Who is Jesus Christ in Jehovah Witnesses

February 19, 2018

Pre-existence of Jesus Christ

Jesus Christ, before becoming man, preexisted in heaven as the first and only direct creation of God, known as Michael the Archangel.  Before becoming man Jesus Christ was a mere angel.  It was through this created archangel that God brought all other things into being.  Michael, as Jehovah God’s greatest creation, was created first, and then he was used by God to create the rest of the universe

16For by him were all other things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers:  all other things were created by him, and for him:  17and he is before all other things, and by him all other things consist. (Colossians 1:16-17 NWT)

So the evidence indicates that the Son of God was known as Michael before he came to earth and is known also by that name since his return to heaven where he resides as the glorified sprit Son of God.  (Reasoning from the Scriptures, 1985, p.218)

Note:

Although the JW’s quote Colossians 1:16-17, it is important to note that they have added the word “other” to the text.  The word “other” does not appear in the Greek text and the addition of the word dramatically changes the doctrine of the passage.  In the first NWT they did not acknowledge that the word was added.  However, in later revisions they had to place the word “other” in brackets to indicate that it was added to the Greek text for the English rendering.  Even with this JW’s claim that the NWT is the “best” translation. 

While on earth Jesus was a perfect man, because it was God who transferred the life-force of Jesus to the womb of Mary. 

“Jesus, no more and no less than a perfect human, became a ransom that compensated exactly for what Adam lost – the right to perfect human life on earth. … The perfect human life of Jesus was the ‘corresponding ransom’ required by divine justice – no more, no less.”  (Should You Believe in the Trinity?, 1989, p. 15)

Deity of Jesus Christ

Jesus Christ is not Jehovah God but instead “a god”.  This is seen in John 1:1 which states, “In the beginning the Word was, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god” (emphasis added) (John 1:1 NWT).  He was seen to be on earth as a perfect man and only spoken of as a god in that sense, as a perfect man, but no more and no less.

The true Scriptures speak of God’s son, the Word, as ‘a god’.  He is a ‘mighty god’, but not the Almighty God, who is Jehovah.  (The Truth Shall Make You Free, 1943, 47)

Note:

JW’s misunderstand the phase “Son of God” as an offspring of God.  However, if you watch the reaction of the Jews when that phrase is used of Jesus Christ they want to stone Him for calling Himself God.  The Jews, who lived at the time, understood that Jesus was calling Himself God, even if those today do not understand that terminology. 

When Jesus is referred to as the “firstborn” it does not mean the “first created” but rather the superior one.  In Jeremiah 31:9, Ephraim is called God’s “firstborn son”.  However, Ephraim was not the first born child, Manasseh was the older.  In this case we see that Ephraim was the firstborn in superiority over his older brother Manasseh. 

 “In other words, he was the first and direct creation of Jehovah God.”  (The Kingdom Is at Hand, 1944, pgs. 46-49)

“The Bible shows that there is only one God…greater than His Son…and that the Son, as the Firstborn, Only-begotten, and ‘the creation by God’, had a beginning.  That the Father is greater and older than the Son is reasonable, easy to understand, and is what the Bible teaches.”  (From Paradise Lost to Paradise regained, 1958, p. 164)

“Thus, Jesus had an existence in heaven before coming to the earth.  But was it as one of the persons in an almighty, external triune Godhead?  No, for the Bible plainly states that in his pre-human existence, Jesus was a created spirit being, just as the angels were spirit beings created by God.  Neither the angles nor Jesus had existed before their creation.”  (Should You Believe in the Trinity?, 1989)

Resurrection of Jesus Christ

JW’s believe that Jesus Christ was raised a spirit creature.  They teach that Christ’s human body was not raised from the dead.  His body was dissolved into gasses or otherwise annihilated.  Christ permanently forfeited his human life when he gave it up for a ransom.  For Christ to have taken back human life would have meant that he was taking back the ransom price.

Jehovah God raised him from the dead, not as a human Son, but as a mighty immortal spirit Son…For forty days after that he materialized, as angels before him had done, to show himself alive to his disciples.  (Let God Be True, 1946 ed., p. 40)

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