Replying to a Unitarian - was the Word/Logos just a "plan, thought..." in the mind of God or a real person?

 Replying to a Unitarian - was the Word/Logos just a "plan, thought..." in the mind of God or a real person?

The Unitarian replying to a previous post by me:

"Well written! And also the Logos was and is an ..it ..not a Divine being”


Reply,

"...also the Logos was and is an ..it ..not a Divine being”

No so!

In Mark 9:36, 37 we read:

“He took a little child whom he placed among them. Taking the child in his arms, he said to them, “Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.” NIV

Other English translations read similarly and makes good sense and good modern English, but a look at the original Greek reveals something interesting!

“καὶ λαβὼν παιδίον ἔστησεν αὐτὸ ἐν μέσῳ αὐτῶν, καὶ ἐναγκαλισάμενος αὐτὸ εἶπεν αὐτοῖς”

 The above transliterated reads:

“And having and having taken (a) child, he set it in the midst of them; and having taken in (his) arms it, he said to them”

To use the above as translation English would not be good English, so translators translate into modern comprehensible English, such as we see in the NIV and others translations!

That being said, the original Greek word for “child” is “Paidion” [παιδίον] and “Paidion” is a neuter noun and its connected pronoun is “αὐτὸ” (used twice in v 36), this pronoun is a demonstrative pronoun and its sole function is to point back to that which it is referring to and that which it is referring to is its antecedent noun “Paidion”, which is a neuter noun.

A demonstrative pronoun such as “auto” [αὐτὸ] can mean “he, she, it, yonder, that, that one…”. The pronoun must according to the rules of Greek grammar must take on the same grammatical gender as its antecedent noun, the noun it refers back to and since “Paidion” is a Greek neuter noun the pronoun “auto” must take on that same grammatical gender and so, “auto” in Greek must be translated as an “it”, not a “he, him…”; we must remember, that we are dealing with the rules of grammar!

This is the point!

Just because Greek demands a neuter pronoun does not mean to say that the subject is not a person, as the context works this out for us and our intelligence by way of that context should inform us that a person is in view, being talked about, not an abstraction!

Now to:

“also the Logos was and is an ..it ..not a Divine being”

Just because, the Greek demonstrative pronoun “it”  [Οὗτος - autos) is used with reference to the “Logos” in John 1:2 does not mean to say that the “Logos” is not a person, no less than the demonstrative pronoun “auto” is used of a “child”, both have “it” connected to them and the very fact that the term “child” (Paidion) is used along with “it” and the context shows that “Paidion” is an actual person, so too the “Logos” and the surrounding context in John 1.

John 1:1-14 ESV

“1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning. 3Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made. 4In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

The Witness of John

6There came a man who was sent from God. His name was John. 7He came as a witness to testify about the Light, so that through him everyone might believe. 8He himself was not the Light, but he came to testify about the Light.

9The true Light who gives light to every man was coming into the world. 10He was in the world, and though the world was made through Him, the world did not recognize Him. 11He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. 12But to all who did receive Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God— 13children born not of blood, nor of the desire or will of man, but born of God.

The Word Became Flesh

14The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

Here we read that something was in the beginning with God and that by means or through that something the “all things” were made, came into existence and in this something there was life and the light of men, John the Baptist came as a witness to testify about that something that was light, so that through that something people might believe, John says that this something was in the world and that the world came into existence through that something, this something became flesh and dwelt among people! Does the above seem as though John was talking about a “plan, thought, word…” as Unitarians would have others believe and that “the Word/Logos” was nothing more than a “plan, thought, word…” in the mind of God, an abstraction, not a person!

Phil 2: 5, 6 NASB 1995

“Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, ⁶ who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped”

Unitarians and their sympathisers at times argue over the term “form” (morphe), but, I am not here to argue over what this means, as I have already dealt with this elsewhere with Unitarians; my point is, whatever pre-existing form Jesus was in he was in that same pre-existing form with ‘next to, alongside, with, next to…God’, the same form Go was in; and God resides in heaven along with the angels, a wholly spirit or spiritual realm.

The context of John 1:1-14 shows we are dealing with a person:

“2He was with God in the beginning. 3Through Him all things were made…”

Since God used an agent, the “through whom”, an instrumental cause to make the “all things”, the apostle Paul confirms this at 1 Cor 8:6

“yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we exist. And there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we exist.” BSB

…was it an abstraction, a “plan a thought…” in the mind of God that brought the “all things” into existence or was it by means of another person; note that the “all things” were “from” the Father, but came into existence by means of the “through whom” the son, the person behind the given name, Jesus! Also, notice, that Paul uses the term “whom”, this term is used of a person or persons, not of an abstraction, a “plan, thought, word…!