Core Glossary

08 — Core Glossary: 2 John (Koine Greek → German)

Purpose

This glossary lists every load-bearing theological term identified in 07_semantic_analysis.md, covering the entire book of 2 John (1:1–13). Terms already fixed in the baseline Romans Language Package are marked [BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY] and carry forward their existing German rendering, risk tier, and notes unchanged. Terms new to this curriculum are marked [NEW] and are proposed here for insertion into translation_memory.json at the next version increment, with full risk analysis per this package’s established methodology.

Risk tiers follow the baseline’s fixed definitions: Critical (human theologian review mandatory, every occurrence), High (human theologian review required), Medium (native speaker review recommended), Low (automated review sufficient).

Glossary Table

Term (EN)	Status	Category	Risk	Original (Greek)	Transliteration	German Rendering	Definition	Translation Notes / Alternatives Rejected
truth	NEW	Doctrine of Truth	High	ἀλήθεια	alētheia	Wahrheit	Objective, Christ-revealed reality, both propositional and relational, that believers know, indwell, and walk in.	Alternatives rejected: none proposed — “Wahrheit” is the only viable German rendering. Primary risk is secularization: contemporary German “meine Wahrheit” discourse relativizes the term. Must anchor to objective, Christ-revealed truth (cf. established `way_truth_life_exclusivity` John 14:6 rendering already in this pipeline) whenever used doctrinally. Occurs 1:1(x2), 1:2, 1:3, 1:4.
love (agapē)	NEW	Doctrine of Love	High	ἀγάπη / ἀγαπάω	agapē / agapaō	Liebe / lieben	Self-giving, covenantal, other-directed love, defined by the letter itself as walking according to God’s commandments, not sentiment.	Must be distinguished in teaching material from German “Liebe’s” broad secular/romantic usage (Eros, familial affection, casual enthusiasm). No German lexical alternative exists (unlike Greek’s ἀγάπη/ἔρος/φιλία distinction) — disambiguation must occur through context and explicit teaching, not word choice. Occurs 1:1, 1:3, 1:5, 1:6 (x2).
elder	NEW	Church Office	Medium	πρεσβύτερος	presbyteros	der Älteste	The author’s self-designation, indicating recognized pastoral seniority and apostolic-era authority, traditionally identified with the Apostle John.	Rejected: “der Presbyter” (too narrowly technical/denominational, risks a Reformed-Presbyterian or Catholic-office reading not intended by the informal self-designation here). Occurs 1:1.
elect lady	NEW	Election / Address	High	ἐκλεκτῇ κυρίᾳ	eklektē kyria	die erwählte Frau / Herrin	The letter’s addressee — variously read as a proper name (“Kyria”), an individual Christian woman of standing, or a personification of a local congregation (“her children” = its members).	Reuses baseline `election` (Erwählung) root for ἐκλεκτή. All three scholarly readings must be presented transparently in teaching material; none should be silently adopted as settled. Echoed at 1:13 (“τῆς ἀδελφῆς σου τῆς ἐκλεκτῆς” / “deine erwählte Schwester”) — render consistently. Occurs 1:1, 1:5, 1:13.
children (spiritual/familial)	NEW	Church / Family	Medium	τέκνα	tekna	Kinder	Either the addressee’s literal children or, if κυρία is read as a congregation, its members figured as children of a “mother” church.	German “Kinder” carries the same double sense as the Greek; state the ambiguity explicitly in teaching material rather than resolving it silently. Occurs 1:1, 1:4, 1:13.
grace	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY	Salvation	High	χάρις	charis	Gnade	Unmerited favor from God, here part of the triadic greeting formula (with mercy and peace) unique to 2 John and the Pastoral Epistles.	Reuses baseline entry exactly; alternatives already rejected there (“Barmherzigkeit,” “Wohlwollen”) remain rejected. Occurs 1:3.
mercy	NEW	Salvation / Divine Character	Medium	ἔλεος	eleos	Barmherzigkeit	God’s compassionate favor toward the needy/afflicted, distinct from χάρις (grace) though closely related; distinctively added to the grace/peace greeting pair in 2 John (cf. 1–2 Timothy).	Note: the baseline’s `grace` entry explicitly rejects “Barmherzigkeit” as a rendering for χάρις — this is not a contradiction, since ἔλεος is a distinct Greek word requiring its own distinct German word. Keep χάρις = Gnade and ἔλεος = Barmherzigkeit strictly separate; never conflate or use interchangeably. Occurs 1:3.
peace	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY	Salvation	Low (per baseline)	εἰρήνη	eirēnē	Friede	Relational, covenantal peace, third member of 2 John’s distinctive grace-mercy-peace greeting triad.	Reuses baseline entry exactly. Occurs 1:3.
Father	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY	God	High (per baseline)	πατήρ	patēr	Vater	God as personal Father, source of the commandment (1:4) and named alongside the Son as the ground of true fellowship (1:9).	Reuses baseline entry exactly. Occurs 1:3, 1:4, 1:9 (x2).
Son (of the Father)	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY (adapted phrase)	Christology	Critical (per baseline `son_of_god`)	υἱὸς τοῦ πατρός	huios tou patros	Sohn des Vaters	Christ’s relational title within the Father-Son pairing, functionally continuous with the baseline’s established “Sohn Gottes,” grounding this letter’s incarnation and Christ-confession concerns from its opening greeting.	Render “Jesus Christus, der Sohn des Vaters” (1:3) preserving the relational pairing; reuse baseline `father` and the full doctrinal weight of `son_of_god`. Also occurs, paired with πατήρ, at 1:9 (“τὸν πατέρα καὶ τὸν υἱὸν ἔχει”).
commandment	NEW	Ethics / Law and Grace	High	ἐντολή	entolē	Gebot	A binding apostolic/divine directive — here specifically the inherited love-command, not Mosaic legislation (already established as “Gesetz” in the baseline).	Risk: German “Gebot” evokes “die Zehn Gebote” (Decalogue) and Luther’s Kleiner Katechismus structure, creating Werkgerechtigkeit risk if not explicitly framed as the love-command “from the Father,” continuous with (not a substitute for) `Gehorsam des Glaubens` already flagged High in the baseline. Occurs 1:4, 1:5, 1:6 (x2).
new commandment	NEW	Ethics	High	ἐντολὴ καινή	entolē kainē	neues Gebot	The love-command, explicitly denied to be a novel teaching — echoes John 13:34, already rendered in this pipeline as “Ein neues Gebot gebe ich euch, dass ihr euch untereinander liebt” (`new_commandment`).	Must echo the established John 13:34 phrasing exactly for recognizability, while the surrounding negation (“nicht als ob… ein neues Gebot”) must be preserved clearly since 2 John explicitly denies novelty. Occurs 1:5.
