---
title: 1 Corinthians 1:24
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/1-corinthians-1-24/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/1-corinthians-1-24.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: 1 Corinthians 1:24
testament: NT
section: Letters
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# 1 Corinthians 1:24

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

## JW Usage

The Watchtower reads 1:24 within the "Christ as God's agent" framework — Jesus is called God's wisdom and power because he faithfully executes divine purpose, not because he shares divine identity. Proverbs 8 is then pulled in ("wisdom was brought forth" as Jehovah's first creation) to support the idea that "the wisdom of God" in Paul's vocabulary is the title of a created being Jehovah produced. This preserves a strict ontological gap between the Father and the Son.

## Protestant Usage

Paul does not say Christ is wise. Paul says Christ IS the wisdom of God — equating the person of Christ with the divine attribute. The Proverbs-8 link the Watchtower makes to read Christ as "wisdom created first" misreads Hebrew wisdom poetry (where wisdom is personified in ways no one reads literally — wisdom also "plays" before God) and, more importantly, conflicts with 1:24's own grammar: "the power of God and the wisdom of God" is identity language, not biographical language. Pair with John 1:1 ("the Word was God") and Colossians 2:3 (in Christ "are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge"). At the door: "The Watchtower would never say an archangel IS Jehovah's power or IS Jehovah's wisdom. Paul says Christ is. That is a statement about who Christ is, not what Christ does."

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Monogenes — 'Only Begotten' Means Unique](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/john3-16-monogenes.md) — John 3:16 [Deity of Christ]
- [When 'Is' Becomes 'Means'](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/is-to-means-broader-pattern.md) — The NWT's Pattern of Paraphrasing the Greek Copula [NWT Translation]
- [An Attribute Can't Become Flesh](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/logos-attribute-vs-person.md) — John 1:14 — the Word who became flesh has a son's glory, a past and a place at the Father's side [Deity of Christ]
- [Was God Ever Without His Wisdom?](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/wisdom-and-power-of-god.md) — 1 Corinthians 1:24 — Christ is God's power and God's wisdom, so Proverbs 8 cannot make him a creature [Deity of Christ]