John 4:42

4:42 They said to the woman, “No longer do we believe because of your words, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this one ¹  really is the Savior of the world.” ² 

John 6:51

6:51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats from this bread he will live forever. The bread ³  that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

John 8:12

Jesus as the Light of the World

8:12 Then Jesus spoke out again, ⁴  “I am the light of the world. ⁵  The one who follows me will never ⁶  walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

John 14:17

14:17 the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot accept, ⁷  because it does not see him or know him. But you know him, because he resides ⁸  with you and will be ⁹  in you.

John 14:27

14:27 “Peace I leave with you; ¹⁰  my peace I give to you; I do not give it ¹¹  to you as the world does. ¹²  Do not let your hearts be distressed or lacking in courage. ¹³ 

John 16:21

16:21 When a woman gives birth, she has distress ¹⁴  because her time ¹⁵  has come, but when her child is born, she no longer remembers the suffering because of her joy that a human being ¹⁶  has been born into the world. ¹⁷ 

John 17:6

Jesus Prays for the Disciples

17:6 “I have revealed ¹⁸  your name to the men ¹⁹  you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, ²⁰  and you gave them to me, and they have obeyed ²¹  your word.

John 17:24

17:24 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, ²²  so that they can see my glory that you gave me because you loved me before the creation of the world ²³ .

John 21:25

21:25 There are many other things that Jesus did. If every one of them were written down, ²⁴  I suppose the whole world ²⁵  would not have room for the books that would be written. ²⁶ 

[4:42]  ¹ tn Or “this.” The Greek pronoun can mean either “this one” or “this” (BDAG 740 s.v. οὗτος 1).

[4:42]  ² sn There is irony in the Samaritans’ declaration that Jesus was really the Savior of the world, an irony foreshadowed in the prologue to the Fourth Gospel (1:11): “He came to his own, and his own did not receive him.” Yet the Samaritans welcomed Jesus and proclaimed him to be not the Jewish Messiah only, but the Savior of the world.

[6:51]  ³ tn Grk “And the bread.”

[8:12]  ⁵ tn Grk “Then again Jesus spoke to them saying.”

[8:12]  ⁶ sn The theory proposed by F. J. A. Hort (The New Testament in the Original Greek, vol. 2, Introduction; Appendix, 87-88), that the backdrop of 8:12 is the lighting of the candelabra in the court of women, may offer a plausible setting to the proclamation by Jesus that he is the light of the world. The last time that Jesus spoke in the narrative (assuming 7:53-8:11 is not part of the original text, as the textual evidence suggests) is in 7:38, where he was speaking to a crowd of pilgrims in the temple area. This is where he is found in the present verse, and he may be addressing the crowd again. Jesus’ remark has to be seen in view of both the prologue (John 1:4, 5) and the end of the discourse with Nicodemus (John 3:19-21). The coming of Jesus into the world provokes judgment: A choosing up of sides becomes necessary. The one who comes to the light, that is, who follows Jesus, will not walk in the darkness. The one who refuses to come, will walk in the darkness. In this contrast, there are only two alternatives. So it is with a person’s decision about Jesus. Furthermore, this serves as in implicit indictment of Jesus’ opponents, who still walk in the darkness, because they refuse to come to him. This sets up the contrast in chap. 9 between the man born blind, who receives both physical and spiritual sight, and the Pharisees (John 9:13, 15, 16) who have physical sight but remain in spiritual darkness.

[8:12]  ⁷ tn The double negative οὐ μή (ou mh) is emphatic in 1st century Hellenistic Greek.

[14:17]  ⁷ tn Or “cannot receive.”

[14:17]  ⁸ tn Or “he remains.”

