Distinction Between Father and Son on Scripture

[Senyorico]

Recently I was trying to read the Greek language about the form of “God” in the text, I’ve observed that it has almost consistently written that “Theon” refers to the Father and “Theos” for the Son. (Jn. 1:1, Jn 17:3) However, in Jn 3:16 the form of the word God is “Theos” but in the context it should be God the Father. My question is, does the form Theos or Theon refer to a certain persona? Thanks!

 

[edward_george1]

No, those are grammatical case declensions, and have nothing to do with whether the word refers to the Father or the Son. It’s what function the words serves in the sentence. I am unable to bring it up right now, but maybe someone can show you a grammar chart.

 

[Vico]

Recently I was trying to read the Greek language about the form of “God” in the text, I’ve observed that it has almost consistently written that “Theon” refers to the Father and “Theos” for the Son. (Jn. 1:1, Jn 17:3) However, in Jn 3:16 the form of the word God is “Theos” but in the context it should be God the Father. My question is, does the form Theos or Theon refer to a certain persona? Thanks!

It is a second declension noun. Example with log-.
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[Hodos]

Recently I was trying to read the Greek language about the form of “God” in the text, I’ve observed that it has almost consistently written that “Theon” refers to the Father and “Theos” for the Son. (Jn. 1:1, Jn 17:3) However, in Jn 3:16 the form of the word God is “Theos” but in the context it should be God the Father. My question is, does the form Theos or Theon refer to a certain persona? Thanks!

This seems to be a misunderstanding perpetuated by some of the modalist/subordinationist cult sects such as Jehovah’s Witnesses and Iglesia Ni Cristo.

In the English noun system we generally figure out what function the noun is performing within a sentence by word order. So for example: John kicked the ball. The word John, which is found at the front of the sentence before verb is generally in the subjective part of the sentence, so we know it is the subject performing the action. Ball on the other hand is located in the objective part of the sentence so we know that Ball is the direct object receiving the action of the verb.

Greek is not structured that way. In Greek nouns have a stem that carries the meaning of the word, and declines using specific case endings that tell you how that word is functioning with the sentence. Word order in Greek does not determine function but can tell you something about the emphasis the author is placing on that concept or phrase. So in Greek, the noun functioning as the subject of a sentence takes the nominative case ending to tell you that it is the subject, whereas the direct object of the sentence takes the accusative case ending. So in your example, the word being declined is Θεός (pronounced Theos). The noun stem that carries the meaning of God is Θεό whereas the nominative case ending (this tells you it is the subject of the sentence) is -ς (sigma or s). If the word were to be the direct object of the verb, the accusative for is Θεόν (pronounced Theon) where the accusative case ending -ν (nu or n) is added to the noun stem Θεό.

You can only tell if the word for God is being applied to the Father or the Son by the context of the passage. So in John 1:1, we know that the word God is applied to the Son in the third clause of the sentence because it says that the Word (which the author explains later is the pre-existent Christ) was God (Θεός ήν ό Λόγος). It is all based on context.