the only Son of God

The Text

The second phrase of the second article, and the immediate gloss on one Lord, Jesus Christ. The one Lord of clause 4 is here named as the only Son of God. Two predicates do the work: Son, the relational name (the same Son the Father of clause 2 eternally fathers); only (μονογενῆ / unigenitum), the qualifying adjective that distinguishes this Son from every other one whom scripture might call a son of God. Israel is called son of God (Hos. 11:1); Davidic kings are called son of God (Ps. 2:7; 2 Sam. 7:14); angels are called sons of God (Job 1:6; 38:7); the believers themselves are called sons of God by adoption (Rom. 8:14–15; Gal. 4:6). The creed is not denying any of these; it is naming the unique sonship that Jesus has and that grounds all the others. The only Son of God — the one and only, the unique, the eternally-begotten Son — is the Father’s first and own, and every other sonship is by adoption into his.

Translation Notes

Huion / Filium — Son. The relational name. Huios in Greek and filius in Latin both carry the full range of human-familial meaning: offspring, heir, inheritor of name and character. The New Testament applies Son to Jesus across the full range — Davidic-messianic (Mark 1:1; Acts 13:33), filial-relational (Jesus’ address of God as Abba, Mark 14:36), fully divine (John 1:14, 18; 3:16; Heb. 1:1–3). The creedal Son picks up the strongest, fully-divine sense, and clauses 6–8 unfold what this Son means in the trinitarian relation.

The same pastoral note that attaches to Father (clause 2) attaches here. Son in the creed does not project the human father-son relation onto God; it names the eternal trinitarian relation by which every human filiation is itself named (Eph. 3:14–15). The relation is the source; the human relation is the image.

Monogenē / unigenitum — only-begotten or only / unique. The most debated word of the clause. Two etymologies are possible for the Greek μονογενής. The traditional patristic-medieval reading takes the second element from γεννάω (to beget) and renders the word only-begotten — the Father’s one and only begotten Son. Recent New Testament scholarship (especially since the mid-20th century) has favored a different etymology, taking γένος as kind / sort (the same root that gives English genus, generic) and rendering μονογενής simply as only or unique — the one and only Son. Contemporary English Bible translations (NRSV, ESV, NIV, CEB) generally follow the latter; the 2011 Roman Missal restored the older only-begotten in Catholic English use.

The doctrinal substance is not at stake in the etymological question. Both readings affirm the unique status of the Son. The patristic-medieval reading puts the begetting explicitly in this clause; the modern reading defers it to clause 6 (eternally begotten of the Father), where the explicit verb is unambiguous. The creed itself can absorb both. The pastoral teacher should know the etymological history and the doctrinal stake, and should not require one rendering against the other.

The English only Son (ELLC 1988) carries the unique sense; the English only-begotten (BCP 1662, Roman Missal 2011) carries the begotten sense. Either is defensible. Only without begotten needs to be supplemented by the next clause; only-begotten contains both in one word. The Methodist parish that uses the ELLC form should read clause 6 with an ear for what only already implies; the parish that uses the older form should read clause 6 as the explicit unfolding of what only-begotten already named.

Historical Context

The confession of Jesus as the only Son of God sits at the intersection of three Old Testament–New Testament traditions.

The royal-messianic tradition. The Davidic king is called son of God in the Old Testament’s royal theology. I will be his father, and he shall be my son (2 Sam. 7:14, the Davidic covenant). You are my son; today I have begotten you (Ps. 2:7, the coronation psalm). The messianic-royal use is the immediate background of the Synoptic Gospels’ application of Son of God to Jesus, particularly at the baptism (Mark 1:11; Matt. 3:17; Luke 3:22) and the transfiguration (Mark 9:7).

The apocalyptic tradition. The intertestamental Jewish literature, in some streams (the Similitudes of Enoch, parts of the Qumran corpus), developed a more exalted son of God / Son of Man figure who would inaugurate the eschatological reign of God. Daniel 7:13–14 — one like a son of man coming on the clouds — gives the scriptural anchor.

