John 17:3 and Unitarianism

John 17:3, from the mouth of Our Lord, reads, "Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent." I heard Muslims cite this passage and argue that this shows that God the Father is the only true God, and thus, Jesus is not. This is an invalid inference. And we know it's invalid because of the placement of the word "only". There is a difference between 

1. God the Father is the only true God 

and 

2. Only God the Father is the true God

The Muslim, and really any unitarian who wants to argue in this way, is saying (2) but the text only says (1). So what's the difference? (1) means that the Father is identical to God and there is exactly one God while (2) means the Father is identical to God and anything identical to God is identical to the Father. Trinitarians can affirm (1). We have to affirm (1). It is part of our faith. But (2) is clearly heretical, and is not supported by the text. 

To clarify further, (1) says X is the only Y, which emphasizes the uniqueness of Y, whereas (2) says only X is Y which emphasizes the exclusivity of X. So for example, to give a parallel example, we could say 

1b. Alice is the only student in class

and 

2b. Only the student Alice is in class 

1b allows for there to be other persons in the classroom. Maybe Billy is in the classroom, but is the teacher, not a student. 2b is exclusive in saying that there is no one else in the classroom with Alice, not even Billy the teacher. This is logically parallel, and clearly are saying two different things. So the unitarian misrepresents John 17:3 in this way. 


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