By Angus Harley
“For just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son also to have life in Himself” (John 5:26)
There is nothing easy about interpreting John 5:26. Over the years great expositors and theologians have differed in their interpretations. In discussing the text, this article interacts with Don Carson’s reading, coming to a different conclusion, one that follows in the steps of John Calvin and Herman Ridderbos. Some issues are perhaps easier to unravel than others, but on the whole we are dealing with complex matters.
The article will interact with Carson’s commentary on John’s Gospel;[1] yet, because it was written in 1991, almost thirty-five years ago, we have to put just as much emphasis, if not more, on his article on John 5:26. It is very detailed, going into the depths of the doctrine of eternal subordination and the interpretation of John 5:26.[2]
As Carson’s article and commentary cover a lot of ground both theologically and exegetically, I will artificially divide up his material into the theological and the exegetical. This article will primarily tend to Carson’s theological arguments (there is some exegesis), and the second will respond to his exegetical content on John 5:26 (as before, there is some theological). In doing things this way, I hope the reader will perceive the theological engine driving Carson’s exegesis.
CARSON’S THEOLOGICAL INTERPRETATION
To begin with, let us see what Carson means by ‘life-in-himself’.
Receiving divine life-in-himself
Carson believes that from all eternity, the Father passed on divine life to the Son.
Receiving life-in-himself and the divine package
Carson writes:
“Third, the reference to the Father’s “life in himself” is, in this context, that life that God alone experiences. It is bound up with his divine nature, his independence, his self-existence. The same “life in himself” is possessed by the Son, who shares the Father’s divine nature, independence, and self-existence. And yet John’s Gospel tells us that the Father granted to the Son to have this life in himself.”
Here we read that both the Father and Son have life in themselves that is bound up as a package with the divine nature, divine self-existence, and divine independence. They are bound as one.
Source of divine authority, deity, and divine being
It might be thought that all Carson is saying is that the life the Son had as Son (i.e., Sonship) was derived from the Father, but not deity itself, for the Son does not derive this from the Father. However, Carson has in mind the more fundamental concept of actual divine life and deity as derived from the Father and passed onto the Son in eternal generation. Commenting on John 17:2, Carson asserts of Jesus’ authority in context:
“This is not the authority Jesus enjoys inherent in his being the Son, making the Father’s gift of authority equivalent to the fact that the Father is the fons divinitatis, the source of deity, of the Son; for if that were in view, it is hard to see how it could serve as the basis for the prayer of v. 1b.”[3]
Notice, of first importance, that the Son receives “deity” from the Father. Secondly, the implication is that he also eternally receives authority from the Father. Yet, as before, Carson cannot deny the Mediatorial context of John 17:2, and recognizes this gift of authority as pertaining to his humiliation. Even so, Carson is evidently indicating that the gift of authority to the Son in time is reflective of the passing on of eternal authority by the Father to the Son.
In his commentary, Carson once again refers to the Father as the fons divinitatis of the Son, quoting positively C. K. Barrett’s commentary on John:
“ ‘The Father is fons divinitatis [“the divine fountainhead”] in which the being of the Son has its source; the Father is God sending and commanding, the Son is God sent and obedient. John’s thought here is focused on the humiliation of the Son in his earthly life, a humiliation which now, in his death, reached both its climax and its end’ (Barrett, p. 468).”[4] [parenthesis are his]
The Son derived his divine being from the Father. Carson considers this the ground of the Father sending and commanding the Son and the Son being obedient to that command. However, in the context of John 14:28, Carson implies the textual evidence pertains directly to the Son’s earthly, or Mediatorial, humiliation. The implication is that both Carson and Barrett think that the Son’s earthly conduct and authority reflected his eternal status and divine life.
Not in the incarnation
Carson therefore concludes that the Son could not have obtained self-existence in the incarnation:
“This cannot mean that the Son gained this prerogative only after the incarnation. The Prologue has already asserted of the pre-incarnate Word, ‘In him was life’ (1:4). The impartation of life-in-himself to the Son must be an act belonging to eternity, of a piece with the eternal Father/Son relationship, which is itself of a piece with the relationship between the Word and God, a relationship that existed ‘in the beginning’ (1:1). That is why the Son himself can be proclaimed as ‘the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us’ (1 Jn. 1:2).”[5]
Eternal generation
The doctrine of the ‘eternal generation of the Son’ is, to Carson, but another way of talking about the Son receiving life-in-himself from the Father, “we have observed that the eternal generation of the Son, expressed in John 5:26”.[6] Even so, his article is arguably just as much, if not more, about ‘eternal generation’, than it is concerned with Jesus having the specific idea of ‘life-in-himself’.
