"Word [ λόγος]" ... "it" or "he"

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@Wolfgang said:
I just had a look in my Logos 8 at a French Bible "la Bible Louis Segond 1910" translation and noticed that in its translation of John 1:1-3 the female pronoun "elle" is used which corresponds to the word "parole ('word')".
Au commencement était la Parole, et la Parole était avec Dieu, et la Parole était Dieu. 2Elle était au commencement avec Dieu. 3Toutes choses ont été faites par elle, et rien de ce qui a été fait n’a été fait sans elle. 4En elle était la vie, et la vie était la lumière des hommes
(Segond, L. (1996). La Sainte Bible (Jn 1:1–4). Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.)

Why do you insist upon using secondary target languages that, as one with translation background well knows, there is not one to one word equivalency but also differences in word gender found in these target languages from the original? It does nothing to prove your theological argument, but does prove than gender issues exist in one language to another as well as pointing out the difficulty translators face in this respect.

Pages

@Wolfgang said:

"Word [λόγος]" by itself already refers to something declared, something spoken, a speech, a message ... in all occurrences!! Whether parts of the content of λόγος is given or not is not relevant, the meaning of λόγος remains "word, message, saying".

It is most certainly relevant to this discussion, or are you taking the position of one who believes there is, semantically or otherwise, only one meaning for each and every Greek word? For instance is πᾶς (all) in every case to mean “all“ without exception? Or do you take the context of what is written to determine if πᾶς is without exception, or with distinction (cf. Mk. 1:5).

λόγος in Jn. 1:1, 14 is used here in an entirely different sense than the other occurrences within John (λόγος as subject) as I have previously demonstrated in my post contrary to your research of λόγος.

Bill_Coley

I don't feel equipped to engage the linguistic issues you all are addressing in this thread (but congratulations on an excellent discussion!) I do, however, feel competent to engage a different aspect of the issue under review.

In my view, what John says about Jesus elsewhere in his first chapter provides consequential assistance to our interpretive efforts:

• John 1.9-10: Jesus is the light that comes into the world.
• John 1.11-12: Jesus (this is a clear and non-controversial reference to Jesus, unlike the "logos" references of prior verses) gives to people who believe in him the right to be children of God, those born of God. [John here has a prime opportunity to identify Jesus as the God whose children believers in him Jesus gives the right to be, but he doesn't.]
• John 1.14: - The "Word" became flesh, and in that fleshly appearance of the "Word" we see glory as of the Father's only Son. [John makes a clear distinction between the Father, whom he seems to identify as God, and the Father's son.]
• John 1.15: John the Baptist describes Jesus as one "who ranks before (him)." [He does NOT describe Jesus as God, who, it would go without John's saying, would obviously "rank before" him. JtB's decision to identify Jesus in this way, it seems to me, makes clear JtB's belief that Jesus is a fellow human, and not God. The "he was before me" phrase of the verse is a challenge to my proposition, I acknowledge, but it is about the only challenge to my contention that can be found in John 1 outside of the Prologue.]
• John 1.18: There are manuscript variations to this verse that matter. Among them, the meaning of the verse that makes the most sense to me is that no one has ever seen God. But the only Son of God has made God known.
• John 1.33-34: John the Baptist testifies that the one who sent him to baptize with water - certainly JtB means to refer to God - told him that the one on whom the Spirit descended is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. God has NOT told JtB that the one on whom the Spirit descended is God. JtB voices that conclusion himself in vs.34 when he says Jesus is the Son of God.
• John1.35-51: In his encounter with his first disciples, Jesus makes NO suggestion that he is God; he rather calls himself "the Son of Man." In addition, none of the disciples concludes Jesus is God: Andrew calls Jesus "the Messiah;" Philip tells Nathaniel that Jesus is the one about whom Moses and the prophets wrote; Nathaniel calls Jesus "the Son of God" and "the King of Israel."

Bottom line: There is no clear indication elsewhere in John 1 that either the Gospel writer, JtB, Jesus, or his disciples believe Jesus to be God. They rather believe him to be God's son, the predicted - and human - messiah of Israel.

