible. And in the New Testament gospel sayings of Jesus, he never says expressly that he is God. Moreover, he said of God, “The Father is greater than I” (John 14.28). That alone totally nullifies the Trinity.

Moreover, right before Jesus was arrested and condemned, he prayed to God, “Father, . . . this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (John 17.3). That should be enough to throw out the Trinity doctrine. The Bible says repeatedly that there is only one true and living God, in distinction from all others who may be called “god,” and Jesus called him “Father.”

The church doctrine of the Trinity wasn’t even developed until the late 4th century AD, thus over 300 years after the Christ event. Concerning all those professing Christians who had never heard of God being a Trinity or of Jesus being equally God as the Father is God, were they not genuine Christians? The Nicene Creed of 325 AD says if you don’t believe Jesus is “very God of very God,” meaning just as much God as the Father is God, you are “anathema”–condemned to hell. That includes those earlier Christians.

I also contend that when we Christians get to glory, if we could ask the apostles Peter or Paul if they believe God is a Triune Being and that Jesus is God, they would look at us puzzled and say something like, “What are you talking about?”

When it comes to defining evangelicalism, for the past four decades church historian and evangelical Dr. David Bebbington of England has been the go-to guy. See my post on this here in which I tell about his Bebbington Quadrilateral and discuss again if I am an evangelical. And the National Association of Evangelicals endorses Bebbington’s Quadrilateral, and nothing else, as a sound definition of evangelicalism. And I subscribe fully to it. Yet it does not include anything about Jesus being God or God being a Trinity.

I contend that evangelicalism needs to go back to the beginning and get this right. Church fathers in the third and fourth centuries were departing from the early Christian message by claiming Jesus was God. The apologists, as they are called, were saying then that Jesus was God, though of a lesser deity than the Father was. I called that belief “big God, little God.” Then in the early third century, the Council of Nicea said Jesus was just as much God as the Father was God. And in the late fourth century, church fathers said God was a Trinity of persons.

It’s all a departure from the New Testament, which was not officially put together and recognized as such until this later time as well. Yet it is the New Testament that evangelicals must use as the ultimate guide in these matters. It says Jesus is Lord and Savior, but not God. (And when I say New Testament, I mean the Greek New Testament, since versions of it, such as English Bibles, might have some faulty translations of particular texts due to the translators’ bias in being Trinitarian.)

Why I Am an Evangelical Even Though Evangelicals Say I’m Not

Last updated on: October 8, 2021 at 6:37 pm By Kermit Zarley

I have been an evangelical Christian since college. I was saved in a Nazarene Church when I was thirteen. Many evangelicals would say I’m no longer an evangelical because of the my book, The Restitution of Jesus Christ. In it, as a former Trinitarian for 22 years, I make a very in-depth examination of critical biblical texts to show that the Bible does not identify Jesus as God, rather as the Messiah of Israel, Lord, and Savior.

The Christians of the first three centuries of the Christian era clearly did not believe Jesus was co-equally God with God the Father, and neither did they believe that God was a trinity of persons: the Father, Son (Jesus) and Holy Spirit. When we believers get to glory–by means of Jesus raising us from the dead at the end of the age–if we could ask the apostle Peter and the apostle Paul if they believed in the deity of Christ and that God is a trinity of persons, I believe they would say something like this, “WHAT! What are you talking about?” They wouldn’t have a clue. Then, when we would explain what these expressions mean, they would soundly answer, “No.”

Since the fourth century, churches have established creeds claiming that if a person does not believe in the doctrine of the Trinity, which includes belief that Jesus is equally God with the Father, also called “the deity of Christ,” that person is not a genuine Christian. I believed that for 22 years mostly because that is what I was taught. But when I took a very serious look at this, with an in-depth examination of the Bible over a period of 28 years, in which I read about a thousand books on the identity of Jesus and consulted many hundreds of Bible commentaries, I came to believe without any uncertainty whatsoever that the Bible does not identify Jesus as being God. Moreover, I believe that false teaching tarnishes somewhat the magnificence of Jesus in his conquering sin and thereby becoming perfectly qualified as the sinless Lamb of God to provide for our so great salvation by dying on the cross for our sins.

So, I claim to still be an evangelical mainly for the following four reasons:

(1) I have always been in the Bible church movement, which is very evangelical, and I still worship at an evangelical church;

(2) the two primary statements that define evangelicalism–the four-point definition of the Bebbington Quadrilateral and the similar statement by the National Association of Evangelicals–do not contain any statement either about Jesus being God or God being a trinity of persons, called the doctrine of the Trinity;

(3) evangelicalism has always been based primarily on the principle that the Bible is the basis for Christian belief so that the Bible supersedes church creeds. The Bible does not have the word Trinity, and it has no statement that God is a trinity of persons. Moreover, Jesus never identified himself as God. Rather, Jesus constantly distinguished himself from God and called God his Father;

(4) evangelicalism has always advocated for church reform, including doctrinal reform if it can be shown that past, common, evangelical belief is not supported by the Bible. I believe that can be convincingly shown. But the church, including evangelicals, refuses to discuss this openly. I have challenged some Christian leaders to publicly debate this with me, and they have refused. The early Protestant Church leaders accepted the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity without giving it any critical examination, and I believe that Reformation still needs to take place.