‘Father’ and ‘Son’
The titles ‘Father’ and ‘Son’ hint of eternal generation:
“In other words, “Son” language tied to “Father” language is one of the unavoidable hints that the relationship between the “Father” and the “Son” is rightly conceived of in terms of generation—indeed, of eternal generation.”[7]
Carson’s article shows how a number of commentators reject the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son.[8] However, Carson believes that the doctrine of the eternal generation of the Son is the controlling doctrine of Christology. Carson writes:
“Lightfoot’s total preserved comment on John 5:26 reads, “ζωὴν ἔχειν ἐν ἑαυτῷ compared to ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ expresses the whole doctrine of the Person of Christ, derived from and yet subservient to the Logos doctrine, the eternal generation of the Son.” ”[9]
The “Logos doctrine”, as Lightfoot calls it, equates to “the eternal generation of the Son”, upon which is built the doctrine of the Person of Christ, for the latter is “derived from” the former. There is no Christology proper without, first of all, laying the foundation of the eternal generation of the Son.
The lexical argument
Carson says that formerly he believed that the term monogenēs meant ‘one and only’ and not ‘generated’ or ‘begotten’. However, recent research has caused him to re-think his position. Now he is open. It is possible, he believes, that monogenēs might indeed mean ‘only begotten’ in Luke 7:12; 8:42; and 9:38. Even if John’s uses of monogenēs (1:14, 18; 3:18; 1 John 4:9) did convey ‘only begotten’, this must be backed up by contextual evidence for this interpretation. However, Carson finds it difficult, if not impossible, to read ‘only begotten’ into monogenēs in Hebrews 11:17, for Abraham had many sons.[10]
Dependent-independence
In defending the doctrine of the Son as eternally generated by the Father, Carson relies on a dependent-yet-independent structure.
Basic idea
The Son is, as to himself, in himself, independent as God-in-himself. However, he is dependent on the grant of the Father for this life-in-himself, having received it in eternity. The Father passes on independence, ‘life-in-oneself’, to the Son. This is not created life, nor the kind of life granted to the world. It is divine life, eternal and independent existence or life.[11]
Revealed in redemptive time
In his article, Carson unfolds how this idea of dependent-independence works in redemptive history:
“The following verses (5:19–30) find Jesus articulating and defending what would become in time the distinctively Christian understanding of monotheism. Jesus most emphatically insists that he is not a separate deity, an independent deity— far from it. He insists that “the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing” (5:19). Here is dependence of the most thorough kind, a form of subordination (there is certainly no reciprocity in the relationship)—yet it immediately turns out to be a subordination carefully qualified. The Son can do only what he sees his Father doing, we are told, “because whatever the Father does the Son also does” (5:19). Two elements in this clause are striking. (a) The Son’s activities are co-extensive with those of the Father. Has the Father created all things? So also has the Son, as God’s Word—God’s own agent in creation (1:1–5). Is it the Father’s prerogative to give resurrection life, raise the dead, and exercise final judgment? So also is it the prerogative of the Son (5:24–30).”[12] [bold text is mine]
Due the fact that the Son is God-in-himself, yet has derived life-in-himself from the Father, the Son and the Father are the monotheistic God of Christianity. Even so, this same divine Son, in this monotheistic arrangement, can only do what he sees the Father do. This is “a form of subordination”. It is not Mediatorial in nature, but specifically divine, for the Son’s actions- what he sees the Father doing- are both co-extensive with the Father’s actions and exactly the same in nature: giving life to the dead and exercising final judgment.
The language dilemma
Carson is aware of the tension his theology brings terminologically speaking:
“If we review once again all the ways in which the Son in John’s Gospel obeys, speaks as he is given words to say, comes and goes on the Father’s command, performs the Father’s will not only in coming into the world through the incarnation but also in going to the cross and in securing those whom the Father has given him, what term shall we use to describe his relation to the Father in all of its unidirectional obedience and dependence (another word on the edge of saying too much), if not subordination? Yet if in our culture “subordination” is corrupted by the tincture of inferiority, it is not a happy term to use. Again, if there is a certain taxis in the Trinity, then in some highly qualified ways it may not be inappropriate to speak of the obedience and subordination of the Son even while we robustly insist that he is in no way inferior to his Father in essence, glory, power, majesty, perfections, and holiness, which of course is what the eternal generation of the Son is designed to protect while still depicting him as the Son of God. Indeed, John 5:26 celebrates that the Son has the same “life in himself” as the Father, which implicitly denies dependence and contingency, at least in the immanent Trinity, while the same verse in making such “life in himself” an eternal grant surely bespeaks some kind of dependence, however carefully we wish to guard the expression.”[13]
There is the obvious tension between the language of dependence and independence. Along with it comes the dilemma of the language of subordination, obedience, inferiority, and taxis (‘order’). Yet, the Son is not inferior in “essence, glory, power, majesty, perfections, and holiness”. The concept of obedience, as it pertains to the Father-Son relationship of the Godhead, is “unidirectional”, concerning the Son alone in his obedience.
