The Koine Greek term Ego eimi, literally I am or It is I, is an emphatic form of the copulative verb εἰμι that is recorded in the Gospels to have been spoken by Jesus on several occasions to refer to himself not with the role of a verb but playing the role of a name, in the Gospel of John occurring seven times with specific titles. These usages have been the subject of significant Christological analysis. The term I Am relating to God appears over 300 times in the Bible, first in the book of Genesis and last in Revelation. This has led to the Biblical God sometimes being referred to as “the great ‘I am’”.
In the New Testament, the personal pronoun ἐγώ in conjunction with the present first-person singularcopulative εἰμι is recorded to have been used mainly by Jesus, especially in the Gospel of John. It is used in the Gospel of John both with and without a predicate nominative. The seven occurrences with a predicate nominative that have resulted in some of the titles for Jesus are:
Without predicate nominative
It is also used without a predicate nominative, which is not very common in Koine Greek, thus some interpret it as Jesus' own self-declaration as God. In Jesus states: "For unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins", and later the crowd attempts to stone Jesus in response to his statement in : "Before Abraham was, I am.". Many other translations including the ASV have rendered John 8:24 as something like "... For unless you believe that I am , you will die in your sins.". Some consider the phrase in John 8:58 to be grammatically different from that in John 8:24, as the copulative verb can be used with any predicative expression and not only a predicate nominative, such as in "ὅπου εἰμὶ ἐγὼ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἦτε" in. "πρὶν Ἀβραὰμ γενέσθαι" can be taken as a predicative prepositional phrase, thus "ἐγώ εἰμὶ" in John 8:58 does not grammatically require a predicate nominative, however it is rather unusual for a present tense verb to be used with a temporal adverb like πρὶν in a declarative statement, though there are rare exceptions outside the New Testament. Thus explanations of John 8:58 generally depend on theology and not Greek grammar.
ἐγώ εἰμι also occurs without an explicit or implicit predicate nominative in the Septuagint, but instead either with a prepositional phrase such as in "μὴ ἀντὶ θεοῦ ἐγώ εἰμι..." , or with a predicative clause such as in "πάροικος καὶ παρεπίδημος ἐγώ εἰμι μεθ' ὑμῶν" in, or with the idiomatic meaning It is I such as in "καὶ εἶπεν Ἰωαβ ἀκούω ἐγώ εἰμι" in. The unique expression of the Tetragrammaton יהוה is composed of matris lectionis that suggest a verbal cognate noun derived from היה, the Hebrew copulative otherwise known as the verb "to be". Translations often render this word in compliance with the tradition of the Septuagint, "Lord". Later it has been pointed with the vowels of the wordElohim and transcribed as "Jehovah". Finally the Tetragrammaton was vocalized as Yahweh. But often found in apposition, if not in construct state with elohim, it suggests "the being" or the "I AM" of God.
