Tag Archives: John 13:13

The Verse in Focus (John 13:13)

ὑμεῖς φωνεῖτέ με, ὁ διδάσκαλος καὶ ὁ κύριος, καὶ καλῶς λέγετε· εἰμὶ γάρ

ὑμεῖς φωνεῖτέ με: Personal Address and Present Action

The subject ὑμεῖς (“you”) is emphatic, addressing the disciples directly. The verb φωνεῖτέ is the present active indicative, second person plural of φωνέω, meaning “you call,” “you address,” or even “you hail.”

– με is the accusative singular pronoun (“me”), the object of their address.

The present tense indicates that this is their ongoing or customary way of speaking to Jesus — a reflection of their habitual respect.

ὁ διδάσκαλος καὶ ὁ κύριος: Titles of Respect

These two titles — ὁ διδάσκαλος (“the Teacher”) and ὁ κύριος (“the Lord”) — are both articular nominatives functioning as predicate nominatives of the quoted speech.… Learn Koine Greek

ὑμεῖς φωνεῖτέ με, ὁ διδάσκαλος καὶ ὁ κύριος, καὶ καλῶς λέγετε· εἰμὶ γὰρ.

In this luminous fragment of dialogue from the Upper Room Discourse (John 13:13), Jesus responds to his disciples’ respectful address with a quiet theological affirmation. The structure of the verse is deceptively simple, yet it contains a rich grammatical phenomenon that reveals much about how identity and role are linguistically anchored in Koine Greek: the double nominative construction.

This feature—often overlooked by beginning students as mere repetition—is in fact a deliberate syntactic choice that carries both semantic weight and rhetorical emphasis. Let us examine closely how this structure functions within the verse and what it tells us about the speaker’s self-understanding.… Learn Koine Greek