from the beginning	NEW	Perseverance	Medium	ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς	ap’ archēs	von Anfang an	The original apostolic proclamation/instruction, as opposed to any later innovation.	Standard, safe rendering; keep consistent with any future treatment of 1 John (which uses this phrase extensively). Occurs 1:5, 1:6.
walk / walking	NEW	Christian Life	Medium	περιπατέω	peripateō	wandeln	The fixed biblical idiom for one’s conduct/way of life, applied here to both “truth” (1:4) and “his commandments” (1:6) — an intentional verbal echo (inclusio) across the passage.	Maintain “wandeln” consistently at every occurrence to preserve the deliberate repetition. Occurs 1:4, 1:6 (x2).
deceivers	NEW	False Teaching	High	πλάνοι / ὁ πλάνος	planoi / ho planos	Verführer / Irrlehrer	Teachers who lead others into doctrinal error, specifically here deniers of Christ’s true incarnation — a specific historical/theological category, not a general term for untrustworthy people.	Prefer “Irrlehrer” (error-teacher) to foreground the doctrinal (not merely moral) nature of the deception. Teaching material must specify the reference is to a particular heresy, restraining any generalized suspicion of outsiders, given this term’s proximity to the hospitality instruction of vv. 10-11. Occurs 1:7 (x2).
world (in this context)	NEW	Cosmology	Low-Medium	κόσμος	kosmos	Welt	Here the wider social/geographic sphere into which the deceivers “went out,” a more neutral sense than Johannine literature’s frequent negative-moral use of κόσμος as the realm hostile to God.	Context disambiguates; translators should be aware both senses exist in Johannine usage and choose consciously here for the neutral sense. Occurs 1:7.
confessing	NEW	Christology / Confession	High	ὁμολογέω	homologeō	bekennen	Formal, creedal-type public acknowledgment of a truth-claim about Christ’s person — the deceivers are defined by their refusal to make this confession.	Positive German resonance: connects to the Lutheran/Reformed Bekenntnisschriften confessional tradition (Konkordienformel, Barmer Theologische Erklärung) — an asset for teaching material framing doctrinal confession as a historic, serious church practice. Occurs 1:7.
Jesus Christ coming in the flesh	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY (component terms)	Incarnation	Critical	Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐρχόμενον ἐν σαρκί	Iēsoun Christon erchomenon en sarki	Jesus Christus, im Fleisch gekommen	The letter’s core doctrinal claim: Christ’s genuine, real, historical assumption of human flesh, denied by the deceivers of v. 7 — a direct anti-docetic confession.	MUST reuse baseline `flesh` = “Fleisch” (never softened to “Körper” or “menschliche Natur” alone) and the doctrinal category `incarnation` = “Menschwerdung” exactly. This is the letter’s single highest-stakes Christological claim; any softening toward metaphor or appearance reproduces the ancient docetic heresy the verse refutes. Occurs 1:7.
antichrist	NEW	Eschatology / False Teaching	Critical	ἀντίχριστος	antichristos	Antichrist	The archetypal figure/spirit of opposition to Christ, specifically manifested (per this verse) in denial of the incarnation; each individual denier “is” this antichrist pattern (cf. 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3).	German-specific collision: Nietzsche’s Der Antichrist (1888) shaped this term’s German cultural-philosophical usage as an atheistic critique of Christianity, distinct from the biblical supernatural-opposition sense. Teaching material must explicitly reclaim and distinguish the biblical Johannine usage. Occurs 1:7.
watch yourselves	NEW	Exhortation	Low-Medium	βλέπετε ἑαυτούς	blepete heautous	hütet euch	An imperative of vigilant self-examination in response to the doctrinal danger just described.	”Hütet euch” preferred over a flatter “passt auf” for its protective-guarding connotation. Occurs 1:8.
lose (reward)	NEW	Perseverance / Reward	Medium	ἀπόλλυμι	apollymi	verlieren	To lose the fruit/reward of prior faithful labor — not a threat to justification/salvation itself, but to the reward for perseverance.	Must be explicitly distinguished from a challenge to eternal security/assurance of salvation (Critical doctrine in the Romans baseline) to avoid a Werkgerechtigkeit misreading. Occurs 1:8.
full reward	NEW	Perseverance / Reward	High	μισθὸν πλήρη	misthon plērē	voller Lohn	The complete recompense for faithful perseverance in the truth and in Christ’s teaching.	”Lohn’s” commercial-transactional register risks a Werkgerechtigkeit misreading if presented as earning salvation; must be framed as reward flowing from and following grace, consistent with this pipeline’s established Philippians-package caution on `working_out_salvation`. Occurs 1:8.
goes ahead / goes beyond	NEW	False Teaching / Perseverance	High	προάγων	proagōn	hinausgehen über (die Lehre Christi)	A self-styled theological “progressive” who claims advancement beyond, while actually abandoning, Christ’s teaching.	German-specific risk: must be carefully distinguished from legitimate German Protestant historisch-kritische scholarly tradition (already flagged Medium-High in the baseline’s “Inspiration of Scripture” doctrine); this verse targets abandonment of Christ’s teaching under a banner of progress, not scholarship as such. Occurs 1:9.
abide / remain	NEW	Perseverance	High	μένω	menō	bleiben	The signature Johannine verb for continuing, settled relationship — applied to truth’s indwelling (1:2) and to persevering in Christ’s teaching (1:9, x2).	Render consistently as “bleiben” at every occurrence across the letter to preserve the intentional verbal thread linking vv. 2 and 9. Occurs 1:2, 1:9 (x2).
the teaching of Christ	NEW	Perseverance / Doctrine	Critical	διδαχὴ τοῦ Χριστοῦ	didachē tou Christou	die Lehre Christi	The apostolic body of instruction concerning Christ, continuing adherence to which is inseparable from saving fellowship with the Father and the Son.	Positive German resonance with Lutheran “reine Lehre” confessional tradition (Konkordienformel; Lehrzucht) — a genuine asset. Risk: bare “Lehre” alone collapses into secular senses (school curriculum, apprenticeship, political ideology); ALWAYS retain the full phrase “die Lehre Christi,” never bare “Lehre.” Occurs 1:9 (x2), 1:10.