Functional and ontological subordination
The phrase ‘functional subordination’, to Carson, indicates the Son as subordinate to the Father, performing his Father’s will. To what extent was the Son made subject to the Father? Was this an eternal state, or was it merely in regard to Christ’s incarnation? Carson writes:
“Is the appeal to a headship distinction between God and Christ (1 Cor 11:3) restricted to the Son in his incarnate state, or is there an “eternal functional subordination” (inevitably abbreviated EFS) of the Son to the Father?”[14]
Incarnate-reflective nature
Carson’s answer to his own question is to maintain that the incarnate subordination of the Son as the Christ is reflective of the Son’s eternal subordination to the Father. This divine subordination is one of the results of the Son being generated eternally by the Father.[15]
EFS
The reader will have noticed that Carson does not speak merely of ‘eternal subordination’ but of ‘eternal functional subordination’. The Son has eternally being functioning as one obeying the Father. This condition preceded his incarnation and was the basis for the Father appointing the Son, before the incarnation, to be the Redeemer of mankind:
“The reason why the Father has entrusted all judgment to the Son is now disclosed: it is so that all may honour the Son just as they honour the Father. Whatever functional subordination may be stressed in this section, it guarantees, as we have seen, that the Son does everything that the Father does (cf. notes on vv. 19–20); and now Jesus declares that its purpose is that the Son may be at one with the Father not only in activity but in honour. This goes far beyond making Jesus a mere ambassador who acts in the name of the monarch who sent him, an envoy plenipotentiary whose derived authority is the equivalent of his master’s. That analogue breaks down precisely here, for the honour given to an envoy is never that given to the head of state.”[16]
Carson is balancing, here, the two concepts of divinity and subordination. The Son in his actions on earth is obedient. Yet, at the same time, the Son demonstrates his divinity, for he does everything that the Father does. It is a divine-doing, and therefore a divine subordination reflected in time. As a result, the Son receives divine honor, not the kind of honor that a mere appointed emissary would receive.
What Augustine said
Carson cites Nicaea and the ancient fathers as the orthodox reading of the Trinity that defended the doctrine of eternal generation.[17] “The Reformers tended to adopt a similar interpretation.”[18] Carson seems to have more a little more to say on Augustine, so we’ll focus on Augustine in this section.
Augustine believed that the Father eternally granted to the Son to have life-in-himself.[19] Carson blends together the findings of Nicaea with Augustine’s own conclusion:
“Nicaea affirms that the only distinctions to be drawn among the eternal persons are their relations of origin: unbegotten Father, eternally begotten Son, and the eternally proceeding Holy Spirit; similarly, Augustine asserts that the divine persons ad intra are one in substance, distinguished only according to their relations of origin. But Augustine adds that the divine persons are also united ad extra (i.e., in their Trinitarian operations) even though they are distinguished in their operations in terms of their respective economic missions (viz., the sending of the Son and the Spirit), which missions in some sense reflect the immanent relations.”[20]
Augustine, like Nicaea, believed in the ad intra, internal, relationship of the Father to the Son, in which both were one in substance (essence), yet the Son’s “origin” is from the Father as eternally begotten. Augustine adds that the Son is also distinguished in operation from the Father when it comes to the Trinitarian acts in of their “economic mission”, i.e., their redemptive roles. See how in this Carson maintains that the external, redemptive, order of the Trinity is a natural extension of the eternal order.
Psalm 2:7 is interpreted by Augustine as referring to the Son’s eternal generation. However, Carson takes the texts back to 2 Samuel 7 and the Davidic sonship. The various features of the king of Psalm 2 are well in line with the Davidic calling itself, argues Carson.[21]
CARSON’S FUNDAMENTAL THEOLOGICAL FALLACIES
I will initially respond to Carson’s theological argument by stating three fundamental theological fallacies he incurs.
Fallacy #1: Carson gives only two options as to ‘life-in-himself’
Carson’s two options
The first fallacy pertains to the choice that Carson gives as to the meaning of ‘life-in-himself’. He delimits it to two alternatives:
1. the Son’s prerogative to exist as God-in-himself was given to him before his incarnation, from all eternity;
2. and, the Son received life-in-himself in his incarnation.
The all-important third option
This form of a choice misses a critical third option:
3. prior to his incarnation, within heaven itself, the Son was set apart as the Son of Man, in a place of subordination, with its Mediatorial prerogatives such as receiving life-in-himself, and was appointed as the Mediatorial Son of Man sent into the world.
The Father granting to the Son to have ‘life-in-himself’ is, to thoroughly underscore this point, aMediatorial prerogative as far as the person of the Son is concerned. It was a blessing that was indeed given to him in heaven before his incarnation, so that it reflected solely his Mediatorial role as the Son of Man (see John 3:13). Put negatively, the Son of Man’s ‘existence’ did not start when he came to earth in the incarnation, for the Son took upon himself that role when in heaven, prior to coming down to earth in the flesh.
If I may illustrate. An ambassador does not ‘become’ so when he steps into a foreign land, for he was already appointed, prior to this, as his country’s ambassador. As the ambassador about to enter a foreign country, he already has received his remit and the authority to pursue it. So, the Son was already appointed in heaven as the Son of Man, with his remit and authority, before he actively set to his duties as the incarnate Son of Man on earth.
Objection
It will be objected that, Carson did believe that the Son was appointed and sent by God into the world as the Son of Man to save those that believe in him.
