What Does John 8:14 Mean?
Jesus answered and said to them, Even if I bear witness about myself, my witness is true, for I have seen where I came from and where I go; but you have not seen where I come from or where I go.
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
Jesus answered and said unto them, Though I bear record of myself, yet my record is true: for I know whence I came, and whither I go; but ye cannot tell whence I come, and whither I go.THE KEY
A testimony can be true even when its hearers cannot trace the speaker’s source or destination.
THE MEANING
The verse places you before a witness whose truth rests in knowing the whole way, where he comes from and where he is going. Others cannot trace that way, but their inability to name it does not make the witness false.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
If others cannot explain where a voice comes from or where it is going, that alone does not prove the voice is false.
THE ROOT
μαρτυρία
martyria
GROWS FROM
μαρτυρ-
martyr- word family
Witness and testimony: the one who bears witness and the act or content of bearing witness.
“bear witness” in this verse is martyria. Here, “record” is testimony borne by a witness, not merely information entered somewhere. The word family names both the witness and the act of testifying, tying the claim to the one who knows the path being witnessed.
ALSO GROWS
martureō: to testify, bear witness
μαρτυρέω
The same family makes the testimony an act of witnessing, not just a statement on a page.
martys: witness; the source of the English word “martyr”
μάρτυς
The testimony is bound to the person who stands as its witness, not only to the words spoken.
THE PATTERN
A testimony is established by knowledge and witness beyond what a single observer can see.
One witness shall not rise up against a man for any crookedness, or for any falling short, in it he misses the mark; upon the mouth of two witnesses, or upon the mouth of three witnesses, the word shall stand.There is another who bears witness about me, and I know that the witness he bears about me is true.If we take in the witness of people, the witness of God is greater, for this is what he has witnessed concerning his Son.THE THREAD
If I bear witness about myself, my witness is not true.The same Greek witness word family appears here, but this line seems to reverse John 8:14: witness about oneself is not true. The surrounding lines in John 8 distinguish solitary self-assertion from witness confirmed by the Father, so the tension is about whether the witness stands alone.
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