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:
Why do you insist upon using secondary target languages that, as one with translation background well knows, there is not one to one word equivalency but also differences in word gender found in these target languages from the original?

I am only showing that other than English languages provide a proper translation in adjusting the pronouns to the grammatical gender of the translated noun in question, thus making clear that "word" (and not a male person with the title "word") is being referred to. Strangely, the English translation, instead of using the pronoun "it" for "word" in its regular sense and meaning, uses the pronoun "he" for "word" thus voluntarily changing the meaning of the whole statements by giving the impression that a "he" person -- as you called it "the Son" -- is being talked about.

It does nothing to prove your theological argument, but does prove than gender issues exist in one language to another as well as pointing out the difficulty translators face in this respect.

See above ... a wrong translation quite often is caused by false theological arguments and adherence to theological dogmas and doctrines.

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:

@Wolfgang said:
"Word [λόγος]" by itself already refers to something declared, something spoken, a speech, a message ... in all occurrences!! Whether parts of the content of λόγος is given or not is not relevant, the meaning of λόγος remains "word, message, saying".

It is most certainly relevant to this discussion, or are you taking the position of one who believes there is, semantically or otherwise, only one meaning for each and every Greek word?

I am well aware that words can take on and do have different meanings in different contexts ... as it is the context which determines the meaning of a word within that context.

There is no change in context in John 1:1 which would necessitate a change in meaning of the word λόγος to all of a sudden and supposedly only in these verses no longer mean "message, saying, word" and be a reference to a male person, a "he".

For instance is πᾶς (all) in every case to mean “all“ without exception? Or do you take the context of what is written to determine if πᾶς is without exception, or with distinction (cf. Mk. 1:5).

The word "all" can not only have these two meanings, but also carry the meaning of "the larger part of" ...

λόγος in Jn. 1:1, 14 is used here in an entirely different sense than the other occurrences within John (λόγος as subject) as I have previously demonstrated in my post contrary to your research of λόγος.

There is no different sense in these occurrences ... 1Pe 1:20 and Gal 4:4, as well as Scripture as a whole, indicate rather plainly that the beginning of "the Son of God" was in the form of "word" and NOT in the form of a living angel, a God-spirit-person, a spirit, etc ... God's plan in God's mind and foresight and foreknowledge was in the beginning, and in the course of time this "Word" was made known and when the time was fulfilled, this "Word" became the reality of which this Word spoke in that the man Jesus was born.

[Deleted User]

@Bill_Coley said:
...
...
Bottom line: There is no clear indication elsewhere in John 1 that either the Gospel writer, JtB, Jesus, or his disciples believe Jesus to be God. They rather believe him to be God's son, the predicted - and human - messiah of Israel.

Indeed ... and as such, they also did not believe that he already lived in some other form or shape prior to his conception and birth.
Thus, the contextual evidence you pointed out also shows that λόγος in John 1 is not a reference to a living male ("he") person, but carries its regular meaning of "WORD".

A short illustration from my personal experience of "word became flesh": Even prior to our wedding, my wife and I talked about a plan of wanting to have children. This "word" was in the beginning, this "word" was with us, and it "was" us (in our words, it was our word). 15 months after we were married, this "word became flesh" when our son was born, 4 years later, our "word became flesh" again when our daughter was born.
Were our children already living beings in some shape or form other than human prior to their conception and birth? No! Did they already exist? Yes ... not as living spirits or whatever, but in the form of "word" in our minds and hearts and plan.

What in the world is so difficult to understand John 1 ??

Pages

@Wolfgang said:

@Pages said:
Why do you insist upon using secondary target languages that, as one with translation background well knows, there is not one to one word equivalency but also differences in word gender found in these target languages from the original?