We will concede this objection, but then add our own. For it is not sufficient to say that the Son was appointed to come to earth as the Son of Man- “the revealer from heaven”, as Carson describes him.[22] Carson has to take the next logical step of, at the very least, inquiring into whether Jesus’ appointment as the Son of Man before his incarnation was in itself a Mediatorial assignment, regulated by Mediatorial ‘rules of engagement’, and imparting only Mediatorial prerogatives. I found only one time he touched on this issue, when he said that the Son’s honor was more than that of an emissary. This is a straw man, as no one advances the view that the Son’s honor as the Son of Man was that of a mere emissary. Carson’s theology is, once more, forcing us to choose between the ontological and eternal Son over against the incarnated Son. Due to Carson’s belief that Christ’s functional subordination as the Son of Man was a mirror image in time of his eternal functional subordination (see ahead), he is unable to see that the Son’s appointment as the Son of Man, before his incarnation, is in itself a Mediatorial act solely. Jesus’ appointment before his incarnation is no more reflective of an eternal state than the title ‘Son of Man’ is.
If we do not conclude this, we are then left with the destructive alternative that ‘the Son of Man’ contributes to the Son’s eternal condition as God from all eternity, a truly unthinkable theology similar to the nonsense pumped out by Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons.
Fallacy #2: the Son from all eternity was given life-in-himself by the Father
We all have to negotiate how Jesus’ divinity interacts with his humanity, his divine relationship to the Father in eternity with his Mediatorial relationship in the redemptive plan. None of this is an easy knot to untangle. There is a balance to be attained between his Mediatorial role/dependence and his divine person with its eternal interrelationships.
Divinizing Mediatorial aspects
However, Carson’s argument ends up, in effect, turning some of Jesus’ Mediatorial actions and prerogatives into divine ones, erasing the distinction at points between the eternal Son and the Mediatorial Son of Man, thereby divinizing some aspects that were merely Mediatorial. Of course, Carson does not collapse the entirety of Jesus’ Mediatorial ‘person’ and actions into his eternal condition as Son. Nonetheless, in Carson’s system, there are far too many aspects that are Mediatorial, and therefore, redemptive, that now find themselves in the eternal-past and ontological category.
God’s life is underived, unsourced
Carson will not appreciate the following severe criticism, but it is the height of contradiction to say that the Son has eternal and divine ‘life-in-himself’, and then to maintain that the Son derived that ‘eternal life’ from the Father. God is by nature autotheos, God-in-himself. How can the Son be God-in-himself, when he derives this as a ‘grant’ from the Father? God does not receive divinity, essence, life, or anything else that is God-like and divine from anyone. It is utterly preposterous to suggest otherwise. Moreover, it opens the door wide to all kinds of doctrinal error.
By contrast, and as we will see in the next article, Jesus receiving life-in-himself from the Father, in John 5:26 is indicative of his Mediatorial role, and is, therefore, properly derived from the Father as the ‘greater’ of the Mediator.
Terminological knots
Carson ties himself up in knots in terminology. Dependent-independence utterly implodes on itself as a concept, as do the following contrasts in Carson. The Son having ‘life-in-himself’, which is then explained as ‘granted’ to him by someone else. The Son being eternally ‘subordinate’ to the Father, yet not inferior to him. The Son having eternally received authority from the Father as one eternally functionally subordinate to him, yet carrying that authority in eternity as one equal in authority. The “unidirectional” nature of obedience, yet the eternal equality in status of Son and Father. A taxis (‘order’) that is a kind of hierarchy in the Trinity that is balanced out by utter equality in all respects. The Son as generated, yet not derived. These attempts by Carson to balance concepts contradict one another, and, quite frankly, defy sense in terms of understanding speech itself, so that words begin to lose their meaning.
Objection
A common counter-response to my view is that the traditional language of eternal subordination is somewhat a theological convention, words that carry a theological meaning as opposed to a strictly modern understanding. Is that not what Carson himself is alluding to when he refers to modern culture’s perception of the language used in the Trinitarian debate?
This would be a valid objection if indeed it did not carry along with it an actual theology of eternal and divine subordination and inferiority. The Son is given and granted divine and eternal life from the Father! The Son received eternal authority from the Father. The Son follows the Father’s command. The Son’s deity was generated by the Father. The Father is first in an eternal order. Any day and age- never mind our own- is perfectly within its rights to see this language as indicative of the common conception of typical subordination, wherein one who is superior in being or authority is ‘above’ the other, controlling the other, sending forth the other, giving life to the other, and so on.
Fallacy #3: eternal generation is the Christological control
The basic error
To Carson, functional Christology is built upon the foundation of the “Logos doctrine” of “eternal generation”. The former (functional Christology) reflects the same model or pattern found in eternity (ontological Sonship). We saw that Carson, rather confusingly, also describes Jesus’ ontological Sonship as bound with eternal functional subordination.
It is this belief of Carson’s that accounts for him erasing, essentially, at certain points, the distinction between the Son in his eternal relationship to the Father, and the Son as the appointed Mediator before his incarnation. This causes Carson to bypass the third alternative spoken of before, in which the Son as the Mediatorial Son of Man in heaven received his prerogatives and appointment, and was in that capacity sent into the world.
