John 3
The chapter in full, then the passages inside it that are worth stopping on — what each one claims, what the Greek or Hebrew shows, and how the reading is arrived at.
John 3 WEB
- 1 Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews.
- 2 He came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him."
- 3 Jesus answered him, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can't see God's Kingdom."
- 4 Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"
- 5 Jesus answered, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born of water and Spirit, he can't enter into God's Kingdom.
- 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
- 7 Don't marvel that I said to you, 'You must all be born anew.'
- 8 The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but don't know where it comes from and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit."
- 9 Nicodemus answered him, "How can these things be?"
- 10 Jesus answered him, "Are you the teacher of Israel, and don't understand these things?
- 11 Most certainly I tell you, we speak that which we know and testify of that which we have seen, and you don't receive our witness.
- 12 If I told you earthly things and you don't believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
- 13 No one has ascended into heaven but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven.
- 14 As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
- 15 that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
- 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only born Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
- 17 For God didn't send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him.
- 18 He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn't believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only born Son of God.
- 19 This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were evil.
- 20 For everyone who does evil hates the light and doesn't come to the light, lest his works would be exposed.
- 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be revealed, that they have been done in God."
- 22 After these things, Jesus came with his disciples into the land of Judea. He stayed there with them and baptized.
- 23 John also was baptizing in Enon near Salim, because there was much water there. They came and were baptized;
- 24 for John was not yet thrown into prison.
- 25 Therefore a dispute arose on the part of John's disciples with some Jews about purification.
- 26 They came to John and said to him, "Rabbi, he who was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you have testified, behold, he baptizes, and everyone is coming to him."
- 27 John answered, "A man can receive nothing unless it has been given him from heaven.
- 28 You yourselves testify that I said, 'I am not the Christ,' but, 'I have been sent before him.'
- 29 He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice. Therefore my joy is made full.
- 30 He must increase, but I must decrease.
- 31 "He who comes from above is above all. He who is from the earth belongs to the earth and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all.
- 32 What he has seen and heard, of that he testifies; and no one receives his witness.
- 33 He who has received his witness has set his seal to this, that God is true.
- 34 For he whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for God gives the Spirit without measure.
- 35 The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into his hand.
- 36 One who believes in the Son has eternal life, but one who disobeys the Son won't see life, but the wrath of God remains on him."
John 3 belongs to the first great cycle of Jesus' Jerusalem ministry in John's Gospel, immediately after the sign at Cana and the temple confrontation. Nicodemus, a Pharisee and member of the ruling council, comes to Jesus by night — the opening move of a private theological conversation that becomes, by verse 16, a public declaration to the whole world. The chapter's second half shifts scene: John the Baptist, still baptizing at the Jordan, answers his own disciples' jealousy for Jesus with the clearest statement in the Gospels of what it means to point away from oneself.
3:3 "Unless one is born anew, he can't see God's Kingdom"
Jesus answers a question Nicodemus never asked. Nicodemus opened with a compliment — "we know that you are a teacher come from God" (3:2) — and Jesus responds with a demand for radical origin, not admiration. The Greek word is ἄνωθεν (anōthen), which genuinely carries both senses the English can't hold at once: "again" and "from above." Nicodemus hears it as "again" and objects on that basis — "Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb?" (3:4) — but John's narration elsewhere uses ánōthen unambiguously for "from above" (3:31, 19:11, 19:23), and Jesus' own explanation in verses 5–8 makes clear the birth in question originates in heaven, not in a second attempt at the first one. The ambiguity is likely deliberate: a birth that comes "from above" is necessarily also a fresh beginning, a second birth in kind if not in mechanism. This is the origin of the phrase "born again," and it is worth noting what the verse claims and what it does not: it does not describe an emotional experience or a decision procedure. It describes something done to a person, using the passive verb γεννηθῇ (be born) — nobody births themselves. Compare 1 Peter 1:23, "born again... through the word of God," and Ezekiel 36:26, "I will give you a new heart" — the initiative throughout belongs to God.
