Is the Granville Sharp Rule a Modalist Trick?
Just the other day, Tom Loghry sent me an email he received from someone who was trying to comment on my article from two years ago entitled “The Granville Sharp Rule: Defending the Trinity.” (I’m not sure why he didn’t comment on the website at the end of the article). My first thought was, “I bet this is from a Oneness Pentecostal.” Turns out I was wrong; it was from a fellow trinitarian! This struck me as odd, but the motivations for his criticism seemed more clear as I carefully read his email. While I disagree strongly with the belief underlying his aversion to the Granville Sharp rule, what really caught my attention -and inspired me to write this article- was a devastating logical fallacy in his argument against the rule. This article may be among my longer ones, so grab a tall cup of coffee and get comfortable!
I will refer to the man I am responding to simply as “Jeff,” which is not his real name, but this will serve as a pseudonym in case the reason for his emailing Tom instead of commenting publicly was for privacy reasons.
So Jeff opened his email with a bold statement: “the Granville Sharp “rule” is a modalist trick to turn expressions like “God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” into “God the Father is the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Emphasis mine) Not only is this a bold statement which he provides no evidence to support, for Granville Sharp was indeed a trinitarian, but it is also a strawman (misrepresentation) of the Granville Sharp rule (further referred to as the GSR). The GSR is not a method of translating certain phrases into English. It does not replace the “and” with “is” as Jeff claimed in the opening of his email. In fact, In order for the GSR to apply, you don’t even have to translate the Greek into any language!. As a brief reminder, the GSR states simply that if two substantives that agree in gender, number, and case are joined with the word “kai” (Greek for “and”) with the definite article preceding the first substantive but not the second substantive, and they are both singular, personal, and not proper names, then both substantives are referring to the same person.
Now I know that if you haven’t studied the GSR, that sounds very complicated, so let’s look quickly at an example and then we will continue critiquing Jeff’s critique. Consider the following sentence: “We met with the captain and owner of the boat, Mr. Jones.” Notice that the two substantives “captain” and “owner” are both singular, and not proper names (gender of words is applicable in Greek). Note also that the definite article “the” only appears before the first substantive, “captain.” Based on the GSR, we can say for sure that Mr. Jones is both the captain and owner of the boat. (Note that we are using an English sentence to help improve your understanding of the rule, as the GSR is applicable to the Koine Greek language, not necessarily in English).
Now let’s take that same sentence, but make one simple change that could alter the meaning of the statement drastically: “We met with the captain and the owner of the boat, Mr. Jones.” Did you catch the difference? The definite article “the” is used before both substantives, so we can conclude that Mr. Jones is the owner of the boat, but the captain could very well be someone else! We need more information in this case whereas in the first example, it is certain that Mr. Jones is both captain and owner of the boat (or it is certainly so in Greek according to the GSR, for once again, this is a rule of Greek grammar, not English).
Now that we have the rule fresh in our minds, let’s return to Jeff’s statement and see if the rule applies (assuming that the statements are accurately translated into English). Look carefully at his statement again and see if you can spot the reason that the rule wouldn’t apply: “the Granville Sharp “rule” is a modalist trick to turn expressions like “God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” into “God the Father is the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Emphasis mine) Did you catch it? That’s right, there are two definite articles! One for each substantive. Remember now that the GSR does not apply when there are two definite articles. This exposes a deep misunderstanding in Jeff’s understanding of the GSR. Let’s look now at the biggest problem in his email response.
Here is what Jeff said: “Titus 2:13 of course says the appearing of the Great God and Our Savior Jesus Christ. I.e. of the Father and Son (very Trinitarian, two distinct persons). But they turn it into the appearing of the Great God Our Savior Jesus Christ, i.e. God is only one Person, Jesus Christ... They are “defending the deity of Christ” but at the expense of the Trinity...”
Jeff’s Negative Inference Fallacy
It may help to put Jeff’s argument in its logical format. The argument would go something like this: Premise 1) If the two substantives “Great God and our Savior” both refer to Jesus Christ, then the Father and the Son are not distinct persons. Premise 2) The GSR states that the two substantives “Great God and our Savior” do both refer to Jesus Christ. Conclusion: Therefore, the GSR denies that the Father and the Son are distinct persons.