The Wisdom-Logos tradition. The Jewish wisdom literature, especially Wisdom of Solomon and Sirach, articulated divine Wisdom as God’s firstborn (Prov. 8:22), the image of God’s goodness (Wis. 7:26), the agent of creation. The early church’s reading of John 1, Colossians 1, and Hebrews 1 picks up this tradition: the only Son of God is the eternal Word, the eternal Wisdom, the agent of creation, who has now become flesh in Jesus of Nazareth.

The New Testament’s monogenēs texts are concentrated in the Johannine literature: John 1:14 (we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son [μονογενοῦς] from the Father); John 1:18 (the only God [μονογενὴς θεός, in the best manuscripts], who is in the bosom of the Father, has made him known); John 3:16 (God so loved the world that he gave his only Son [τὸν Υἱὸν τὸν μονογενῆ]); John 3:18; 1 John 4:9. The Pauline use of firstborn (Rom. 8:29; Col. 1:15, 18) carries the same theological weight without using the monogenēs vocabulary.

The fourth-century controversies — the Arian challenge in particular — forced the church to articulate what the only Son of God meant in dogmatic precision. The Arian argument was straightforward: if the Son is begotten, then there was a time when the Son was not (since every begetting begins, by analogy from human begetting); therefore the Son is not co-eternal with the Father; therefore the Son is a creature, however exalted. The Nicene response (in clauses 6 and 8) is that the begetting of the Son is eternal, not temporal — from all eternity the Father is Father and the Son is Son. The only Son is only because his sonship is unique: it is eternal, immediate, of one being with the Father, in a way that no creaturely sonship can be.

The Constantinopolitan expansion of the creed in 381 sharpened the third article (on the Holy Spirit) but did not significantly modify clauses 5–6 on the only Son; the substance is already in the Nicene text of 325.

Lines of Interpretation

Patristic

Tradition: Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho; Irenaeus, Against Heresies III; Origen, On First Principles and Commentary on John; Athanasius, Discourses Against the Arians; Gregory of Nazianzus, Theological Oration III (On the Son); Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on John

The patristic settlement on the only Son of God holds two convictions in tension. First, the Son is unique — monogenēs in the strongest sense — distinct from every other sonship that scripture might name. Second, the Son is eternal — co-eternal with the Father, of one being with the Father, the eternal generation of the Father’s life. The two convictions are inseparable: the Son is unique because his sonship is eternal in a way no creaturely sonship can be.

Origen’s articulation of the eternal generation (Greek aïdios gennēsis) in the third century — that the Father’s generation of the Son is an eternal act, not a temporal beginning — gave the patristic tradition the conceptual tool it needed to resist Arianism in the fourth century. Origen’s formulation: the Father always generates the Son; the generation is co-eternal with the Father; there was not when the Son was not. This formula was decisive at Nicaea and remained authoritative for the Cappadocians and Augustine.

Gregory of Nazianzus’s Third Theological Oration (On the Son) is perhaps the single most penetrating patristic discussion of what Son means in the creedal grammar. Gregory’s argument: Father and Son name the relation, not the being; the Son is not a different thing from the Father but the same divine being in his eternal relation to the Father. Gregory’s careful distinction between what is shared (the divine being, fully) and what distinguishes (the relations of paternity and filiation) is the foundation of catholic Trinitarianism.

Strengths

• Holds the unique and the eternal of the Son’s sonship together as a single confession
• Origen’s eternal generation formula remains the foundation of the catholic doctrine
• Gregory of Nazianzus’s relation-not-being framework is permanently usable

Weaknesses

• Origen’s broader theological framework included some elements (esp. on the pre-existence of souls) that the later tradition had to retire, even while keeping his Christology
• The strong polemical context of the Arian controversy occasionally produced overstatements the New Testament does not warrant

Scholastic

Tradition: Anselm, Cur Deus Homo; Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.27 (on the procession of the Word) and I.33–35 (on the Father and the Son); Bonaventure, Disputed Questions on the Trinity

The scholastic tradition received the patristic doctrine and gave it Aristotelian-philosophical articulation. The Son is the Word (Verbum) of the Father — not a created word (which would be a sound or a thought distinct from the speaker) but the eternal Word who is the Father’s act of self-knowing. The Son is also the Image (Imago) of the Father — not a created image (which would be a representation distinct from the original) but the eternal Image who is the Father’s complete self-representation in his own being. The vocabulary of Word and Image allows the medieval tradition to articulate, with conceptual precision, what only Son names: the Son is one, unique, eternal, because he is the Father’s complete self-expression in his own divine being.