have God / have the Father and the Son	NEW	Fellowship with God	Medium	θεὸν ἔχειν / τὸν πατέρα καὶ τὸν υἱὸν ἔχειν	theon echein / ton patera kai ton huion echein	Gott haben / den Vater und den Sohn haben	An idiom for standing in living, covenantal, saving relationship/fellowship with God — not literal possession.	Gloss explicitly in teaching material to avoid an overly literal, transactional-sounding reading of “haben” as possessing an object. Occurs 1:9 (x2).
receive into the house	NEW	Hospitality / Doctrinal Discernment	Critical	λαμβάνειν εἰς οἰκίαν	lambanein eis oikian	ins Haus aufnehmen	The concrete first-century act of granting an itinerant teacher lodging and, critically, a platform of congregational legitimacy — withheld here specifically from incarnation-denying false teachers.	THE single highest-sensitivity term in this letter for German teaching material. Must be explicitly and repeatedly scoped to itinerant teachers propagating the specific heresy of v. 7, never generalized into a warrant for inhospitality toward strangers, refugees, or people of other faiths, given Germany’s live contemporary Willkommenskultur discourse and strong constitutional/cultural hospitality and non-discrimination commitments. Mandatory theologian-authored scoping framing required for every use, analogous to the baseline’s existing Matthew 23/27:25 treatment. Occurs 1:10.
does not bring this teaching	NEW	Doctrinal Discernment	High	ταύτην τὴν διδαχὴν οὐ φέρει	tautēn tēn didachēn ou pherei	bringt diese Lehre nicht	The precise, narrow criterion for withholding hospitality-as-legitimation: denial of the specific incarnation confession of v. 7, not any broader doctrinal or personal disqualifier.	The demonstrative “diese/this” must always be retained, anchoring the criterion back to v. 7’s specific content rather than allowing drift into a vague general-orthodoxy test. Occurs 1:10.
greeting (χαίρειν, formula)	NEW	Social Convention / Doctrinal Discernment	Medium	χαίρειν	chairein	Gruß (entbieten) / “Sei gegrüßt” sagen	The standard Hellenistic formal greeting, withholding of which functioned as a recognized social signal of non-endorsement.	Distinct from χαρά (“joy,” vv. 4, 12); must be glossed as withholding formal, legitimizing welcome, not basic human courtesy, to avoid a rigorist misapplication in ordinary social encounters. Occurs 1:10, 1:11.
shares in / participates in (evil works)	NEW	Fellowship / Moral Complicity	High	κοινωνεῖ	koinōnei	hat Teil an / ist mitverantwortlich für	The verbal form of κοινωνία used here in its rare negative sense: extending legitimizing welcome to a false teacher constitutes active moral participation in that teacher’s evil (doctrinal) work.	Extends the baseline’s existing κοινωνία/Gemeinschaft caution (there flagged for its positive-fellowship collision with Volksgemeinschaft collectivist ideology) to a new, negative-complicity sense not yet covered in the baseline. Recommend “hat Teil an seinen bösen Werken,” glossed with its etymological connection to the positive fellowship term already established, to avoid the paradoxical sound of “Gemeinschaft haben mit dem Bösen.” Occurs 1:11.
evil works	NEW	False Teaching	Medium	ἔργα πονηρά	erga ponēra	böse Werke	The false teacher’s doctrinal and ministry activity spreading the incarnation-denying heresy — not unrelated personal sin.	Specify the referent explicitly in teaching material (the spread of the specific heresy of v. 7) rather than leaving as a vague catch-all. Occurs 1:11.
paper and ink	NEW	Epistolary Convention	Low	χάρτης καὶ μέλαν	chartēs kai melan	Papier und Tinte	Concrete writing materials, establishing the letter’s genuinely personal, occasional character.	No special risk. Occurs 1:12.
face to face / mouth to mouth	NEW	Fellowship	Low-Medium	στόμα πρὸς στόμα	stoma pros stoma	von Angesicht zu Angesicht	An idiom for direct, personal, oral communication, preferred by the elder over written correspondence for matters of relational nuance.	Prefer idiomatic “von Angesicht zu Angesicht” (matching German Bible convention at Numbers 12:8) over a literal “von Mund zu Mund,” which collides with unrelated modern German idioms (Mund-zu-Mund-Beatmung; Mund-zu-Mund-Propaganda). Occurs 1:12.
joy	NEW	Fellowship / Relational Fulfillment	Medium	χαρά	chara	Freude	Full, completed relational joy through direct personal fellowship, echoing Johannine “fullness of joy” language (John 15:11; 1 John 1:4).	Note in teaching material the letter’s threefold χαρ- root wordplay (ἐχάρην/χαίρειν/χαρά), largely invisible in the German rendering and requiring explanation. Occurs 1:12.
greets (epistolary closing)	NEW	Fellowship	Low	ἀσπάζεται	aspazetai	grüßt	The warm epistolary closing greeting, functioning as the positive counterpart to the withheld χαίρειν greeting of vv. 10-11.	No special risk; note the contrast with the withheld greeting earlier in the letter for teaching material. Occurs 1:13.
elect sister	NEW	Election / Family / Church	Medium	τῆς ἀδελφῆς σου τῆς ἐκλεκτῆς	tēs adelphēs sou tēs eklektēs	deine erwählte Schwester	Echoes v. 1’s “elect lady” address, forming a literary bracket (inclusio); referent shares the same three-way interpretive ambiguity (individual woman / congregation) as v. 1.	Render “erwählt” consistently with v. 1’s “die erwählte Frau/Herrin.” Occurs 1:13.
flesh	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY	Flesh and Spirit / Incarnation	Critical (per baseline)	σάρξ	sarx	Fleisch	Here used in its neutral, non-ethical sense (Christ’s genuine physical humanity), distinct from the baseline’s Galatians-context ethical/sinful-nature sense — disambiguate on first occurrence per the baseline’s existing rule.	Reuses baseline entry exactly; note the sense-shift from the Galatians ethical usage to this letter’s neutral incarnational usage. Occurs 1:7 (within “ἐρχόμενον ἐν σαρκί”).
incarnation (doctrine name)	BASELINE — REUSE EXACTLY	Christology	Critical (per baseline, extended)	— (doctrinal category, not a single Greek lexeme)	—	Menschwerdung	The theological name for Christ’s real, historical assumption of human nature, directly at stake in this letter’s central warning (v. 7).	Reuses baseline doctrinal category exactly; 2 John 1:7 is this pipeline’s most direct anti-docetic proof-text to date, second in concentration only to John 1:14.

