I have not written to you because you don’t know the truth, but because you know it, and because no lie is of the truth.
Parallel translations
- KJV I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth.
- BSB I have not written to you because you lack knowledge of the truth, but because you have it, and because no lie comes from the truth.
- NKJV I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and that no lie is of the truth.
- NASB I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth.
- NLT So I am writing to you not because you don’t know the truth but because you know the difference between truth and lies.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 5
- 2 Pet 1:12Therefore I will not be negligent to remind you of these things, though you know them, and are established in the present truth.
- Jude 1:5Now I desire to remind you, though you already know this, that the Lord, having saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who didn’t believe.
- Prov 1:5that the wise man may hear, and increase in learning; that the man of understanding may attain to sound counsel:
- Rom 15:14–15I myself am also persuaded about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish others.
- Prov 9:8–9Don’t reprove a scoffer, lest he hate you. Reprove a wise man, and he will love you.
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Jesus is the Word of life made manifest, the propitiation for our sins, the Son in whom is eternal life — 'that you may know that you have eternal life.'
How 1 John 2:21 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.