BilliardsBall: “The issue isn't linguistics as much as whether you believe the Bible is God's Word, and whether you will follow the Bible, not JW teachings that are extra-biblical.”
“My doctrine is accurate. I was happy to make a point about the NWT, which is a contrived and false translation in some aspects.”
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Since we are discussing John 1:1c, I take it that the NT Greek texts of that clause are part of the Bible which you are recommending. Whether JW’s have made a “contrived and false translation” at this important clause should be based on the careful, honest translation of that NT Greek text.
It wasn’t until the 1930’s when a trinitarian (E.C. Colwell) finally came up with an alleged grammatical proof that John 1:1c should read “God.” (Trinitarians had been translating it that way anyway simply because they wanted to.)
Colwell said, in effect, that when a predicate noun (theos, in this case) without the definite article (“the”) came before the verb in a clause in NT Greek, that predicate noun should be understood to have the definite article with it anyway.
Since theos with the definite article was understood to be “God,” not “a god” --- there was your proof. He listed some examples to ‘prove’ his point, but they were incorrect examples. You see, just as in English, there are often exceptions to the rule. Since Colwell picked only the exceptions to ‘prove’ his rule, it is not proven. In fact, if you actually examine all the uses of examples truly parallel to John 1:1c in John’s writings, you will find that all 19 are just the opposite: the predicate noun is indefinite (takes an indefinite article, a/an).
So the actual literal reading is “a god.”
Even some noted trinitarian scholars are forced to admit that grammatically John 1:1c in NT Greek may be literally translated as “the Word was a god”! These include:
W. E. Vine (p. 490, An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1983 printing.);
Dr. C. H. Dodd (director of the New English Bible project, Technical Papers for the Bible Translator, vol. 28, Jan. 1977);
Dr. Murray J. Harris (p. 60, Jesus as God, Baker Book House, 1992);
Dr. Robert Young (p. 54, ‘New Covenant’ section, Young’s Concise Critical Bible Commentary, Baker Book House, 1977 printing).
Dr. William Barclay (p. 205, Ever yours, edited by C. L. Rawlins, Labarum Publ., 1985).
J.W. Wentham, p. 35 (f.n.) The Elements of New Testament Greek, Cambridge University Press, 1965.
Of course, being trinitarians, they often insist that the correct interpretation of such a literal translation must be, somehow, trinitarian in spite of the actual literal meaning.