3:5-8 "Born of water and Spirit" / "The wind blows where it wants to"
Verse 5 has generated four centuries of denominational argument because "water" can plausibly point three different directions. Some readers (much of the Reformed and Baptist tradition) take ὕδατος as figurative for cleansing or the word, paired with Πνεῦμα as the one true agent, arguing the two nouns under one preposition (ἐξ) describe a single reality, not two separate rites. Sacramental traditions (Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, much of Anglicanism) read it as a direct reference to baptism, noting that a first-century Jewish hearer steeped in mikveh practice and in texts like Ezekiel 36:25 ("I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean") would hear "water" as ritual cleansing, not metaphor. What the text does not settle by itself is the mechanics of that connection; what it does insist on, unmistakably, is verse 6: flesh generates flesh, Spirit generates spirit. Ancestry, ethnicity, and religious pedigree — all of which Nicodemus possessed in abundance — produce nothing of the kingdom's kind. The wind image in verse 8 plays on the single Greek word πνεῦμα, meaning both "wind" and "Spirit" (as ruach does in Hebrew) — the Spirit's operation is heard in its effect, as wind is heard in its sound, without its source or course being available for inspection or control. This directly answers Nicodemus's mechanical question in verse 9 ("How can these things be?") by declining to give a mechanism at all.
3:14-15 "As Moses lifted up the serpent... so must the Son of Man be lifted up"
Jesus reaches back to Numbers 21, where Israel, dying of snakebite for its complaining, was told to look at a bronze serpent raised on a pole and live. The comparison is exact and strange: Israel's healing came from gazing at an image of the very thing killing them, lifted up in plain sight. Jesus applies the pattern to himself with the verb ὑψωθῆναι (lifted up), a word John uses with a deliberate double meaning that runs through the whole Gospel (see also 8:28, 12:32-34): the lifting up is simultaneously the crucifixion — the physical raising onto the cross — and the exaltation that crucifixion accomplishes. There is no way to detach one sense from the other in John's usage; the cross is the throne. The result clause in verse 15 is the first appearance in the chapter of the verb that will govern everything after it: πιστεύων, believing — not admiring, not agreeing intellectually, but a settled reliance, the same posture Nicodemus's initial compliment in verse 2 conspicuously lacked.
3:16 "For God so loved the world"
The most quoted verse in the Bible carries a claim easy to blunt through familiarity. Οὕτως (houtōs) does not mean "so" as in "so much" — intensity — but "so" as in "in this way": God loved the world in this manner, namely by giving. The love is defined by its action, not measured by a quantity. Τὸν κόσμον (the world) is not a flattering term in John; elsewhere it names the sphere in active rebellion against God (see the chapter's own verses 19-20). The love is not a response to the world's merit but a gift given despite the absence of any. Μονογενῆ ("only born," sometimes rendered "only begotten") does not describe biological generation but unique, one-of-a-kind sonship — the term also appears of Isaac in relation to Abraham (a son among others by birth, unique in covenant standing), so the word marks Jesus' singular relation to the Father, not a claim about how he came to exist. Verse 17 immediately forecloses one common misreading: the Son was not sent to condemn, though verse 18 makes plain that unbelief brings a judgment already in force — "he has not believed in the name of the only born Son of God." The universality of "whoever believes" (3:15, 3:16) and the exclusivity of the object of belief are not in tension in the text; they are the same claim stated from two directions.
3:19-21 "Men loved the darkness rather than the light"
The chapter's verdict on unbelief refuses the excuse of ignorance. The judgment (κρίσις) is not a future tribunal alone but a present fact: light has arrived, and the response to it — not the information available about it — is what convicts. The reason given is moral, not intellectual: "their works were evil." Coming to the light exposes deeds; avoiding it protects them. This is not a claim that unbelievers are uniquely wicked and believers uniquely virtuous — verse 21's phrase "done in God" describes the ground of the deeds, not human merit — but it is a claim, stated plainly, that unbelief has a cause the chapter locates in the will, not merely the intellect. Nicodemus himself is the chapter's own case study of someone caught between the two, coming initially "by night" (3:2) — and John will note, in 19:39, that he returns after the crucifixion, this time in the open, to bury the body.
