Names and Nature of God.
- Names of God.
- The Biblical names of God.
- (1) El, usually translated "God".
This is the oldest Semetic name of God occuring 2570 times.
- (a) It means "the powerful, strong one".
- (b) There are two forms of this name derived from El:
- [1] Eloah is singular form, and
- [2] Elohim is plural form (Gen. 1:1).
- (c) El with its derivatives and compounds is the
most general name for the God in the O.T.
- (d) The plural form Elohim is used in Genesis 1-2.
- (e) The compound form El-Elyon is used in
Gen. 14:17-24 and means "God Most High".
- (2) Adonai, usually translated "Lord".
This is the name by which the Israelites in later
times addressed God. see Gen. 15:2, 8.
- (a) It means "the almighty ruler".
- (b) With the above names it emphasized the
transcendent aspect of God's nature, whereas,
as Berkhof remarks, the following names emphasizes
"that this exalted Being condenscended to enter
into relation with His creatures."
(BST, p. 48;
cited in HNDG, p. 78)
- (3) El Shaddai, usually translated "Almighty God".
- (a) The occasion of its disclosure is Gen. 17:1.
- (b) It "signifies already not alone the powerful
world maker and ruler of Gen. 1-2, known broadly
to all men in the course of general revelation,
but specifically 'the God who testifies of
Himself in special deed of power, by which
He subdues nature to the ways of His kingdom,...
and who causes that race with which He has
entered into covenant to experience His powerful
presence in protection and blessing.'"
(OTOT, p. 91;
cited in HNDG, 78)
- (c) Contrast between Elohim and El Shaddai.
- [1] Elohim is God as creating and
supporting creation.
- [2] El Shaddai is God constraining creation
to do His will and so subdues it so that it
bows to and subserves His grace.
- (4) Jehovah, usually translated "LORD".
This name of God is peculiar of the Mosaic period
and has become fastened upon Israel throughout its
national history.
- (a) The occasion of its disclosure was Ex. 3:13-17; 6:3.
- (b) This name became the sacred divine proper name
in the O.T., occurring 6828 times.
- (c) The name emphasizes the Redemptive purpose of God,
God as entering into special redemptive relation.
Jehovah or Yahweh comes from Havah
which means "to become", that is, to become known.
Hence it means God's coming to man, God entering
into redemptive relation with him (see Ex. 6:6).
- (d) The fuller manifestation of God as expressed in
the name Jehovah is demonstrated in three
circumstances:
- [1] Israel's deliverance from Egyptian bondage,
- [2] Israel's adoption as the people of God,
- [3] Israel's guidance into the promise land.
- (e) The problem of the occurences of this name prior
to Ex. 6:3, for example, Gen. 15:7.
Solution of problem: Moses edited previously
written tablets and where he saw foregleams of
redemption either changed the name in the tablet
(Gen. 4:26) or added to the name already in the
tablet (Gen. 2:4-3:24 [call=worship] Jehovah-Elohim
=Redeemer-God).
- (f) Biblical exegetes have fallen into a extended
disagreement in their effort to interpret the
words "I am who I am" which were given to
Moses as the divine self-identification (Ex. 3:14).
There are two meanings:
- [1] The self-determined one.
- [2] The historical display of the divine essence
entering into the phenomena of space and time.
- (g) Compound names with Jehovah:
- [1] Jehovah-Jireh: The Lord will provide
(Gen. 22:13, 14)
- [2] Jehovah-Rapha: The Lord that healeth
(Ex. 15:26)
- [3] Jehovah-Nissi: The Lord our banner
(Ex. 17:8-15)
- [4] Jehovah-Shalom: The Lord our peace
(Judges 6:24)
- [5] Jehovah-Raah: The Lord my shepherd
(Psa. 23:1)
- [6] Jehovah-Tsidkenu: The Lord our righteousness
(Jer. 23:6)
- [7] Jehovah-Shammah: The Lord is present
(Ezek. 48:35)
- [8] Jehovah-Sebaoth: The Lord of hosts
(Isa. 1:9; 6:3; 37:16; Psa. 84:1, 12;
80:4, 7, 12; 89:6-8; Hosea 12:4, 5)
- (5) The Father, the Son and Holy Spirit - the Trinity
(Matt. 3:16-17; 28:19; John 14:16-17; I Cor.