I am only showing that other than English languages provide a proper translation in adjusting the pronouns to the grammatical gender of the translated noun in question, thus making clear that "word" (and not a male person with the title "word") is being referred to. Strangely, the English translation, instead of using the pronoun "it" for "word" in its regular sense and meaning, uses the pronoun "he" for "word" thus voluntarily changing the meaning of the whole statements by giving the impression that a "he" person -- as you called it "the Son" -- is being talked about.

It does nothing to prove your theological argument, but does prove than gender issues exist in one language to another as well as pointing out the difficulty translators face in this respect.

See above ... a wrong translation quite often is caused by false theological arguments and adherence to theological dogmas and doctrines.

I’ll restate my position again in regard to the issue of gender within the realm of translation from the Greek text of the NT – and that is, when one has these type of questions one ought to defer to the original language source text to inform their target translation text.

On the issue of gender, what gender is the Holy Spirit in German?

Two questions come to mind that I’m curious about with regard to λόγος and οὗτος in our discussion:

First, would you please provide for me the location in John’s Gospel where λόγος is translated in any written translation as “God’s plan”, or “plan“.

Secondly, in John’s gospel would you kindly direct me to where λόγος is the subject in a clause and also the antecedent of οὗτος as the subject in an immediately following clause apart from Jn. 1:1-2.

Pages

@reformed said:

At minimum, you must call it a title and not a thing given the context of the passage.

Are you thinking of Rev. 19:13, and in the OT the Word of the Lord, or the Word of God – Memra in the Targums?

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:
I’ll restate my position again in regard to the issue of gender within the realm of translation from the Greek text of the NT – and that is, when one has these type of questions one ought to defer to the original language source text to inform their target translation text.

This has been the underlying basis the whole time ... perhaps should have stated it separately instead of by implication in the various posts which address of grammatical gender
The Greek word λόγος is of masculine grammatical gender and thus in Greek will have pronouns associated with it in masculine gender. This is the case in any occurrence of the word λόγος in any context. The word λόγος always refers to someTHING (word, message, saying, etc), but not to someONE (a person, male or female).

When translating into another language, a correct translation will adjust any pronouns to the grammatical gender of the noun that is translated from λόγος -- in German "das Wort" (neuter grammatical gender), in French "la parole" (feminine grammatical gender). As for English with no clearly visible grammatical gender, a correct translation will then use the pronoun in regards to the natural gender of to what the noun refers, and the English term "word" (message, saying, etc) would therefore have to be "it", in order to falsely give the impression that "word" would not refer to a thing but instead by a name of a person or similar, in case of "he" a male person, in case of "she" a female person.

So much for original language gender and translation matters associated with it.

On the issue of gender, what gender is the Holy Spirit in German?

The word for "spirit" is "Geist" with masculine grammatical gender ... but that does NOT provide any indication for whether the word "Geist" refers to a person (with no natural gender anyways) or something (an "it" -- for example, that spirit power with which God empowered His prophets and by which spirit power they received revelation and declared God's message)

Two questions come to mind that I’m curious about with regard to λόγος and οὗτος in our discussion:

First, would you please provide for me the location in John’s Gospel where λόγος is translated in any written translation as “God’s plan”, or “plan“.

Firstly, this is not a question, is it? Secondly, "plan" consists of thoughts which are always formulated as words, etc ... the term "Word" in John 1 in the overall context of John and Scripture as a whole is clearly (at least to me) a reference to that "word" in God's plan of redemption and salvation about that Messiah Whom He (God) would provide and sent and who would be a human being (cp v.14 "made flesh", not "made {something else}" )

Secondly, in John’s gospel would you kindly direct me to where λόγος is the subject in a clause and also the antecedent of οὗτος as the subject in an immediately following clause apart from Jn. 1:1-2.

The word οὗτος actually is better translated "this" or "the same" (rather than "he") which again is a clear reference back to the "word (message)". Also, please note, what I mentioned above regarding grammatical gender of λόγος and associated pronouns of course applies here as well ... in Greek οὗτος corresponds to the grammatical masculine gender of the noun λόγος, and - as you may correctly suspect - the German and French translations have "the same" in their respective neuter / feminine grammatical gender as well.
The word οὗτος as a subject for a sentence does NOT mean that it is a male person ("he").

