Exodus 4:22
Exodus 4:2222Then tell Pharaoh that this is what the LORD says: ‘Israel is My firstborn son,
JWs cite — "Israel is my firstborn son" — alongside to argue that "firstborn" denotes creation: just as Israel was called God's firstborn without being literally the first nation, Jesus is called "firstborn of all creation" as God's first and greatest created being. The parallel is used to support the JW position that "firstborn" can mean pre-eminent while still implying a point of origin within creation.
actually undermines the JW argument: Israel was not the first nation in existence, yet God calls Israel his "firstborn." The title designates rank and covenant privilege, not chronological origin. makes the same point explicitly: God says he will make David "firstborn, the highest of the kings of the earth" — yet David was not the first king (Saul was). commands angels to worship the Son, quoting (LXX/Dead Sea Scrolls) — a passage where YHWH himself is the object of worship. A monotheistic Jewish author would never apply a YHWH-worship text to a creature unless he identified the Son with YHWH. The Arian reading — that Jesus is a created being holding the rank of firstborn — was examined and rejected by the entire undivided church at Nicaea in AD 325, including men whose teachers had known the apostles.