12:4-6; I Pet. 1:2; Eph. 2:18; II Cor. 13:14).
- (a) This is the culmination of God's revelation
of Himself.
- (b) There were foregleams of Trinity in O.T.:
- [1] Elohim was plural name,
- [2] God speaks to Himself (Gen. 1:26; 3:22;
11:7; Isa. 6:8),
- [3] The Triagia - "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God
Almighty" (Isa. 6:3; compare Rev. 4:8),
- [4] Aaronic benediction (Number 6:24-26),
- [5] Jehovah distinguished from Jehovah,
that is, Jehovah talking about Jehovah
(Gen. 19:24; Hosea 1:7),
- [6] Jehovah has son (Psa. 2:7).
- The significance of the Biblical names of God.
The name of a person or thing was for the Hebrews
not simply distinctive, distinguishing something from
something else; it was a revelation of the
nature of the person or the thing named, nay, often
it was almost equivalent for the thing itself.
As examples, the 3rd command (Ex. 20:7), the names of
persons - Abram (exhalted father) changed to Abraham
(father of a multitude) (Gen. 17:4-5) - Jacob (he supplants)
changed to Israel (he who strives with God) (Gen. 25:26;
32:26-28; 35:10), the names of places - Bethel (house of
God) (Gen. 35:15) - Peniel (the face of God) (Gen. 32:30).
The following is the significance of the names of God
in the Bible:
- (1) The names of God and revelation: God is truly known
only when and where He makes His Name known.
- (a) Our knowledge of God depends upon God's
disclosure of Himself in His Name.
- [1] God is an unknown God until He makes Himself
known in His Name. Therefore, the biblical Names
of God are not human constructions or products
of man's reason. Philosophical names of God
are human inventions and precede from man's
limited and often wrong understanding.
- [2] But where and when the Biblical Names of God,
those names which are disclosed by God, are
unknown; it does not mean that there is no
knowledge of God.
[a] For a knowledge of the Creator forms
part of the creaturely existence of
man (Rom. 1:19).
[b] This knowledge does not and is not
sufficient to remove man bondage of sin
and save him. This knowledge is knowledge
about God, not a personal knowledge
of God that is eternal life (John 17:3).
It leaves man "without excuse." for
his idolatry (Rom. 1:20).
[c] This knowledge is perverted by sin of
idolatry that results in images and abstract
impersonal ideas of God. For example,
"The Unmoved Mover" - Aristotle and
"Absolute" - Hegel.
[d] Where God does not make His Name known,
He cannot be known aright.
- (b) God's disclosure of Himself in His Name is a
progressive divine disclosure.
- [1] There is a true progression of divine activity
and revelation of the knowledge of God. This
progressive divine revelation is recorded in the
Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, the Bible.
- [2] This does not mean that the earlier revelation
has no permanent significance nor that the unity
of the Bible is simply the unity of God's acts.
God discloses a new name, but not an alias.
He reveals Himself, not in self-contradiction,
but in a more complete disclosure.
- [3] Hence the Scripture speaks of the Name
of God in the singular. In the most general
sense of the word then, the Name of God is
His self revelation. For us, the one general
Name of God is split up into many names,
expressive of the many-sided Being of God.
- (2) The Names of God and God as a person.
The concept of the "Name" of God suggests
further that God is a person. This means that
- (a) God is not an impersonal super "It" but a
personal being, and that
- (b) God is not one person but three persons.
God has revealed Himself as a Trinity of Persons.
Therefore, God is a personal God.
