Is There Evidence for Jesus’ Divinity?

The most powerful historical manifestation of Jesus’ divinity comes from His appearances to His disciples after His resurrection. These appearances had three features: (1) embodiment manifested as a human form which could be witnessed by many people simultaneously through their physical senses; (2) transmateriality which was not controlled by or subject to the laws of physics (it could pass through closed doors, take on a variety of forms, and disappear from view); and (3) characteristics which appeared to reflect the glory of God.

As N.T. Wright implies, it would have taken something of this magnitude to move the apostles from the status of believers in a dead and humiliated master to a force which ultimately converted the Roman Empire and became a world Church:

It launched a claim on the world: a claim at once absurd (a tiny group of nobodies cocking a snook at the might of Rome) and very serious, so serious that within a couple of generations the might of Rome was trying, and failing, to stamp it out. It grew from an essentially positive view of the world, of creation. It refused to relinquish the world to the principalities and powers, but claimed even them for allegiance to the Messiah who was now the lord, the kyrios.^[20]

Jesus’ risen appearance was experienced as divine power in human history, and unequivocally implied His divine status. Paul’s recounting of an early Christian kerygma (proclamation) makes this connection between resurrection and divinity quite clear:

the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and designated Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by His resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord…. (Rm 1:3-4)

Does Jesus’ transformed embodiment and glorified appearance exhaust the evidence for His divinity? Though it is very powerful evidence, it does not. As the above passage from Romans implies, the apostolic Church had access to another entrance of God into history, namely, the Holy Spirit, who was experienced as the personified power of God, and was possessed by Jesus during His ministry, given by Jesus after His resurrection, and connected with the name of Jesus to this very day. James Dunn notes in this regard that:

“wonders and signs” are attributed variously [by Luke in Acts] to the Spirit of God, the name of Jesus and the hand of the Lord, without any attempt being made to explain the relationship of these concepts of power.^[21]

Though the early witnesses had a privileged access to Jesus’ divinity in their experience of His risen embodiment and transformation, Christians today still have an experiential access to the personified power of God in the Holy Spirit. If the millions of accounts of healings, particularly those without any known physical explanation, and other charismatic manifestations of the Holy Spirit are not to be totally discounted; and if all the internal manifestations of the Holy Spirit (such as a peace beyond all understanding, the ability to call God “Abba,” the inspiration to understand and articulate truths beyond our ordinary human knowledge and wisdom, the curious energy which draws us toward new opportunities when other doors have been closed, the insight into the heart of Jesus which transforms us in a humble, self-sacrificial love) are likewise not to be totally discounted, then we too have access to the very Spirit of God that constituted a vital piece of the evidence for Jesus’ divinity, and more importantly, constitutes the vehicle through which we can be animated disciples of Jesus and transformed into His image.

When the Christian Church reflected on these two entrances of the divine into human history (which occurred through Jesus alone), they found themselves drawn toward an inexorable conclusion, namely, that Jesus is the power and glory of God. The earliest witnesses could not help but believe that Jesus was “designated Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by His resurrection from the dead” (Rm 1:4).

But was Jesus made Son of God at His resurrection? The apostolic Church had excellent reason to believe that this was not the case, and furthermore, to believe that He was not made Son of God during His ministry or at His birth. He was not made Son of God at all. He was Son before all creation.

What made the apostolic Church so certain about this? A confluence of four of Jesus’ deeds and claims during His ministry: (1) He manifested divine power in himself by exorcizing demons, healing the sick, and raising the dead without recourse to the divine name (in contrast to the other great profits such as Elijah and Elisha who did this through God’s name)—see Encyclopedia Unit N; (2) He claimed to bring the kingdom of God in his own person, to defeat evil by his own power, and to change Torah and forgive sins by his own authority (deeds reserved to Yahweh); (3) He claimed to fulfill the mission reserved to Yahweh alone through himself; and (4) He implied and claimed that He is the exclusive Son of the Father with power and access to the Father which are uncreated (co-eternal): “No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal Him” (Matthew 11:27/Luke 10:22)—see Unit II-G.

The apostolic Church recognized a remarkable parallel between Jesus’ Sonship, and the personification of Wisdom (Sophia) in the books of Proverbs, Sirach, and Wisdom. This gave rise to the Christological hymns. One can feel how easily the Colossians Hymn (1:15-17), for example, could have emerged:

[The beloved Son] is an image of the invisible God [the Father] supreme over all creation, because in Him were created all things in the heavens and on the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or lordships or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through Him and for Him and He is before all things and in Him all things are held together.

The early Church probed this truth more deeply in the Philippians Hymn:

[Jesus], subsisting in the form of God did not deem equality with God something to be held onto but emptied Himself taking the form of a servant. (Phil 2:6-7)

Other early Church writers also made use of the Wisdom tradition to express the divinity of Jesus in the remarkable hymn in the prologue to the Gospel of John (which predates the Gospel by many decades and was probably used as a liturgical hymn):

In the beginning was the Word [the Son], And the Word was with God [the Father] And the Word was God [the power of God]. (John 1:1-2)

The early Church felt that these remarkable proclamations were corroborated by God in the resurrection appearances and by the Holy Spirit.

Units II-C-G will set out the evidence for the above claims, and show the historicity of Jesus’ resurrection, gift of the Holy Spirit, miracles, and claims about Himself. This evidence shows that Jesus is Emmanuel, and simultaneously that God is unconditional Love. Not surprisingly, this is precisely what Jesus claimed about His Father and about Himself.