Ἦν τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινόν, ὃ φωτίζει πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἐρχόμενον εἰς τὸν κόσμον (John 1:9)

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Title:  The True Light, Which Gives Light to All Humankind, Was Coming Into the World

The text is, “Ἦν τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινόν, ὃ φωτίζει πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἐρχόμενον εἰς τὸν κόσμον”.

Ἦν -> third person, singular, imperfect, indicative verb -> was

τὸ -> neuter, singular, nominative article -> the

φῶς -> neuter, singular, nominative noun -> light

τὸ -> neuter, singular, nominative article -> the NRIEH*

ἀληθινόν -> neuter, singular, nominative adjective -> true

ὃ -> neuter, singular, nominative, definite, relative pronoun ->which

φωτίζει ->third person, singular, present, active, indicative verb -> gives light to

πάντα -> masculine, singular, accusative adjective -> all

ἄνθρωπον -> masculine, singular, accusative noun -> humankind

ἐρχόμενον -> present, singular, participial, neuter, singular, nominative verb -> coming

εἰς -> preposition taking the accusative for its object word -> into

τὸν -> masculine, singular, accusative article -> the

κόσμον -> masculine, singular, accusative noun -> world

The meaning of this verse is,

The true light, which gives light to all humankind, was coming into the world.

*NRIEH: For the sake of clarity the word is translated into English, but to avoid such odd constructions as applying a definite article (“the”) to a substantive sufficiently determined by its being a proper noun, or by the use of a qualifier other than the definite article. An example would be the basic translation “Peter said to the Jesus”; the word “the” is completely unnecessary. There are many examples of this in the New Testament. The designation NRIEH is equivalent to “Not Rendered Into English Here”.

Ἦν τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινόν, ὃ φωτίζει πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἐρχόμενον εἰς τὸν κόσμον (John 1:9) by Dennis Glover is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.