Notes for Translation Memory Integration

Version increment required. All 27 “NEW” terms above should be inserted into translation_memory.json at the next version increment (v10), each tagged with "doctrine_risk" matching the tiers assigned above, and each carrying the German rendering fixed in this glossary as the enforced translation-memory value for all Phase 2 segment translation.
No conflicts with existing baseline entries. No term proposed here contradicts or requires revision of any existing baseline entry. The one point requiring explicit translator/reviewer attention is the distinction between χάρις (Gnade, baseline) and the newly introduced ἔλεος (Barmherzigkeit) — these are two distinct Greek words rendered by two distinct German words and must never be used interchangeably, despite the baseline’s unrelated rejection of “Barmherzigkeit” as an alternative rendering for χάρις specifically.
Highest-priority Critical terms for Phase 2 review routing: Jesus Christus, im Fleisch gekommen (1:7), Antichrist (1:7), die Lehre Christi (1:9-10), ins Haus aufnehmen (1:10), and Sohn des Vaters (1:3, 1:9) — all require mandatory human theologian review at every occurrence, consistent with this pipeline’s established Critical-tier review routing.
Highest-priority German-specific cultural-sensitivity flag: 2 John 1:10’s hospitality instruction, given its live collision potential with contemporary German Willkommenskultur discourse, requires mandatory theologian-authored scoping framing for any teaching material derived from this passage, comparable in seriousness (though not in historical weight) to the baseline’s existing Matthew 27:25 and Matthew 23 requirements.

Critical Risk Terms

Antichrist

Approved rendering: Antichrist
Transliteration: Antichrist
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Rejected alternatives: Gegner Christi / Feind Christi (softens the fixed Johannine technical term — also used 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3)
Original: ἀντίχριστος
Category: False Teaching / Eschatology

NEW. The archetypal figure/spirit of opposition to Christ, manifested specifically in denial of the incarnation (1:7); each individual denier instantiates this pattern. CRITICAL German-specific collision: Friedrich Nietzsche’s 1888 ‘Der Antichrist’ has substantially shaped the German-educated reader’s default association with this exact word as an atheistic-philosophical critique of Christianity, not a supernatural end-times opponent of Christ. Teaching material must explicitly reclaim the biblical, Johannine sense at every occurrence.