Carson’s mirror model
What ends up happening in Carson’s thought is that when the deity of the Son is clearly conjoined with his Mediatorial role, then his Mediatorial role is read as always implying his EFS, so that his Mediatorial subordination is thereby considered but an extension of EFS. The one ends up mirroring the other: EFS mirrors mere (Mediatorial) functional subordination; and functional subordination (which is Mediatorial) mirrors EFS. The effect of this is that, whenever there is a divine name or title such as ‘Father’ or ‘Son’, or where Christ is marked out as divine, these divine markers attributed to the Son are said to reflect EFS, an eternal subordination that is manifested to us in time through the Son’s role as Son of Man.
John’s medium model
By contrast, John’s teaching, and that of the NT as a whole, is that Jesus’ Mediatorial role as the Son of Man is a window through which we see the divine Son. His flesh is the ‘medium’ for his divine glory, but nowhere does John melt Jesus’ Mediatorial role into his divine glory, nor merge his divine glory with the role as the Son of Man. For it is through his role as the subordinate Son of Man in the flesh that the Son reveals the full salvific power of God. After all, it is about divine salvation, authority, and power. Even so, we get to see this divine glory only through the medium of his ‘inferior’ status and role as the Mediator, the Man for us. John 1:14 is very clear on this, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.” The grace and truth of God are revealed to us through his incarnate Son. This grace and truth of the divine glory is manifested always and only in Jesus’ subordinate role as the Son of Man, leading up to the cross and to his resurrection. It is via his entire ministry as the Son of Man, but particularly on the cross, that the Son reveals his divine credentials as the Savior of the world. None of this, however, requires EFS as a prior condition to the Son’s Mediatorial role.
Example of the difference
We could refer to any of the various prerogatives given by the Father to the Son in John’s Gospel, but we’ll focus on Carson’s understanding of John 14:28, where Jesus says, “the Father is greater than I”.
Unable to bring forth any contextual evidence, Carson concludes that there is an implied theological “pattern of functional subordination of the Son to the Father, already alluded to, that extends backward into eternity past”.[23]
Yet, the context is about the Son’s Mediatorial subordination and his inferiority to the Father, and the Father’s superiority as the head of his Son, the Mediator. Jesus is going to the cross in order to ascend back to his Father. He is in the process of teaching his disciples that simple plan in John 14. He will rise to the Father’s right hand as their Mediator, so that he can then ask the Father to send the Spirit to empower them to do greater works than even he did.
Similar “greater” language is taken up in John 10:29. John 10:28 says that Jesus will preserve his sheep for no one will snatch them out of his hand. In addition to this, Jesus argues in v29 that, “ “My Father, who has given them to me is greater than all and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.” ” The implication here is that the Father is greater than the Son, for he gives the sheep into the Son’s hand in the first place. Consequently, the Father is “greater than all”, quite literally, including the Son himself.
Carson, in exegeting John 10:28-29, does not refer to Jesus’ ontological relationship to the Father in eternity, for Carson’s comments solely pertain to God’s act of redemptive preservation in his Son.[24]
So, although Carson argues that John 14:28 is part of an implied theological pattern of eternal subordination in John’s teaching, he does not follow through on this teaching for John 10:28.
We can say with certainty that on both occasions, John is indicating the Son’s role as the Mediator, and therefore as lesser than the Father. The Son was sent in this Mediatorial capacity by the Father, and the Father appointed sheep to the Son as Mediator, so that the Father is the greater of the two, being the source not only of the Son’s Mediatorial role, status, authority, and salvation, but also the source of his sheep. If no one can snatch Jesus’ sheep from out of his hand as Mediator, then it is set in stone that no one will be ever able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand, the greater One that appointed the Mediator and set apart his sheep.
ANOTHER LOOK AT AUGUSTINE
Agreement
Where all agree is that Augustine believed that divine life was passed on to the Son by the Father in an act of eternal generation, so that the Son had life-in-himself. If one reads Augustine’s commentary on John 5:26, the evidence is stark for that reading.[25] It is also evident that Augustine refers to the Son receiving his divine being from the Father. This, once more, is indisputable.
In what capacity?
However, this far from settles the issue. For the question then has to be asked, in what capacity does the Son receive life-in-himself and divine being from the Father?
Carson’s understanding is that, according to the Nicene model, Augustine believed that the divine life spoken of is part of the package of the Son receiving divinity, being, and deity from the Father.
However, it is the duty of Carson and others who hold this Nicene reading of Augustine to demonstrate that it, in its entirety, is found in him. I am not the first, nor will be the last, who reads Augustine differently. Calvin in his Institutes 1.13.19 quotes Augustine advocating the position that the Son’s Sonship was derived from the Father, but his deity or divine substance/essence was not:
“ “By those names which denote distinctions” says Augustine “is meant the relation which they mutually bear to each other, not the very substance by which they are one.” In this way, the sentiments of the Fathers, which might sometimes appear to be at variance with each other, are to be reconciled. At one time they teach that the Father is the beginning of the Son, at another they assert that the Son has both divinity and essence from himself, and therefore is one beginning with the Father. The cause of this discrepancy is well and clearly explained by Augustine, when he says, “Christ, as to himself, is called God, as to the Father he is called Son.” And again, “The Father, as to himself, is called God, as to the Son he is called Father. He who, as to the Son, is called Father, is not Son; and he who, as to himself, is called Father, and he who, as to himself, is called Son, is the same God.” Therefore, when we speak of the Son simply, without reference to the Father, we truly and properly affirm that he is of himself, and, accordingly, call him the only beginning; but when we denote the relation which he bears to the Father, we correctly make the Father the beginning of the Son. Augustine’s fifth book On the Trinity is wholly devoted to the explanation of this subject.”
