---
title: John 1:6
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/john-1-6/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/john-1-6.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: John 1:6
testament: NT
section: Gospels
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# John 1:6

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> There came a man who was sent from God. His name was John.

## NWT Wording of the Key Phrase

- NWT (2013 revision): "There came a man who was sent as a representative of God; his name was John."

## JW Usage

Used in NWT-defence as a parallel for the anarthrous theos rendering at John 1:1: "John was sent from God" has theos without the article in the Greek, yet the NWT keeps capital-G "God" here. The argument runs consistency-by-context — the NWT renders article-less theos at 1:1c as "a god" but keeps "God" at 1:6, 1:12, 1:13, 1:18, etc.

## Protestant Usage

John 1:6 is the cleanest counter-text against the NWT's John 1:1 rendering. theos appears without the article six times in John 1:1-18, and the NWT only renders one of them as "a god" — at 1:1c, where the doctrinal stakes are at their highest. Same grammar, different translation: that is theological selection, not faithful Greek. Read through John 1:6, 1:12, 1:13, 1:18 in the NWT and let the inconsistency surface in the JW's own translation. Then close with John 12:41, where John says Isaiah saw Jesus' glory — the same prologue that opens with "the Word was God" identifies that Word as the Jehovah of Isaiah's throne-room.

## NWT Issue

Where the standard English tradition reads "There came a man sent from God" (KJV/ESV/NASB/NIV), the NWT renders "There came a man who was sent as a representative of God." The expansion of apestalmenos para theou into "sent as a representative of" is not a manuscript variant; it is a doctrinally-shaped paraphrase that introduces the JW agency- Christology vocabulary into a verse that does not require it. The same "representative" logic is then deployed elsewhere to argue that Jesus is merely God's representative, not God in person. Importing the conclusion into John the Baptist's introduction begs the question of what Jesus' own commissioning means.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Gods Who Die and God to Pharaoh Don't Parallel Jesus](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/psalm82-exodus71-gods-parallel.md) — Psalm 82:6-7 / Exodus 7:1 / John 10:34-36 [Deity of Christ]
- [The Grammar Doesn't Support 'A God'](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/colwells-rule-john-1-1.md) — John 1:1c — Colwell, Harner, and the construction the NWT mishandles [Deity of Christ]
- [Two Verbs, Two Categories](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/en-vs-egeneto-john-1-tense.md) — John 1 — the Word 'was' (ēn), creation 'came to be' (egeneto) [Deity of Christ]