Does Paul say that Jesus is God in Romans 9:5?

He does not include the word Jesus. Christ is Anointing — Anointed and One who Anoints — God is Spirit.

I am not a trained theologian but I read some parts of the Bible with close attention — like the Psalms — and I believe that Christendom is guilty of quite a bit of odd thought.

Hi Andrew, thanks for detailed discussion! Couldn’t this very plausibly be an example of scribal interpolation? Seems to make the most sense to me.

Another reference work on Romans 9:5 worth considering is Gordon Fee — Pauline Christology: An Exegetical-Theological Study (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2007 pp 272-277). Fee is not as fashionable as the authors mentioned in your study, and does not have the same approach. Nevertheless, this is an acclaimed work by an outstanding NT scholar. I also happen to agree with him! In a review of Fee’s book on Evangelion, Don Garlington says:

Readers may be surprised that in the two places in his letters where Paul appears explicitly to call Christ God, Rom 9:5 and Titus 2:13, Fee denies that such is the case. As regards the former, Fee concludes: “It seems incongruous both to the letter as a whole and to the present context in particular—not to mention Paul’s usage throughout the corpus—that Paul should suddenly call the Messiah theos when his coming in the flesh is the ultimate expression of what God is doing in the world” (277). Don Garlington - Evangelion

Fee’s interpretation is very detailed and densely argued, referring to the three interpretations as outlined in your post. The section needs to be read in full, but he comes to the following summary (my apologies for the absence of pointing):

My point, then, is that the presence of the ων is ultimately irrelevant in terms of meaning but its occurrence is almost certainly responsible for the present word order. Had Paul chosen to emphasize only that God should be blessed forever, then none of this discussion would have happened, because there would have been no ων επì πάντον.But since the emphasis is on God’s being the ultimate source and ruler of “all things,” especially the glorious history of his people, the word order comes out the way it does. It seems incongruous both to the letter as a whole and to the present context in particular—not to mention Paul’s usage throughout the corpus—that Paul  should suddenly call the Messiah θεος  when his coming in the flesh is the ultimate expression of what God is doing in the world.

(To make complete sense of this, the whole passage needs to be read, which it can be here).

The fact that Titus 2:13, which seems to say something similar to Romans 9:5, is brought into the argument seems to me significant.

Interestingly, the Codex Alexandrinus has a space and a punctuation mark between sarka and wn. Possible indication of how the scribe and his community undertood the text. Or even of uncertainty of authenticity.

O’Neill thinks the word “God” might have been absent from the original text, and that marginal notes have been inserted into the text by a copyist along the way. He notes that Codex Sangermanensis is missing “God” and Irenaeus has it in a different place in the sentence.

The result would be that the text originally said “of them is Christ, who is above all blessed forever”, which solves both the grammatical problems and the theological ones.

Here’s a possible alternative reading/punctuation of Romans 9:5 for your consideration. In verse 4 Paul presents a litany of benefits accruing to the Israelites. To the Israelites are the adoption and the glory and the covenants and the law-giving and the service and the promises — six “to-whoms” altogether in v4. The litany continues in v5, beginning with another “to whom” construction paralleling that at the beginning of v4. Maybe, instead of a to-whom and a from-whom, there are two “to-whoms” listed in v5, thus continuing the list begun in the preceding verse. I.e., to the Israelites are also (7) the fathers and (8) the God above all. The “from-whom” clause in the middle of the verse then serves as a subordinate modifier for the final “to-whom.” Thus: “to whom are the fathers and — from whom is the Messiah according to flesh — the God above all who is blessed to the ages, amen.” Or, reorganized into a more English syntax: “To whom are the fathers and the God above all, from whom is the Messiah according to the flesh, who is blessed to the ages, amen.”

It’s a bit of convoluted construction, but I don’t think it’s incorrect grammatically in Greek or in English. The question then becomes whether the God above all can be deemed the source of the Messiah “according to flesh.” I don’t know why not.

The reason why many “christians” tend to assume that GOd is equal to Jesus as opposed to separate is that the catolic church invented the doctrine of trinity, setting Jesus Christ equal to God.

The protestant church adopted this view which in reality is a combination of a heathen believe in a trinity of gods (such as Zeus and family) as passed on through new-Platonian scriptures referencing the trinitarian custom of Babylon.

The church in my theory then made a compromise since Judaism was strictly monoteistic, to maintain the monoteism but introduce trinity otherwise, as ONE God with 3 faces.

I believe its simply a humanly thought out invention in order to perhaps satisfy peoples need and habbit of worshipping trinities, and get them into the stable so to speak.

I believe we need to apply all factors of uncertainty including copies of the original scriptures containing mistakes or subjective interpretations, the intention of the church, variations in expressions and the lack of understanding the way of thinking at that time, PLUS the possible doubt of the apotoles making them being sometimes rather vague instead of clear in their definitions. Remember how the close disciples of Jesus had doubt until the end.

The way to fully understand the truth is to not memorise doctrines invented by the church but allow for the holy spirit to enlighten us, and cast aside our egos tendency to insist on conclusions, that is to be netral and objective and truth seeking as opposed to nurturing the ego and humans habbits, trends and tendency to assume the words of “authorities”. As Jesus says the authorities and titles matter nothing. Its the faith and humility that allows for truth to enter and for one to be worthy.

Thanks for this thread with many arguments/considerations similar to my mine. I wrote a thread in another language on a huge site providing emails as well as debates and many topics. The archive was seemingly lost. My thread about this topic was visited by many in a short time. THe title was: “Is trinity false? Is Jesus equal to God?” Was it the devil? Perhaps an inspiration for another book or article of yours? I am a writer myself writing about health combined with the power of faith.

By the way the text dissapeared when I forgot to write the verification. The first longer one not but this last one.

Cheers

I don’t think Paul would have any difficulty at all referring to Jesus as God in Romans 9:5 considering the fact that he applied YHWH from Joel 3:5LXX unto Him in Romans 10:13.

Regarding Romans 9:5 I support version c)

C) …from whom the Christ according to the flesh, the one being over all. God, blessed for the ages, amen.

You may find my arguments by searching for my name Dines in this thread.

One example of how the Church has deliberately manipulated with Pauls words is Titus 2:13

“while we wait for the blessed hope–the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, “

In many versions God was put equal to Jesus and the noun glory was substituted with glorious, an adjective.

How to ynderstand Titus 2:13: Jesus is Gods Glory. As simple as that. Never the less the Church manipulated with this and countless other sentences.

I see someone has written about this same argument in this thread.

God enlighten our path before us, amen.