Flesh

Approved rendering: Fleisch
Transliteration: Fleisch
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Original: σάρξ
Category: Flesh and Spirit / Incarnation

Inherited from Romans/Galatians package, unchanged. Used here in its neutral, non-ethical sense (Christ’s genuine physical humanity, 1:7), distinct from the Galatians ethical/sinful-nature sense already documented in the baseline; disambiguate on first occurrence per the baseline’s existing rule.

Incarnation

Approved rendering: Menschwerdung
Transliteration: Menschwerdung
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Original: — (doctrinal category, not a single Greek lexeme)
Category: Christology

Inherited doctrinal category from Romans/John package, unchanged. 2 John 1:7 is this pipeline’s most direct anti-docetic proof-text to date, second only in concentration to John 1:14.

Jesus Christ Come In The Flesh

Approved rendering: Jesus Christus, im Fleisch gekommen
Transliteration: Jesus Christus, im Fleisch gekommen
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Rejected alternatives: Jesus Christus, der wirklich ein Mensch war (dilutes the specific, historically loaded en sarki / im Fleisch language into a generic humanity claim)
Original: Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐρχόμενον ἐν σαρκί
Category: Incarnation

NEW. The letter’s core doctrinal confession (1:7): Christ’s genuine, real, historical assumption of human flesh, denied by the deceivers — a direct anti-docetic statement paralleling 1 John 4:2. Reuses baseline Critical-tier ‘Fleisch’ and doctrinal category ‘Menschwerdung’ exactly. Any softening toward metaphor, symbol, or mere spiritual ‘coming’ reproduces the ancient docetic heresy this verse was written to refute.

Receive Into House

Approved rendering: ins Haus aufnehmen
Transliteration: ins Haus aufnehmen
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment
Original: λαμβάνειν εἰς οἰκίαν
Category: Hospitality

NEW. THE single highest-sensitivity term in this letter. The concrete first-century act of granting an itinerant teacher lodging and, critically, a platform of congregational legitimacy — withheld here specifically from incarnation-denying false teachers (1:10). Must be explicitly and repeatedly scoped in teaching material to itinerant propagators of the specific heresy of 1:7, never generalized into a warrant for inhospitality toward strangers, refugees, or people of other faiths, given Germany’s live Willkommenskultur discourse and the constitutional human-dignity foundation of Grundgesetz Art. 1. Mandatory theologian-authored scoping framing required for every use.

Son Of God

Approved rendering: Sohn Gottes
Transliteration: Sohn Gottes
Doctrine: Sonship and Deity of Christ in the Greeting and Climax

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. Retained as the fixed formula against which this letter’s more relational ‘Sohn des Vaters’ phrase must be recognized as fully continuous, not a lesser or adoptive title.

Son Of The Father

Approved rendering: Sohn des Vaters
Transliteration: Sohn des Vaters
Doctrine: Sonship and Deity of Christ in the Greeting and Climax
Rejected alternatives: Gottes Sohn (bare, generic — loses the deliberate Father/Son relational pairing structure recurring at 1:9)
Original: υἱὸς τοῦ πατρός
Category: Christology

NEW. Christ’s relational title within the explicit Father-Son pairing (1:3, 1:9), functionally continuous with the baseline’s established ‘Sohn Gottes.’ Must never read as adoptive, honorary, or a lesser title than the fixed formula — German readers must recognize this as the identical eternal, co-equal Sonship already fixed Critical in the Romans package. Additionally flagged for the Neue-Welt-Übersetzung (Jehovah’s Witnesses) created-Son doctrinal collision documented in 05_translation_landscape.md — must never be taught in a way harmonizable with a created, non-co-eternal Son.

Teaching Of Christ

Approved rendering: die Lehre Christi
Transliteration: die Lehre Christi
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Rejected alternatives: Lehre (bare noun — collapses into secular senses: school subject, vocational apprenticeship, political party ideology), was Christus gelehrt hat (paraphrase that loosens the fixed-technical-term status this doctrine requires)
Original: διδαχὴ τοῦ Χριστοῦ
Category: Perseverance / Doctrine

NEW. The apostolic body of instruction concerning Christ, continuing adherence to which is inseparable from saving fellowship with the Father and the Son (1:9 x2, 1:10). Positive German resonance with the Lutheran confessional category of ‘reine Lehre’ and ‘Lehrzucht.’ ALWAYS retain the full phrase ‘die Lehre Christi,’ never the bare noun alone.

High Risk Terms

Abide

Approved rendering: bleiben
Transliteration: bleiben
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Original: μένω
Category: Perseverance

NEW. The signature Johannine verb for continuing, settled relationship — applied to truth’s indwelling (1:2) and to persevering in Christ’s teaching (1:9 x2). Render consistently as ‘bleiben’ at every occurrence to preserve the intentional Johannine verbal thread linking truth’s abiding presence to doctrinal perseverance.

