Discussion 1

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Liberty University *

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301

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Religion

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Apr 3, 2024

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docx

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Uploaded by joeldetamore

1.) Research Question: Who is the “I” in the “I Am” statements to which the author is referring to; the divine Logos of eternality or Jesus of Nazareth born of human frailty and how is He enough to be the “I Am?” 2.) Initial Research: There seemed to be a decent number of academic articles, books, blogs, etc. surrounding Jesus’ “I Am” statements in John. I did not find it too difficult to find something that I could dissect and use. That said, the first article I really dove in to is entitled, “Difficult text: John 14:6 – is Jesis the only way?” by Ian Wallis. This article dove into the Greek phrase egô eimi and its correlation to the Septuagint of the Old Testament statements by Yahweh and posing the question of whether egô eimi is dependable enough to God’s Old Testament statements of being “I Am” to Jesus’ statements of being the “I Am” in the New Testament. The second resource I chose to dig in to is a book entitled, “Unlocking the Bible” by David Pawson. In his section on the New Testament and the Gospels, specifically John, Pawson goes into the history of the word “logos” which John gave Jesus the title of in John 1:1. It goes back approximately 600 years before John wrote his gospel in Ephesus to a man named Heraclitus and his life dedicated to science and wanting to understand why things happened in natural laws, such as life, weather, society, etc. Heraclitus defined “logos” as “the reason” behind natural laws, i.e., bio logy , meteor ology , socio logy , etc. John, knowing this history of “logos” knew that Jesus is the “reason behind” everything . Thus, giving Jesus the title “Logos” or “Word.” (This is a simplified version of the breakdown of the history of “logos” for space’s sake.) I found the first article through the Jerry Falwell online library. David Pawson’s book is one that I own. 3.) One of the biggest debatable aspects of the posed question is relating to Jesus’ duality of being both God and man. At question is whether He was fully God and fully man, did He leave His deity when He came to earth, what gives Him the right to make the same claims Yahweh did in the Old Testament? We see the Pharisees challenging Jesus in this when he not only healed the paralytic but also forgave his sins. Additionally, I believe at debate is the historicity of Jesus. Was He truly who He said He was, and others said/say about Him, did He really say the things in “red letters,” did He really resurrect, etc? These questions and debates are nothing new. Scripture even shows Jesus being questioned on His deity. The Jesus Seminar has debated for years on the historicity of Jesus and the claims He made about Himself and the book “Jesus Under Fire” is a great rebuttal to The Jesus Seminar’s claims.

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