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My Father Is Greater Than I — What John 14:28 Actually Means

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John 14:28 records Jesus saying: “My Father is greater than I.” The verse is among the most direct Biblical statements bearing on the question of whether the Father and Son are equal. The Coptic priest’s response attempts to explain it away through the doctrine of kenosis — the self-emptying of Christ in his incarnation — while simultaneously making concessions that undermine the very monotheism his tradition claims to defend.

The Priest’s Explanation

The priest argued that “My Father is greater than I” does not indicate any real inferiority of the Son to the Father, because they are one in essence, nature, and divinity. He offered three lines of explanation.

The first line: The verse was said in the context of Christ’s self-emptying (kenosis). The priest cited Philippians 2:6–7:

Philippians 2:6–7 (ESV) “He did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, and coming in the likeness of men.”

He argued that while Christ was equal to the Father, he emptied himself of glory in the incarnation. On earth, he was exposed to suffering, insults, and death. The Father is greater than the Son only in the comparison between the humbled state of incarnation and the glorified state before incarnation — not in essence, nature, or divinity. He supported this with Christ’s fuller statement in John 14:28:

John 14:28 (ESV) “If you loved me, you would have rejoiced, because I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I.”

The priest explained: Christ is telling the disciples that they should rejoice rather than grieve at his departure, because he is returning to the glory he had with the Father before the world was — and in that glory, he is not less than the Father.

The second line: The Father is greater than the Son in the mere dignity of fatherhood, not in nature or essence. The priest said any son can say “my father is greater than I” while being of the same nature, the same blood, the same essence. In sonship, the Son is in the state of one who obeys; in fatherhood, the Father is in the state of one who wills.

The third line: The priest cited multiple verses to argue Christ is not less than the Father in anything — John 10:30 (“I and the Father are one”), John 14:9 (“He who has seen me has seen the Father”), John 17:10 (“All that is Mine is Yours, and all that is Thine is Mine”), John 16:15 (“All that the Father has is Mine”), Colossians 2:9 (“in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily”), and the statement of Christ’s return in the glory of his Father (Matthew 16:27, Luke 9:26).

Responses to the Priest’s Explanation

The Kenosis Argument Collapses the Trinity Into Polytheism

The Father is greater only in the state of incarnation, not in essence The priest argued that the greatness of the Father over the Son is confined to the period of Christ’s self-emptying on earth, and has nothing to do with essence, nature, or divinity — in which they are one.
The priest’s own words refute him before the response does. He said: This statement is a confession that the Father is God and the Son is not less than God — meaning we have two beings who are both fully God. There is no equality except between two distinct beings. When the priest says they are equal in nature and essence, he is describing two gods who share the same nature — not one God. And when he explains the Father’s greater status by saying “the Son in sonship is in the state of one who obeys, and the Father in fatherhood is in the state of one who wills,” he is reinforcing that there are two distinct subjects — one who obeys and one who wills — which is precisely what monotheism denies.

The analogy the priest gave makes this worse, not better. He said: you and your father are of the same human essence, yet you can say “my father is greater than I.” Exactly — and you and your father are two separate human beings. When the priest uses this analogy, he has described the Father and Son as two separate divine beings who share the same divine nature. That is not monotheism. That is ditheism.

Furthermore, if Christ acknowledges the Father’s higher status as a real acknowledgment — and the priest agrees he does — then can the Father say “my Son is greater than me”? If not, then the greatness is real and directional, not merely formal. Christ would not be acknowledging something false about himself and his Father.

The Incarnation Argument Does Not Account for Eternity Past or the Day of Judgment

The Father’s greater status applies only to the incarnation period The priest argued that the greatness specific to the comparison between the state of incarnation and the state before incarnation has nothing to do with the eternal relationship between Father and Son.
Three proofs demonstrate that the Father’s superior status over the Son is not limited to the period of incarnation.

The first proof: Could the Father himself have been incarnated instead of the Son? The priest’s own theology would answer: no — it was the Son, not the Father, who was incarnated. If the Father had been incarnated and exposed to humiliation while the Son remained in glory, they would have been equal before the incarnation in a way that was then temporarily reversed. But since it is the Son who was incarnated and humiliated — and not the Father — this establishes a permanent directional difference. The one who is incarnated and humiliated is by that very fact lower in status than the one who is not. The incarnation was not a temporary equalisation that was later restored — it was a revelation of an existing distinction.

The second proof concerns the period before the incarnation. The Book of Proverbs, in the Catholic translation, records:

Proverbs 8:22–25 (Catholic Translation) “The Lord created me, before his works, from the beginning. From eternity I was established from the beginning, before the earth was. I was brought forth when there were not deeps and abundant springs of water. Before the mountains were planted, before the hills I was brought forth.”

