For one thing, the term logos really had, by the time the Gospel was written, acquired a metaphysical significance that “Word” cannot possibly convey; and in places like Alexandria it had acquired a very particular religious significance as well.
For the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher Philo, for instance, it referred to a kind of “secondary divinity,” a mediating principle standing between God the Most High and creation. In late antiquity it was assumed widely, in pagan, Jewish, and Christian circles, that God in his full transcendence did not come into direct contact with the world of limited and mutable things, and so had expressed himself in a subordinate and economically “reduced” form “through whom” (δι᾽ αὐτοῦ [di’ avtou]) he created and governed the world. It was this Logos that many Jews and Christians believed to be the subject of all the divine theophanies of Hebrew scripture.
Come on guys, he is laying out exactly what I've been saying. This is not the Trinity nor is it the WT.
The later Arianism, as I understand it, was much closer to second power theology. Arian asserted that Logos was God as a somewhat limited aspect of God. IMO the sole distinction is that for Arian (and all proto-orthodox Christians by then) the Logos had acquired complete humanity as well as autonomy and entity. How closely this reflects the Johannine prologue is a matter of question depending upon the degree of temporality/historicity intended by the Gospel writer/s.
