John 4:1

Footnotes

1. 1 Several early and important witnesses, along with the majority of later ones (𝔓66c, 75 A B C L Ws Ψ 083 f13 33 𝔐 sa), have κύριος (kurios, “Lord”) here instead of Ἰησοῦς (Iēsous, “Jesus”). As significant as this external support is, the internal evidence seems to be on the side of Ἰησοῦς. “Jesus” is mentioned two more times in the first two verses of chapter four in a way that is stylistically awkward (so much so that the translation has substituted the pronoun for the first one; see note below). This seems to be sufficient reason to motivate scribes to change the wording to κύριος. Further, the reading Ἰησοῦς is not without decent support, though admittedly not as strong as that for κύριος (𝔓66* א D Θ 086 f1 565 1241 lat bo). On the other hand, this Gospel speaks of Jesus as Lord in the evangelist’s narrative descriptions elsewhere only in 11:2; 20:18, 20; 21:12; and probably 6:23, preferring Ἰησοῦς most of the time. This fact could be used to argue that scribes, acquainted with John’s style, changed κύριος to Ἰησοῦς. But the immediate context generally is weighed more heavily than an author’s style. It is possible that neither word was in the original text and scribes supplied what they thought most appropriate (see ). But without evidence to this effect coupled with the harder reading Ἰησοῦς, this conjecture must remain doubtful. All in all, it is best to regard Ἰησοῦς as the original reading here.
2. 2 See the note on Pharisees in .
3. 3 Grk “Jesus”; the repetition of the proper name is somewhat redundant in English (see the beginning of the verse) and so the pronoun (“he”) has been substituted here.
4. 4 Grk “was making.”