Foster Friess Died at 81

Last updated on: June 17, 2021 at 9:36 pm By Kermit Zarley

Foster Friess died last Thursday here in Scottsdale, Arizona, where I live. He was 81 years old. He had been undergoing treatments here at the Mayo Clinic for a blood and bone marrow cancer. The gregarious Foster Friess will be greatly missed by friends. With a name like that, how could you not like Foster Friess. His name always reminded me of when I was growing up in Seattle, my family sometimes would go have an evening treat after supper by driving to the ice cream joint called Foster’s Freeze.

I was one of Foster’s many, many friends. Since he lived in both Scottsdale and Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the always-smiling and positive-thinking Foster Friess often had his picture taken wearing a cowboy hat and perhaps riding a horse due to the founding of his organization Foster’s Outriders.

Foster Friess was well known in the financial industry for founding and operating the Brandywine Fund, the flagship of Friess Associates. Investors may be interested to know that CNBC once identified Foster Friess as one of the 20th “century’s great investors.” Forbes magazine named Foster Friess one the 1990’s top stock pickers. That decade, Brandywine Fund had average annual gains of 20% with up to $15 billion in assets managed, of which the Friess family owned 10%.

Foster was a devout Christian and a prominent Republican who once ran for governor of Wyoming. And he and his wife Lynn also were known for being philanthropists to Christian charities and donors to Republican politicians, such as Rick Santorum.

I first met Foster Friess at a private Golf Fellowship weekend retreat held at the elite Pine Valley Golf Club in southern New Jersey. During the 1980s, I worked with my two friends Jim Hiskey and Tom Flory in establishing Golf Fellowship groups throughout the U.S. It was an evangelical Christian ministry to amateur golfers. We played golf together, prayed together, studied the Bible together, and discussed our personal Christian faith together.

Golf Digest has always rated Pine Valley Golf Club as the #1 golf course in the U.S. It is surprising that no major, professional golf championship has ever been held at this venue. It is truly a remarkable golf course design. I have to say that Golf Digest got it right about this place. And that is the only time I ever played Pine Valley.

One day during this Golf Fellowship retreat at Pine Valley, Foster Friess and I were paired together playing the great Pine Valley Golf Club. You’d think that we would have our minds totally engrossed in playing such a world-famous track as Pine Valley. But somehow, we got into a slightly-tense discussion about whether or not Jesus is God. Of course, just about all Christians since the fourth century have been taught, just as I had been, that the Bible says Jesus is both God and man. This teaching was later included in the theological construct called “the doctrine of the Trinity.”

Christians who read my blog much know that I was a Trinitarian Christian for twenty-two years until one day a Bible verse caught my attention while I was studying the Bible in my home office. It is in Jesus’ so-called Olivet Discourse which he delivered privately to his apostles only a few days before his crucifixion on Good Friday, his resurrection the following Sunday morning, and his ascension to heaven forty days later. Jesus then said concerning his yet future return which he had predicted, “But about/of that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of/in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Matthew 24.32/Mark 13.32 NRSV).

Along with this teaching that Jesus is God and its corollary, the doctrine of the Trinity, I also had been taught “the hypostatic union” of Jesus Christ. The Catholic Church had established that Jesus was God during its first ecumenical council, in 325, and it further established its doctrine of the Trinity in its second ecumenical council, in 381. After that, the Church established its doctrine of the hypostatic union to explain how Jesus could be both man and God. The hypostatic union means that Jesus had two natures: a human nature and a divine nature. This teaching was applied to the deeds and sayings of Jesus as recorded in the four gospels of the New Testament. Thus, according to the hypostatic union, church leaders often explained that Jesus said his statement in Matthew 24.36/Mark 13.32 solely according to his human nature. That is, in his human nature he did not know the time of his return, but in his divine nature he did know because, being God, with a divine nature, God knows everything.

All of sudden, when I was reading that saying of Jesus in the winter of 1979-1980, I believe a light went on inside of me. Contemplating that Jesus did not know in his human nature the time of his return, yet he did know it in his divine nature, I then blurted out loud to myself, “That makes Jesus look like a liar. He said didn’t know, but he really did know.” I then decided that I must have a serious look at this issue.