- (3) The Names of God and the salvation of men.
The communication of a name is the disclosure of one's
self to another person and thus the establishment, or
at least the beginning, of a personal relation and
fellowship (or communion). Thus the disclosure of the
Name of God is the beginning of fellowship and
communion with God. Spiritual death is the lack of or
absence of this fellowship with God and spiritual
life is a personal relation to God and fellowship
with Him. Since salvation is basically from death to
life, the disclosure of the name God to a man is
salvation. Biblically the name of a person is sum of
the qualities which make up the nature or character of
a person. To believe in the name of Jesus Christ, the
Son of God, is to accept as true the revelation
contained in that name. It is salvation and all who
call upon and believe in the Name of God shall be saved
(Rom. 10:13).
- Nature of God.
Traditionally theology has made a distinction between the existence and
the essence of God. This gives rise to the two major problems that
theology tries to solve; the problem of the existence of God: Does God
exist? and the problem of the essence of God: What is God? To answer
the latter question theology tries to fomulate the definition of God.
- Definition of God.
- (1) Definition of Definitions:
There are many ways to define a word or phrase:
- (a) Denotative - definition by enumeration or examples.
- (b) Ostensive or demonstrative - definition
by pointing or some other gesture.
- (c) Verbal or synonymous - definition by giving another
word with same meaning - a synonym.
- (d) Operational - definition by the operations required
to determine its meaning or value.
- (e) Connotative or analytical - definition by genus and
difference. The class whose membership is divided
into subclasses is the genus, and the various
subclasses are species. A class is a
collection of entities having some common
characteristic. All members of a given genus will
have same characteristic in common. A genus may be
divided into different species or subclasses such
that all the members of one subclass have some
further characteristic in common which is not shared
by any members of any of these other subclasses and
which differentiates them from the members of any
other subclasses. This characteristic that serves
to distinguish them is called the specific
difference.
- (2) Biblical definition of God:
- (a) God is a spirit (John 4:24);
- (b) God is love (I John 4:8,16; II Cor. 13:11);
- (c) God is light (I John 1:5);
- (d) God is the Creator (Isa. 40:28);
- (e) God is holy (Psa. 99:9; Isa. 57:15; I Pet. 1:15-16);
- (f) God is "I AM WHO I AM" (Ex. 3:13-14).
- (3) Theological definitions of God:
- (a) From Westiminster Shorter Catechism:
"God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and
unchangeable in his being, wisdom, power, holiness,
justice, goodness, and truth."
Answer to Question 4.
- (b) From Articles of Religion (Protestant Episcopal):
"There is but one living and true God, everlasting,
without body, parts, or passions; of infinite power,
wisdom, and goodness; the Maker, and Preserver
of all things both visible and invisible. And in
unity of this Godhead there be three Persons, of
one substance, power, and eternity; the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Ghost."
Article I.
- (4) Philosophical definitions of God.
- (a) For Plato, God is the eternal mind, the Good and
the cause of all good in nature.
- (b) For Aristotle, God is is self-thinking thought,
"the first ground of being", and
the umoved mover.
- (c) For Spinoza, God is "the absolute, universal
substance, the real Cause of all and every
existence; and not the Cause of all being, but
it is itself all being, of which every special
existence is only a modification."
- (d) For Leibnitz, God is the final reason of things.
- (e) For Kant, God is a Being, Who, by His understanding and
will, is the Cause of nature; a Being Who has all
rights and no duties; the moral Author of the world.
- (f) For Hegel, God is the Absolute spirit, but a spirit
without consciousness until it becomes conscious in
the reason and thought of man.
- The Existence of God.
- (1) The existence of God is assumed by Scripture.
- (2) The philosophical arguments for the existence of God:
- (a) The cosmological
argument:
Everything begun must have adequate cause;
the universe was begun;
therefore, the universe must have an adequate
cause.
- (b) The ontological
argument:
The idea of God implies the existence of God.
