Echad (‘Plural’ Oneness)
I have seen Deut. 6:4 - “YHWH [Jehovah/Yahweh] our God, YHWH [Jehovah/Yahweh] one [Echad] in Hebrew]” - rendered in several ways. (I prefer "Jehovah [is] our God, Jehovah alone.") Some trinitarians misinterpret this. They often say something like this: “At Deut. 6:4 the word ‘one’ is echad in Biblical Hebrew, which means ‘composite unity’ or ‘plural oneness’.”
First, it certainly wouldn’t be surprising to find that some noted trinitarian authority on Biblical Hebrew had written somewhere that echad means “united or plural oneness.” But I haven’t found one yet!
Here is what I have found written about echad by authorities on Biblical Hebrew:
The only definition given for echad in the trinitarian New American Standard Exhaustive Concordance is: “a prim[ary] card[inal] number; one”. We find no “plural oneness” there!
The highly respected Biblical Hebrew authority, Gesenius, says that echad is “a numeral having the power of an adjective, one.” He then lists the various meanings of echad as:
“(1) The same,”
“(2) first,”
“(3) some one,”
“(4) it acts the part of an indefinite article,”
“(5) one only of its kind,”
“(6) when repeated [echad ... echad] ‘one ... another’,”
“(7) [K echad] AS one man.” [The initial consonant of this word, “K” actually means “as” or “like,” so in this special form the meaning is close to that of a plural oneness. But this is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 !! ]
Gesenius also lists a plural form of the word (achadim,) which means “joined in one, united.” This, too, is not the form used at Deut. 6:4 which context shows, instead, to have meaning #5 above. - See Gesenius’ Hebrew-Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament, #259, Baker Book House. Surely, if God (or Jehovah) were really a union of persons, a united one, this form which truly means “united one” would have been used to describe “Him” repeatedly in the Holy Scriptures. But it and all other words with similar meanings were never used for God (or Jehovah)!
By using a good Bible Concordance (such as Strong’s or Young’s) we can find all the uses of echad in the Bible. Unfortunately (due to space limitations), Young’s and Strong’s both list the rare plural form (achadim,) and the “AS one” (Kechad) form along with the common singular form (echad) without distinguishing among them.
Nevertheless, since both the plural form and the kechad form are used quite rarely (see Ezek. 37:17 and 2 Chronicles 5:13 for examples), we can see that the overwhelming majority of the uses of echad listed in these concordances (over 500) obviously have the meaning of singleness just as we normally use the word “one” today.
If you should find a scripture listed as using echad in your concordance that definitely has the meaning “plural oneness” or “together,” or “as one,” you should check it out in an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible. If the word in question is really the echad form of the word (as at Deut. 6:4), then it will end with the Hebrew letter “d” in the Hebrew portion of your interlinear. If, however, it is really the plural form of the word (achadim), then it will end in the Hebrew letter “m”. And if the word is really Kechad (“AS one”), it will begin with the Hebrew letter “k” (looks like a backwards "C"). Remember, though, that Hebrew reads from right to left (so the LAST letter of a Hebrew word is really the letter at the extreme LEFT.)
Using your concordance along with an interlinear Hebrew-English Bible in this manner, I don’t believe you will ever find echad (as used at Deut. 6:4) literally meaning “plural oneness”!
Further emphasizing the impropriety of this “plural oneness” interpretation of echad are the many trinitarian renderings of Deut. 6:4. In the dozens of different trinitarian Bible translations that I have examined none of them have rendered Deut. 6:4 (or Mark 12:29) in such a way as to show anything even faintly resembling a “plural oneness”!!
Even the highly trinitarian The Living Bible, which, being a paraphrase Bible, is able to (and frequently does) take great liberties with the literal Greek and Hebrew meanings in order to make better trinitarian interpretations, renders Deut. 6:4 as “Jehovah is our God, Jehovah alone.” Notice that there’s not even a hint of a “plural oneness” Jehovah!
The equally trinitarian (and nearly as “freely” translated as The Living Bible) Good News Bible (GNB) renders it: “The LORD - and the LORD alone - is our God.” - Compare the equally “free-handed” (and trinitarian) The Amplified Bible.
And even among the more literal trinitarian translations of Deut 6:4 we find:
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - New Revised Standard Version.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone!” - New American Bible.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - The Holy Bible in the Language of Today, Beck (Lutheran).
“Yahweh our God is the one, the only Yahweh.” - New Jerusalem Bible.
“Yahweh is our God, - Yahweh alone.” - The Emphasized Bible, Rotherham.
“The LORD is our God, the LORD alone.” - An American Translation (Smith-Goodspeed).
“The Eternal, the Eternal alone, is our God.” - A New Transation, Moffatt .
The trinitarian ASV (also the RSV) gives 4 different possible renderings of Deut. 6:4. One of them is identical with The Living Bible, and none of them includes an understanding of a “plural oneness” God!
The paraphrased The Living Bible also renders Mark 12:29 (where Jesus quotes Deut. 6:4 and an excellent spot for him to reveal a “trinity” God --- or even just a “plural oneness” God) as: “The Lord our God is the one and only God.” Notice the further explanation of the intended meaning of this scripture at Mark 12:32, 34. “’... you have spoken a true word in saying that there is only one God and no other...’ Realizing this man’s understanding, Jesus said to him, ‘You are not far from the Kingdom of God.’”
Why doesn’t this highly interpretive trinitarian paraphrase Bible (or any other Bible for that matter) bring out a “plural oneness” meaning at these scriptures (Deut. 6:4; Mark 12:29) if that can be a proper interpretation for echad?
Surely, if the trinitarian scholars who made this Bible had thought there was even the slightest justification for an echad = “plural oneness” interpretation, they would have rendered it that way: “Jehovah is a composite unity;” or “Jehovah is the United One;” or “Jehovah is a plural oneness;” etc.
Instead they have clearly shown that God (who inspired it), Moses (who wrote it under inspiration), and even Jesus himself (who taught that it was part of the most important commandment of all - Mark 12:28-29, LB; GNB; etc.) intended this scripture to show God as a single person only!
Similarly, the three annotated trinitarian study Bibles I own would certainly explain any intended “multiple-oneness” meaning for echad at Deut. 6:4 (if there were any possibility of such an interpretation). But the extremely trinitarian New American Bible, St. Joseph ed., gives no hint of such an understanding of echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And the trinitarian The New Oxford Annotated Bible, 1977 ed., likewise gives no hint of such an understanding in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). And that trinitarian favorite: The NIV Study Bible, 1985, also gives no hint of such a meaning for echad in its footnote for Deut. 6:4 (or anywhere else). The only possible reason for all these trinitarian study Bibles ignoring this “proof” is that it simply is not true!
