καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ναθαναήλ· ἐκ Ναζαρὲτ δύναταί τι ἀγαθὸν εἶναι (John 1:46)

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Title:  And Nathanael Said to Him, “Can Anything Good Come From Nazareth?”

The text is, “καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ναθαναήλ· ἐκ Ναζαρὲτ δύναταί τι ἀγαθὸν εἶναι λέγει αὐτῷ ὁ Φίλιππος· ἔρχου καὶ ἴδε”.

καὶ -> coordinating additive conjunction -> and

εἶπεν -> third person, aorist, active, indicative verb-> said

αὐτῷ -> third person, personal, masculine, singular, dative pronoun -> to him

Ναθαναήλ -> masculine, singular, nominative, proper noun -> Nathaniel

ἐκ -> preposition taking the genitive for its object word -> from

Ναζαρὲτ -> feminine, singular, genitive, proper noun -> Nazareth

δύναταί -> third person, present, passive, indicative verb -> can

τι -> neuter, singular, nominative, indefinite pronoun -> anything

ἀγαθὸν -> neuter, singular, nominative adjective -> good

εἶναι -> present, infinitive verb -> (to) come

λέγει -> third person, present, active, indicative verb -> he says CER*he  said

αὐτῷ -> third person, personal, masculine, singular, dative article -> to him

[ὁ] -> masculine, singular, nominative article -> the NRIEH**

Φίλιππος -> masculine, singular, nominative, proper noun -> Philip

ἔρχου -> second person, singular, present, middle, imperative verb -> you come

καὶ -> coordinating additive conjunction -> and

ἴδε -> second person, singular, aorist, active, imperative verb -> you see

The meaning of this verse is,

And Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come from Nazareth?”  Philip said to him, “You come and you see”.

*CER:  indicates a non-literal, but good translation.  In the first example here, the verb “ἔρχεται” is present tense, which in the indicative mood often can be rendered in the aorist tense, since it expresses linear action not in the present but at some point in the past.  The designation CER is equivalent to “Contextual English Rendering”.

*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”.

 

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CC BY 4.0 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ Ναθαναήλ· ἐκ Ναζαρὲτ δύναταί τι ἀγαθὸν εἶναι (John 1:46) by Dennis Glover is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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