Bible Says: Jesus Is Human, Not God

In the Old Testament, God says He is not a human, nor the son of a human.

“God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should change His mind. Does He speak and not act? Does He promise but not fulfill?” (Numbers 23:19)

Suppose I said the following: “I am not a cat, that I should walk on four limbs.”

This mean: I am literally not a cat, therefore I do not behave like cats do.

So when God in the Old Testament says He is not a man, nor the son of man, that means God is literally not a human or the son of a human, therefore He does not behave like humans do.

This fundamentally contradicts with the Trinity, in which Jesus (a man and the Son of Man) is believed to also be God.

Some could respond, “God is not human by nature, but can’t God change into a human form without ever becoming a human?”

The answer is yes, God can change into whatever form He wants. But then, what does that make Jesus, whom the Bible confirms was an actual human, rather than simply God mimicking the attributes of a human or taking the form of a human?

Jesus Calls God “My God”

There are multiple verses in the New Testament as well in which Jesus declares that he is not God.

One example of this is that Jesus calls God “my God” in several verses. If Jesus was God, he would not be calling himself “my God” because this would imply that God himself has a God whom He worships.

In fact, Jesus himself, during crucifixion, asks: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” If Jesus truly was God, then why would God ask if He has forsaken His own self?

Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ (John 20:17)

The one who is victorious I will make a pillar in the temple of my God… (Revelation 3:12)

About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)

Jesus Says God Is Greater Than Himself

If Jesus were God, then would God be greater than Jesus, instead of equal to Jesus?

Moreover, Jesus says that not even he knows when the world will end, only God. If Jesus was God, would he not know the day and the hour of the end of the world just like God?

If Jesus were truly God, he would not say that God is greater than him and that he does nothing without God’s authority, and he would know when the world will end.

“You heard me say, ‘I am going away and I am coming back to you.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.” (John 14:28)

So Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me. (John 8:28)

But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. (Mark 13:32)

Jesus instructs a man not to call him good, because God alone is good. That means Jesus is not God, but is a being that is less than God.

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.” (Mark 10:18)

If Jesus was God, and God alone is good, then Jesus would have no problem with this person calling him good.

Bible Verses That Say Jesus is God

Here is a list of verses that indicate Jesus is God, and is worshipped:

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14)

Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” (John 20:28)

While we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, (Titus 2:13)

Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?” (John 14:9)

Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.” (Matthew 14:33)

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18)

Doctrine of Hypostatic Union

Many verses in the Bible indicate Jesus is not God, and many verses in the Bible indicate Jesus is God.

Therefore, to resolve this theological conflict in the Bible about the real nature of Jesus, the Council of Chalcedon in Rome during 451 AD came up with the doctrine of “hypostatic union”.

In short, hypostatic union states that Jesus is both “100% God” and “100% human” at the same time.

However, this concept of Jesus being 100% God and 100% man at the same time is a logical contradiction in itself.

If we examine the three qualities that God possesses, but humans lack, we find that God is:

Immortal
All-Knowing
All-Powerful

But if we example the qualities of humans, we find that they are:

Mortal
Limited in knowledge
Weak

As you can see, the traits that are exclusive God are the exact opposite of the traits that define humanity, such that one person cannot possess both traits at once.

One cannot be immortal (God) and mortal (human) the same time, that is a logical contradiction. You can only be one or the other.

One cannot be all-knowing (God) and not all-knowing (human) at the same time either. You can only be one or the other.

One cannot be all-powerful (God) and not all-powerful (human) at the same time.

Therefore, one cannot be both fully human and fully God at the same time. Jesus must either be fully God or fully human, but not both.

Jesus can’t be a demigod (partially God, partially human) either, because worshipping demigods is not allowed in Christianity.

Of course, someone can say, “Maybe Jesus at times switches between a state of omniscience and a state of limited knowledge. Maybe Jesus sometimes switches back and forth between being all-powerful and being weak. He switches between his divine and his human nature whenever he wants but is not both at the same time.”

The Bible references this idea once, in Philippians 2:7, where it said Jesus did “kenosis” by temporarily emptying his divine nature to become human.

But this is theologically problematic, because if Jesus is God and God is Jesus, then saying Jesus switches between two natures at will is like saying God is sometimes weak and dumb like humans, and sometimes all-powerful and all-knowing.

But in Christianity, God is supposed to always be all-powerful and all-knowing, rather than sometimes.

Nestorianism: A Logical Solution?

The idea of hypostatic union would not be self-contradictory if Jesus was not an individual, but was instead two distinct individuals inhabiting one body, with one of the individuals being fully God, and the other individual being fully human (Jesus).

This idea is known as Nestorianism.

Nestorianism would solve the logical contradictions involved with hypostatic union because Jesus would then be two individuals with two distinct natures inhabiting one body, rather than one individual with two fundamentally contradictory natures inhabiting one body.

But if Nestorianism was correct, then Christians would not be allowed to worship Jesus, the human entity that is inhabiting the body, because worshipping a human is not allowed.

Instead, Christians would only be forced to worship God, the divine entity that is inhabiting the same body.

The Trinity at least gave Christians a doctrinal excuse to worship Jesus, because it claimed Jesus to be both God and human at the same time, but there would be no Jesus-worship if Nestorianism was the dominant philosophy in Christianity.

Nestorianism is not fundamentally different from the Muslim view that Jesus is an entity that is human and distinct from God, although Muslims would certainly deny that Jesus’s body was inhabited by two entities.

But for this reason, the idea of Nestorianism contradicts the Trinity and was declared by the Catholic Church as a heresy many centuries ago.

The Quran Rejects the Trinity

It is well known that God in the Quran tells Christians many times to reject the Trinity doctrine. Christians are permitted in the Quran to continue following what God revealed in the Gospel (Injeel in Arabic), but they must reject the Trinity.

[5:47] And let the People of the Injeel judge by what God has revealed in it. And whoever does not judge by what God has revealed, then those are the deviant.

[4:171] O People of the Book, do not exceed the limits in your religion, and do not say about God except the truth. Christ Jesus, the son of Mary, was only the messenger of God, and His word which He cast towards Mary, as well as a spirit from Him. So believe in God and His messengers, and do not say, “Three.” Desist, it is better for you. God is only one God. The sublimity of Him, that He should have a son! For Him is what is in the heavens and what is in the earth. And God is sufficient as a Trustee.

There are contradictory Bible verses about whether Jesus is God or not God, so obviously one of those group of verses would have to be man-made. We would have no way of knowing which point of view is a man-made fabrication unless a future revelation would be sent down to clarify that.

Hence, Muslims believe that one of the purposes of the Quran (the future revelation after the Bible) is to clarify that God has no son, Jesus was just a human, and that the Trinity is false, therefore helping people realize that the Bible verses which suggests otherwise certainly did not originate from God.

It is no surprise that God in the Quran takes a strong stance against the Trinity, because it is a strange and self-contradictory concept: the idea that God fathered Himself, or that God has a begotten son who possesses two fundamentally contradictory attributes (fully God and fully human).