Aquinas’s treatment in Summa Theologiae I.27 unfolds the doctrine of the processions (the eternal acts by which the Son is begotten and the Spirit proceeds) with characteristic care. The generation of the Son is the procession of the Word from the Father’s act of self-knowing; the procession of the Spirit is the act of self-loving. The framework integrates the only Son of the creed with the doctrine of the Trinity in a single coherent articulation.

Strengths

• The Word and Image framework gives the only Son its full theological depth
• Aquinas’s treatment of the processions remains a foundational medieval synthesis
• The scholastic vocabulary preserves both unity and distinction in the Trinity with care

Weaknesses

• The Aristotelian framework is not native to scripture and requires translation
• Some scholastic discussions of the divine processions reached refinements the biblical witness does not warrant

Lutheran

Tradition: Luther, On the Councils and the Church; Augsburg Confession Art. III; Luther’s hymns (Vom Himmel hoch; Christ, unser Herr)

The Lutheran tradition has held the only Son of God confession in catholic form. The Augsburg Confession (Art. III) affirms the catholic doctrine: the Son of God, who is the Word of the Father, the very and eternal God, of one substance with the Father, took man’s nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin. Luther’s distinctive contribution is the pastoral integration of the doctrine with the gospel of justification: the only Son is the only Mediator (1 Tim. 2:5), and his unique sonship is the foundation of the gospel’s Christ alone (solus Christus) principle. The believer is saved by this Son and no other; the only Son of the creed is the only hope of salvation.

Strengths

• The integration of only Son with Christ alone is one of the great Reformation moves
• Luther’s hymnody (esp. Vom Himmel hoch) gives the doctrine pastoral form
• The Lutheran articulation has kept the doctrine from drifting into religious-pluralist accommodation

Weaknesses

• The polemical context of the Reformation occasionally produced articulations sharper than the patristic substance required
• The strong solus Christus register has sometimes been heard as anti-ecumenical, against the catholic substance the Reformers themselves intended to preserve

Reformed

Tradition: Calvin, Institutes II.14 (on the unity of the divine and human natures of Christ); Heidelberg Catechism QQ. 33–34; Belgic Confession Art. 10

The Reformed tradition has held the only Son confession in catholic form, with a distinctive pastoral accent in the Heidelberg Catechism. Q. 33 asks: Why is he called God’s only-begotten Son, since we also are God’s children? The catechism’s answer: Because Christ alone is the eternal and natural Son of God, and we are children of God by adoption for his sake. The catechetical move is exactly the right one for this clause: the only Son of the creed is the natural Son, the eternal Son, the unique Son; the believers are sons (and daughters) of God by adoption (Rom. 8:15) and for his sake. The two sonships are not in competition; the first is the foundation of the second.

The Belgic Confession (1561), Art. 10, gives the same articulation in confessional form: Jesus Christ, according to his divine nature, is the only-begotten Son of God, begotten from eternity, not made nor created, for then he would be a creature… of the same essence with the Father, co-eternal, the express image of his Father’s person.

Strengths

• The Heidelberg’s distinction between natural and adoptive sonship is permanently usable pastorally
• The Reformed confessional tradition has held the catholic substance with great care
• Calvin’s integration of the doctrine with the gospel is foundational for Protestant Christology

Weaknesses

• The Reformed scholasticism of the 17th century occasionally pressed the doctrine into refinements the New Testament does not warrant
• The strong emphasis on adoption has sometimes been heard as understating the depth of the believer’s union with Christ

Eastern Orthodox

Tradition: Athanasius, Discourses Against the Arians; Basil, On the Holy Spirit; Gregory of Nazianzus, Theological Oration III; Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on John; John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith I.8

The Eastern tradition has held the only Son of God confession with the strongest accent on the eternal generation and the monarchy of the Father. The Father is the unique source of the Son’s being; the Son is only-begotten because his being is wholly from the Father, eternally and immediately, in a manner unique among the persons of the Trinity. The Eastern tradition has been particularly careful to keep the only Son connected to the monarchy of the Father — the Son is only because he is the one Son of the one Father whose monarchy is the source of the divine life.