There are two forms of this argument:
- [1] Anselm's argument:
We have the idea of an absolutely perfect being;
existence is an attribute of an
absolutely perfect being;
therefore, an absolutely perfect being exists.
- [2] Descartes' argument:
We have the idea of God;
all ideas have an adequate cause; therefore,
God must exist as adequate cause of that idea.
- (c) The teleological
argument:
Order and useful arrangement in a system imply
intellegence and purpose in originating cause;
the universe is characterized by order and useful
arrangement;
therefore, the universe has an intelligent and
purposeful cause.
- (d) The moral argument:
Conscience recognizes the existence of a moral law;
since it is not self-imposed, must be
imposed by exterior and superior source;
therefore, there exists a holy will who imposes
the law.
- (e) The argument from congruity:
The theory that best fits all the facts is
probably true;
the theory that assumes the existence of God
best fits the facts;
therefore, God exists.
- The Essence of God.
- (1) Spirituality: "God is a spirit" (John 4:24);
- (a) God is immaterial and incorporeal (Luke 24:39).
What about the expressions that represent God
as having bodily parts: hands (Isa. 65:2;
Heb. 1:10), feet (Gen. 3:8; Psa. 8:6), eyes
(I Kings 8:29; II Chron. 16:9), ears (Neh. 1:6;
Psa. 34:15)? Anthropomorphism.
- (b) God is invisible:
(Rom. 1:20; Col. 1:15; I Tim. 1:17; 6:16).
Compare Deut. 4:15-19; Ex. 33:20; John 1:18.
What about the Scripture that say men saw God?
(Gen. 32:20; Ex. 3:6; 24:9-10; Num. 12:6-8;
Deut. 34:10; Isa. 6:1). Saw God's glory but not
His being (Ex. 33:21-23; Heb. 1:3). Also God
as a spirit can be manifested in visible form
(John 1:32; Heb. 1:7). "The angel of Jehovah"
was such a manifestation of God in visible form
(Gen. 16:7-14; 22:11-18; Ex. 3:2-5; Judges 6:11-23;
I Kings 19:5-7; II Kings 19:35; Gen. 18:13-33).
- (c) God is alive:
- [1] Living God (Josh. 3:10; I Sam. 17:26;
Psa. 84:2; Matt. 16:16; Acts 14:15;
I Thess. 1:9; I Tim.3:15; Heb. 10:31).
See Psa. 115:3-9.
- [2] Source of life (John 5:26; Psa. 36:9).
- (2) Personality:
- (a) Self-conscious (Ex. 3:14; Isa. 45:5; I Cor. 2:10).
- (b) Self-determination (Job 23:13; Rom. 9:11;
Heb. 6:17; Psa. 115:3; 135:6).
- (3) Self-existence (Ex. 3:14; 6:3):
God has the ground of His existence in Himself.
- (4) Infinity or immensity - spatial infinity:
(I Kings 8:27; II Chron. 2:6; Jer. 23:24).
God is not limited or circumscribed by space.
- (5) Eternity - temporal infinity:
- (a) Eternal God (Gen. 21:33; Psa. 90:2; 102:23-27;
Isa. 57:15).
- (b) Immortality (I Tim. 6:18).
- Attributes of God
- (1) The problem of the
"attributes"
Traditionally theology has distinguished between the
essence and the substance of God. The essence of God
is what God is and the substance of God is that which
underlies all outward manifestations of God; it is the
reality in which the qualities and attributes lie.
The essence is what the substance is. Both of these terms
refer to the basic aspects of the nature of God; if there
were no substance then there would be no attributes.
- (2) Origin and division of the attributes;
Traditionally theology has distinguished between the
natural and the moral attributes of God.
The natural attributes are those qualities that inhere
in the substance of God and constitute the essence of God.
