DIS-ARMING the Saints With Erroneous Translations

DISARMING THE SAINTS:

Men, altering the WORD+ of GOD,

Are Hiding the COUNTERFEIT Christ ~ The antiChrist ~

Behind Their Modern Translations 
 . . .  ILLEGALLY 
( Breaking the rules of Greek grammar in these Versions)  

The historic antiChrist doctrine has been altered in the modern versions of the New Testament in 1 John 4:3.

 

This subtle alteration OMITS the coming of the “man of sin” as a COUNTERFEIT Christ. 

Instead, the modern versions with one voice state in 1 John 4:3 that the “man of sin” is simply one who OPPOSES CHRIST. 

In so doing,  the  modern versions  DISARM the Body of CHRIST. 

How are these versions doing this ?

One alteration comes by omitting some of the Greek text, which was done in 1 John 4:3, one of the antiChrist verses.  

The OTHER alteration comes by not following

the established, standard rules of Greek grammar,

thus making a mis-translation

. . . which was also done in 1 John 4:3 . 

In that verse about the antiChrist in the first Epistle of John, we find a GLARING DISTORTION of the translation via the grammar-not-followed method. 

 [ NOTE: There are only four verses in the New Testament, all in the first two General Epistles of John ( I John and 2 John ) , which use the express term “antiChrist” ~ αντιχριστοs ~ 5 times in those four verses.]

Now understand this, in the Greek language, words fit together like jigsaw puzzle pieces. They do this by “agreement.” 

In English, we say a verb must AGREE with its subject. The subjects and verbs must agree in the Greek language as well. 

If the subject is singular in form, then the verb MUST be singular in form also.  If the subject is plural in form, then the form of the verb must be plural also. This is simply Basic English grammar and Basic Greek grammar as well.

 

In Greek , however, there is an additional AGREEMENT which must be followed. Adjectives  also must agree with their nouns. Pronouns which refer back to the nouns must also AGREE with their nouns. 

Adjectives and Pronouns agree with their nouns in THREE ways: 

1.  in number ( singular vs plural )  Yes, all Greek nouns are either singular or plural , as are adjectives and pronouns.

2.  in gender ( masculine, feminine, neuter ) Yes, all Greek nouns are either masculine, feminine, or neuter, as are the adjectives and pronouns.

3.   in case. CASE refers to the function – the job -- a word does in the sentence. In Latin and Greek, CASE is shown by the endings. 

Now, this bit of grammar is important because AGREEMENT is how we “hook” the Greek sentence together to make it make sense.

In Greek grammar, words which are used as

1.  subjects have a NOMINATIVE ending. So do predicate nouns which follow a linking verb ( is, are, etc. )

2.  direct objects have an ACCUSATIVE ending.

3.  in a prepositional phrase , words have a DATIVE ending.

4.  possessives are translated “of the ____” and they have a GENITIVE ending --- no apostrophe’s here as it is in English.

There is NO SEPARATE Greek word for “of”; it is understood when the GENITIVE case is used.

·      

All Greek nouns are either Nominative, Accusative, Dative, or Genitive ... as are the adjectives and pronouns that modify or refer to those nouns.  This is called AGREEMENT.

When this standard rule of AGREEMENT in Greek grammar is followed, the truth of Scriptures is communicated clearly. When the standard grammar rules are broken, then the message becomes muddled at best.

 Oftentimes, the message  ends up being FALSE.

For instance, in Greek, the article “the” is considered an adjective, so “the” must be written in the form that AGREES with the noun it is modifying . . .  in all THREE ways: number, gender, and case.  

The same is true of relative pronouns ( who, which ) or demonstrative pronouns ( this, that, these, those ).

In this manner, then, the Greek language becomes a VERY PRECISE language. The message can be accurately determined . . . if the translator follows the rules of grammar. 

[ The Greek language includes idioms, as in all languages, that do not follow the standard rules of grammar .  But these idioms also follow their own peculiar set of rules and patterns and are well-defined in Greek grammar books. Unless the phrase is an idiom, then the standard grammar rules should apply. ]

Having briefly reviewed basic Greek grammar above, let us look at the agreement problem in the modern translations of 1 John 4:3. 