3:30 "He must increase, but I must decrease"
John the Baptist's disciples bring him a complaint dressed as news: "everyone is coming to him" (3:26). John's answer refuses the bait entirely. He identifies himself not as a rival but as the bridegroom's friend — a specific role in ancient Jewish weddings, the one who arranges things and stands guard, whose joy is precisely in the bridegroom's success, not his own prominence. "This is the judgment" of chapter 3's first half has its counterpart here in "this is the joy" of its second: correctly locating oneself in relation to Christ is what both judgment and joy turn on. Verse 30 is often lifted as a general maxim of humility, which it is, but it is spoken by a man watching his own following visibly shrink in favor of another's, and meaning it.
What the chapter asks
John 3 presses a single question past every framework a reader might bring to soften it: not whether Jesus was a good teacher, which even Nicodemus already granted, but whether a person will submit to a birth they cannot produce and a light that exposes rather than flatters. The chapter gives no room for admiring Jesus from a safe distance — Nicodemus's opening gambit is answered, not with information, but with a demand that dismantles the premise that religious credentials, ethnicity, or sincere curiosity could ever be sufficient. The whole movement, from "born from above" to "the wrath of God remains on him" (3:36), insists that the only two positions available are belief and its absence, and that both carry consequences already underway, not merely pending.
The verses this turns on
He came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do, unless God is with him."discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
οὗτος ἦλθεν πρὸς αὐτὸν νυκτὸς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ῥαββεί, οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἀπὸ Θεοῦ ἐλήλυθας διδάσκαλος· οὐδεὶς γὰρ δύναται ταῦτα τὰ σημεῖα ποιεῖν ἃ σὺ ποιεῖς, ἐὰν μὴ ᾖ ὁ Θεὸς μετ’ αὐτοῦ.
- οὗτος οὗτος demonstrative pronoun · nominative singular masculine G3778
- ἦλθεν ἔρχομαι verb · aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular G2064
- πρὸς πρός preposition G4314
- αὐτὸν αὐτός personal pronoun · accusative singular masculine G846
- νυκτὸς νύξ noun · genitive singular feminine G3571
- καὶ καί conjunction G2532
- εἶπεν λέγω verb · aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular G3004
- αὐτῷ αὐτός personal pronoun · dative singular masculine G846
- Ῥαββεί, ῥαββί Hebrew transliteration G4461
- οἴδαμεν οἶδα verb · perfect active indicative, 1st person plural G1492
- ὅτι ὅτι conjunction G3754
- ἀπὸ ἀπό preposition G575
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- John 5:36 But the testimony which I have is greater than that of John; for the works which the Father gave me to accomplish, the very works that I do, testify about me, that the Father has sent me.
- Acts 10:38 how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.
- Acts 2:22 "Men of Israel, hear these words! Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved by God to you by mighty works and wonders and signs which God did by him among you, even as you yourselves know,
- Acts 4:16 saying, "What shall we do to these men? Because indeed a notable miracle has been done through them, as can be plainly seen by all who dwell in Jerusalem, and we can't deny it.
- John 9:16 Some therefore of the Pharisees said, "This man is not from God, because he doesn't keep the Sabbath." Others said, "How can a man who is a sinner do such signs?" So there was division among them.
Jesus answered him, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can't see God's Kingdom."discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν, οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ Θεοῦ.
- ἀπεκρίθη ἀποκρίνομαι verb · aorist middle deponent indicative, 3rd person singular G611
- Ἰησοῦς Ἰησοῦς noun · nominative singular masculine G2424
- καὶ καί conjunction G2532
- εἶπεν λέγω verb · aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular G3004
- αὐτῷ αὐτός personal pronoun · dative singular masculine G846
- Ἀμὴν ἀμήν Hebrew transliteration G281
- ἀμὴν ἀμήν Hebrew transliteration G281
- λέγω λέγω verb · present active indicative, 1st person singular G3004
- σοι, σύ personal pronoun G4771
- ἐὰν ἐάν conditional G1437
- μή μή particle · nominative G3361
- τις τὶς indefinite pronoun · nominative singular masculine G5100
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- 2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
- John 3:5 Jesus answered, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born of water and Spirit, he can't enter into God's Kingdom.
- 1 Peter 1:23 having been born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word of God, which lives and remains forever.
- 1 John 3:9 Whoever is born of God doesn't commit sin, because his seed remains in him, and he can't sin, because he is born of God.
- 1 John 5:1 Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God. Whoever loves the Father also loves the child who is born of him.