Pages

@Wolfgang said:

The word οὗτος as a subject for a sentence does NOT mean that it is a male person ("he").

First, I have sincerely enjoyed our exchanges.

Lastly, and in closing, John in his gospel writes οὗτος (in the masc. singular nominative case) as the subject of a clause a total of twenty-two times, where twenty-one times οὗτος is making reference to a (male) person – the twenty-second instance is of course Jn. 1:2.

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:

@Wolfgang said:
The word οὗτος as a subject for a sentence does NOT mean that it is a male person ("he").

Lastly, and in closing, John in his gospel writes οὗτος (in the masc. singular nominative case) as the subject of a clause a total of twenty-two times, where twenty-one times οὗτος is making reference to a (male) person – the twenty-second instance is of course Jn. 1:2.

Which proves nothing in regards to Jn 1:2 ... as the pronoun οὗτος is NOWHERE by itself defining anything or anyone, it is always the context and antecedent noun to which it refers.
Thus, if I write an article and speak of a lady (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") talking a walk in the garden while the sun (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") is shning, and in 99 passages I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back the "the lady" and in 1 passage I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back to "the sun", do you want to tell me from this supposed textual evidence that "the sun" is actually "the lady" ???
That John is using οὗτος in 21 passages in direct reference to "a male person" and in 1 passage to "word", does NOT at all make "Word" to be "a male person", no more than my 99 passages about "the lady" would make "the sun" in the 1 passage "the lady".

Pages

@Wolfgang said:

@Pages said:

@Wolfgang said:
The word οὗτος as a subject for a sentence does NOT mean that it is a male person ("he").

Lastly, and in closing, John in his gospel writes οὗτος (in the masc. singular nominative case) as the subject of a clause a total of twenty-two times, where twenty-one times οὗτος is making reference to a (male) person – the twenty-second instance is of course Jn. 1:2.

Which proves nothing in regards to Jn 1:2 ... as the pronoun οὗτος is NOWHERE by itself defining anything or anyone, it is always the context and antecedent noun to which it refers.
Thus, if I write an article and speak of a lady (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") talking a walk in the garden while the sun (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") is shning, and in 99 passages I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back the "the lady" and in 1 passage I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back to "the sun", do you want to tell me from this supposed textual evidence that "the sun" is actually "the lady" ???
That John is using οὗτος in 21 passages in direct reference to "a male person" and in 1 passage to "word", does NOT at all make "Word" to be "a male person", no more than my 99 passages about "the lady" would make "the sun" in the 1 passage "the lady".

You make an excellent and valid point in this example regarding context; however, were I to re-write your one passage example to something along the lines of ...the Sun, as she is known by a close intimate group of friends and associates – removes “Sun” from the realm of solar objects to that of being a sense of title or nickname does it not. I’ve used the same grammatical form for both terms as you in your writing, and yet we have contextually two different and separate meanings implied by the construct of our 1 out of 99 passages.

reformed

@Wolfgang said:

@reformed said:
At minimum, you must call it a title and not a thing given the context of the passage.

From where in the context of the passage do you get the idea that "word" is a title ?????
The language used in John 1:1-3 has nothing that would be indicative of this term being "title".
Compare the rest of the passages in John where the word logos is used to get a better picture of how John understood and used the term "word"/logos ... there is no indication that John used the term differently from how he used it in other passages.

Because the whole passage is talking about Christ. The Word is the title for Christ in this passage.

[Deleted User]

@reformed said:

@Wolfgang said:
From where in the context of the passage do you get the idea that "word" is a title ?????
The language used in John 1:1-3 has nothing that would be indicative of this term being "title".
Compare the rest of the passages in John where the word logos is used to get a better picture of how John understood and used the term "word"/logos ... there is no indication that John used the term differently from how he used it in other passages.

Because the whole passage is talking about Christ. The Word is the title for Christ in this passage.