We can therefore contrast Carson and Calvin in this way:
Carson: Augustine believed that the Son’s Sonship and deity was granted to him in the act of eternal generation;
Calvin: Augustine taught that only the Son’s Sonship was granted to in the act of eternal generation, and that he possessed of himself deity.
Now, for most readers, this is splitting hairs. Yet, it is what it is. To Augustine’s mind, the life and being of the Son as Son, not the life and being of the Son as God, was granted eternally to him by the Father.
If one looks again at Augustine’s commentary on John 5:26 and other comments, the use of a Nicene-like language is at times delimited to the difference between the persons of the Godhead, and is not applied directly to the concept of deity itself. Harry Wolfson writes:
“For, according to the predecessors of Augustine, the Father was the cause of both (1) the existence and (2) the godhood of the other two persons, whereas, according to Augustine, the Father was the cause only of the existence of the other two persons. Consequently, if the relation of cause and effect is to be considered at all as a mark of inequality between the cause and the effect, then, according to Augustine, there is only one inequality between the Father and the other two persons, whereas, according to his predecessors, there are two inequalities between them.”[26]
Augustine compared and contrasted to Nicaea
Both Augustine and Calvin held to exactly the same distinction that, in regard to the Son’s Sonship, not his divine essence, it was eternally generated. Whereas, the Nicene Creed refers to “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God”. It is Augustine’s theology, not Nicaea’s, that makes the Son truly autotheos, God-in-himself. What John Murray says about Calvin and the Nicene Creed’s homoousion clause, translated as “consubstantial with the Father”, is equally applicable to Augustine:
“Calvin was too much of a student of Scripture to be content to follow the lines of what had been regarded as Nicene orthodoxy on this particular issue. He was too jealous for the implications of the homoousion clause of the Nicene creed to be willing to accede to the interpretation which the Nicene fathers, including Athanasius, placed upon another expression in the same creed, namely, ‘very God of very God.”[27]
The homoousion clause implies the identity of essence, of substance, which in itself entails that the Son’s divinity and deity are underived, unsourced, non-generated, and unbegotten. Augustine, Calvin, Warfield, Murray, and Reymond are theologians who give primacy to the homoousion statement in the Creed, and move away from Nicaea’s understanding of “God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God”.
Augustine and the Psalms
I find myself in agreement with Carson’s critique of Augustine on Psalm 2, and do not see any indication, in context, of the Son as eternally generated.
That being said, Carson is seemingly unaware of a nuance Augustine advances in regard to the Son’s eternal generation. Writing on Psalm 109:20, Augustine states:
“For the Father aids the Son, as far as the Deity aids Man, on account of His having assumed the form of a servant, to which Man, God, and to which Form of a servant, the Lord too is Father. For in the form of God, the Son needs not aid, for He is equally all-powerful with the Father, on which account He also is the helper of men….And because when he had said, Work Thou with me, he added, for Your Name’s sake, he has commended grace. For without previous deserving works, human nature was raised to such a height, that the whole in one, the Word and Flesh, that is, God and Man, was styled the Only-begotten Son of God. And this was done that that which had been lost might be sought by Him who had created it, through that which had not been lost; whence the following words, For Your mercy is sweet.”[28]
Unlike before when Augustine distinguished between the Son’s Sonship as derived from the Father but his essence or substance was not, Augustine in the immediate quote contrasts the Son as Servant to the Son as God. As Servant he needs God’s help; but as the divine Son he does not. In both examples, Augustine is working on the principle that the Son’s deity/substance/essence is a stand-alone entity in which he needs no ‘support’ or grant from the Father. By contrast, as to his divine Sonship and as to his role as Servant, both are derived. It is for this reason, I would propose, that these latter two aspects are bonded together by Augustine in reflecting upon the Son as the only-begotten one.
ETERNAL GENERATION: THE LEXICAL ARGUMENT
Agreement
As stated already, there is agreement with Carson that Psalm 2 has nothing to do with eternal generation. I also agree with him that nothing is lost by allowing monogenēs in Luke 7:12; 8:42; and 9:38 potentially to mean ‘only-begotten child’. For as Carson says, the context, not the word itself, determines meaning.
Hebrews 11:17
I would also allow, however, that Hebrews 11:17 might imply ‘only begotten’ when using monogenēs of Isaac. Carson is right to point out that Abraham had already begotten Ishmael, so that Isaac was not literally Abraham’s only son at the time of his offering. Yet, Hebrews 11 as a whole, as Hebrews 11:17 in particular, pertains to the fulfillment of the promises of God. It is just possible that, after a fashion similar to Romans 9:6ff., that Isaac is considered the only-begotten son according to the promise.
