Look, Ma—No HANDS!

Why Another Man-Made Trinitarian Argument Cannot Carry the Claim That Jesus Is God

Trinitarian authors Robert Bowman and J. Ed Komoszewski developed the acronym H.A.N.D.S. to summarize what they regard as New Testament evidence that Jesus is God. That is, Jesus shares the Honors, Attributes, Names, Deeds, and Seat that allegedly belong exclusively to the God of the Bible. But these HANDS do not carry much weight, because Scripture shows that all these things can be shared with others—not only with the Son of God. Simply put, shared titles, functions, and even imagery do not prove shared identity.

H — Honors

First, throughout the Bible, people are said to be “worshiped” by others—that is, in the general sense of receiving homage. On one occasion, the whole nation of Israel “bowed down before Yahweh and the king” (1 Chron. 29:20). Redeemed Israel herself is even portrayed as receiving worship and supplication—or prayer—from other nations (Isa. 45:14). Likewise, Jesus promises that others will do the same before the feet of his followers (Rev. 3:9). The point is that the same act may honor God’s appointed representative without identifying that person as God.

How much more, then, should the uniquely procreated human Son receive the highest honor, since God has super-exalted him and commanded that all creation honor him (Phil. 2:9–11)? Jesus himself explains that the Father “has entrusted all judgment to the Son” so that everyone may honor the Son (John 5:22–23). The honor follows from delegated authority, not from the Son’s supposedly being, by nature, the same one God.

Even Philippians 2 distinguishes throughout between the one God, who is the Father, and the Son whom He super-exalts, giving him “the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—in heaven and on earth and under the earth—and every tongue will confess that Jesus Messiah is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9–11).

A — Attributes

Possessing attributes or abilities resembling God’s does not establish identity with God. Moses performed awesome miracles and wonders in Egypt and during Israel’s sojourn in the wilderness. Prophets such as Elisha raised the dead and even knew another man’s hidden actions, just as Peter exposed the secret deception of Ananias and Sapphira (Exod. 7–14; 2 Kings 4:32–35; 5:25–27; Acts 5:1–10). These abilities all came from the one God.

The same explanation is explicitly given for His Son when Peter declares:

“God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the holy spirit and with power…because God was with him” (Acts 10:38).

The Son did not possess those attributes independently or by nature. Once again, he himself says, “All authority…has been given to me” (Matt. 28:18). Nor was he omniscient, since he says that the Son does not know the day or hour of his return (Mark 13:32).

N — Names

Scripture freely gives divine titles—and even the divine name—to God’s representatives without confusing their identities. Moses was made “God to Pharaoh” (Exod. 7:1); Israel’s judges were called “gods” (Ps. 82:6; John 10:34–36); and God explicitly says that He placed His name—that is, His authority and power—in His angelic representative (Exod. 23:20–21).

In the same way, the Son promises to write upon faithful believers the name of his God, the name of God’s city, and his own new name (Rev. 3:12). Bearing or receiving another’s name therefore signifies authorization, power, possession, and representation—not numerical identity.

Most importantly, the title “Lord” given to Jesus, often confused with the divine name Yahweh, was conferred upon him rather than being his inherently by nature. At Pentecost, Peter explains that “God has made this Jesus…both Lord and Messiah” (Acts 2:36). The one who appointed Jesus as His anointed Lord remains “the God of our Lord Jesus Messiah” (Eph. 1:17).

D — Deeds

As with the previous arguments, God regularly performs His works—His deeds—through chosen agents. Moses parted the Red Sea, Joshua stopped the sun, prophets such as Elijah raised the dead, and the apostles likewise healed the sick, cast out demons, and raised the dead. Yet obviously none of them was therefore ever said to be God.

The Son repeatedly says the same throughout the Gospel of John, the favorite playground of those who claim that Jesus is God:

“The Son can do nothing from himself” (John 5:19, 30).

“I have a much greater witness than John, because the works which the Father has given me to do—these works testify to the fact that the Father has commissioned me” (John 5:36).

“I have shown you many good works from the Father.… If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, so that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father” (John 10:32, 37–38).

“The Father living in me performs His works” (John 14:10b).

Peter consequently describes Jesus as “a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know” (Acts 2:22). Note that, for the New Testament writers, he was “a man,” not a God-man. Even Jesus’ authority to judge and give life is presented as something the Father gave him (John 5:21–27).

S — Seat

Sharing God’s throne does not make a person God. Solomon “sat on Yahweh’s throne as king” (1 Chron. 29:23), yet Solomon was obviously not Yahweh. Jesus promises that believers will sit with him on his throne, just as he sat with his Father on His throne (Rev. 3:21). If sharing Jesus’ throne does not make Christians Jesus, it follows that sharing God’s throne does not make someone God.

Psalm 110:1, the Old Testament passage most frequently quoted or alluded to by the New Testament writers, actually distinguishes the one LORD, Yahweh, from David’s “my lord”—adoni, not the divine title Adonai—whom He commands to sit at His right hand. This is a position of supreme but delegated authority, subordinate to God. Paul later shows that the exalted Son remains subject to the God who placed everything under him in the first place, “so that God may be all in all” (1 Cor. 15:27–28).

Lastly, to say that these biblical examples do not apply because “Jesus is a special, unique case”—or simply because he is supposedly God—is special pleading and assumes the very conclusion the argument was meant to prove. The question is not whether he is God’s uniquely procreated Son, the promised Messiah, and the “one mediator between God and humanity…himself human” (1 Tim. 2:5). The real question is why he possesses all these things.

The New Testament repeatedly answers that question by showing that the one God remains the ultimate source of all the Son’s H.A.N.D.S. This manufactured Trinitarian acronym mistakes divinely granted representation for identity. Each “finger” points away from post-biblical God-man theories and toward the biblical fact that the one God gave His Son honor, attributes, the name above every name, and mighty deeds. The one God then seated him at His right hand, a permanently subordinate position that effectively cuts off the so-called H.A.N.D.S. argument!