Well .... isn't indeed not only this passage but rather the whole gospel of John is talking about Christ? What about all the other passages in which "the word" is mentioned?

In Jh 1:1ff we are told that the beginning of Christ was in the form of "word" (in the beginning was the word"), and in Jh 1:14 we are told that the form changed from "word" to "flesh" ("the word became flesh").

Do you not agree that there was first God's plan of a coming human Messiah (cp Gen 3:15 prophecy of "seed of the woman") and later when the time had come for this prophecy to be fulfilled, this human Messiah was born of a woman (cp Gal 4:4) ??
You seem to have Christ (how would you address him with the title "Word" ? "Word Christ"?? ) already living and carrying out his ministry even before God's plan was even in existence ?

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:

@Wolfgang said:
Thus, if I write an article and speak of a lady (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") talking a walk in the garden while the sun (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") is shining, and in 99 passages I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back the "the lady" and in 1 passage I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back to "the sun", do you want to tell me from this supposed textual evidence that "the sun" is actually "the lady" ???
That John is using οὗτος in 21 passages in direct reference to "a male person" and in 1 passage to "word", does NOT at all make "Word" to be "a male person", no more than my 99 passages about "the lady" would make "the sun" in the 1 passage "the lady".

You make an excellent and valid point in this example regarding context; however, were I to re-write your one passage example to something along the lines of ...the Sun, as she is known by a close intimate group of friends and associates – removes “Sun” from the realm of solar objects to that of being a sense of title or nickname does it not. I’ve used the same grammatical form for both terms as you in your writing, and yet we have contextually two different and separate meanings implied by the construct of our 1 out of 99 passages.

You are making my point ... getting back to the record in the gospel of John, Joh 1:1ff is 1 passage which should not be interpreted as οὗτος referring to a male person as in 21 other passages. "Word" is NOT a "person", but a thing ... and as 1Pe 1:20 further indicates, it was indeed "word" (and not a living person) that existed even before the foundation of the world in God's foreknowledge in God's mind.

reformed

@Wolfgang said:

@reformed said:

@Wolfgang said:
From where in the context of the passage do you get the idea that "word" is a title ?????
The language used in John 1:1-3 has nothing that would be indicative of this term being "title".
Compare the rest of the passages in John where the word logos is used to get a better picture of how John understood and used the term "word"/logos ... there is no indication that John used the term differently from how he used it in other passages.

Because the whole passage is talking about Christ. The Word is the title for Christ in this passage.

Well .... isn't indeed not only this passage but rather the whole gospel of John is talking about Christ? What about all the other passages in which "the word" is mentioned?

Red Herring. The context of the immediate passage is what you look at first.

In Jh 1:1ff we are told that the beginning of Christ was in the form of "word" (in the beginning was the word"), and in Jh 1:14 we are told that the form changed from "word" to "flesh" ("the word became flesh").

No, we are not told in John 1:1 that Christ's form was a word. You are reading that into the passage. Word is clearly a title.

Do you not agree that there was first God's plan of a coming human Messiah (cp Gen 3:15 prophecy of "seed of the woman") and later when the time had come for this prophecy to be fulfilled, this human Messiah was born of a woman (cp Gal 4:4) ??

I never disagreed with that. And God the son fulfilled that by becoming flesh and being born of a woman.

You seem to have Christ (how would you address him with the title "Word" ? "Word Christ"?? ) already living and carrying out his ministry even before God's plan was even in existence ?

Nope, not sure how you come to that conclusion. Remember, through Christ all things were made, therefore he obviously was in existence before his human birth.

[Deleted User]

@reformed said:

@Wolfgang said:

Because the whole passage is talking about Christ. The Word is the title for Christ in this passage.

Well .... isn't indeed not only this passage but rather the whole gospel of John is talking about Christ? What about all the other passages in which "the word" is mentioned?

Red Herring. The context of the immediate passage is what you look at first.

But that is exactly what I am doing ... I am reading "word" and understand "word". YOU are the one who is NOT looking at the immediate context, since you are reading "word" and interpret "Christ".

