Did Jesus claim to be “The Great I AM” in John 8.58? If not, what was he saying? In this episode we examine the alleged parallel passage in Exodus where God reveals his name to Moses at the burning bush. Next, we’ll explore texts with the same Greek construction that Jesus used in an effort to sniff out bias. In the end we’ll see there are three viable possibilities for translating John 8.58, the least likely of which is what we find in most translations.
—— Books ——
- The First Testament by John Goldingay
- The Hebrew Bible by Robert Alter
- The Schocken Bible by Everett Fox
- A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd Edition (BDAG)
- Greek Grammar by Herbert Weir Smyth (see rule 1885)
- A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature by F. Blass, A. Debrunner, and Robert Funk (see rule 322, note the typo John 5.58 should be John 8.58)
- Truth in Translation by Jason David BeDuhn
—— Links ——
- Did Jesus Claim to be the “I Am” in John 8.58? by Victor Gluckin (audio sermon)
- Explanation of John 8.58 by John Schoenheit (from One God & One Lord)
- John 8.58 by Steve Katsaras (audio sermon)
- Debate: Patrick Navas vs. James White on Chris Date’s Theopologetics Podcast (part 2 addresses the “I am” statements in John)
- Check out all the lectures in How We Got the Bible
- See what other classes are available here or on the Restitutio Classes podcast (subscribe in Apple, Spotify, RSS feed)
- If you’d like to support Restitutio, you can donate here.
- Intro music: Good Vibes by MBB Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0) Free Download / Stream: Music promoted by Audio Library
Will you be recommending any particular translations before wrapping up this stimulating series? I’ll never be proficient in Greek and Hebrew, so any guidance would be appreciated. 🙂
Hey J. Kerr,
First of all, never say never to learning a biblical language. A little persistence can pay rich dividends. Yes, I will recommend a few translations in the last episode, due to come out on Saturday.
Hey Sean thanks for all the hard work! It is awesome that you dive into difficult topics and avoid bias as much as a possible. I have attempted to do this on my own for a few doctrines and it was so hard but rewarding. Now it is a little easier since I can use your material as a starting point especially as life gets a little busier. I think you should strongly consider doing some work on whether or not there was psychedelics. I know it sounds crazy but there is a few authors that have published work on this topic and it doesn’t seem like anyone it talking about it. Contact “TheThirdWave” if you want to maybe get on a podcast on the other side of the argument. People basically believe frankincense, myrrh, shewbread, anointing oil and the smoke that Moses stood in the tabernacle to contain psychedelic properties. The famous acai tree mentioned multiple times in the bible has properties of dmt. Here is an article https://www.anewunderstanding.org/single-post/2016/05/28/The-Bibles-Moses-Was-On-DMT-Says-Hebrew-Professor I hope this isn’t too taboo! I just want to know what scripture says and you do amazing research!
Hi Sean,
I am an Eastern Orthodox Christian. Exodus 3:14 (Septuagint) ‘EGO EIMI O ON’ corresponds to Apocalypse 1:8 **EGO EIMI** to Alpha kai to Omega legei Kurios O Theos **O ON** kai O En kai O Erchomenos O Pantokrator.
The Holy Scriptures and the Dogmas and Praxes of The Holy Orthodox Faith can be proven via a pattern involving the numbers 40 (and 41). The pair {40, 41} points to The Mystery of The Incarnation; i.e. this is the number of weeks from The Great Feast of Annunciation to The Nativity of The Lord. This pattern occurs everywhere throughout The Holy Scriptures.
I will begin with this one example of the Christological Significance of the words ‘EGO EIMI’ when spoken by Christ.
There are 6 cases of ‘ego eimi’ spoken by someone other than Christ. These exclusions are as follows: Matthew 26:22, Matthew 26:25, Luke 1:19, John 9:9, Acts 10:21, Acts 26:29. Note: The critical text has one additional case – Acts 22:3.
What we are interested in are the number of times the words ‘EGO EIMI’ is spoken by God, and these are as follows:
Three times in Matthew
Matthew 14:27, Matthew 22:32, Matthew 24:5
Three times in Mark
Mark 6:50, Mark 13:6, Mark 14:62
Three times in Luke
Luke 21:8, Luke 22:70, Luke 24:39
Twenty three times in John
John 4:26, John 6:20, John 6:35, John 6:41, John 6:48, John 6:51, John 8:12, John 8:18, John 8:24, John 8:28, John 8:58, John 10:7, John 10:9, John 10:11, John 10:14, John 11:25, John 13:19, John 14:6, John 15:1, John 15:5, John 18:5, John 18:6, John 18:8
Four times in Acts
Acts 9:5, Acts 18:10, Acts 22:8, Acts 26:15
Four times in Apocalypse
Revelation 1:8, Revelation 1:17, Revelation 2:23, Revelation 22:16
3 + 3 + 3 + 23 + 4 + 4 = 40 instances.
bibleproofs.org/ia.html
Thanks Sean – that was a brilliant presentation.
Another quick thought :
Jesus denied the accusation that He claimed to be God, in John 10:33 – so it would be apparently contradictory if He had earlier claimed to be God, in John 8:58 (either via Ex. 3:14, or via Is. 41:4, 43:10, et al).
God bless you, Sean, and all yours.
Hello Sean,
I came upon your teaching video when I did a google search for “MacDonald Idiomatic Translation” which was translated by my late father-in-law, Dr. William G. MacDonald, who passed away on December 31, 2017. He was a Greek and Hebrew scholar and was a professor at various Bible colleges over the years. If anyone would like to request a pdf copy of his translation, you can email me at oldmacdonald7@gmail.com
I am curious to know how you came across the MIT? (It used to be on Bible Works.)
I found your testimony intriguing and followed the link to Living Hope church which is unique in that the Biblical beliefs are similar to ours which is unusual. Thanks for posting the church’s videos on YouTube.
Our family ministry website has free gospel music downloads at http://www.macdonaldfamilysingers.com and can be heard on Spotify and Apple.
On the first page of our music website you will find “Wonderful Jesus” written by Dr. MacDonald that you may find edifying.
Also, I have numerous free piano hymn arrangements at this link: https://www.free-scores.com/Download-PDF-Sheet-Music-lauriemacdonald.htm
Grace and Peace through our Lord Jesus Christ,
Laurie MacDonald