Journal: Southern Baptist Journal of Theology
Volume: SBJT 25:1 (Spring 2021)
Article: The Divine Word In The Theology Of John Gill (1697–1771)
Author: Jonathan E. Swan

SBJT 25:1 (Spring 2021) p. 131

The Divine Word In The Theology Of John Gill (1697–1771)

Jonathan E. Swan

Jonathan E. Swan is a PhD candidate in Church History and Historical Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky. Jonathan teaches Greek at Highlands Latin School, Louisville, Kentucky and serves as Director of Operations for The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood where he is also the book review editor for Eikon: A Journal for Biblical Anthropology.

John Gill’s theology of the divine Word had ramifications for his understanding of the immanent and economic Trinity. Basing the origin of this divine name on the apostle John’s interpretation of the Old Testament (OT), Gill applied the significance of the Son’s identification as the divine Word to his understanding of the Son’s divine nature and works. Gill’s understanding of the Son as the divine Word incorporated the analogy of the mind, inherited from church tradition and bolstered by Greek Philosophy. This analogy was further understood by Gill’s incorporation of other Scriptural images, and was further apprehended by the Son’s identification as Wisdom. These analogies, names, and images were mutually defining for understanding the nature of the divine Word, the Son of God. The central theological implications of this divine name, which include the Word’s deity, eternality, and distinct personality, were all based on Gill’s reading of Scripture, most notably in the Gospel of John. The economic implications of this name include the Son’s role in the eternal council and covenant of grace and his co-efficient work in speaking creation into existence. As the Word, the Son was not only spoken of in the OT, but as the interpreter of the Father’s mind, he knows God’s mind and has revealed it throughout all ages, most definitively in the

SBJT 25:1 (Spring 2021) p. 132

incarnation. As the divine Word, the Son is the Mediator who intercedes on behalf of the elect. Thus, understanding the identity of the divine Word provided Gill with a way of understanding central elements of his Trinitarianism and soteriology.

The Identity Of The Word

Seventeenth and eighteenth-century England saw a rise in antitrinitarian theology that required constant attention. John Gill, a Baptist pastor in London, first published on the Trinity in his 1731 The Doctrine of the Trinity, Stated and Vindicated.1 The spread of Sabellianism among Baptists formed the immediate context for its composition and publication.2 This work, however, provided a robust biblical and theological defense of the Trinity against both Sabellianism ...