The Fallacy of Negative Inference is when someone tries to get a negative conclusion from a positive premise. Let me give you an example:
Imagine that you spotted me in the grocery store and walked up to me to say hello. There is someone with me, so I reply to you, “Oh hey (your name here)! I’d like to introduce my cousin and good friend, Megan.” To this you say to me, “but I thought Eddie was your cousin!” Do you see what you did wrong in this scenario? You assumed that the substantive “cousin” could only refer to one person. This is what Jeff is doing.
Just because Jesus is referred to in scripture as God, it does not mean that the Father and the Spirit aren’t also referred to as God elsewhere throughout scripture. My cousin analogy isn’t an exact parallel because my two cousins are not only distinct persons but they are also separate beings. The analogy is still helpful though, as it is a linguistic analogy, not an ontological analogy for the Trinity (every ontological analogy for the Trinity I’ve ever heard has failed miserably, because there is no parallel in creation to which we can compare God as a triune Being). I mention this because I have had people in the past misunderstand the purpose of certain analogies such as this. As trinitarians, we believe that there is one being that is God, but that there are three distinct persons within the Godhead. It boggles my mind to think that Jeff couldn’t see this flaw in his reasoning. I’ll just mention one more major thing that I wish to address before I end this article.
Jeff said toward the end of his email, “I’ve never seen any Granville Sharp groupy defend it by anything but bald assertion that it works in Titus 2:13 and 2 Peter 1:1 only (lol! A grammar rule that only works in 2 verses,” which again demonstrates his lack of familiarity with the GSR. If you end up reading this Jeff (you know your real name), then tell me, do you really think that scholars would accept a rule that only applies in two verses in the Bible? Sharp published a paper with 25 passages in the New Testament alone that have no bearing on Christology. That isn’t even counting the times the rule is applicable in the Septuagint (Greek Old Testament). Not only that, but Sharp was hardly the only one who did work on this rule. Other scholars have found countless places where this rule with its conditions applies in multiple non-biblical works of Greek literature!
I returned after a year-long hiatus to write this article to demonstrate the importance of Christians being engaged in deeper study of basic philosophy and logic as well as theology and apologetics. Philosophy is not opposed to Christianity. Rather philosophy is the handmaid of theology. Without proper reasoning and careful study, we can become careless in our theology and even end up attacking good scholarship and misunderstanding it as being in opposition to the truth of the Christian faith. This is a reality for all Christians, myself absolutely included. I hope that, if nothing else, this article has shown why we need to disciple our brothers and sisters in Christ in a way that promotes critical thinking and lessens careless thinking.
Jeff’s Email:
So I saw your article stating that the Granville Sharpe "Rule" is "important to know" to defend the Trinity, and I agree its important to know about to defend the Trinity but for the opposite reason. Namely, the Granville Sharpe "rule" is a modalist trick to turn expressions like "God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ" into "God the Father is the Lord Jesus Christ." Why do you think there is an explosion of modalism or Oneness Pentecostalism in our world since the 90s? Because all these new translations applying this modalistic "rule"!
Titus 2: 13 of course says the appearing of the Great God and Our Savior Jesus Christ, i.e. of the Father and Son (very Trinitarian, two distinct persons).
But they turn it into the appearing of the Great God Our Savior Jesus Christ, i.e. God is only one Person, Jesus Christ, i.e. the very Creed of Oneness Pentecostalism!
They are "defending the deity of Christ" but at the expense of the Trinity and at the expense of honesty and integrity. No unitarian has ever been convinced by the Granville Sharpe shicanery! But any unitarian who hears this stuff just concludes the defenders of Jesus' divinity are liars. Further, if it did convince them Jesus is God it would at the same time convince them God is only One Person, Jesus Christ. Because Granville Sharpe's trick is all about erasing the Father.
If you can prove otherwise, let me know. Because to date I have never seen any Granville Sharpe groupy defend it by anything but bald assertion that it works in Titus 2:13 and 2nd Peter 1:1 only (lol! a grammar rule that only works in 2 verses, the very ones Modalists want to remove the Father from to make God only Jesus Christ and not a Trinity!). If you have any better proof of this "rule" than the wishful thinking of Oneness Pentecostals, then send it my way. But I ain't expecting much, because I know no proof exists.
And once you realize this "rule" is a Oneness Pentecostal ruse to hijack translations into teaching their doctrine, you need to oppose this "rule" vigorously as the lie that is is.
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