The problem is about the dis-agreement by which some translators have broken the rules of grammar and distorted the message  about the antiChrist in 1 John 4:3.

First, in literal English, we will start with 1 John 4:2 because it sets the context for our target verse, 1 John 4:3.

 

In this, KNOW the SPIRIT of GOD; Every spirit which confesses JESUS CHRIST in flesh having come, out of GOD it is.

And likewise* every spirit which  

does NOT confess  JESUS CHRIST

in flesh having come, it is NOT out of GOD;

And this is the ______ of the antiChrist

which you have heard that it is come

and now in the world it is already.

+  +  +

NOTE THIS: Every RED word is NEUTER, SINGULAR, and NOMINATIVE (  used as a subject or predicate nominative after a linking verb).  

The PURPLE words are MASCULINE, SINGULAR, and GENITIVE ( possessive. )

The Necessity of FILLING in the Yellow BLANK

In the Greek New Testament text, “the” can and often does stand alone without filling in the blank for us. 

For instance, Mark 12:17, “the things that are GOD’s” is such an example. The word “things” is not supplied in the Greek text.  It is “understood” as a plural accusative (object) NOUN in the NEUTER case.

In Greek, this sentence is written with two DIFFERENT “the’s” together; no noun is in between them. The noun is “things” which is “understood” or implied by the grammar. 

. . . τα του θεου . . .

the the of GOD

(the literal translation)

τα – “the” ACCUSATIVE plural NEUTER

του—“the” GENITIVE ( “of-the”) singular MASCULINE

θεου – GOD , noun GENITIVE (“ of GOD”) singular MASCULINE

English translators sometimes handle this incompleteness of statement  (that is,  “the” which has no noun after it) for us readers by stating “the ones” or “the ones who. . .” . 

The Greek text simply has “the” and expects the reader to understand to WHOM or WHAT that particular “the” is referring.

We find a similar grammar construction 

in 1 John 4:3. 

There are TWO Greek “the’s” in the Greek text ~ τὸ  and  τοῦ ~  written next to each other , without a noun in between them. 

 Furthermore, as anyone can see, the two Greek “the’s” are spelled differently. This is to indicate that each has a different GENDER, according to their function  here in this sentence, and each are in a different grammatical CASE. 

Here is the Greek of 1 John 4:3, with variants. Notice the two underlined “the’s”, which are different from each other: 

καὶ πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ μὴ ὁμολογεῖ  τὸν Ἰησοῦν χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα  ἐκ  τοῦ θεοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν· καὶ τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ τοῦ ἀντιχρίστου, ὃ ἀκηκόατε ὅτι ἔρχεται, καὶ νῦν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐστὶν ἤδη. 

The Greek “the” [ TOU ] is in the genitive case to show possession ~  of the antiChrist ~ therefore, we add “of” to the phrase when translating that into English.

 

Keep in mind now that “antiChrist” is also in the genitive case; that is how we know that “the” is in the genitive case here. 

TOU (“the”) is MASCULINE in gender here according to function, because it goes with antiChrist, which is MASCULINE, not NEUTER. As a matter of fact, the spelling of antiChrist here is antiChristou, which is in agreement with TOU, “the”. 

Moving on, let’s examine the NEUTER red “the” right before the purple  “the” .

The red  “the”  is different from the purple “the”; the red “the” is in the NEUTER case.  It refers to an UN-NAMED ( or “understood”) noun or pronoun found previously in this verse that is also in the NEUTER case.

And likewise* every spirit which does NOT confess JESUS CHRIST in flesh having come, it is NOT out of GOD; And this , it is the  _______ of-the antiChrist which you have heard that it is come and now in the world it is already.

Looking at the verse, we see that all the words high-lighted in RED are in the NEUTER case.  So among those words coming BEFORE the red “the”, we must find the NEUTER word that is “understood” to fill in the blank.

