My Review of Alexander Smarius’s Article

A recent article with an interesting take on John 1:1 is Alexander Smarius’s Another God in the Gospel of John?: A Linguistic Analysis of John 1:1 and 1:18 in Brill’s Horizons in Biblical Theology Journal.

The article takes on a contested topic in recent scholarship, which is how to translate John 1:1. After a brief few comments, Smarius jumps right into his argument about the possibilities for translation.

In Part 1 of my review of Smarius’s article, I will include the possibilities for translation for this widely debated Bible verse.

Translation possibilities

Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος. (John 1:1)

“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” (most Bible translations)

Smarius notes that there are a number of possibilities for translation and issues with the translation of this verse. He wrote this paper to argue that the last part of the phrase should read “the Word was a god.”