In Jh 1:1ff we are told that the beginning of Christ was in the form of "word" (in the beginning was the word"), and in Jh 1:14 we are told that the form changed from "word" to "flesh" ("the word became flesh").

No, we are not told in John 1:1 that Christ's form was a word. You are reading that into the passage. Word is clearly a title.

I am reading "word" and I am reading "beginning" and I understand the passage in light of the remote context of 1Pe 1:20 (speaking about the same topic) that "word" is meant as "word" and it refers to what was in God's foreknowledge, what God had in mind from even before the foundation of the world.
You are reading "Christ" into the verse and re-interpret "word" to be a title of Christ,

Do you not agree that there was first God's plan of a coming human Messiah (cp Gen 3:15 prophecy of "seed of the woman") and later when the time had come for this prophecy to be fulfilled, this human Messiah was born of a woman (cp Gal 4:4) ??

I never disagreed with that.

IF you believe that Christ already lived as a living person of some kind prior to being foreknown in God's foreknowledge and prior to God's plan of a human Messiah being promised, then you are disagreeing with what Scripture teaches about God's plan being first and the realization of the plan coming second.

And God the son fulfilled that by becoming flesh and being born of a woman.

Again, you are reading into the passage, there is NOTHING whatever about a God-Person (a "God the Son") "becoming flesh" in the passage.

You seem to have Christ (how would you address him with the title "Word" ? "Word Christ"?? ) already living and carrying out his ministry even before God's plan was even in existence ?

Nope, not sure how you come to that conclusion.

This seems to be what you are indicating or implying by your interpretation of an already existing "Christ" for whom "Word" is a title ... meaning that Jhn 1:1ff is actually saying "in the beginning was Christ ... etc etc"

Remember, through Christ all things were made, therefore he obviously was in existence before his human birth.

God (the Father of Christ Jesus, the Almighty, etc) was the CREATOR ... Jesus was not an alive acting person at the time. This should be very clear from the statements of Jesus himself, for example where he made reference back to when God made and created man as male and female, etc (notice: Christ did not speak of himself creating man as male and female !!)
In Jhn 1, the text speaks of God (the Father of Jesus, the ALmighty, the Creator, etc) who made all things by means of His Word .... and God did so in accordance with and with a view toward what His plan for the coming of the human Messiah required.

Pages

@reformed said:

@Wolfgang said:

@reformed said:
At minimum, you must call it a title and not a thing given the context of the passage.

From where in the context of the passage do you get the idea that "word" is a title ?????
The language used in John 1:1-3 has nothing that would be indicative of this term being "title".
Compare the rest of the passages in John where the word logos is used to get a better picture of how John understood and used the term "word"/logos ... there is no indication that John used the term differently from how he used it in other passages.

Because the whole passage is talking about Christ. The Word is the title for Christ in this passage.

I'm in agreement with you that John is using λόγος in this sense at Jn. 1:1, 14.

Pages

@Wolfgang said:

@Pages said:

@Wolfgang said:
Thus, if I write an article and speak of a lady (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") talking a walk in the garden while the sun (in German feminine grammatical gender, "she") is shining, and in 99 passages I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back the "the lady" and in 1 passage I use "she" as a subject in a sentence referring back to "the sun", do you want to tell me from this supposed textual evidence that "the sun" is actually "the lady" ???
That John is using οὗτος in 21 passages in direct reference to "a male person" and in 1 passage to "word", does NOT at all make "Word" to be "a male person", no more than my 99 passages about "the lady" would make "the sun" in the 1 passage "the lady".

You make an excellent and valid point in this example regarding context; however, were I to re-write your one passage example to something along the lines of ...the Sun, as she is known by a close intimate group of friends and associates – removes “Sun” from the realm of solar objects to that of being a sense of title or nickname does it not. I’ve used the same grammatical form for both terms as you in your writing, and yet we have contextually two different and separate meanings implied by the construct of our 1 out of 99 passages.