 So . . . let’s look at this verse again in the literal English to find a red, NEUTER NOUN which can be used to FILL IN THE YELLOW BLANK to complete the meaning of “the”.

And likewise* every spirit which does NOT confess JESUS CHRIST in flesh having come, it is NOT out of GOD; And this,  it is the  _______ of-the antiChrist which you have heard that it is come and now in the world it is already.

Upon a clear, face-value reading of the verse and the words in red, we can locate the NEUTER noun that is precisely “understood” which accurately fills in the blank after the NEUTER “the”.  

According to the linguists’ analytical lexicons, we can only find ONE NEUTER noun written in this verse previous to the BLANK.  [ Timothy and Barbara Friberg’s Analytical Lexicon of the Greek New Testament, page 59 and E-Sword’s parsing component from Maurice Robinson. ] 

That “understood” noun to fill in the blank MUST be the NEUTER noun, “SPIRIT.”  Thus, an accurate, literal translation of the Greek text in I John 4:3 should be :

 

And likewise* every spirit which does NOT confess JESUS CHRIST in flesh having come, it is NOT out of GOD; And this it is the SPIRIT  of-the antiChrist which you have heard that it is come and now in the world it is already.

To do ANYTHING ELSE in translation with that yellow blank or to insert a MASCULINE noun in the blank or to omit the “understood” word altogether breaks the established standard Greek grammar rules which are followed throughout the New Testament .

Hence, any version which states: “This is antiChrist” has been incorrectly translated and does NOT follow the standard rules of Greek grammar.

One well-known, on-line, published Bible scholar and translator, David Robert Palmer, breaks this grammar agreement rule and translates 1 John 4:3 like this: 

³and every spirit that does not confess Jesus [Christ has come in the flesh], is not of God. And this is antichrist, which you have heard that he was coming, and now is in the world already.

I John 4:3 from David Robert Palmer’s comparison of the N-A 28^th Edition Text against Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform. ( This is free and on-line from his website PALMER'S 1 JOHN , Chapter 4 --- PDF, Bible verses alternate with Greek 

Mr. Palmer’s translation has given us a confusion of grammatical errors. Unfortunately, his is not the only translation which prints such errors.

Courtesy of Biblegateway.com, here is listed some other translations which have not followed the text and the grammar in 1 John 4:3 in this clause with the linking verb:

1.  AMPC Amplified Bible, Classic Edition, 1954-1987, Lockman Foundation 

2.  CEV  Contemporary English Version, 1995, American Bible Society

3.  DARBY  John Nelson Darby’s ( of pre-tribula Rapture Theory fame) translation, 1884

4.  Douay-Rheims 1899 , American Edition ( a Roman Catholic Bible)

5.  GW God’s Word to the Nations, 1995, Baker Publishing Group

6.  GNT  Good News Translation, 1992, American Bible Society

7.  TLB The Living Bible, 1971, Tyndale House

8.  NLV New Life Version , 1969, Christian Literature International

9.  NLT  New Living Translation , 2015 , Tyndale House

10.  TPT The Passion Translation, 2017, Broad Street Publishing Group

11.  WYC  Wycliffe Bible, 2001, Terence P . Noble, editor. [ Mr. Noble converted Wycliffe’s old-style English into modern-day English. John Wycliffe translated from Latin manuscripts. ]

These New Testaments are volumes in-hand and not listed with Biblegateway.com: 

12.    New English Bible, 1961, Oxford University Press

13.   Translator’s Translation of the New Testament, 2008, by Ellis W. Deibler, Jr., Cummins Works, Publisher, Ann Arbor, Michigan. [ Mr. Deibler is a retired Wycliffe translator and has worked closely with SIL and JAARS ministries/ missions/ and translators.]

That is the current list of New Testaments which mis-translate this LINKING VERB clause in 1 John 4:3. 

So now, let us look closely at this problematic LINKING VERB dis-agreement found in Mr. Palmer’s translation as well as the others.

³and every spirit that does not confess Jesus [Christ has come in the flesh], is not of God. And this is antichrist, which you have heard that he was coming, and now is in the world already.