[14:17]  ⁹ tc Some early and important witnesses (Ì^66* B D* W 1 565 it) have ἐστιν (estin, “he is”) instead of ἔσται (estai, “he will be”) here, while other weighty witnesses ({Ì^66c,75vid א A D¹ L Θ Ψ Ë¹³ 33^vid Ï as well as several versions and fathers}), read the future tense. When one considers transcriptional evidence, ἐστιν is the more difficult reading and better explains the rise of the future tense reading, but it must be noted that both Ì⁶⁶ and D were corrected from the present tense to the future. If ἐστιν were the original reading, one would expect a few manuscripts to be corrected to read the present when they originally read the future, but that is not the case. When one considers what the author would have written, the future is on much stronger ground. The immediate context (both in 14:16 and in the chapter as a whole) points to the future, and the theology of the book regards the advent of the Spirit as a decidedly future event (see, e.g., 7:39 and 16:7). The present tense could have arisen from an error of sight on the part of some scribes or more likely from an error of thought as scribes reflected upon the present role of the Spirit. Although a decision is difficult, the future tense is most likely authentic. For further discussion on this textual problem, see James M. Hamilton, Jr., “He Is with You and He Will Be in You” (Ph.D. diss., The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2003), 213-20.

[14:27]  ⁹ sn Peace I leave with you. In spite of appearances, this verse does not introduce a new subject (peace). Jesus will use the phrase as a greeting to his disciples after his resurrection (20:19, 21, 26). It is here a reflection of the Hebrew shalom as a farewell. But Jesus says he leaves peace with his disciples. This should probably be understood ultimately in terms of the indwelling of the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, who has been the topic of the preceding verses. It is his presence, after Jesus has left the disciples and finally returned to the Father, which will remain with them and comfort them.

[14:27]  ¹⁰ tn The pronoun “it” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied. Direct objects in Greek were often omitted when clear from the context.

[14:27]  ¹¹ tn Grk “not as the world gives do I give to you.”

[14:27]  ¹² tn Or “distressed or fearful and cowardly.”

[16:21]  ¹¹ sn The same word translated distress here has been translated sadness in the previous verse (a wordplay that is not exactly reproducible in English).

[16:21]  ¹² tn Grk “her hour.”

[16:21]  ¹³ tn Grk “that a man” (but in a generic sense, referring to a human being).

[16:21]  ¹⁴ sn Jesus now compares the situation of the disciples to a woman in childbirth. Just as the woman in the delivery of her child experiences real pain and anguish (has distress), so the disciples will also undergo real anguish at the crucifixion of Jesus. But once the child has been born, the mother’s anguish is turned into joy, and she forgets the past suffering. The same will be true of the disciples, who after Jesus’ resurrection and reappearance to them will forget the anguish they suffered at his death on account of their joy.

[17:6]  ¹³ tn Or “made known,” “disclosed.”

[17:6]  ¹⁴ tn Here “men” is retained as a translation for ἀνθρώποις (anqrwpoi") rather than the more generic “people” because in context it specifically refers to the eleven men Jesus had chosen as apostles (Judas had already departed, John 13:30). If one understands the referent here to be the broader group of Jesus’ followers that included both men and women, a translation like “to the people” should be used here instead.

[17:6]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “Yours they were.”

[17:6]  ¹⁶ tn Or “have kept.”

[17:24]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “the ones you have given me, I want these to be where I am with me.”

[17:24]  ¹⁶ tn Grk “before the foundation of the world.”

[21:25]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “written”; the word “down” is supplied in keeping with contemporary English idiom.

[21:25]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “the world itself.”

[21:25]  ¹⁹ tc Although the majority of mss (C² Θ Ψ Ë¹³ Ï lat) conclude this Gospel with ἀμήν (amhn, “amen”), such a conclusion is routinely added by scribes to NT books because a few of these books originally had such an ending (cf. Rom 16:27; Gal 6:18; Jude 25). A majority of Greek witnesses have the concluding ἀμήν in every NT book except Acts, James, and 3 John (and even in these books, ἀμήν is found in some witnesses). It is thus a predictable variant. Further, excellent and early witnesses, as well as a few others (א A B C*^,3 D W 1 33 pc it), lack the particle, rendering no doubt as to how this Gospel originally ended.