“One could go on interminably . . .”

No, this does not imply I acknowledge biblical support for your position. It just implies one could go on interminably, as this conversation seems to be doing!

“The biblical testimony is overwhelming . . .”

Actually, I find your comment in response to mine quite naive. If it is purely ‘sinning’ that makes us ‘sinners’, and all Jesus needed to do was to stop ‘sinning’, then our redemption can be simply by-passed: just don’t sin! (Unless there is a hidden significance attached to your presentation of Jesus: he was the only one who could stop ‘sinning’). I take Romans 3:9-18 and Romans 5:12-18 as paradigmatic: sin is universal, and death, its consequence, is universal. This is paradigmatic for the bible - which relentlessly exposes sin in all its heroes. I take it from this that sin is both a choice and a condition. Paul’s exposition of the remedy is that the solution lies in a death (and a rebirth). Jesus died on the cross as the representative of the last Adam. He rose from the dead as the representative of the new humanity. Our participation in this new humanity depends on a death, not a choice.

“I wonder- Is it a prerequisite of the gospel that we make sin out to be as powerful as we possibly can?”

No - it’s a reasonable inference from our experience and from the observation that God provided the sacrifice through himself in the form of His Son that sin is indeed something profoundly rooted in our human Adamic identity.

“All the other questions which you raise concerning the relationship of the Son to the Father on the cross can be answered fairly simply.

I wonder, could I press you further to actually do this? How could God forsake God, yet still be one God? How can the immortal God die? Would he not then cease to be immortal?”

Yes, but not on this thread, as it entails more space and time than is available to me.

“Unique normality”

Apart from JAT Robinson, where in the bible are any of the concepts you propose in this paragraph substantiated?

” ‘And David said to all the congregation, Now bless Yahweh your God. And all the congregation blessed Yahweh God of their fathers, and bowed down their heads, and worshipped Yahweh, and the king’ (I Chronicles 29:20).”

Very interesting - and I need to do further study on this - but it comes nowhere near the divine identification of Jesus in Philippians 2:10-11.

In the verse you quote, the obeisance and prostration are made before God and king, but it’s one form of obeisance to God, and another to the king - I don’t think anyone is suggesting this is worship of the king as divine! In Philippians 2:10-11, there is no room for such a separation: especially in the light of the rest of the passage.

“The ‘all things’ created through Jesus are specified in the immediate context. Not the heavens and earth of the Genesis creation, but thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers that are in the present heavens and earth”

Really? Where did you get the authority to make this distinction? Were there two acts of creation in which the heavens and earth of Genesis preceded an act of creation of heavens and earth by Jesus?

“Yahweh had no intermediary in the Genesis creation, for he says ‘I am Yahweh that makes all things; that stretches out the heavens alone; that spreads abroad the earth by myself’ (Isaiah 44:24)”

Exactly - Jesus was YHWH - as part of his being. There was no intermediary.

“Kyrios”

Claiming a privileged definition of the word based on earlier texts over and above the way the word is actually used in the NT is special pleading.

“The Bible presents us with God the Father and Jesus the Son of God. The title Father describes God. The title Son describes a man’s relationship to God.”

This needs a separate thread - in which the augmented significance of phrases like ‘Son of God’ in the NT can be brought out. In the meantime, ponder on John 19:7. To claim to be ‘Son of God’ is not a
capital offence, in the traditional use of the term.

You also need to answer the criticisms I made of your interpretation of John 8 in the ‘I am …’ post.

In the meantime, take a look at Hebrews 1:6, 8, 10. Any comments?