Prepositions

6.3. Prepositions
Prepositions are important words. They indicate the relationship (of time, place, and circumstance) between two entities in a sentence. They modify verbs, nouns and adjectives.
In Matthew 28:20 the Lord Jesus said και ιδου εγω μεθ υμων ειμι (kai idou egō meth humōn eimi) ‘And remember, I am with you always’ (NET). The preposition ‘with’ (μεθ meth) describes the relation between the two entities ‘I’ (Jesus) and ‘you’ (His disciples). This phrase can be paraphrased as ‘I will always accompany you’.
In Ephesians 5:2 the prepositional phrase εν αγαπη (en agapē), ‘in love’ modifies the verb περιπατειτε (peripateite) ‘walk’. The believer is not just commanded to walk, but to walk in love.
However, when you translate prepositions from one language to another, you must understand that it will not be possible to find a preposition in the two languages with an identical meaning.
I recall a Greek student who translated a Greek preposition wrongly. He worked on Matthew 28:19. The Lord Jesus commanded his disciples to baptise the nations εις (eis) ‘in’ the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit (NET). In this verse he translated εις (eis) as ‘in’.
When this student came to Luke 15:21, he translated εις (eis) with ‘in’ as he did in Matthew 28:19. In Luke 15:21 the prodigal son confessed his sins before his father. According to the Greek text he said: ‘Father I have sinned εις (eis) the heaven’. The student translated: ‘Father I have sinned in the heaven’. He took the preposition εις to mean ‘in’. In this case he was incorrect. The theology that resulted from that translation is very bad. People are not sinning in heaven. Eis here should be translated as ‘against’.
Prepositions are difficult to translate from one language to another. In my mother tongue we have far fewer prepositions than English. One preposition is used to cover most of the English prepositions accurately. When dealing with Greek prepositions one has to be very careful. Do not base a doctrine on your understanding of a particular preposition. A preposition may be used as a synonym of another one. I will illustrate this with a few more examples of εις (eis) ‘into’.
What is the meaning of the preposition εις? There are passages in the New Testament, where εις seems to have the meaning εν ‘in’. Depending on the context, according to Thayer, εις can be translated as ‘into, unto, to, towards, for, among’.
· When it is used after verbs that indicate a motion, it is translated as ‘into, towards’.
Matthew 9:7 εις ‘towards’ his house.
Acts 17:10 εις ‘towards’ the synagogue.
· When the movement is directed towards a surface, it is not possible to use the preposition ‘towards’. In those cases, ‘on’ may be a better translation.
Matthew 27:30 εις ‘on’ his head.
Matthew 5:39 εις ‘on’ the right cheek.
· Sometimes εις is use as a synonym for εν (in).
Mark 10:10 and εις ‘in’ the house.
· The meaning of εις sometimes overlaps the meaning of epi (on).
He was sitting ‘on’ (εις) the Mount of Olives opposite the temple (Mark 13:3, NET).
As these examples demonstrate, there may be an overlap in meaning between prepositions.
Εις appears more than 1,700 times in the New Testament. The preposition that appears the most is εν (en). It appears more than 2,700 times. Εν (en) often refers to a location, a space or place where something or someone is found.
Matthew 2:1 εν ‘in’ Bethlehem of Judah.
Hebrews 4:7 εν ‘in’ David, meaning ‘in the Psalm of David’.

Other Greek prepositions|
προ, before|επι, upon|
προς, towards|κατα, down|
περι, around|δια, through|
απο, away from|αντι, over against|
υπο, under|υπερ, above|
εκ, out of|ανα, up|
μετα, with|συν, with|
παρα, beside||
The definitions listed in this table are not the sole meanings. The context and the cases that they take will decide the meaning. The following diagram, taken from Wallace (1996:358), gives a good illustration of the use of prepositions with the different cases that they take.
[See image08]
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To establish the exact meaning of a given preposition, one should consult an advanced Greek lexicon.