The iconographic tradition gives the doctrine its living visual form. The icon of Christ the Pantokratōr — the Son seated in glory, the book of the gospels in his hand, his other hand raised in blessing — is the visual confession that the only Son is the one Lord who rules from the Father’s throne. The icon of the Old Testament Trinity (Rublev’s most famous version) presents the three persons in their eternal communion, with the Son at the center (or sometimes at the right hand) — the only Son receiving the Father’s gift and offering himself to the world.

Strengths

• The eternal generation and monarchy of the Father together give the doctrine its full patristic depth
• The iconographic tradition keeps the doctrine present in living liturgical form
• The Eastern tradition’s vigilance against Arianism is permanently valuable

Weaknesses

• The strong monarchy-of-the-Father framework has occasionally been heard, in the West, as veering toward subordinationism
• The detailed theological vocabulary requires translation for cultures unfamiliar with the patristic-monastic tradition

Wesleyan

(See Wesleyan Voice below.)

Modern Ecumenical

Tradition: Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics I/1 §11 (on the Son); IV/2; Karl Rahner, The Trinity (1967); Robert W. Jenson, Systematic Theology I; Sarah Coakley, God, Sexuality, and the Self (2013)

The 20th-century theological recovery of the doctrine of the Trinity has carried with it a renewed articulation of the only Son of God. Barth’s treatment in Church Dogmatics I/1 §11 is foundational: the only Son of the creed is the eternal Son in whom God has elected to be God-for-us. Rahner’s recovery of the Trinity as the doctrine of the one God (against generic Western philosophical monotheism) restores the only Son to his proper place at the center of Christian theology. Jenson’s Systematic Theology I (1997) gives the most sustained recent American Protestant articulation.

The dialogue with religious pluralism has been a major focus of recent theological work. The only Son clause cannot be evaded in any honest Christian theology of religions: the Christian church confesses that Jesus is the only Son of God in a strong, dogmatically determinate sense. The question of how this confession relates to the genuine truth and grace present in other religious traditions is a serious one, and the contemporary church has been working it out (in dialogue with the documents of Vatican II, with the work of Karl Rahner, of Jacques Dupuis, of others). The dogmatic substance is not negotiable; the pastoral and practical implications are still being worked out.

Strengths

• The 20th-century recovery has restored the only Son to its proper centrality
• Barth’s election-Christology and Rahner’s trinitarian framework are foundational
• The contemporary discussion of religious pluralism has matured significantly

Weaknesses

• Some pluralist accommodations have effectively replaced rather than supplemented the creedal only — and whatever their merits, they cannot count as articulations of the creed itself
• The Western philosophical-trinitarian discussion has occasionally drifted from the biblical-narrative anchor

Wesleyan Voice

Wesley’s confession of Jesus as the only Son of God is unambiguous, catholic, and pastorally central. The Methodist Articles of Religion (1784), Article II — Of the Son of God, who was made very Man — affirms the doctrine in conciliar form: the Son, who is the Word of the Father, the very and eternal God, of one substance with the Father. Wesley’s Standard Sermons return repeatedly to the only Son as the Mediator, the Savior, the believer’s righteousness, the believer’s life. Sermon 5, “Justification by Faith,” is perhaps the clearest statement: Christ alone is the meritorious cause of our justification, and Christ in this context is the only Son of clause 5 — there is no other Son whose merit could save, no other Mediator between God and humanity (1 Tim. 2:5).

The Wesleyan pastoral accent is on the only of the clause. Only means the believer’s hope is wholly in Christ, not partly in Christ and partly in herself; only means the believer cannot save herself nor be saved by any other; only means the gospel is genuinely good news because the only Son is for the believer, in his life, in his death, in his resurrection, in his intercession.

The Wesleyan tradition’s distinctive contribution is the experiential register the only Son confession acquires. The believer who is justified by faith (Wesley’s Sermon 5) has received, by the Spirit’s witness, the assurance that the only Son is her Savior — not in general, but particularly. The Methodist class meeting was the practical site at which this confession became the believer’s working conviction. The only Son of the creed is the only Son who has saved me.