Commandment

Approved rendering: Gebot
Transliteration: Gebot
Doctrine: The Commandment of Love
Original: ἐντολή
Category: Ethics

NEW. A binding apostolic/divine directive — specifically the inherited love-command received ‘from the Father,’ not Mosaic legislation (1:4, 1:5, 1:6 x2). German ‘Gebot’ immediately evokes ‘die Zehn Gebote’ and Luther’s Kleiner Katechismus, risking a Werkgerechtigkeit misreading. Every occurrence must explicitly frame ‘Gebot’ as the love-command received from the Father, continuous with (never a substitute for) the baseline’s High-risk ‘Gehorsam des Glaubens.‘

Confessing

Approved rendering: bekennen
Transliteration: bekennen
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Original: ὁμολογέω
Category: Christology / Confession

NEW. Formal, creedal-type public acknowledgment of a truth-claim about Christ’s person (1:7); the deceivers are defined by their refusal to make this confession. German ‘bekennen’ carries strong positive resonance with the Lutheran/Reformed confessional tradition (Bekenntnisschriften, Konkordienformel, Barmer Theologische Erklärung) — an asset, not merely a risk, for teaching material.

Deceivers

Approved rendering: Irrlehrer
Transliteration: Irrlehrer
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Rejected alternatives: Verführer (too generic; reads as morally untrustworthy rather than specifically doctrinal)
Original: πλάνοι / ὁ πλάνος
Category: False Teaching

NEW. Teachers who lead others into doctrinal error, specifically deniers of Christ’s true incarnation (1:7 x2) — a defined historical-theological category, not a general term for untrustworthy people. Teaching material must state clearly this refers to a particular first-century heresy, restraining any generalized suspicion of outsiders given this term’s proximity to the hospitality instruction of 1:10-11.

Does Not Bring Teaching

Approved rendering: bringt diese Lehre nicht
Transliteration: bringt diese Lehre nicht
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment
Rejected alternatives: eine andere Lehre hat (loses the specific demonstrative anchor back to 1:7’s precise content)
Original: ταύτην τὴν διδαχὴν οὐ φέρει
Category: Doctrinal Discernment

NEW. The precise, narrow criterion for withholding hospitality-as-legitimation: denial of the specific incarnation confession of 1:7, not any broader doctrinal or personal disqualifier (1:10). The demonstrative ‘diese/this’ must always be retained.

Elect Lady

Approved rendering: die erwählte Frau
Transliteration: die erwählte Frau
Doctrine: Election of the Elect Lady and Sister
Rejected alternatives: Kyria (transliteration as proper name — would silently resolve a live, genuinely disputed exegetical question)
Original: ἐκλεκτῇ κυρί�ᾳ
Category: Election

NEW. The letter’s addressee (1:1), read variously as a proper name (‘Kyria’), an individual Christian woman of standing, or a personification of a congregation with ‘her children’ as its members. Shares its root with the baseline’s Erwählung doctrine. Teaching material must present all three scholarly readings transparently, never silently resolving to one. Echoed at 1:5 and 1:13 (‘deine erwählte Schwester’) — render ‘erwählt’ consistently across both addresses.

Election

Approved rendering: Erwählung
Transliteration: Erwählung
Doctrine: Election of the Elect Lady and Sister

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. The adjective root underlying this letter’s ‘die erwählte Frau’ (1:1) and ‘deine erwählte Schwester’ (1:13); imports the same Lutheran/Reformed predestination-emphasis tension the baseline already documents — neither tradition’s precise systematic doctrine should be imposed on this letter’s epistolary address.

Father

Approved rendering: Vater
Transliteration: Vater
Doctrine: Sonship and Deity of Christ in the Greeting and Climax
Original: πατήρ
Category: God

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. Source of the commandment (1:4) and named alongside the Son as the ground of true saving fellowship (1:9).

Full Reward

Approved rendering: voller Lohn
Transliteration: voller Lohn
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Original: μισθὸν πλήρη
Category: Perseverance / Reward

NEW. The complete recompense for faithful perseverance in the truth and in Christ’s teaching (1:8). German ‘Lohn’ carries a commercial-transactional register risking a Werkgerechtigkeit misreading; must be framed as reward that follows and flows from grace already given, consistent with the Philippians package’s ‘working_out_salvation’ caution.

Goes Beyond

Approved rendering: über die Lehre Christi hinausgehen
Transliteration: über die Lehre Christi hinausgehen
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Original: προάγων
Category: False Teaching / Perseverance

NEW. A self-styled theological ‘progressive’ who claims advancement beyond, while actually abandoning, Christ’s teaching (1:9). German-specific risk: must be carefully distinguished from Germany’s culturally prestigious historisch-kritische Methode tradition, already flagged Medium-High in the baseline’s Inspiration of Scripture doctrine; this verse targets abandonment of Christ’s teaching under a banner of progress, not scholarship as such.

Grace

Approved rendering: Gnade
Transliteration: Gnade
Doctrine: Grace, Mercy, and Peace Greeting
Rejected alternatives: Barmherzigkeit, Wohlwollen
Original: χάρις
Category: Salvation

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. Reused here as the first member of 2 John 1:3’s distinctive grace-mercy-peace triadic greeting. Must never be conflated or used interchangeably with the newly introduced ‘Barmherzigkeit’ (eleos) in the same verse — these render two distinct Greek words.

Love Agape

Approved rendering: Liebe
Transliteration: Liebe
Doctrine: Walking in Truth and Love
Original: ἀγάπη / ἀγαπάω
Category: Truth and Love

NEW. Self-giving, covenantal, other-directed love, defined by the letter itself as walking according to God’s commandments, not sentiment (1:1, 1:3, 1:5, 1:6 x2). German ‘Liebe’ is a single lexeme spanning romantic, familial, and casual senses; unlike Greek’s agape/eros/philia distinction, no German lexical alternative isolates covenantal love, so disambiguation must occur entirely through explicit teaching context, not word choice.

