What Does 1 John 5:20 Mean?
And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us a mind, so that we may perceive the true one. And we are in him, in his Son, Jesus, the Anointed One. This is the true God and the life of the ages.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.THE KEY
The understanding given here does not stop at recognizing the true one; it draws the knower into the one known.
THE MEANING
You are included in a knowing that is given: understanding opens you to the true one. The verse joins knowing him with being in him, so truth is not only something you grasp but the one in whom you stand. This is the life of the age, named as present in the true one.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie this verse undoes is that knowing God means only holding correct information about God. Here, knowing is joined to being in him.
THE ROOT
γινώσκωμεν
ginōskōmen
GROWS FROM
γινωσκ-
ginōsk-
To know, recognize, or come to know.
“perceive” in this verse is ginōskōmen. The verse opens with οἴδαμεν (oidamen, “we know”) and then uses γινώσκωμεν (ginōskōmen, “we may know”) for the knowing that understanding makes possible. The second verb belongs to a family of knowing and recognition; its goal is not information alone, since the verse locates us in the one known.
ALSO GROWS
ginōskō: To know or recognize.
γινώσκω
This is the base form of the verb used in the verse, keeping its emphasis on recognition visible.
epiginōskō: To recognize or come to know.
ἐπιγινώσκω
This compound retains the same γινωσκ- root and shows its reach into recognition of what is before you.
ἀληθινόν
alēthinon
GROWS FROM
ἀληθ-
alēth-
True, genuine, or real.
The verse calls the one known “the true one,” then names him as the true God. The shared root also names truth itself, joining the person who is true with the reality expressed by truth.
ALSO GROWS
alēthēs: True or genuine.
ἀληθής
This related form describes what is true and shares the root used to identify the one known.
alētheia: Truth or reality.
ἀλήθεια
The same root names truth itself, linking the true one with the truth in which you stand.
αἰώνιος
aiōnios
GROWS FROM
αἰων-
aiōn-
An age or span of life.
“the life of the ages” in this verse is aiōnios. The word rendered “eternal” carries the root αἰών (aiōn, “age”). The phrase also holds the sense of life of the age, keeping this life connected to the true one in whom the verse says you are.
ALSO GROWS
aiōn: An age or era.
αἰών
This is the noun beneath the verse’s closing word, making the age audible in its description of life.
aiōnios: Of an age or age-lasting.
αἰώνιος
This adjective describes the life named at the close of the verse and carries the same age-root.
THE PATTERN
Knowing the true one is given as a relationship that becomes belonging and life.
And I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the LORD; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God; for they shall turn back to me with their whole heart.I am the good shepherd. I perceive my own, and my own perceive me.And this is the life of the ages, that they might know you, the only God of truth, and Jesus, the Anointed One, whom you have sent.THE THREAD
And this is the life of the ages, that they might know you, the only God of truth, and Jesus, the Anointed One, whom you have sent.Both verses join knowing the true God and Jesus Christ with the life of the age; the same Greek root for “know” holds the statements together. John 17:3 makes explicit the link that 1 John 5:20 compresses: knowing the true one is named as life.
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