This verse serves as an introduction to the entire “Book of Glory.” It also gives the immediate setting for Jesus’ Last Supper with his disciples (verse 2).
In Greek the first verse of Chapter 13 is one sentence, which Good News Translation, New English Bible, and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch break into two sentences. It was now the day before the Passover Festival is more literally “but before the Feast of Passover….” The phrase “before the Feast of Passover” is rather vague. Anchor attempts to make it more specific by translating “It was just before the Passover Feast….” That John has reference to the day before the Passover Feast is seen by 18.28; 19.14,31,42. Good News Translation makes this information explicit in the present verse.
John clearly distinguishes between the Last Supper and the Jewish Passover, and in this respect he differs from the Synoptic Gospels, which understand the last supper to be a Passover meal. It is not within the scope of this commentary to discuss the problem of the relation between the Johannine and the Synoptic accounts of that last meal, but it is important to point out one or two facts. The Jewish religious calendar was a lunar calendar, and the beginning of a new day was counted from sunset. According to Old Testament regulations (Lev 23.5), the Passover meal was eaten on the evening that concluded the fourteenth day of Nisan and began the fifteenth day. For the Synoptic Gospels the meal that Jesus ate was a Passover meal (Mark 14.12 and parallels), whereas, according to the Gospel of John, the last supper took place a day before the Passover, and the trial and crucifixion of Jesus are clearly dated on Passover eve, the fourteenth of Nisan (18.28; 19.14). Although the calendar dates are different, John (19.31) agrees with the other Gospels on the day of the week on which these events took place. That is, both for the Synoptics and for John the meal was eaten on Thursday evening, and the crucifixion took place on Friday.
Good News Translation, New English Bible, and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch all have a full stop after the reference to the “Passover” (or Passover Festival); some translations place a comma after “Passover,” but achieve essentially the same effect: “It was before the festival of the Passover, and Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to pass from this world to the Father” (Jerusalem Bible). The difference of focus between the two restructurings is slight. According to the restructuring of Good News Translation, the first sentence is simply a statement of time. Those translations which join the first two sentences with “and” (as Jerusalem Bible) tie the idea of Jesus’ knowing about his hour more closely to the day before the Passover Festival. The grammar of the Greek sentence is difficult, and no final decision can be made in favor of either viewpoint, though it seems more natural to tie the idea of knowing to the temporal clause, rather than separating the two as Good News Translation, New English Bible, and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch do. In Greek the verb knew is a participle, but most modern English translations make it a finite verb.
It is impossible in most languages to translate literally It was now the day before the Passover Festival, for a temporal particle such as now would not fit in such a past tense sequence. Furthermore, some languages require a verb of “becoming” to indicate a progression of time, for example, “as the day before the Passover Festival became….”
In some languages the first sentence of verse 1 is best interpreted simply as a temporal setting. The identification of the day before the Passover Festival may often be indicated merely as a preposed element to the following sentence, for example, “The day before the Passover Festival Jesus knew that his hour had come….”
The hour is a reference to Jesus’ death and exaltation (see 2.4). As in many languages, one cannot say literally the hour had come. In some instances one can say “Jesus knew that it was almost time for him to leave this world” or “… that soon it would be the occasion for him to leave this world.” In certain instances neither “time” nor “occasion” may be employed, and one may simply say “Jesus knew that soon he would leave this world.”
To leave this world and go to the Father is more literally “to go from this world to the Father.” New English Bible also uses two verbs: “and he must leave this world and go to the Father.” For languages which require an indication of kinship relations, it may be necessary to say “his Father.”
Especially in the second half of John’s Gospel, the world is equated with those people who stand in opposition to God (see 1.10). This is a frequent term throughout John’s Gospel. However, it should be noted that in these last discourses the phrase “the world” or “this world” appears some forty times.
In 14.12,28 and 16.10,28 Jesus’ departure from this world is again spoken of as “going to the Father.”
Although the Greek of this verse is one sentence, most modern English translations have a full stop after Father. He had always loved is a participle in Greek, rendered rather literally in Revised Standard Version as “having loved.” This aorist participle is to be taken as applying to the expression of Jesus’ love throughout his entire ministry; and several other translations (New English Bible, Jerusalem Bible, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch) also render this participle He had always loved. The second appearance of the verb loved in this verse translates an aorist indicative, best understood as a reference to the love he revealed in his death on the cross.
The Greek clause rendered to the very end occurs in the emphatic position. Most translations understand it in the same way as Good News Translation does, that is, “to the very end of life.” However, it may also mean “completely,” the meaning given it in New English Bible, Jerusalem Bible, and La Sainte Bible: Nouvelle version Segond révisée. Although the idea of “completely” is certainly not foreign to the context, the fact that the hour of Jesus’ death is in focus in this passage tend to support the other interpretation.
In rendering those in the world who were his own, it is important to avoid the impression that these individuals were his personal slaves, that is, persons who were “his own” in a commercial sense. In some languages the most appropriate equivalent of his own would be “his followers” or “those who believed in him.”
He loved them to the very end must be translated in some languages “he loved them right up to the time he died” or “… to the end of his life.” Such a rendering may be necessary in languages which cannot speak of an “end” without indicating specifically what is involved. However, to translate “he loved them as long as he lived” might imply that he did not love them after he had died. This problem may be avoided by translating “he always loved them, even to the end of his life.”
Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1980. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .