--- title: John 1:3 url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/john-1-3/ markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/john-1-3.md type: verse perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching reference: John 1:3 testament: NT section: Gospels index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt --- # John 1:3 ## Text (Berean Standard Bible) > Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made. ## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase - NWT (2013 revision): "All things came into existence through him, and apart from him not even one thing came into existence." ## JW Usage JWs read this verse through Colossians 1:16 rather than the other way round. Because the Watchtower teaches that Jehovah created Jesus first and then made everything else through him, "all things came into existence through him" is understood as agency — Jesus is the master worker, the skilled craftsman of Proverbs 8:30, through whom Jehovah produced the rest of creation. The verse is taken to describe what Jesus did on Jehovah's behalf, not what Jesus is. A JW will often grant the verse readily and move straight to "but he was created first," treating creative agency as proof of subordinate rank rather than of divine identity. ## Protestant Usage This is the verse that closes the escape route, and it does so in the JW's own Bible. Their NWT reads: "All things came into existence through him, and apart from him not even one thing came into existence." Ask gently what "not even one thing" leaves out. If Jesus himself came into existence, then he is one of the things that came into existence — and the verse says every one of those came into existence through him. He would have to have made himself. Then set it beside Isaiah 44:24, where Jehovah says he stretched out the heavens alone and spread out the earth by himself, with no one else present. Two statements, both in their Bible: Jehovah created alone; all things were made through Jesus. There is no third option that keeps both true except that Jesus is not outside the identity of the one Creator. The grammar reinforces it. John has been using two different verbs. The Word "was" (en) — continuous, with no starting point in view. But all things "came to be" (egeneto) — a point of origin. John puts the Word on one side of that line and everything created on the other, and he never once crosses the Word over until verse 14, when the Word becomes flesh. Compare John 1:4, John 1:10. Some JWs who read from an interlinear point to the Greek word behind "apart from", choris, and suggest it leaves room for one exception: the Word himself, made first and standing outside the "all things". But choris means "without" or "separately from". It is the word Paul uses in Romans 3:28 when he says a person is declared righteous apart from works of law. It describes what happens when someone is absent from an action, not who is left off a list. John's claim is that if you take the Word out of the picture, nothing at all comes into being. Try reading it as "except" and the verse falls apart: "All things came into existence through him, and except for him not even one thing came into existence" would mean the Word was the only thing that ever came into existence, which contradicts the first half of the same sentence. John says it twice on purpose, once positively (all things through him) and once negatively (not even one thing without him), so that no created thing is left outside the Word's work. The NWT keeps the "without" sense, so you can make the point from their own Bible. Ask kindly which word in the verse means "except". ## NWT Issue The NWT renders this verse faithfully — "not even one thing came into existence" — with no qualifier added. That matters, because four verses into Colossians 1 the same translators insert "other" four times, so that Jesus creates "all other things." The two passages make the same claim in the Greek. Only one of them was adjusted. Reading John 1:3 and Colossians 1:16 side by side in the NWT itself is the quickest way to show that the qualifier in Colossians is the translators' addition and not the text's. ## Arguments Using This Verse - ['A God' = Polytheism](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/john1-polytheism.md) — John 1:1 + Exodus 20:3 + Isaiah 43:10 [Deity of Christ] - [Monogenes — 'Only Begotten' Means Unique](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/john3-16-monogenes.md) — John 3:16 [Deity of Christ] - [Jehovah Created Alone — So Jesus Must Be Jehovah](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/isaiah44-creator.md) — Isaiah 44:24 [Deity of Christ] - [Irenaeus Believed Jesus Is God](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/early-church-fathers-irenaeus.md) — Against Heresies — In Context [Deity of Christ] - [Let Us Make Man — The Isaiah 44:24 Trap](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/genesis1-26-let-us.md) — Genesis 1:26 / Isaiah 44:24 / Job 33:4 [Deity of Christ] - [Gods Who Die and God to Pharaoh Don't Parallel Jesus](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/psalm82-exodus71-gods-parallel.md) — Psalm 82:6-7 / Exodus 7:1 / John 10:34-36 [Deity of Christ] - [The Christian Shema — Paul Splits the Shema to Include Jesus](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/christian-shema.md) — 1 Corinthians 8:6 / Deuteronomy 6:4 / Isaiah 44:24 [Deity of Christ] - [Two Verbs, Two Categories](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/en-vs-egeneto-john-1-tense.md) — John 1 — the Word 'was' (ēn), creation 'came to be' (egeneto) [Deity of Christ] - [Two Matches, One Candle — How Three Persons Create as One](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/trinity-causal-overdetermination.md) — Causal overdetermination and opera ad extra sunt indivisa [Deity of Christ] - [The Prologue Has Two Bookends — Read John 1:18 Before You Argue About John 1:1](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/john1-1-and-1-18-inclusio.md) — John 1:1 and 1:18 — the opening and closing of John's prologue say the same three things [Deity of Christ] - [Was God Ever Without His Wisdom?](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/wisdom-and-power-of-god.md) — 1 Corinthians 1:24 — Christ is God's power and God's wisdom, so Proverbs 8 cannot make him a creature [Deity of Christ] - [Always the Father, Always a Son](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/eternal-father-eternal-son.md) — Malachi 3:6 / John 17:24 — if Jehovah never changes and has always been Father, he has always had a Son [Deity of Christ]