The Word of Yahweh
Famously, St. John opens his Gospel by stating, “in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” The Greek word used here is Λόγος, and as many have noted, by using this term, John seemingly alludes to Hellenic philosophy, wherein the Logos is the divine logic or reason that undergirds all reality; the point being: the divine principle of creation, that even the philosophers recognized, has become incarnate in the person of Christ.
And while I do think this reading of the text is completely valid, I don’t think this is what John was primarily getting at by referring to our Lord as “the Word.” Rather, I would argue that John is largely drawing his “Logos theology” from the Hebrew Bible.
To see this, it’s important to understand that “the Word” shows up quite a bit in the OT (2 Samuel 24:11, 1 Kings 17:24, 1 Kings 18:1, 2 Kings 20:4). The first time we meet Him is in Genesis 15:1-4, wherein we’re told that “the Word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision saying… The Word of the Lord came to him saying...” The language used here is very significant, because “the Word” isn’t something Abram simply hears, rather the Word is personified as someone that appears to Abram, and speaks to him. Indeed, the word “vision” is only used one other time in the Torah, and it’s an explicit reference to “seeing the Almighty” (Numbers 24:4, 16).
With this in mind, consider how the OT links this personified “Word of Yahweh” to Israel’s Messiah. The prophet Isaiah tells us that “in the latter days… the law shall go forth out of Zion, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge (וְשָׁפַט֙) between the nations” (Isaiah 2:3-4). The “He” who “judges between the nations” in this passage is ambiguous in the Hebrew; and so when we realize that the OT portrays “the Word of the Lord” as a personal subject, and that He is the only subject mentioned in the context of this passage, it’s quite clear that the Word is the one who brings judgement on the nations.
But wait, Isaiah says elsewhere about the messianic seed from the root of Jesse, “He shall not judge by what His eyes see, or decide disputes by what His ears hear, but with righteousness He shall judge (וְשָׁפַט֙) the poor” (11:3-4); and again about the Suffering Servant, “I have put my Spirit upon Him, He will bring judgement to the nations” (42:1). So according to the prophecy of Isaiah, in the messianic age, both the Word of Yahweh and the Davidic Servant of Yahweh will judge the nations, almost as if they’re somehow mysteriously being identified as the same person.
This is simply one thread in the overarching narrative of Isaiah, which consistently portrays the Christ of Israel as Yahweh Himself;1 by adding “the Word” to this list of associations, Isaiah is telling us that anywhere we see this personified Word show up in the OT, we can be confident that it’s the preincarnate Christ. Isaiah does this elsewhere by identifying the promised child of Isaiah 9 as “the Angel of the Lord” that we see throughout the OT (cf. Isaiah 9:6 MT, LXX, Judges 13:7).
This, I believe, is why St. John tells us that Jesus is “the Word of God”; it’s because he’s drawing on the rich theology of the prophecy of Isaiah, in order to tell us that his Gospel is going to be all about the incarnation of Yahweh, and His fulfillment of the Scriptures.
See Seraphim Hamilton’s excellent article “Israel’s Divine Messiah in Isaiah” for more on this.