Tool Beta
Hebrew and Greek Without Learning Either
A walk through Genesis, the Psalms, and John, plus the key Hebrew and Greek words worth knowing. Each card is a place the English Bibles part company, and what in the Hebrew or Greek made them.
John 18:5-6
I am he. And they went backward and fell to the ground.
John 18:5-6, in every translation this tool compares.
I am. Nobody falls over at a name. The narrator reports a reaction that the printed English does not explain.
Because the arresting party falls over at a two-word answer, and the he is supplied by the translator. The reaction is the strongest internal evidence for how these two words were heard.
Every version supplies he. The reaction in verse 6 is printed unexplained.
ἐγώ εἰμι ego eimi
Ego eimi absolute, twice. Verse 6 then reports that they drew back and fell. John does not comment. The pattern of the absolute sayings through the Gospel, and the Septuagint background at Exodus 3:14 and Isaiah 43:10, is the explanation on offer.
English requires a completion after the verb, so the two-word answer becomes a three-word identification and the reaction stops making sense.
When a narrative reports a reaction that the English does not account for, look at what was actually said in the original.
I am he is the majority rendering.
- The absolute sayings at John 4:26; 8:24, 28, 58; 13:19; 18:5-6
- The reaction at John 18:6
- Septuagint Exodus 3:14; Isaiah 43:10
