Re: John 1:1

From: Jonathan Robie (
Date: Mon Feb 02 1998 - 13:44:03 EST

At 01:33 PM 2/1/98 -0600, Ron J Macy wrote:
>Jonathan Robie wrote:
>But why should John make such a big deal about introducing the concept of
>LOGOS, then surreptitiously change what it refers to a few verses later
>without telling us?

>This is what I am wondering and why I asked if the personality issue had
>a linguistic base or if it is more on the theological side. If there is
>no specific linguist base for Logos being a person (in verse 1) then I
>would understand the argument to be mostly theological and not
>necessarily a part of the discussion for this list.
>If there is a linguistic foundation, I would like to know what it is.
My argument was not a theological one, but a contextual one. To me, few
things seem to be fixed 100% by the linguistics of any statement, which is
to say that most sentences in any language could be understood differently
depending on the context in which they occur. Theology does not fix the
meaning of any verse, but describes the meanings we have given to them. If
you have only linguistics and theology to draw from, you can't read.
Discourse analysis and other methods that carefully consider the whole of a
passage in context are essential.

Texcel Research
