John 3:16, A Terrible Mis-Translation!

John 3:16

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

Foreword

The gross mistranslations in this one verse of scripture are the cause for the GREATEST deception the world has ever known.  Herein below, I shall prove it.

“in” or “for”?

I am no expert in Hebrew, but I am a linguist and I am an expert on various Far Eastern languages.  For example, in the Altaic languages, there is no way to distinguish “believe him” or “believe in him”.  In fact, no preposition is used ever in that case.  However, I have come to understand by using Strong’s Concordance that there actually IS a preposition there in Greek.  In John 3:16, Strong’s Concordance suggests that “for” might be a better choice as a translation for that preposition.

“him” or “himself”?

The word “him” is a complete and utter mistranslation.  There’s no doubt about it.  The original Greek is “autos”, which means “one’s self”.  It is a reflexive pronoun.  Surely the translators knew that.  Why then, did they mistranslate it?  It had to be on purpose.  Anyone who know anything about the Greek language knows that “autos” means self.  It’s not a “toss up” as with the prepositions.

Conclusion

Because of the ambiguity in the Greek preposition’s actual meaning, we have two possible translations:

(1) “…that whosoever believeth in himself, should not perish…”

Or

(2) “…that whosoever believeth for himself, should not perish…” (preferred by Strong’s)

Personally, I like the first one best.  But whether you go with the first or the last, the meaning is vastly different from the one portrayed in the various English translations of the Bible.  Isn’t it interesting that as each new translation of the Bible comes out, they continually keep the same MIS-translation, while the purported purpose of giving a NEW translation is to give a more correct translation?  I think that it is very, VERY interesting.

After-Word

It makes the blood boil of any logical thinker to even consider the most illogical and fantastic notion that by simply believing IN another person, one would guarantee one’s own salvation.  So, I have long maintained that the CORRECT translation must have been “believe him” (instead of “believeth in him”).  Oh, how wrong I was!  There certainly is a preposition there in the Greek.  I was completely taken by surprise when I read Strong’s Concordance and found out that there was a reflexive pronoun after that preposition.  IT’S REFLEXIVE!

Either you believe FOR YOURSELF, or you believe IN YOURSELF.  Take your pick.  And now, James chapter 2 makes perfect and complete sense, when he writes that even the Devil’s believe and tremble, but they shall not see salvation (I’m  paraphrasing).  Merely believing in another being guarantees nothing!

Please learn what Jesus (Yohoshua) actually taught.  He taught, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.”