The Bible itself, as is often the case, offers little help. In our time and place, we read it in modern English. But the Gospel of John was first written on papyrus in Greek 100 years or so after the death of Jesus. It was translated into Latin two or three hundred years after that, and translated into English in the middle 1500s. Jesus himself, like most of the people around him, spoke Aramaic, a language very different from Greek, Latin, and English.
 
Getting back to “the Word,” most scholars agree that the Greek translation is the most accurate. The Greek term for “the Word” is logos. In classical Greek, logos refers to a universal divine intelligence, an eternal and unchanging truth present from the time of creation, sometimes referred to as the mind of God. So, I think a little confusion with the spareness of the English translation is understandable. And this definition does explain how “the Word” could both come before God, and be God.

It also helps to explain what follows, “2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Further on it says “14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” For those of us who try to understand it literally, this sentence could be even more confusing if it did not go on to say “We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” “The Word” in John 1 refers to Jesus.

I have learned not to read the Bible only literally. Sometimes the written word does mean what it seems to, but very often a good deal has been lost because of translation after translation after translation. When this chapter of John came before me recently, I was struck by the potent sense of Presence that it brought to me and the space around me. “The Word,” that universal divine intelligence and eternal, unchanging truth, can be experienced as Presence, as Light, as energy. And when I am open to it, “the Word” communicates this truth to me throughout the Bible, as it is itself the Word of God. It is alive. It is powerful. It changes us. “For the word of God is alive and active.” Hebrews 4:12 This is the meaning of “the Word” conveyed in the Gospel According to John.