Nicodemus said to him, "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
λέγει πρὸς αὐτὸν ὁ Νικόδημος Πῶς δύναται ἄνθρωπος γεννηθῆναι γέρων ὤν; μὴ δύναται εἰς τὴν κοιλίαν τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ δεύτερον εἰσελθεῖν καὶ γεννηθῆναι;
- λέγει λέγω verb · present active indicative, 3rd person singular G3004
- πρὸς πρός preposition G4314
- αὐτὸν αὐτός personal pronoun · accusative singular masculine G846
- ὁ ὁ article · nominative singular masculine G3588
- Νικόδημος Νικόδημος noun · nominative singular masculine G3530
- Πῶς πῶς adverb G4459
- δύναται δύναμαι verb · present middle or passive deponent indicative, 3rd person singular G1410
- ἄνθρωπος ἄνθρωπος noun · nominative singular masculine G444
- γεννηθῆναι γεννάω verb · aorist passive infinitive G1080
- γέρων γέρων noun · nominative singular masculine G1088
- ὤν; εἰμί verb · present active participle, nominative singular masculine G1510
- μὴ μή particle · nominative G3361
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- 1 Corinthians 2:14 Now the natural man doesn't receive the things of God's Spirit, for they are foolishness to him; and he can't know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
- 1 Corinthians 1:18 For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
- John 3:3 Jesus answered him, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can't see God's Kingdom."
- John 4:11 The woman said to him, "Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. So where do you get that living water?
- John 6:53 Jesus therefore said to them, "Most certainly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you don't have life in yourselves.
Jesus answered, "Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born of water and Spirit, he can't enter into God's Kingdom.discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ Πνεύματος, οὐ δύναται εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ Θεοῦ.
- ἀπεκρίθη ἀποκρίνομαι verb · aorist middle deponent indicative, 3rd person singular G611
- Ἰησοῦς Ἰησοῦς noun · nominative singular masculine G2424
- Ἀμὴν ἀμήν Hebrew transliteration G281
- ἀμὴν ἀμήν Hebrew transliteration G281
- λέγω λέγω verb · present active indicative, 1st person singular G3004
- σοι, σύ personal pronoun G4771
- ἐὰν ἐάν conditional G1437
- μή μή particle · nominative G3361
- τις τὶς indefinite pronoun · nominative singular masculine G5100
- γεννηθῇ γεννάω verb · aorist passive subjunctive, 3rd person singular G1080
- ἐξ ἐκ preposition G1537
- ὕδατος ὕδωρ noun · genitive singular neuter G5204
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- Ezekiel 36:25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.
- Ephesians 5:26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,
- Acts 2:38 Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
- 1 Peter 3:21 This is a symbol of baptism, which now saves you—not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
- 1 Corinthians 6:11 Some of you were such, but you were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and in the Spirit of our God.
As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
καὶ καθὼς Μωϋσῆς ὕψωσεν τὸν ὄφιν ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ, οὕτως ὑψωθῆναι δεῖ τὸν Υἱὸν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου,
- καὶ καί conjunction G2532
- καθὼς καθώς adverb G2531
- Μωϋσῆς Μωϋσῆς noun · nominative singular masculine G3475
- ὕψωσεν ὑψόω verb · aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular G5312
- τὸν ὁ article · accusative singular masculine G3588
- ὄφιν ὄφις noun · accusative singular masculine G3789
- ἐν ἐν preposition G1722
- τῇ ὁ article · dative singular feminine G3588
- ἐρήμῳ, ἔρημος adjective · dative singular feminine G2048
- οὕτως οὕτω adverb G3779
- ὑψωθῆναι ὑψόω verb · aorist passive infinitive G5312
- δεῖ δεῖ verb · present active indicative, 3rd person singular G1163
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- Numbers 21:7 The people came to Moses, and said, "We have sinned, because we have spoken against Yahweh and against you. Pray to Yahweh, that he take away the serpents from us." Moses prayed for the people.
- John 8:28 Jesus therefore said to them, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he, and I do nothing of myself, but as my Father taught me, I say these things.
- John 12:32 And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself."
- Luke 24:26 Didn't the Christ have to suffer these things and to enter into his glory?"
