John 17:3 - Who is The Only True God?

I have recently has a Jehovah's Witness put forward the following challenge:

"(John 17:1-3) 17 Jesus spoke these things, and, raising his eyes to heaven, he said: “Father, the 

hour has come; glorify your son, that your son may glorify you, 2 according as you have given him 

authority over all flesh, that, as regards the whole [number] whom you have given him, he may 

give them everlasting life. 3 This means everlasting life, their taking in knowledge of you, the only 

true God, and of the one whom you sent forth, Jesus Christ. 

Most translations here use the expression “the only true God” with reference to the Father. NE 

reads“who alone art truly God.” He cannot be “the only true God,” the one “who alone [is] truly 

God,” if there are two others who are God to the same degree as he is, can he? Any others referred 

to as “gods” must be either false or merely a reflection of the true God.

If the Trinity were true, it should be clearly and consistently presented in the Bible. Why? Because, 

as the apostles affirmed, the Bible is God’s revelation of himself to mankind. And since we need to 

know God to worship him acceptably, the Bible should be clear in telling us just who he is." (4)

First, the Bible is very clear in telling us who Jesus is and that He is God.  I cannot imagine any doctrine 

more clearly presented in scripture. To repeat the details would make this a very long document, thus 

for the purposes of keeping this document short, I will simply recommend that the reader check out these 

documents which provide consider information and references from scripture which show without any 

possibility of doubt, that Jesus is God.

1) Is Jesus God? by Tom Smith

2) Is Jesus God? by Larry Mitchell

3) Who is Jesus? by Tom Smith

4) The Trinity by Larry Mitchell

These documents are not exhaustive on the evidence for the deity of Jesus. Indeed, the evidence is so 

overwhelming from Genesis through to Revelation that I doubt that anyone in their lifetime to write

a book which could exhaustively document the evidence for the deity of Jesus from scripture alone.

Now to the verse mentioned in this quote - let's look at what John 17:1-3 has to say.

John 17:1-4
17:1 Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said: "Father, the hour has come. 

Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, 2 as You have given Him authority over all 

flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. 3 And this is eternal life, 

that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. 
NKJV

Interestingly, the person who posted this message did not carry on to the next two verses, which read:

John 17:4-5
4 I have glorified You on the earth. I have finished the work which You have given Me to do. 5 And 

now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the 

world was.
NKJV

Note that Jesus and the Father shared the same glory together before the world began. Jesus is therefore 

not, as the Watchtower Society claims, a created being. Indeed, it was Jesus who created everything that is:

Col 1:16-18
16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, 

whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and 

for Him. 17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. 
NKJV

John 17:3 says that God is the only true God. This raises a question. The Watchtower Society translates 

John 1:1 as follows:

"In [the] Beginning the Word was, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god" (1)

If God the Father is the only true God, and Jesus is a god, then the Jehovah's witnesses have a bit of a 

quandry. Is Jesus there a false god? There interpretation of these verses are contradictory. On the other 

hand, scripture is clear that God is a trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Here we have no problem in 

saying that there is one true God, and that  Jesus is God.

Scripture is clear.

References:

(1) New Word Translation (NWT), Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, 1961

(2) Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by Permission. All rights 

reserved.

(3) Reasoning from the Scripture with the Jehovah Witnesses, Ron Rhodes, Harvest House Publishers, 1993

(4) Message from "hOPE12"on Answerway.com, Christianity Board, Sept 30, 2006. Note: The exact name of the person is not know due to

the option of anonymity on this site and the person has chosen to keep their identity hidden.