I John 4:3 from David Robert Palmer’s comparison of the N-A 28^th Edition Text against Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform.

At a glance, anyone can see that the colors do not match after the linking verb IS, as they are supposed to do. The pronoun THIS ( touto ) is used as the subject, the nominative, and touto ONLY is NEUTER in gender.

 

So we see that Mr. Palmer and other translators have a NEUTER nominative linked to a MASCULINE genitive after IS , breaking everybody’s grammar rules. The NOMINATIVE should be linked to a predicate NOMINATIVE, not a GENITIVE. Grammar does not work that way in English nor in Greek. 

Next, Mr. Palmer and the other translators ignored the NEUTER “the” (TO) in the Greek text and totally omitted clarifying the idiom of “the + its understood noun” to complete the thought. Both “the” and its understood noun must OF COURSE be in the same gender, number, and case.

Finally, Mr. Palmer discarded the SECOND “the”, the TOU, which attaches itself to antiChrist in this verse. Both TOU and “antiChristou” are in the GENITIVE CASE. They have mis-translated the GENITIVE “antiChristou” as though it were a predicate noun in the nominative case, following a linking verb. 

Unfortunately for Mr. Palmer and a few others who discarded the Greek grammar rules, it should be translated as:  

“ of the antiChrist.”

Mr. Palmer and the other translators derived an erroneous translation because they:

1.  discarded the TWO “the’s” in the Greek text

 

2.  ignored the  DIFFERENT GENDERS of those two “the’s”

 

3.  ignored the DIFFERENT CASES of those two “the’s”

4.  did not complete the thought with the “understood” word for his readers . . . which had to be in the same gender, case, and number as “the” ( TO )

5.  ignored the fact that TOUTO ( “this”) is always NEUTER, never MASCULINE

6.  erroneously tried to force the possessive (genitive) “antiChristou” into the nominative (subject) case as a predicate noun after a linking verb

7.  gave readers to understand: NEUTER NOMINATIVE this = MASCULINE GENITIVE antiChrist  . . . which it does not.

8.  ignored the following NEUTER “which” . . . and pretended that it was a masculine pronoun SO THAT the translators might use “he” to refer to the masculine antiChrist . . .  so to write “…which you have heard that he was coming . . .”

Again, the genders, indicated by the colors, must match in Greek grammar. Because “which” is a red Neuter, then “he” is incorrect and needs to be changed to an “it” . It refers to the spirit , both words being NEUTER.

The ACCURATE Translation

The verse is NOT saying that the antiChrist was in the world when the Apostle John wrote this.

It is CLEARLY and GRAMMATICALLY stating that the SPIRIT of the antiChrist was already in the Apostle John’s world  . . . and it is in the world today.

+  +  +

 And JESUS answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. Matthew 24:4

And JESUS answering them began to say, Take heed lest any man deceive you:  For many shall come in My+ Name, saying, I+ am CHRIST; and shall deceive many. Mark 13:5-6.

Take heed therefore how ye hear: for whosoever hath, to him shall be given; and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he seemeth to have. Luke 18:8.

+  +  +

TWO IMPORTANT NOTES: 

Now note this well: the two “the’s” --- one a NOMINATIVE-NEUTER and the other a GENITIVE-MASCULINE --- have not one variant among them .

In other words, both the Byzantine textform and the eclectic N-A 28^th [ Alexandrian-based ] Greek texts AGREE that the words are correct here. 

καὶ πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ μὴ ὁμολογεῖ  τὸν  Ἰησοῦν χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα  ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν· καὶ τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ τοῦ ἀντιχρίστου, ὃ ἀκηκόατε ὅτι ἔρχεται, καὶ νῦν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐστὶν ἤδη.

* KAI = LIKEWISE. See: Thayer’s Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament, Joseph H. Thayer, Peabody, MA, Hendrickson Publishers Inc. ( reprinted from 4^th edition; sixth printing-October 2003 ), p. 316, paragraph I I (Roman numeral two), section 1, letter (a). In addition, see BAGD, 2^nd Edition, page 393,section I I ( Roman numeral two.)