Wesley’s careful theological judgment on the only Son is also evident in his work on the doctrine of the Trinity. Sermon 55, “On the Trinity,” affirms the catholic doctrine without modification: the only Son is the eternal Son, co-eternal and co-essential with the Father. Wesley’s pastoral move — I do not pretend to explain — is the same move the patristic tradition made: the doctrine is confessed, not comprehended.

The hymnody of Charles Wesley names the only Son on nearly every page. Hark! the herald angels sing, / glory to the newborn King; / peace on earth and mercy mild, / God and sinners reconciled… veiled in flesh the Godhead see; / hail the incarnate Deity, / pleased as man with man to dwell, / Jesus, our Emmanuel. The Godhead veiled in flesh of the hymn is the only Son of the creed — and Charles’s repeated naming of this Son is the singable form of the Methodist confession.

The pastoral Wesleyan posture: confess Jesus as the only Son of God in the full catholic sense; receive him as the only Mediator of salvation; live in the assurance that the only Son is for the believer by the Spirit’s witness; refuse every diluting accommodation that would soften only into one among many; receive the believer’s own sonship-by-adoption as the gift of the only Son’s gracious sharing of his own relation to the Father.

Hymnody

The Methodist hymnody on the only Son is woven throughout the Christmas, Easter, and Christological repertoire.

“Hark! the herald angels sing” (Charles Wesley, 1739; alt.) is the great Methodist Christmas hymn, and its theological substance is precisely the only Son: veiled in flesh the Godhead see; / hail the incarnate Deity, / pleased as man with man to dwell, / Jesus, our Emmanuel.

“Of the Father’s love begotten” (Aurelius Prudentius, 4th c.; trans. J. M. Neale, 1854) is the great patristic Latin hymn on only-begotten: of the Father’s love begotten, / ere the worlds began to be, / he is Alpha and Omega, / he the source, the ending he, / of the things that are, that have been, / and that future years shall see, / evermore and evermore.

“O come, all ye faithful” (anon., 18th c.; trans. Frederick Oakeley, 1841) names the only-begotten Son explicitly: God of God, light of light, / lo, he abhors not the Virgin’s womb. The hymn’s lines paraphrase clauses 5, 7, and 11 of the Nicene Creed.

“Lo, how a Rose e’er blooming” (German, 15th c.; trans. Theodore Baker, 1894) names the only Son as the long-awaited fulfillment of prophecy: Isaiah ‘twas foretold it, / the Rose I have in mind; / with Mary we behold it, / the Virgin Mother kind.

“Crown him with many crowns” (Bridges 1851; Thring 1874) names the only Son’s glorification: crown him the Lord of life, / who triumphed o’er the grave, / and rose victorious in the strife / for those he came to save.

“Jesus, the very thought of thee” (Bernard of Clairvaux, 12th c.; trans. Edward Caswall, 1849) gives the medieval Latin devotional accent: Jesus, the very thought of thee / with sweetness fills the breast; / but sweeter far thy face to see / and in thy presence rest.

For the Trinitarian register: “Holy, Holy, Holy! Lord God Almighty!” (Heber, 1826) names the only Son in the trinitarian refrain (God in three persons); “Father, in whom we live” (Charles Wesley, 1747) gives a stanza to the Son: Spirit of holiness, / let all thy saints adore / thy sacred energy, and bless / thine heart-renewing power.

Pastoral and Liturgical Use

Two pastoral tasks attach to this clause.

The first is restoring the strong sense of “only.” In a pluralist culture, the creedal only is the most contested word of the second article — sometimes more contested than the patristic homoousios will be in clause 8. Only names the unique sonship of Jesus, in a way that cannot be paralleled by any other religious figure. Only names the unique mediation of Jesus, in a way that cannot be supplemented by other mediators. Only names the unique relation of Jesus to the Father, in a way that cannot be shared by any creaturely sonship — even the believer’s own.

The pastoral teaching task is not the dogmatic enforcement of only against the contemporary religious-pluralist context — that would be both pastorally counterproductive and theologically clumsy. The task is the careful unfolding of what only means. Only Son in the creed means the one Son whose sonship is eternal, unique, and constitutive of the divine life. It does not mean the only one who has ever known anything true about God (a denial scripture itself does not make — Acts 10, the cosmic-Christology passages). It does not mean the only one through whom God has ever worked (the Old Testament prophets, the cosmic providence of God, the work of the Spirit beyond the visible church are part of the Christian confession). Only Son names the unique relational status of Jesus in the Trinity — and from that unique status, all the rest of Christology unfolds.