- Luke 24:44 He said to them, "This is what I told you while I was still with you, that all things which are written in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms concerning me must be fulfilled."
that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων ἐν αὐτῷ ἔχῃ ζωὴν αἰώνιον.
- ἵνα ἵνα conjunction G2443
- πᾶς πᾶς adjective · nominative singular masculine G3956
- ὁ ὁ article · nominative singular masculine G3588
- πιστεύων πιστεύω verb · present active participle, nominative singular masculine G4100
- ἐν ἐν preposition G1722
- αὐτῷ αὐτός personal pronoun · dative singular masculine G846
- ἔχῃ ἔχω verb · present active subjunctive, 3rd person singular G2192
- ζωὴν ζωή noun · accusative singular feminine G2222
- αἰώνιον. αἰώνιος adjective · accusative singular feminine G166
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only born Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
- John 6:40 This is the will of the one who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day."
- John 3:36 One who believes in the Son has eternal life, but one who disobeys the Son won't see life, but the wrath of God remains on him."
- 1 John 5:11 The testimony is this: that God gave to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.
- John 12:44 Jesus cried out and said, "Whoever believes in me, believes not in me, but in him who sent me.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only born Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν Υἱὸν τὸν μονογενῆ ἔδωκεν, ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων εἰς αὐτὸν μὴ ἀπόληται ἀλλ’ ἔχῃ ζωὴν αἰώνιον.
- Οὕτως οὕτω adverb G3779
- γὰρ γάρ conjunction G1063
- ἠγάπησεν ἀγαπάω verb · aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular G25
- ὁ ὁ article · nominative singular masculine G3588
- Θεὸς θεός noun · nominative singular masculine G2316
- τὸν ὁ article · accusative singular masculine G3588
- κόσμον, κόσμος noun · accusative singular masculine G2889
- ὥστε ὥστε conjunction G5620
- τὸν ὁ article · accusative singular masculine G3588
- Υἱὸν υἱός noun · accusative singular masculine G5207
- τὸν ὁ article · accusative singular masculine G3588
- μονογενῆ μονογενής adjective · accusative singular masculine G3439
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- Romans 5:8 But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
- 1 John 4:9 By this God's love was revealed in us, that God has sent his only born Son into the world that we might live through him.
- Romans 8:32 He who didn't spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how would he not also with him freely give us all things?
- John 3:15 that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
- John 11:25 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.
This is the judgment, that the light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were evil.discussed above
Greek Nestle 1904
αὕτη δέ ἐστιν ἡ κρίσις, ὅτι τὸ φῶς ἐλήλυθεν εἰς τὸν κόσμον καὶ ἠγάπησαν οἱ ἄνθρωποι μᾶλλον τὸ σκότος ἢ τὸ φῶς· ἦν γὰρ αὐτῶν πονηρὰ τὰ ἔργα.
- αὕτη οὗτος demonstrative pronoun · nominative singular feminine G3778
- δέ δέ conjunction G1161
- ἐστιν εἰμί verb · present active indicative, 3rd person singular G1510
- ἡ ὁ article · nominative singular feminine G3588
- κρίσις, κρίσις noun · nominative singular feminine G2920
- ὅτι ὅτι conjunction G3754
- τὸ ὁ article · nominative singular neuter G3588
- φῶς φῶς noun · nominative singular neuter G5457
- ἐλήλυθεν ἔρχομαι verb · perfect active indicative, 3rd person singular G2064
- εἰς εἰς preposition G1519
- τὸν ὁ article · accusative singular masculine G3588
- κόσμον κόσμος noun · accusative singular masculine G2889
Punctuation is editorial — the manuscripts carry none.
See also 5
- John 8:12 Again, therefore, Jesus spoke to them, saying, "I am the light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life."
- 2 Thessalonians 2:12 that they all might be judged who didn't believe the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.
- John 9:39 Jesus said, "I came into this world for judgment, that those who don't see may see; and that those who see may become blind."
- Romans 2:8 but to those who are self-seeking and don't obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, will be wrath, indignation,
- John 12:43 for they loved men's praise more than God's praise.
From the interpretive tradition
The resurrection of Jesus Christ is either one of the most wicked, vicious, heartless hoaxes ever foisted upon the minds of men, or it is the most remarkable fact of history.
The glory of God is a living man; and the life of man consists in beholding God.