“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and mankind, a man, Christ Jesus…”
This is one of the great and clear texts in the debate as to who Jesus really is. If Jesus were God, this would have been a wonderful place to say it. Instead, Jesus is clearly called “a person” using the Greek word anthropos, “person, human, man.” The lexicons state that it is “man” in contract with animals, plants, angels, and of course, God. The Greek text reads that there is one mediator between God and “mankind,” or “people,” “a person” or “a man”, Jesus Christ. Although Trinitarians say that this refers only to his human nature, that is an interpolation, not the text of Scripture. If Jesus were a God-man, this would be one of the many places to say it, but Scripture never says it, ever. Instead, Jesus is stated to be a member of the human race, just as the Old Testament prophecies foretold he would be.
This verse is commonly translated, “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,” but there is no definite article, no “the” in the Greek text before “man, Christ Jesus.” Adding the “the” before “man” distorts the verse a little, as if it were saying that Jesus was “the man.” This verse is not pointing out that Jesus is “the” man, it is pointing out that he is “a man,” “a person,” a human being. Romans 5 shows that it was a person who sinned and got mankind into the mess it is in, and it was a person, Jesus, who got us out of that mess.
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