The Heidelberg Catechism’s articulation is the working teaching device. Why is he called God’s only-begotten Son, since we also are God’s children? Because Christ alone is the eternal and natural Son of God, and we are children of God by adoption for his sake. The believer’s sonship is the fruit of the only Son’s unique sonship. The two are not in competition; the second depends on the first.

The second is restoring the believer’s adoption. The flip side of the only Son’s uniqueness is the believer’s adoption. By the Spirit, the believer is given to enter into the Son’s own relation to the Father — to cry Abba with the Son, to share his inheritance, to participate in his prayer to the Father. The doctrine of adoption is one of the great pastoral gifts of the gospel, and the Methodist tradition has been particularly strong here (see Wesley’s Sermon 9, The Spirit of Bondage and of Adoption). The believer is not made the only Son — the unique status remains the Son’s alone — but the believer is made a son (a daughter) by gracious inclusion in the only Son’s relation.

The Pauline texts on adoption (Rom. 8:14–17; Gal. 4:4–7; Eph. 1:5) are the pastoral source. The Spirit is the Spirit of adoption who cries Abba in the believer’s heart; the believer is the heir of God and fellow-heir with Christ; the inheritance is the kingdom the only Son has prepared. The clause’s pastoral substance is the framework for the entire Methodist ordo salutis — prevenient, justifying, sanctifying, glorifying grace — under the heading of the only Son’s gracious sharing of his own relation to the Father.

For the preacher: do not flinch from only, and do not narrow it. Only is the gospel: the Father has given one Son, and through him the world is being reconciled. Only is also the foundation of the believer’s adoption: only because the only Son is only can his sharing of his own relation with the Father be the gift the believer receives. Both moves are necessary, and both are pastorally life-giving.

Further Reading

• Genesis 22 — Abraham and his only son (the Old Testament typological background for the New Testament’s monogenēs usage)
• 2 Samuel 7:12–16; Psalm 2:7; Psalm 89:26–27 — the Davidic-royal son-of-God
• Proverbs 8:22–31 — Wisdom’s firstborn status
• Isaiah 9:6 — unto us a Son is given
• Matthew 3:17; 17:5 (and parallels) — the Father’s voice naming the Son
• John 1:14, 18; 3:16, 18; 1 John 4:9 — the Johannine monogenēs texts
• Romans 8:14–17, 29 — the believer’s adoption and the Son as firstborn
• Galatians 4:4–7 — God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem
• Ephesians 1:3–14 — adoption in the Beloved
• Colossians 1:15–20 — the cosmic Son
• Hebrews 1:1–5 — in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son
• Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho
• Irenaeus, Against Heresies Book III
• Origen, On First Principles I.2; Commentary on John
• Athanasius, Discourses Against the Arians
• Gregory of Nazianzus, Theological Oration III (On the Son)
• Basil of Caesarea, On the Holy Spirit
• Augustine, On the Trinity; Tractates on the Gospel of John
• Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on John
• John of Damascus, On the Orthodox Faith I.8
• Anselm, Cur Deus Homo
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I.27, I.33–35
• Heidelberg Catechism, QQ. 33–34
• Belgic Confession, Article 10
• Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 8
• Articles of Religion of the Methodist Church (1784), Article II
• Martin Luther, On the Councils and the Church
• Augsburg Confession, Article III
• John Wesley, Standard Sermons, esp. Sermons 5, 9, 55
• John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the New Testament on John 1, 3, and Romans 8
• Charles Wesley, “Hark! the herald angels sing” (1739)
• Aurelius Prudentius, Of the Father’s love begotten
• Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics I/1 §11; IV/2
• Karl Rahner, The Trinity (1967)
• Robert W. Jenson, Systematic Theology Vol. 1 (Oxford, 1997)
• Sarah Coakley, God, Sexuality, and the Self (Cambridge, 2013)
• Larry W. Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ (Eerdmans, 2003)
• Richard Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel (Eerdmans, 2008)