This page is not about whether Joseph was Jesus' biological father or not. I already have a page about the Virgin Birth narrative. This page is about which "father God" Jesus prayed to and claimed to represent. I want to be perfectly clear up front. I do not believe Jesus was real, and I do not believe the Bible is a reliable source of information. However, I do think we can apply logic and reason to identify which God Jesus called his father, according to what we have written in the New Testament. For me, this debate is akin to a debate about whether Superman loved Lois Lane, according to the comic books. It is a debate about a fictional story with fictional characters, about the written narrative. People argue and debate whether Jesus represented a different God than the Jewish God of the Old Testament, but this page should put an end to that debate. According to the Bible, Jesus most certainly referred to the Jewish God, named Yahweh (Jehovah), as his father. The New Testament is written in Greek and the Old Testament is written in Hebrew, and the name Yahweh/Jehovah never appears in the New Testament, but Jesus makes it abundantly clear that he was calling Yahweh his father. Let me demonstrate the evidence.

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Mark 12 alone can end the debate. Jesus is teaching about the resurrection of the dead starting in verse 26 and says, "but about the dead, that they are raised, haven't you read in the book of Moses about the (burning) bush, how God spoke to him saying, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?' He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. You are therefore badly mistaken." Then someone asks Jesus what is the greatest commandment. Jesus answered in verse 29, "the greatest is: Hear Oh Israel, the LORD is our God, and the LORD is one." Jesus was quoting Deuteronomy 6:4, which is called the "shemah" by the Jews, because the Hebrew word for hear is sama (H8085). The Hebrew text says, "Hear Oh Israel, Yahweh is our God and Yahweh is one." So in this short reading from Mark 12, Jesus confirmed that Yahweh was his God, as well as the God of Moses, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. According to Jesus, they all worshipped the same God who was called Yahweh. In verse 32, a scribe said to Jesus, "Truly teacher, you have said well that he is one, and there is none other but he." Then in verse 34 Jesus says the scribe answered wisely and said, "You are not far from God's Kingdom." This short passage not only identifies that Jesus considered Yahweh to be his God, but it also destroys the Trinity doctrine that God is made up of three persons. 

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The next nail in the coffin of this debate is in Matthew 5:17-19 where Jesus says, "Don't think I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn't come to destroy, but to fulfill. For most certainly, I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not even one smallest letter or one tiny pen stroke shall in any way pass away from the law, until all things are accomplished. Therefore, whoever shall break one of these least commandments and teach others to do so, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven, but whoever shall do and teach them shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven." Jesus goes on to bring up some of the Old Testament/Mosaic Laws to confirm which commandments he is referring to. Clearly, Jesus affirmed Moses and considered Yahweh to be his God.

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Mark 7, starting in verse 8, Jesus said, "For you set aside the commandment of God, and hold tightly to the tradition of men; washing the pitchers and cups, and you do many other such things." He said to them, "Full well do you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your traditions. For Moses said, 'Honor your father and mother' and 'He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him be put to death.' But you say 'If a man tells his father or his mother whatever profit you might have received from me is Corban.' that is to say, given to God. Thus you make void the word of God by your traditions which you have handed down. You do many things like this." Once again, Jesus is siding with Moses and Yahweh against the Jews. Jesus is not rejecting the Hebrew Scriptures or the Hebrew God, Jesus is affirming the Hebrew Scriptures and the Hebrew God, while rebuking the Jews of his day who have replaced the Hebrew Scriptures (the word of God) with their traditions. 

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Now let's let Luke add a nail to the coffin. Jesus says in Luke 24:26-27, "Didn't the Christ have to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?" Beginning from Moses and from all the prophets, he explained to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. In verse 44 he says, "this is what I told you while I was still with you, that all the things which are written in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms concerning me must be fulfilled." Even though there is nothing about Jesus anywhere in the Hebrew Scriptures, it was his claim that everything was about him. See my page on the prophecy scam. So once again, Jesus was affirming the Hebrew Scriptures, Moses, the Hebrew prophets, and the Psalms and claiming that it was all prophesying about him. I want to point out another thing that jumped out at me in verse 44. Jesus said he pointed out all these things while he was still with them, as if he is speaking to them, but not really with them when he spoke. How does that work? The context is saying Jesus was speaking to them after he resurrected from the dead, so why would Jesus say he told them these things while he was still with them? It would make more sense if he said, I told you these things before I died and resurrected, rather than while I was still with you, because that implies that Jesus was not even with them anymore, which calls the resurrection into question. If Jesus was speaking to them spiritually while he was not with them, then maybe they were just hallucinating or making up a story.  

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Now it is John's turn. Jesus says in John 5:44, "How can you believe who receive glory from one another, and you don't seek the glory that comes from the only God? Don't think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you, even Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote about me. But if you don't believe his writings, how will you believe my words?" So Jesus is teaming up with Moses again against the Jews and saying that they did not believe or understand or obey Moses and that would be the cause of their downfall. Also, I underlined only God, because Jesus did not consider himself to be a God anywhere in the Bible. Christians call Jesus a god, and some Christians call Jesus the only God, but most Christians say Jesus is a member of a Triune god, which is unbiblical. 

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Another clear reference to which God Jesus recognized is in John 8:54, where he tells the Jews, "If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing. It is my Father who glorifies me, of whom you say that he is our God." So Jesus again is destroying Trinity, while identifying Yahweh as his father. Jesus is clearly saying that he is not glorifying himself, but that the one true God (called Yahweh by the Jews) was the one who glorified him. 

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John is supposed to be the book that most Deifies Jesus, but all throughout John, Jesus talks about his father who was the one true God. Jesus said in John 17:3, "This is eternal life, that they know you, the one true God and the one you sent, Jesus Christ." If the one true God sent Jesus, then Jesus is not the one true God, but that is slightly off topic for this page. Also, take note how Jesus talks about himself in the third person. He didn't say you sent me, he said the one you sent, Jesus Christ. Clearly, some anonymous author was putting words in the mouth of Jesus. The clues are everywhere, that the whole New Testament is a Roman propaganda campaign. 

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Also in John, we see Jesus calling the Jewish Temple his father's house. John 2:15 says Jesus made a whip of cords and drove all out of the temple and he poured out the money changers money and overthrew the tables and said, "Take these things out of here! Don't make my father's house a marketplace!" If the Jewish Temple was his father's house, then by default that makes Yahweh his father, because the Jewish Temple was built to honor Yahweh according to 1 Kings 5:5, which says, "Behold, I will build a house for the name of Yahweh my God, as Yahweh spoke to David my father, saying, ‘Your son, whom I will set on your throne in your place shall build the house for my name.'" If the Jewish Temple was Jesus' father's house, then Jesus' father was Yahweh. 

 

There is so much more I could say to support the Biblical teaching that the father/god of Jesus was the Jewish god called Yahweh. The authors of the New Testament did not teach that Jesus was part of a Triune god, nor did they teach that Jesus worshipped a different God from the Jews. Jesus quoted Moses and affirmed that he served the exact same God as the Jews, but Jesus claimed to know and understand Yahweh better than the Jews. There is no rational case that can be made that Jesus worshipped a different God than Yahweh.