The moral attributes of God are those characteristics
of God as a moral govenor. There are other ways of
classifying God's attributes. One classification
distinguishes between immanent, that is, those
attributes that relate to what God is in Himself, and
transitive, that is, those by which He is revealed
outwardly in His relation to creation. Another
classification is positive by which God's
perfections are affirmed, and negative by which
the limitations of God are denied.
- (3) The natural attributes:
- (a) Omnipresence - God is present everwhere
(Psa. 139:7-12; Jer. 23:23-24; Acts 17:27-28).
- (b) Omniscience - God knows everything
(Psa. 139:1-6; 147:5; Prov. 40:27; 46:10; Jer. 32:19).
- (c) Omnipotence - God is all powerful
(Gen. 17:1; Job 42:2; Isa. 40:25-26, 28-29; Jer. 32:
17-21,27; Matt. 19:26; Luke 1:37).
- (d) Immutability - God is unchangeable
(Psa. 33:11; 100:5; 103:17; 118:1-4,29; 136; Mal. 3:6;
James 1:17). What about the Scripture that say God
does not repent (Num. 23:19; I Sam. 15:29; Psa. 110:4)
and those that represent Him as repenting (Gen. 6:6;
Ex. 32:14; II Sam. 24:16; Jer. 18:8; Joel 2:12-13;
Jonah 3:10)?
- (4) The moral attributes:
- (a) Holiness.
In the Old Testament there are three senses in which God is holy.
These defines the holiness of God.
- [1] God is holy in the sense that He is separated from His creation.
(Isa. 45:11-12; 57:15; 6:1-5; 17:7; 41:20; 54:5; Psa. 99:1-3, 5, 9)
- [2] God is holy in the sense that He is separated from all false gods
(Isa. 40:18-20, 25-26, 28; 17:7-8).
- [3] God is holy in the sense that He is different from all other gods;
He is a Savior and Redeemer. (Isa. 41;14; 43:3, 10-11, 14; 44:6-8; 45:5-6,
14, 16-19, 20-22; 46:9). The true God is holy because He alone can save and
deliver. He alone can save because He alone is love. God is holy because
He is love.
- (b) Righteousness and Justice.
- [1] True definition:
[a]
The Righteousness of God
is God acting to set right the
wrong. When God in righteousness acts on behalf
His people, He delivers and saves them from
their oppressors (Psa. 72:1-4; 31:1; 71:1-3;
143: 11-12; 98:1-2; Isa. 51:5-8; 59:16; 62:1).
[b] Justice or judgment is God acting to put down
the oppressor and lift up the oppressed (Psa.
75:7; Judges 2:16-18).
- [2] False definition:
The legalistic misunderstanding of God
has lead to the following false definitions of the righteousness of God and
His justice.
[a] Righteousness is that attribute by which God
has instituted a moral government in the world,
imposing just laws, attaching sanctions thereto.
[b] Justice is that attribute by which God executes
His laws, bestowing rewards and inflicting
punishments impartially according one's due.
- (c) Goodness (Mark 10:18):
- [1] Love (I John 4:8,16; II Cor. 13:11)
- [2] Benevolence (Psa. 145:9,15-16; Job 38:41;
Psa. 104:21; Matt. 5:45)
- [3] Mercy (Eph. 2:4; James 5:11)
- [4] Grace - God's love in action (Eph. 2:4-5)
- (d) Truth and faithfulness (Deut. 7:9; Psa. 36:5; 40:10;
88:11; 89:1-2,5,8,24; 119:90; Isa. 11:5; 49:7; Lam.
3:23; I Cor. 10:13; II Thess. 3:3; II Tim. 2:13;
Heb. 10:23; 11:11).
ENDNOTES
BST Berkhof, L., Systematic Theology
(Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Erdmans Pub. Co., 1946).
HNDG Henry, Carl F. H., Notes on the Doctrine of God
(Boston: W. A. Wilde Company, 1948).
OTOT Oehler, G. F., Theology of the Old Testament
(New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 1885).