John’s use of monogenēs
Carson is now open to John using monogenēs to refer to the Son’s eternal generation. However, Carson does not follow through on this potential, so we are left to wonder how he might work it out.
Of course, the position of this article is that John’s use of monogenēs is not at all referring to Jesus as eternally begotten. Carson’s older, more restricted, view is certainly possible, so that the Son as monogenēs means “one and only”. This can apply, too, to Luke 7:12; 8:42; 9:38, and even to Hebrews 11:17. This, I believe, is now the majority reading.
Yet, I think it possible, also, that monogenēs in John is referring to the Son’s Mediatorial role and status. It was as the Word who became flesh that the Son was recognized as monogenēs, “we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). The eternal glory of the Word was revealed in the flesh that the Word took on as the Son of Man. Similarly, in John 1:18, we read that no one has seen God, yet he has been explained/revealed in the “only begotten God”, the enfleshed One, “No one has seen God at any time; the only begotten God who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him” (see John 1:1, 14). Thus, in John 3:16, the Christ is given to the world- and therefore as seen by the world- as “the only-begotten Son”. That we are dealing with a Mediatorial role might, again, be indicated by John 3:18, for it refers to believing in the only-begotten Son, that is, the enfleshed Son. Throughout John’s Gospel, the Son is known through his Mediatorial role as the Man for us. To believe in Jesus is to believe in him as the incarnation of divine life and salvation, yet only as seen and mediated through his role as the Son of Man, especially in his death and resurrection. 1 John 4:9 can similarly be read as implying that the Son as the only begotten, as the enfleshed One, was appointed to this role in heaven, before his incarnation, to then take on this role in time via his death, for he came as the propitiation of our sins (1 John 1:9-10).
I am happy with either of the above alternatives, as neither requires anything close to the idea of EFS.
ANSWERING HARD QUESTIONS
It is inevitable in such a very difficult subject matter as addressed in this article, that there will be a number of objections on both sides. I have tried to address a few against my own position as I have gone on. There are two more that are prominent counter-replies to my interpretation.
‘Why do you divide so strongly between Son as divine and Son as Mediator?’
The first objection argues that my interpretation divides too strongly, even artificially, between Christ as Mediator and Christ as the eternal Son, and that I create two kinds of authority and two kinds of eternal life, one for the Mediatorial Son and the other for the eternal Son. Scripture knows only of one type of eternal life- divine and from the Father. I will now respond to this critique.
In referring to the Christ’s authority and to his capacity of giving life unto others, we must always bear in mind his Mediatorial role. It is through that medium that divine authority, salvation, and life are exercised. As such, they are ‘throttled back’, to speak extremely loosely, by Jesus’ Mediatorial humanity. The power to save souls, although divine in origin and nature, is manifested how? By Jesus’ mortal death and the resurrection from mortality to immortality as the Man for us. How is forgiveness of sins, a divine prerogative and blessing, administered? Through faith in that same Christ, and by that same Christ acting as Mediator, the Man for us who is now in heaven as the propitiation for our sins (see Rom.5:15-19; 1 Cor.15:45-49; 1 Tim.2:5; 1 Jh.2:1-2). How does the divine authority manifest itself unto eternal life? Via the Man for us, the Mediator, who assumes a position of complete subordination to the Father for our sake, in order to redeem us.
It is only through this Mediatorial lens, as the Man for us, that we see the divinity of the Son to save and give life. Therefore, the only way to know Jesus as “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6) is exclusively through his role as the Man for us. We come to the second objection.
‘Do not the titles ‘Father’ and ‘Son’ in and of themselves indicate the eternal subordination of the Son?’
The second objection will argue that my view does not account for the divine titles of ‘Son’, ‘Father’, and even ‘Spirit’, that patently reveal an order, even subordination, and because they are divine titles, this, in turn, implies an eternal order of subordination.
In understanding the divine titles of ‘Father’, ‘Son’, and ‘Spirit, it is imperative that we realize that it is only through the revelation of the Son as Mediator that the Father reveals his divine glory, the Son his, and the Spirit comes as the paraclete thereby revealing his divinity. For the divine titles of ‘Son’ and ‘Father’, even the name of ‘Spirit’, are manifested to us exclusively and entirely through the medium of the revelation of the Son’s subordinate status as the Son of Man, the Mediator-Man for us. For he alone is the fleshly manifestation of God. It is through this incarnated Son that the Father reveals his salvation; and it is this incarnated Son that the Paraclete was sent to bear witness to. It is for this reason that ‘Father’, ‘Son’, and ‘Spirit’- none of whom are subordinate to one another in the Trinity- come to bear an almost redemptive hue, not because they are mere redemptive constructs, but because we come to know them exclusively through their roles in redemption, as taught in the NT revelation about the Son’s Mediatorial role as the Son of Man. It is for the same reason that the Father-Son relationship that is so blatantly divine in John’s Gospel has redemptive actions and events inextricably woven into it, making it almost impossible at times to extricate one level (the divine) from the other (the redemptive). Having responded to two hard questions, I have my own hard questions for Carson.
Why was the Son subordinate to the Father from all eternity?