Not A New Commandment

Approved rendering: nicht ein neues Gebot, sondern das von Anfang an
Transliteration: nicht ein neues Gebot, sondern das von Anfang an
Doctrine: The Commandment of Love
Rejected alternatives: Das ist nichts Neues, was ich euch sage (loose paraphrase that loses the recognizable echo of John 13:34’s fixed ‘neues Gebot’ phrasing)
Original: οὐχ … ἐντολὴν καινὴν … ἀλλ’ … ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς
Category: Ethics

NEW. The elder’s explicit denial that the love-command is a novel teaching; it is the same command received ‘from the beginning’ (1:5). Must echo the pipeline’s established John 13:34 rendering exactly for recognizability while preserving the negation clearly in German syntax — losing the negation would create the false impression the elder claims to be innovating.

Shares In Evil Works

Approved rendering: hat Teil an (seinen bösen Werken)
Transliteration: hat Teil an (seinen bösen Werken)
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment
Rejected alternatives: Gemeinschaft haben mit (would sound paradoxical to German ears — ‘fellowship with evil’ — given the established positive Gemeinschaft/koinonia sense elsewhere in this pipeline)
Original: κοινωνεῖ (κοινωνέω)
Category: Fellowship / Moral Complicity

NEW. The verbal form of koinonia used in its rare negative sense: extending legitimizing welcome to a false teacher constitutes active moral participation in that teacher’s evil doctrinal work (1:11). Extends the baseline’s existing ‘Gemeinschaft’ Volksgemeinschaft-collision caution into a new negative-complicity register; gloss explicitly as moral complicity through endorsement.

Truth

Approved rendering: Wahrheit
Transliteration: Wahrheit
Doctrine: Walking in Truth and Love
Original: ἀλήθεια
Category: Truth and Love

NEW. Objective, Christ-revealed reality, both propositional and relational, in which believers know, abide, and walk (1:1 x2, 1:2, 1:3, 1:4). German ‘Wahrheit’ is the only viable rendering, but contemporary colloquial ‘meine Wahrheit’ discourse relativizes it into subjective private conviction. Every doctrinal occurrence must anchor ‘Wahrheit’ to the objective, Christ-revealed truth already established via John 14:6’s ‘Ich bin … die Wahrheit,’ never to personal conviction.

Medium Risk Terms

Children

Approved rendering: Kinder
Transliteration: Kinder
Doctrine: Election of the Elect Lady and Sister
Original: τέκνα
Category: Church and Family

NEW. Either the addressee’s literal children or, if kyria is read as a congregation, its members figured as children of a ‘mother’ church (1:1, 1:4, 1:13). German ‘Kinder’ carries the identical double sense; state the ambiguity explicitly rather than silently resolving it.

Elder

Approved rendering: der Älteste
Transliteration: der Älteste
Doctrine: Pastoral Authority of the Elder
Rejected alternatives: der Presbyter (too narrowly technical; risks a later ecclesiastical-office reading — Catholic presbyterate, or Reformed Presbyterium polity — foreign to this informal self-designation)
Original: πρεσβύτερος
Category: Church Office

NEW. The author’s self-designation of recognized pastoral seniority and apostolic-era authority, traditionally identified with the Apostle John (1:1). Follows Luther’s own convention.

Elect Sister

Approved rendering: deine erwählte Schwester
Transliteration: deine erwählte Schwester
Doctrine: Election of the Elect Lady and Sister
Original: τῆς ἀδελφῆς σου τῆς ἐκλεκτῆς
Category: Election / Church and Family

NEW. A closing greeting echoing 1:1’s ‘elect lady’ address, forming a literary bracket (inclusio); shares the same interpretive ambiguity (individual woman / congregation) as the letter’s opening address (1:13). Render ‘erwählt’ consistently with ‘die erwählte Frau’ at 1:1.

Evil Works

Approved rendering: böse Werke
Transliteration: böse Werke
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment
Original: ἔργα πονηρά
Category: False Teaching

NEW. The false teacher’s doctrinal and ministry activity spreading the incarnation-denying heresy — not unrelated personal sin (1:11). Teaching material should specify the referent explicitly rather than leaving as a vague catch-all.

Face To Face

Approved rendering: von Angesicht zu Angesicht
Transliteration: von Angesicht zu Angesicht
Doctrine: Fellowship and Completed Joy
Rejected alternatives: von Mund zu Mund (literal rendering that collides with unrelated modern German idioms Mund-zu-Mund-Beatmung and Mund-zu-Mund-Propaganda)
Original: στόμα πρὸς στόμα
Category: Fellowship

NEW. An idiom for direct, personal, oral communication, preferred by the elder over written correspondence (1:12). Matches established German Bible convention at Numbers 12:8’s rendering of the same Hebrew idiom.

Fellowship

Approved rendering: Gemeinschaft
Transliteration: Gemeinschaft
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged, retained here for consistency since this letter extends the same koinonia word-group into a rare negative sense at 1:11 (‘koinonei’ = shares in / hat Teil an). The baseline’s positive Volksgemeinschaft-collision caution applies equally to the new negative-complicity use; see ‘shares_in_evil_works’ below.

From The Beginning

Approved rendering: von Anfang an
Transliteration: von Anfang an
Doctrine: The Commandment of Love
Original: ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς
Category: Perseverance

NEW. The original apostolic proclamation and instruction, as opposed to any later innovation (1:5, 1:6). Standard, safe rendering; keep consistent with any future treatment of 1 John, which uses this same phrase extensively.

