There is no word for “a” or “an” in greek.
A deffinate noun has “the”. An indeffinate noun leaves it off.
In english we usually add “a”. it is not adding a word, just following the rules of english grammer which tell us it is not correct to say: ‘Snoopy is dog’. we would say ‘Snoopy is a dog.’
Best regards.
Here’s some more clarification on the Greek from Jeff Schwehm
**
catholicxjw.com/Wordwasgod.html
Understanding and Translating John 1:1**
The conflict between the JWs and Christians is the third part of John 1:1. The JWs translate
that third part as follows:
“the Word was a god”.
Christians translate the third part of John 1:1 as follows:
“the Word was God.”
Most often JWs’ assume that Christians believe that the third part of John 1:1 means that
Christians are saying that God the Father and the Word (who is Jesus-God the Son) are the
same person. Again, the JWs are making the mistake that Christians who believe in the
Trinity are actually Modalists. This is not what the Church has taught with regard to how we
are to understand John 1:1. In fact, St. John is not saying in this verse that God the Father
and Jesus are the same person. What St. John is actually telling us is that Jesus has all the
qualities and attributes of God the Father.
It is just like someone calling me the son of a man. My father is a human being. Therefore, I
am also a human being and I also have the same human nature that my father has. Similarly,
Jesus is the Son of God and has all of the attributes of God or to put it another way Jesus has
the same divine nature as God the Father.
**
The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures**
First of all, I want to point out that I am not an expert in Biblical Greek. However, after much
research and study using the Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures, I
discovered that the New World Translation was not as faithful to the Greek text as it claimed
to be.
The Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures is published by the Jehovah’s
Witnesses. It contains the Greek text of the New Testament on one side of the page with the
New World Translation of the New Testament on the other side of the page. Underneath the
Greek text of the New Testament in this book is a literal word for word English translation.
When dealing with John 1:1, the JWs’ Kingdom Interlinear Version of the Greek Scriptures
says the following in defense of the New World Translations rendering of “and the Word was
a god.”
“The God with whom the Word, or Logos, was originally designated here by the Greek
expression ό θεός, that is the•os’ preceded by the definite article ho. This is an articular
the•os’. The articular construction of the noun points to an identity, a personality, whereas a
singular anarthrous predicate noun preceding the verb points to a quality about someone.
Therefore, John’s statement that the Word, or Logos, was “a god” or “divine” or “godlike”
does not mean that he was the God with whom he was. It merely expresses a certain quality
about the Word, or Logos, but it does not identify him as one and the same God himself.”
From the explanation above, the JWs’ believe that Jesus is a god in the sense that he is
godlike or an inferior god to God the Father. There are a couple of problems with this view.
First, their own Bible contradicts this view in Colossians 2:9 which states that in Christ “all
the fullness of the divine quality dwells bodily.” In other words, Christ has all of the qualities
of the divine and not just a part of it. The second problem with this is explained in the
following section.
Can Jesus be referred to as the God (ho the•os’)?
The Jehovah’s Witnesses say that in John 1:1 when St. John says and “the Word was with
God” the Greek expression used for Almighty God in this verse is “the God” or (ho the•os’).
In their Bible encyclopedia entitled Insight On the Scriptures it says the following on page 54:
”Additionally, the word for “god” (Gr., the•os’) in its second occurrence in the verse is
significantly without the definite article “the” (Gr., ho). Regarding this fact, Ernst Haenchen, in
a commentary on the Gospel of John (chapters 1-6), stated: “[the•os’] and [ho the•os’] (‘god,
divine’ and ‘the God’) were not the same thing in this period. . . . In fact, for the . . . Evangelist,
only the Father was ‘God’ ([ho the•os’]; cf. ÞJohn Ü17:3); ‘the Son’ was subordinate to him
(cf. ÞJohn Ü14:28).”
The problem with this explanation is that in this same article in their “Insight” publication, the
Jehovah’s Witnesses admit that St. John uses the phrase ho the•os’ to refer to Jesus. Notice
the following:
”On the occasion of Jesus’ appearance to Thomas and the other apostles, which had
removed Thomas’ doubts of Jesus’ resurrection, the now-convinced Thomas exclaimed to
Jesus: “My Lord and my God! [literally, “The Lord of me and the God (ho The•os’) of me!”].”
(John 20:24-29) Some scholars have viewed this expression as an exclamation of
astonishment spoken to Jesus but actually directed to God, his Father.” - Insight on the
Scriptures page 55
This can also be demonstrated in their Kingdom Interlinear Version as the following scans
demonstrate.
Kingdom Interlinear Scan of John 1:1
Kingdom Interlinear Scan of John 20:28
Check it out for yourself.