Much is said by Carson defending the Son’s eternal generation and EFS. But what he never answers, nor do any Complementarians answer, is why the Son was eternally subordinate. What possible purpose was there for the Son to be eternally in subordination to the Father? Why was he eternally under his authority? The Son’s subordination in John’s Gospel, in the NT, is not a theoretical concept, a mere philosophical or theological deduction. It is not a mere status or state of being associated with having been ‘eternally generated’. Subordination, rather, invariably is not only a status but is a form of activity, of the execution of the Father’s will; it is ‘live’ and ‘active’ at all times. In fact, because of this, everything we do know about the Son’s subordination is derived from his actions in regard to redemption. Consequently, all of the NT’s data about the Son’s subordination, when read in the light of EFS, necessitates that the Son was, from eternity, obeying this or that command of the Father. What commandments? And to what end? There is something more profound yet to consider: what do we do with the Spirit? He was sent by the Father and by the Son. He is doubly subordinate, therefore, from all eternity. Thus, there is a very, very strict hierarchy in eternity: Father as first, the Son as second; the Spirit as third. And then we must ask the same questions of the Spirit. Why was he eternally subordinate to the Father? Why was he eternally subordinate to the Son? Why was he eternally ‘sent’ by the Father? And why was he eternally ‘sent’ by the Son? Which commandments were given to him? Why was he given them? As to the Father, what was his eternal will and plan lying behind the eternal subordinations of Son and Spirit? None of these questions are remotely considered by Carson or by Complementarianism, yet they are waiting to be answered.
Why are Carson and Complementarians unable to look at the doctrine of the Trinity without resort to the Complementarian debate itself?
This is a challenge that they must take up, surely. Are they able to wrestle with the doctrine of the Trinity without taking their readers back in some fashion to the Complementarian vs Evangelical Feminist reading. Are these Complementarians not aware that their own Complementarian positions have the potential to negatively influence their theology of the Trinity? Are they perhaps, for example, overreacting, overcorrecting, for the sake of answering Evangelical Feminism? Once again, such questions never cross the mind of the Complementarian, nor of Carson.
Why do Carson and Complementarians rely so heavily upon the theology of the fathers?
We are not the only generation to know the bible and theology, and that the fathers were as wise, even wiser, than we. Even so, there is an incredible amount of emphasis placed on these early fathers by both Carson and the Complementarians. They are scrambling for patristic sources to defend their position. So much so that, at times, the Complementarian position reads as if it is following a version of Greek Orthodoxy, in which ‘divine truth’ is a ‘tradition’ conveyed in both the Scripture and the early fathers taken as one. In fact, at times this zeal for the fathers has been so strong that they Complementarians are not aware of the nuanced views of certain fathers. I do not agree with any of Augustine’s position on eternal generation; yet, why is it that Carson and Complementarianism do not respond to the interpretation that says that Augustine limited Jesus’ eternal generation merely to his Sonship, utterly avoiding his deity?
The idea of a ‘mere exegesis’ does not exist for any exegete or theologian. There are always theological presuppositions that we all bring to the table. Sometimes those presuppositions are good; sometimes they are bad. Sometimes the early fathers expose the bad and highlight the good. However, Scripture alone is our touchstone, and any other source for theology must be seen by all conclusively to be a mere handmaiden to the Scripture’s authority.
[1] Don Carson, The Gospel According to John, The Pillar New Testament Commentary, (Grand Rapids, MI; Eerdmans, 1991).
[2] Don Carson, “John 5:26: Crux Interpretum for Eternal Generation”, in Retrieving Eternal Generation, eds. Fred Sanders and Scott R. Swain (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2017), 79-97.
[3] Carson, Gospel, 555.
[4] Carson, Gospel, 508.
[5] Carson, Gospel, 256.
[6] Carson, “John 5:26”, 92.
[7] Carson, “John 5:26”, 87.
[8] Carson, “John 5:26”, 81-82.
[9] Carson, “John 5:26”, 82.
[10] Carson, “John 5:26”, 87-90.
[12] Carson “John 5:26”, 83.
[13] Carson, “John 5:26”, 96.
[14] Carson, “John 5:26”, 93.
[15] Carson, Gospel, 85, 250, 254, 264, 352, 508.
[16] Carson, Gospel, 254.
[17] Carson, “John 5:26”, 82, 87, 91, 94,
[18] Carson, “John 5:26”, 82.
[19] Carson, “John 5:26”, 82,
[20] Carson, “John 5:26”, 84.
[21] Carson, “John 5:26”, 91.
[22] Carson, Gospel, 301.
[23] Carson, Gospel, 508.
[24] Carson, Gospel, 393-394.
[25] Augustine, “Tractate 22 (John 5:24-30)”, New Advent, accessed July 7, 2025, https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1701022.htm.
[26] Harry Wolfson, The Philosophy of the Church Fathers, Volume 1: Faith, Trinity, Incarnation (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1956), 357.
[27] John Murray, “Systematic Theology”, in Collected Writings of John Murray, Volume 4 (Edinburgh, UK: The Banner of Truth trust, 1982), 8.
[28] Augustine, “Exposition of Psalm 109”, New Advent, accessed July 27, 2025,
All Things New Covenant 