Greeting Formula

Approved rendering: Gruß entbieten
Transliteration: Gruß entbieten
Doctrine: Hospitality and Doctrinal Discernment
Original: χαίρειν
Category: Social Convention / Doctrinal Discernment

NEW. The standard Hellenistic formal epistolary/verbal greeting, the withholding of which functioned as a recognized social signal of non-endorsement (1:10, 1:11). German has no single technical equivalent distinct from chara (‘Freude,’ 1:4, 1:12); gloss explicitly as withholding formal, legitimizing welcome, not basic human courtesy.

Have God

Approved rendering: Gott haben / den Vater und den Sohn haben
Transliteration: Gott haben / den Vater und den Sohn haben
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Original: θεὸν ἔχειν / τὸν πατέρα καὶ τὸν υἱὸν ἔχειν
Category: Fellowship with God

NEW. An idiom for standing in living, covenantal, saving relationship and fellowship with God, not literal possession (1:9 x2). German ‘Gott haben’ is grammatically direct but can sound transactional if read too literally; gloss explicitly as covenant relationship, echoing 1 John’s repeated use of this construction.

Joy Chara

Approved rendering: Freude
Transliteration: Freude
Doctrine: Fellowship and Completed Joy
Original: χαρά
Category: Fellowship / Relational Fulfillment

NEW. Full, completed relational joy achieved through direct personal fellowship, echoing Johannine ‘fullness of joy’ language (John 15:11; 1 John 1:4) (1:12). Teaching material should note the letter’s threefold charr-root wordplay (echarēn 1:4, chairein 1:10-11, chara 1:12), invisible in German since ‘freute mich’/‘Gruß’/‘Freude’ share no common root.

Lose Reward

Approved rendering: verlieren
Transliteration: verlieren
Doctrine: Perseverance in the Teaching of Christ
Original: ἀπολέσητε (ἀπόλλυμι)
Category: Perseverance / Reward

NEW. To lose the fruit or reward of prior faithful labor — not a threat to justification or salvation itself, but to the reward for perseverance (1:8). Must be explicitly distinguished from the baseline’s Critical-tier Assurance of Salvation doctrine to prevent a Werkgerechtigkeit misreading.

Mercy

Approved rendering: Barmherzigkeit
Transliteration: Barmherzigkeit
Doctrine: Grace, Mercy, and Peace Greeting
Original: ἔλεος
Category: Salvation

NEW. God’s compassionate favor toward the needy and afflicted, distinct from charis though closely related; distinctively added to the grace/peace greeting pair in 2 John (cf. 1-2 Timothy) at 1:3. The baseline’s ‘grace’ entry rejects ‘Barmherzigkeit’ as an alternative rendering for charis specifically — this is not a contradiction, since eleos is a separate Greek lexeme requiring its own distinct German word. Keep ‘Gnade’ (charis) and ‘Barmherzigkeit’ (eleos) strictly non-interchangeable.

Walk Peripateo

Approved rendering: wandeln
Transliteration: wandeln
Doctrine: Walking in Truth and Love
Original: περιπατέω
Category: Christian Life

NEW. The fixed biblical idiom for one’s conduct/way of life, applied to both ‘truth’ (1:4) and ‘his commandments’ (1:6) as a deliberate verbal echo (inclusio). Maintain ‘wandeln’ consistently at every occurrence within the letter; do not vary the German verb for stylistic reasons.

World Neutral

Approved rendering: Welt
Transliteration: Welt
Doctrine: Warning against Deceivers Denying the Incarnation
Original: κόσμος
Category: Cosmology

NEW. The wider social/geographic sphere into which the deceivers ‘went out’ (1:7) — a more neutral sense than Johannine literature’s frequent negative-moral use of kosmos as the realm hostile to God. German ‘Welt’ carries both senses; translators must consciously select the neutral sense here since context, not lexical choice, disambiguates.

Low Risk Terms

Greets Closing

Approved rendering: grüßt
Transliteration: grüßt
Doctrine: Fellowship and Completed Joy
Original: ἀσπάζεται (ἀσπάζομαι)
Category: Fellowship

NEW. The warm epistolary closing greeting, functioning as the positive counterpart to the withheld chairein greeting of 1:10-11 (1:13). No special translation risk.

Jesus

Approved rendering: Jesus
Transliteration: Jesus
Doctrine: Sonship and Deity of Christ in the Greeting and Climax

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. Stable proper name, occurring within ‘Jesus Christus, der Sohn des Vaters’ (1:3) and ‘Jesus Christus, im Fleisch gekommen’ (1:7).

Paper And Ink

Approved rendering: Papier und Tinte
Transliteration: Papier und Tinte
Doctrine: Fellowship and Completed Joy
Original: χάρτης καὶ μέλαν
Category: Epistolary Convention

NEW. Concrete writing materials, establishing the letter’s genuinely personal, occasional-correspondence character (1:12). No special risk.

Peace

Approved rendering: Friede
Transliteration: Friede
Doctrine: Grace, Mercy, and Peace Greeting
Original: εἰρήνη
Category: Salvation

Inherited from Romans package, unchanged. Third member of 2 John 1:3’s greeting triad; relational, covenantal peace, not psychological calm.

Referenced passages

2JN.1.7 2JN.1.10 2JN.1.11 2JN.1.3 2JN.1.9 2JN.1.8 2JN.1.4 2JN.1.5 2JN.1.6 2JN.1.1 2JN.1.13 2JN.1.2 2JN.1.12

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