That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. So certainly this verse may be rendered (with most of the Fathers and the Vulgate; and of the moderns, with Luther, Erasmus, Calvin, Beza, Bengel, Meyer, Van Osterzee). But "coming into the world," besides being rather a superfluous, is in Scripture quite an unusual, description of "every man." [It has been observed too-and the remark has great force-that the article ton (G3588) should in that case have been inserted before erchomenon (G2064)], On the other hand, of all our Evangelist's descriptions of Christ, none is more familiar than His "coming into the world." See John 3:19; John 6:14; John 12:46; John 18:37; and compare 1 John 4:9; 1 Timothy 1:15, etc. In this view of the words the sense will be, 'That was the true Light which, coming into the world, lighteth every man,' or became "The Light of the World." [So substantially Lampe, Lucke, De Wette Tholuck Olshausen, Luthardt, Ewald, Alford, Webster and Wilkinson.] If this be the Evangelist's meaning, it beautifully carries on his train of thought in John 1:4-5: q.d., 'The Life was the Light of men; and though men resisted it when it shone but faintly before the Incarnation yet when it came into the world (by the Personal assumption of flesh, about to be mentioned), it proved itself the one all illuminating Light.'