The Van Dyke Arabic translation of the same verse reads:

Proverbs 8:22 (Van Dyke Translation) “The Lord created me as the first of his works, before his acts of long ago.”

The New International Version (UK) renders it:

Proverbs 8:22 (NIV-UK) “The LORD brought me forth as the first of his works, before his deeds.”

The New Living Translation renders it:

Proverbs 8:22 (NLT) “The LORD formed me from the beginning.”

These verses, understood by a major strand of Christian tradition as referring to the pre-incarnate Son, state that he was created or brought forth by the Lord. This is the world of divinity before the incarnation — before the earth was, before the deeps, before the mountains. The distinction between the Father and Son is therefore not a product of the incarnation. It existed from eternity. Playing with the translation of the word — rendering it as “acquired” or “possessed” rather than “created” — does not resolve the problem. If the Lord acquired or owned the Son from eternity, one must ask: from where? And what does it mean for one divine being to acquire another?

The third proof concerns the Day of Judgment — after the ascension, after the restoration of Christ’s glory. The priest’s entire argument depends on the incarnation being the window of the Father’s greater status, with that window closing at the ascension. But 1 Corinthians 15 describes a subjection of the Son to the Father that occurs after the end of all things:

1 Corinthians 15:24–28 (Van Dyke Translation) “And after this comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when he abolishes all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be abolished is death. For he has put all things under his feet. But when he says, ‘All things are put under him,’ it is clear that he is not the one who put all things under him. And when all things are subjected to Him, then the Son Himself also will be subjected to Him who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all.”

This subjection of the Son to the Father occurs after Christ’s ascension, after his glory has been restored, after his reign is complete — at the very end of all things. The incarnation has nothing to do with it at this point. The Son, in his glorified state, having completed his reign, will himself be subjected to the Father, “so that God may be all in all.” The Father’s greater status is therefore not a bracket around the incarnation. Before the incarnation, the Father was higher. During the incarnation, the Father was higher. After the incarnation, at the end of all things, the Father is still higher.

The “Non-Glorious Image” Argument and the Resurrection Body

After the resurrection and ascension, Christ returned to the non-humbled, glorious state The priest argued that the human, humble image was a temporary concealment of divinity that ended with the ascension and the sitting at the right hand of the Father.
After the alleged resurrection, did Christ actually shed the human body? No — he rose, by the Gospel accounts themselves, in the same human body. He showed his disciples his wounds. He told them he was not a spirit. He ate fish and honey in front of them. He ascended in that human body. The very proof of the resurrection that the Gospels offer is the continuation of the bodily, material form. If the “non-glorious image” is the human body, and Christ ascended in the human body, then the argument that the humiliation ended at the ascension is invalidated by the testimony of the same texts the priest is using. The human nature was not shed at the ascension — it was, by Trinitarian doctrine itself, permanently united to the divine nature.

The Hebrews Confirmation

Hebrews 2:7 (ESV) “You have made him a little lower than the angels; you have crowned him with glory and honor, and set him over the works of your hands.”

The verse says that the Father made Christ lower — not that Christ lowered himself temporarily through an act of voluntary self-emptying. The subjection is attributed to the Father as an act performed upon the Son. If the Father made the Son lower than the angels, the Father is unambiguously greater than the Son — and greater by his own choice and action, not merely by the Son’s voluntary humility.

The Tawhid Conclusion

Surah Al-Ma’idah 5:76 قُلْ أَتَعْبُدُونَ مِن دُونِ اللَّهِ مَا لَا يَمْلِكُ لَكُمْ ضَرًّا وَلَا نَفْعًا ۚ وَاللَّهُ هُوَ السَّمِيعُ الْعَلِيمُ

“Say: Do you worship, besides Allah, that which has no power to harm you or to benefit you? And Allah is the Hearing, the Knowing.”

The priest’s response to John 14:28 fails on every level it attempts. His kenosis argument — that the Father is greater only in the period of incarnation — is refuted by Proverbs 8:22, which places the Son’s derived status before the incarnation, in eternity past; by 1 Corinthians 15:28, which places the Son’s subjection to the Father after the ascension, at the end of all things; and by Hebrews 2:7, which attributes the Son’s lower status to an act of the Father, not merely to the Son’s voluntary self-emptying. His analogy of a father and son sharing human nature proves polytheism, not monotheism — since two beings of the same essence are two beings, not one. His claim that Christ is not less than the Father in anything is a direct departure from monotheism by his own formulation. And his “non-glorious image” argument is falsified by the resurrection narratives of the very Gospels he cites, which describe a bodily resurrection in the same human form that was allegedly the source of the humiliation. John 14:28 means what it says: the Father is greater than the Son — not in one limited window, but from before creation, through creation, through the incarnation, and until the end of all things.
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