Wow, did I ever. I estimate that for the next thirty years, I read about 1,000 books on the identity of Jesus. And I scoured hundreds of Bible commentaries regarding what they said of the critical Bible texts on this subject, which are several. The result of this immense study was that I wrote a 600-page book on my findings entitled The Restitution of Jesus Christ which I self-published in 2008. I believe this book presents the most thorough and biblical challenge to the teaching that Jesus is God that has ever been published from the viewpoint that Jesus is all that the church has agreed to about him–such as his virgin birth, miracles, sinless perfection, died for our sins as Savior and Lord, and literally arose from dead–except that he is not God.

So, Foster and I did not come to agreement about this. But that is the way it usually has been for me in discussing this subject with my Christian brethren. For the church generally says I am a heretic, and thus not a real Christian, because of I now believe the Bible does not say Jesus is God. Thus, I believe church fathers got this wrong. Nevertheless, Foster was such a loving friend to people that he and I did not let this ruin our Christian fellowship. And in my opinion, that’s the way it should be.

Justin Rose Still Leads the Masters

Last updated on: April 10, 2021 at 12:55 pm By Kermit Zarley

Justin Rose–a Brit with a perfect golf swing who the 2013 U.S. Open champion–still leads the Masters today after two rounds with an even par 72 today. It goes with his blistering 7-under par round of 65 yesterday in which he led the field on a tough day by four strokes. He had started poorly, two over par after seven holes, and then went nine under par his last eleven holes, which may be some kind of record at the Masters. Rose is one stroke ahead of left-hander Brain Harman and a new, young guy on the PGA Tour who looks like Thomas Jefferson.

He is 24-year old, 6’2″, 165 pound Will Zalatoris, possibly a rising new star on the best pro golf circuit in the world. He quit school at Duke and missed Q-school his first try. Last year he did well on the PGA Tour’s Korn Ferry Tour and won one tournament. He gets a lot of club head speed and therefore hits the ball long off the tee with a fairly short backswing and hardly any wrist cock. If he wanted to, by adding wrist cock to his backswing, he could hit the ball a country mile. Will also looks like a great putter. He putts with a long putter with the grip hugging his left arm, which stabilizes the club head and I think is a terrific method.

Zalatoris was born in San Francisco and lives in Plano, Texas. He attended Trinity Christian Academy in high school, which is a conservative, non-denominational Christian school. Will won the U.S. Juniors in 2014. He attended Wake Forest University, a Baptist school, and quit in his senior year to turn pro. He tied for 6th last year in the U.S. Open, indicating he may have quite a future in pro golf.

Superstar Jordan Spieth–a three-time major winner who got back in the winners circle last week after a long drought–is lurching close behind at 5-under par. Spieth is definitely a favorite on these fast and firm greens at Augusta National. They look like they are starved for water being brown looking. Cross-handed putter Spieth is one of the best, if not the best, putters to come along in recent years on the pro circuit.

Evangelicals Being Radicalized with Violence

Last updated on: February 4, 2021 at 11:18 pm By Kermit Zarley

I just read such a good article on how some Christians, especially Evangelicals, have been radicalized to support violence as a means to make the USA a Christian nation. This growing movement was evident in the assault on members of Congress gathered at the Capitol Building on January 6th to certify the election of Joe Biden as president. And then a riot erupted in which five people died, but it could have been much worse.

The Senate will begin the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump next week. It will be centered on the question of whether or not Trump incited the crowd gathered to hear him speak near the Capitol, and whether or not he caused the crowd to storm the Capitol minutes later. If he did, that would be incitement to insurrection, which the impeachment claims. It’s hard to think of anything worse that a president of the USA could do if that is indeed what happened.

Some of the members of that riot at the Capitol claimed to be Christians. Some of the fringe groups that were represented in that assault espoused Christian beliefs. Many of those people believed in a religious nationalism in which it was their goal to restore the USA to its former status as a supposed Christian nation. A recent movement called QAnon is one of those fringe groups. It has had some influence in certain segments of American Christianity, such as evangelicalism.

Politico magazine’s editor Zack Stanton has written an article about it, just published seven hours ago, that is an interview he did with Elizabeth Neumann, who has a strong evangelical background. She was the senior advisor and Deputy Chief of Staff of the Homeland Security from 2017 to 2020. She then resigned last spring in protest to President Donald Trump’s policies.

Elizabeth Neumann grew up in Dallas, Texas, attended Trinity Christian Academy nearby, and earned her Bachelors degree in Government Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, which is where both of my daughters graduated. My family was evangelical in metro-Houston just like Ms. Neumann was in Dallas-Austin.

In this interview of Ms. Neumann, she demonstrates a profound understanding of conspiracy theory groups such as QAnon and their influence on evangelicalism. The article is entitled “It’s Time to Talk About Violent Christian Extremism,” and it can be accessed here.