You are making my point ... getting back to the record in the gospel of John, Joh 1:1ff is 1 passage which should not be interpreted as οὗτος referring to a male person as in 21 other passages. "Word" is NOT a "person", but a thing ... and as 1Pe 1:20 further indicates, it was indeed "word" (and not a living person) that existed even before the foundation of the world in God's foreknowledge in God's mind.

I disagree that I’m making your point. On the contrary, it has been demonstrated in my example how the same term Sun may be used outside of it’s common-use meaning (a solar object) to that of being considered semantically as having an additional use and meaning (title/nickname) in this specific term’s domain. And so for λόγος in its use at Jn. 1:1.

Grammatically and syntactically John’s usage of the demonstrative οὗτος as subject referring to a male unquestionably in twenty-one of twenty-two uses in this gospel is strong evidence for a considered application to Jn. 1:1.

Moreover, in regard to your ““Word” is not a “person”, but an thing” statement, I refer you to John writing in Rev. 19:13 ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ where our term (λόγος) is being used of a male (αὐτοῦ) as a name (ὄνομα). Is there any question that ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ is applied to a male in this passage, or that λόγος is here being used in a different sense?

We find similar usage in the OT regarding the Word of the Lord being used in this manner. Where the Word of the Lord is seen, revealed, comes as a personal presence, even making physical contact (cf. Gen. 15:1; 1Sam. 3:1-10; Jer. 1:4-9). I would maintain that these OT passages are informing John’s writing of vs. 1-2, 14.

[Deleted User]

@Pages said:
I disagree that I’m making your point. On the contrary, it has been demonstrated in my example how the same term Sun may be used outside of it’s common-use meaning (a solar object) to that of being considered semantically as having an additional use and meaning (title/nickname) in this specific term’s domain. And so for λόγος in its use at Jn. 1:1.

You have not shown that at all ... John does NOT use the term as a title or name, just compare all the many other places where John uses the term λόγος. Let's apply the same consideration which you suggest below for John's use of the demonstrative pronoun οὗτος ...

Grammatically and syntactically John’s usage of the demonstrative οὗτος as subject referring to a male unquestionably in twenty-one of twenty-two uses in this gospel is strong evidence for a considered application to Jn. 1:1.

See above ... that is only the case because in the many passages the pronoun refers back to a male person in its context, where in John 1, it does NOT refer to a male person but to "Word", which is NOT a person but a thing. This truth, by the way, is shown rather plainly and clearly in many Bible translations in other languages than English, which all adjust the gender of the pronoun correctly to the gender of the noun used for "word". None of these just arbitrarily uses a "he, him" in order to make it look as if there had been a male person already in the beginning living as God together wirh (another) God, etc ....

Moreover, in regard to your ““Word” is not a “person”, but an thing” statement, I refer you to John writing in Rev. 19:13 ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ where our term (λόγος) is being used of a male (αὐτοῦ) as a name (ὄνομα).

I would think that you would agree that A NAME is a thing, not a male person?? See, even in this passage the word λόγος is NOT a male person.

Is there any question that ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ is applied to a male in this passage, or that λόγος is here being used in a different sense?

There is no question that the word λόγος is such a reference, not in John 1 either! But in both passsages, λόγος is NOT itself the living person.

In John 1, the text does NOT say "In the beginning lived the person Jesus, and the person Jesus was living together with God. and that person Jesus was God". This becomes epecially clear in v. 14, where the text says "Word BECAME flesh ("flesh" used as a term in a figure of speech to indicate "a living human person") ... thus it should be obvious that before this time (also referred to in Gal 4:4), that "word" was not a living person.

We find similar usage in the OT regarding the Word of the Lord being used in this manner. Where the Word of the Lord is seen, revealed, comes as a personal presence, even making physical contact (cf. Gen. 15:1; 1Sam. 3:1-10; Jer. 1:4-9). I would maintain that these OT passages are informing John’s writing of vs. 1-2, 14.

I would suggest a study of the field of figures of speech as used in the Bible, for the above passages a knowledge of Hebrew idiom would greatly help.