Reading John 1:1–5

Walking into the prologue with what you know

The first five verses of John are among the most-read lines of Greek in the world. There is nothing new to learn in this lesson except three small words. Instead you will take the tools from earlier lessons and use them, verse by verse. When a word gives you trouble, follow the link back to the lesson that taught it. The only new vocabulary is οὐδέ, εἷς and ἄνθρωπος.

Read slowly, and do not feel you must analyse every word. If the form looks familiar and fits the English translation, that is enough.

Verses 1 and 2: case, article and the imperfect

The word ἦν ("ayn") appears three times, always in the same form. It is the imperfect of εἰμί, "to be", and it suggests a state that was already going on (the imperfect). The third clause, θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος, has the order that surprises English readers: "God was the Word", literally. Which is the subject? Both nouns are nominative, θεὸς and λόγος, so case cannot decide. The article does. The noun with ὁ is the subject, and the one without is describing it (the article). So the clause says "the Word was God", and putting θεός first stresses it (conjunctions and word order). Scholars describe the nuance of the article-less θεός in more than one way, but what the grammar shows clearly is that ὁ λόγος is the subject and θεός describes it; the BSB and the 개역한글 both translate it "God".

In the second clause, πρὸς ("pros") with the accusative θεόν means "with" or "toward" (prepositions). The first clause pairs Ἐν with the dative ἀρχῇ ("archay"), "in the beginning". Verse 2 opens with οὗτος ("HOO-tos"), "this one", and then reuses almost every word of verse 1. Read it aloud once: ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος. Repetition like this makes the passage a good reading exercise.

Verse 3: everything that came to be

πάντα ("panta"), "all things", is an adjective standing alone as a noun (adjectives). δι᾽ is διά with its last vowel dropped before another vowel, and with the genitive αὐτοῦ it means "through him". The verb ἐγένετο ("eg-EN-eh-toh") is a form of γίνομαι, "to become, come into being", labelled 2nd Aorist and Middle Deponent: middle in shape, active in meaning (middle and passive). The skeleton of the sentence is "all things came into being through him".

Next come οὐδὲ ("oo-DEH"), "not even", and ἓν ("hen"), "one": together, "not even one thing". οὐδέ occurs about 140 times and εἷς about 340. Then ὃ is a relative pronoun (conjunctions and word order), introducing "that which" came to be; read with verse 3, it picks up "one thing". Ancient manuscripts have little punctuation, so some scholars attach ὃ γέγονεν to verse 4 instead: "what has come into being in him was life". The BSB and the 개역한글 keep it with verse 3. Its verb, γέγονεν ("GEG-o-nen"), is the same γίνομαι, now in the 2nd Perfect. Compare the two: the aorist ἐγένετο says all things came into being, while the perfect γέγονεν points to what has come into being and stands there (the perfect). The same verb in two tenses, side by side, is a nice thing to be able to recognise.

Verses 4 and 5: life and light

Verse 4 shows gender through the article: ἡ ζωή is feminine and τὸ φῶς is neuter. The last word, ἀνθρώπων ("AN-thro-pone"), is genitive plural, "of men" or "of people". ἄνθρωπος is the ordinary word for "human being" and occurs about 550 times. The verse says: in him was life, and the life was the light of people.

Verse 5 sets two tenses against each other. φαίνει ("FAI-nay") is present: the light is shining, and keeps shining (the present). κατέλαβεν ("kat-EL-ab-en") is a 2nd Aorist (the aorist). The "2nd" is only a note about the stem; the meaning is that of any aorist, a summary of the event.

Here translations differ. The verb καταλαμβάνω can mean "to seize, overcome" or "to grasp, understand". The BSB reads "has not overcome it", while the Korean 개역한글 reads "깨닫지 못하더라", close to "did not comprehend". Both are possible readings of the one Greek word, and interpreters still discuss which John intended, or whether he meant both. The panel's gloss, "grasped", sits somewhere between. The habit to take away: when two Bibles disagree, open the 원어 panel and look at the word itself.

Summary

In verse 1 the article told you which of two nominatives was the subject. In verse 3 one verb stood in the aorist and in the perfect side by side. In verse 5 the present and the aorist contrasted, and the aorist's meaning split the translations. Words you still do not know will shrink with each new word you learn.

Words in this lesson

• οὐδέoudenor141 times in the NT
• εἷςheisone343 times in the NT
• ἄνθρωποςanthrōposa human550 times in the NT

Practice