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TheKoine Greek termEgo eimi (Ἐγώ εἰμί,pronounced[eɣóimí]),lit.'I am' or'It is I', is an emphatic form of thecopulative verb εἰμι that is recorded in theGospels to have been spoken byJesus on several occasions to refer to himself not with the role of a verb but playing the role of a name, in theGospel of John occurring seven times with specific titles. It is connected to the passage in Exodus 3:14 in which God gives his name asאֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה,Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh, translated most basically as "I am that I am" or "I shall be what I am".[1] These usages have been the subject of significantChristological analysis.[2][3]
In theNew Testament, the personal pronounἐγώ in conjunction with the present first-person singularcopulativeεἰμι is recorded to have been used mainly by Jesus, especially in theGospel of John.
It is used in the Gospel of John both with and without apredicate nominative. The seven occurrences with a predicate nominative that have resulted in some of thetitles for Jesus are:
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There are other times the phrase is used in the New Testament, but with a predicate nominative and/or adjectives in betweenἐγώ andεἰμι: acenturion inMatt 8:9 andLuke 7:8,Zechariah inLuke 1:18,Gabriel inLuke 1:19,a man blind from birth inJohn 9:9 who is healed by Jesus and told to go wash in thePool of Siloam,Peter inActs 10:21 andActs 10:26,Paul the Apostle inActs 22:3,Acts 23:6,Acts 26:29,Romans 7:14,Romans 11:1,Romans 11:13,1 Corinthians 15:9 and1 Timothy 1:15, some Corinthian believer in1 Corinthians 1:12 and1 Corinthians 3:4,John the Baptist in the negative (οὐκ εἰμὶ ἐγὼ, 'I am not') inJohn 3:28 andActs 13:25 (compare with Jesus in John 8:23, 17:14,16), andPilate in a question (Μήτι ἐγὼ Ἰουδαῖός εἰμι, 'Am I [a] Jew?') inJohn 18:35.[4][5][6]
ἐγώ εἰμι also occurs without an explicit or implicit predicate nominative in theSeptuagint, but instead either with a prepositional phrase such as in"μὴ ἀντὶ θεοῦ ἐγώ εἰμι ..." ("Am I in place of God ...")Genesis 30:2, or with a predicative clause such as in"πάροικος καὶ παρεπίδημος ἐγώ εἰμι μεθ' ὑμῶν" ("As a foreigner and a sojourner I am with you") inGenesis 23:4, or with the idiomatic meaning 'It is I' such as in"καὶ εἶπεν Ἰωαβ ἀκούω ἐγώ εἰμι" ("And Joab said: I hear; it is I") in2 Samuel 20:17.[7]
It has been suggested that the unique expression of theTetragrammatonיהוה (YHWH) is a verbal cognate noun derived fromהיה (hayah), the Hebrew linking (or 'copular' or 'copulative') verb, 'to be'. Translations often render this word in compliance with the tradition of the Septuagint, "Lord".
The philosopherJoseph de Torre, commenting on the philosophical implications of "I am" as the name of God, wrote:
Aristotle conceived God as the First Moverbut outside the world, because of his defective concept of "act", which is more physical than metaphysical. WhatSt. Thomas did was to take this concept and raise it to ametaphysical plane, and then he combined it withPlato's concept of "participation". But he did all this under the guiding light of the faith, since it is the Bible that describes God as HE WHO IS (Exodus, 3): he saw that Godis the fullness of being, the veryAct of Being, the perfection of being, the subsistent act of being; and everything else is a participation in the act of being, which must be created by God "out of nothing", since God cannot share Hisinfinite act of being.[8]
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