Was "the Word" Jesus before He/It became flesh?

[ViaCrucis]

Thanks, as always, for your thoughtful and complete postings.

It seems that you are holding together aspects that I am attempting to pull apart. (for examination purposes only)
I am a Trinitarian, but am considering how this "pre-incarnate" aspect may have worked on a more practical level.

The bit that I quoted above from your post is what I am considering.

My premise is that the pre-incarnate Logos of the Father became in flesh the incarnate Son known to us as Jesus.
But you want to recognize the Son as pre-incarnate, it seems.

Question: What is the point/purpose of the Word, the Logos, the reason of the Father, prior to the need for the Son incarnate?
And especially as it relates to that which was before the creation of this physical universe.

Earlier in this thread I posed the question if you struggled with the idea of God as always existing, which you said you didn't have a hard time with as a way to point out that, Jesus as the Son/Word, is God and so always has been. That is: it's the same thing. Saying "Jesus has always been" is no different than saying "God has always been", because Jesus, as God, has always been.

While He did not receive the name "Jesus" until His Incarnation, by His conception in the womb of the Virgin Mary and uniting to Himself our own human nature, He is nevertheless the self-same Person He has always been. His Identity, Who He is, has always been the same: He's the only-begotten Son of the Father, He's the Uncreated Word of God. What He is is God, Who He is is the Son and Word. "God" refers to His Being, nature, substance, essence, etc by His being what the Father is, for He is of the Father's Being and is one-in-being with the Father. "Son" and Word refers to His Hypostasis and Person--Who He is in relation to the Father. Who is He? He's the Son, the only-begotten of the Father, the Word, the Reason behind everything that exists because all things exist because of Him for God the Father made all things through Him. This Person of the Son, who by nature or Being is truly God in all timeless eternity, then united to Himself our humanity, becoming one of us, being conceived and born in time as a member of the human family, and given the name Jesus.

He is not, as it were, God joined to a man named Jesus. He is the man called Jesus, and the "He" here refers to the Eternal Son and Word.

So, then, in a similar way the question "what is the point/purpose of the Word ... prior to the need for the Son incarnate?" is likewise answered "what is the point/purpose of God?". In other words, God doesn't need a point, God is. To put it in language similar to that of Paul Tillich (though not wishing to imply I am necessarily agreeing with Tillich's views), God is the very "ground of being". He needs no cause, because He is uncaused, His existence is, and again I am going to borrow the language of philosophers, "necessary being". Our existence is a contingent existence, we contingently exist. But God is necessary being, His being doesn't depend on anything, He is because He is, "I Am that I Am". There is no contingency for His being, He is before all things and after all things, above and below all things: He exists therefore anything exists at all. We exist because God is. God doesn't have a because connected to Hi existence, He is that He is.

So "that which was before the creation of this physical universe" is in some sense an impossible question. Impossible because there is no such thing as a "before" here. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The very first thing that ever happened is the genesis of all reality, and God is the cause of that. He is before it, not because there is a time before creation; but because God is utterly transcendent from all else other than Himself, though He simultaneously is immanent and permeates all things.

But there is no before, because there can't be a before that precedes the first. There is a beginning of time, a beginning of all reality, the first moment--when time itself was created by God. At the first moment, when there came to be a moment at all, God said "Let there be" and it was.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Jesus is YHWH]

No worries. Okay then.

Let's begin here.
What does the term "pre-incarnate" mean in this context?
Meaning, what's the difference between the incarnate Son, Jesus and the pre-incarnate Logos?
The Logos became flesh.

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

It means the Son prior to His Incarnation, when He became a man.

 

[Jesus is YHWH]

Earlier in this thread I posed the question if you struggled with the idea of God as always existing, which you said you didn't have a hard time with as a way to point out that, Jesus as the Son/Word, is God and so always has been. That is: it's the same thing. Saying "Jesus has always been" is no different than saying "God has always been", because Jesus, as God, has always been.

While He did not receive the name "Jesus" until His Incarnation, by His conception in the womb of the Virgin Mary and uniting to Himself our own human nature, He is nevertheless the self-same Person He has always been. His Identity, Who He is, has always been the same: He's the only-begotten Son of the Father, He's the Uncreated Word of God. What He is is God, Who He is is the Son and Word. "God" refers to His Being, nature, substance, essence, etc by His being what the Father is, for He is of the Father's Being and is one-in-being with the Father. "Son" and Word refers to His Hypostasis and Person--Who He is in relation to the Father. Who is He? He's the Son, the only-begotten of the Father, the Word, the Reason behind everything that exists because all things exist because of Him for God the Father made all things through Him. This Person of the Son, who by nature or Being is truly God in all timeless eternity, then united to Himself our humanity, becoming one of us, being conceived and born in time as a member of the human family, and given the name Jesus.

He is not, as it were, God joined to a man named Jesus. He is the man called Jesus, and the "He" here refers to the Eternal Son and Word.

So, then, in a similar way the question "what is the point/purpose of the Word ... prior to the need for the Son incarnate?" is likewise answered "what is the point/purpose of God?". In other words, God doesn't need a point, God is. To put it in language similar to that of Paul Tillich (though not wishing to imply I am necessarily agreeing with Tillich's views), God is the very "ground of being". He needs no cause, because He is uncaused, His existence is, and again I am going to borrow the language of philosophers, "necessary being". Our existence is a contingent existence, we contingently exist. But God is necessary being, His being doesn't depend on anything, He is because He is, "I Am that I Am". There is no contingency for His being, He is before all things and after all things, above and below all things: He exists therefore anything exists at all. We exist because God is. God doesn't have a because connected to Hi existence, He is that He is.

So "that which was before the creation of this physical universe" is in some sense an impossible question. Impossible because there is no such thing as a "before" here. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The very first thing that ever happened is the genesis of all reality, and God is the cause of that. He is before it, not because there is a time before creation; but because God is utterly transcendent from all else other than Himself, though He simultaneously is immanent and permeates all things.

But there is no before, because there can't be a before that precedes the first. There is a beginning of time, a beginning of all reality, the first moment--when time itself was created by God. At the first moment, when there came to be a moment at all, God said "Let there be" and it was.

-CryptoLutheran

Excellent post on the Person of Christ. Have you read the 2 natures in Christ by Martin Chemnitz the Lutheran reformer ?