that very sense, for the basic presumption is that a single discourse does not employ one word in two unrelated meanings.

Fourth: The claim that the term “Father” is used with the special meaning they reserve for the Messiah can only stand once it is first known that such a meaning was indeed intended in his case. If they attempt to prove that meaning solely from the mere occurrence of the word “Father,” the argument becomes circular: one can know that the word carries that sense with respect to God only after it has been established that it was intended with regard to the Messiah, yet that cannot be established until the sense itself has already been proven. Because the knowledge of each point depends on the other, neither is ever secured. It is therefore evident that they possess no proof that the word “Father” bears, in reference to the Messiah, the specialized sense they allege in the disputed passage.

Fifth: In the writings of the prophets the name “Father” is indeed applied to God, but the name “Son” is never used for anything of the Godhead—neither for His Word nor for His Life. Whenever the word “Son” appears, it is invariably a designation for a created being; the title “Son,” then, is never used except for a created son. Consequently, the entity signified by “the Son” in the case of the Messiah must be his human nature. This undermines their assertion that “the Son” and “the Holy Spirit” are two attributes of God, and that “the Messiah” is a name that combines both divinity and humanity. Thus the textual evidence of the prophetic books refutes the doctrine of the Christians and contradicts the creed they profess.

They are therefore caught between two alternatives: either they affirm the words of the prophets and thereby invalidate their own religion, or they vindicate their religion and, in doing so, reject the prophets. This is exactly the point we wished to establish.