Does John 21 : 22 , " If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me.” Stand as a prophecy of the (then) coming event of John, in the Isle of Patmos, "for the word of God”? I take it to be so from Rev. 1:17 where it would seem to mean that while John was in Pat mos, "He (Christ) laid his right hand upon him (or me)”, that Christ therefore did visit John and thus fulfill the Scrip ture in John 21 : 22 . I do not think so. This interpretation seems to me to be very fanciful and far fetched. It almost seems absurd to think of Jesus saying to Peter,,If I will that he tarry till I come to him in a vision, what is that to thee? It would apparently seem to have very little sense or meaning. What John saw as recorded in Rev. 1:17, you will see if you look at it in the context, was something that he saw “in the Spirit,” a visionary appearance of the Lord. Of course, the vision stood for facts, but it was, nevertheless, a vision. There is n o , more reason for supposing that there was an actual bodily coming of ,Jesus than that there were actual candlesticks and a man with actual stars in his hand, and with a literal two-edged sword proceeding out of his mouth. The most natural interpreta tion to put upon our Lord’s words in John 21:22 was that He referred to a personal, bodily coming of Himself such as is spoken of so often in the Bible, e.g., in Acts 1 :11. Who is the “He” in Rev. 4 : 3 ? If you will read on through the passage you will see in verse 8 that the He is the “Lord God, the Almighty;" and if you will read on still further you will see that it is “Our Lord and our God.” You may wish to ask still further, but is it the Lord Jesus? This question is answered in the Sth chap ter, 13th verse, where a clear distinction is
drawn between “Him that sitteth on the throne” and the Lamb. Of course the “Lamb” is the Lord Jesus. What particular reason is there for the translation "life of the ages'’ instead of everlasting life and eternal life, in Wey mouth’s translation of the New Testa ment? Is this work a translation or a revision, or both? There is no good reason for so rendering the Greek words which the Authorized Version renders as “everlasting life” and “eternal life.” The phrase used in the Greek is “Zoe aionios.” “Zoe” means life and “aionios” is an adjective. It is an adjective derived from the word “aion” which means 'age, but which itself is derived from a word “aei” which means always. The meaning of the word “aion ios” is not “of the ages,” but rather, age- lasting (i.e., lasting throughout all ages), or everlasting. Our English word “ever” comes from the Latin word which cor responds to the Greek word “aion.” The meaning of "swords is determined by their usage and the usage of the word “aionios” in the New Testament is, of that which has no end and “everlasting” or “eternal” is a perfectly proper translation according to the usage of the word. “Of the ages” is not a proper translation. It is a mis leading translation. In regard to Wey mouth’s translation of the New Testa ment in general, it is a very unreliable book. You ask whether it is a translation or a revision or both. In some places it is neither one nor the other, but an interpre tation rather than a translation, and not a reliable interpretation. The so-called trans lation is sometimes so inaccurate and so biased, and to such an extent the substi tution of what Weymouth thinks the Bible writers ought to have said for what they
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