Is this your translation of John 1:1-4?
“In the beginning was the Word; and the Word was with God, and the Word was (emphatically) God. This one was in the beginning toward * God. Everything came into being through Him, and not one thing came into being without Him. What comes into being within this one was life, and the life is the light of me.”
I ask because this seems a little different from the KJV’s “and without Him was not anything made that was made.”
I like your translation better, but is “that was made” in the Greek?*
Michael,
The grammar in the Greek can be read either way, though more easily one way, but against some strong issues otherwise if so; leaving translators having to make a punctuation choice based on other ideological criteria. In this case I am partly following the consensus of pre-4th century quoters of the text (including during the Nicene Arian debates, where both sides treated the punctuation as noted); and partly following George MacDonald in rejecting the pleonasm (“not even one thing came into being that has come into being”, effectively repeating the final phrase for emphasis), not because it’s a bad thing, but because altering the punctuation point brings out, as he puts it, “fine gold instead of questionable ore”.
Summarizing all the points I can think of pro and con (and with help from Metzger’s notes):
PRO) Earliest fashion before Nicea universally understood {ho gegonen} (that which was made) as ranging with the subsequent clause (in Him was life).
CON) Punctuation often reflects exegetical fashion and this could just be one such example.
PRO) But the theory of exegetical fashion doesn’t match the consent of usage between heretic and orthodox parties alike. Whereas the theory of exegetical fashion explains exactly (as all students of the question admit, including Metzger) the switch among the orthodox party afterward to the pleonasm (so that the Holy Spirit, understood to be the Life that was the Light of men, would not be considered a created entity). Agreed grammatic usage among opponents on two very different sides of the issue, where that usage by universal evidence predates a switch by definite exegetical convention afterward on one side of the issue, is extremely strong evidence of a widespread long-running tradition of reading it according to the prior grammar. Which must lend proportionate weight toward this being the originally intended reading, aside from whatever the intended meaning of the reading might be. (I consider this to be the strongest point pro.)
CON) But the grammar is intolerably clumsy this way!–the perfect tense of {gegonen} would require present tense {estin} as the verb instead of {en}. (It should be “That which was made in Him is life”, not “was life”.)
PRO) I don’t know why the referent would have to be present tense in regard to something reportedly done in the past.
CON) Contemporary usage at the time agreed that this was a problem, however, because many early ecclesiastical writers changed it to {estin}, as did the Aleph and D codices, plus Old Latin witnesses, Syriac-c, the Sahidic Coptic and Fayyudic Coptic.
PRO) All of which are, hm, 4th century, right? (Yes. Except for D, 5th c.) When we know for a fact that how the material was read changed among orthodox authorities (represented by these texts by the way) because they thought that would inoculate against Arianism.
CON) So?
PRO) So does this change fit that profile? Yes–maybe. It might thus be read (by early orthodox proponents who hadn’t made the punctuation switch yet) that the Spirit was continually being generated in the Word/Christ. Which would tend to imply something specially other than a creation in the past.
CON) So what? It still indicates that the grammar of reading it that way was weird.
PRO) By the exact same token, it indicates that people on both sides of the dispute were willing to read it that way by universal testimony before Nicene despite the (supposed) grammatic weirdness of doing so.
CON) Switching the punctuation around, however, does fix the grammar and fits the weight of evidence otherwise that the text originally read {en}; because “In Him was life” nicely and precisely parallels the subsequent clause “And the Life was the Light of men.” (I consider this one of the strongest Con arguments.)
PRO) Text critical principles however say that, other things being equal, difficult grammar is harder to explain (aside from plausible types of scribal copy-error, none of which apply here) than smoother grammar, smoother grammar thus weighing more toward an amended text instead of originality. It isn’t easy to explain how both sides of a critical theological dispute came to regard the reading universally as (A) (and especially with no evidence of any earlier way of reading the text) when (B) would have solved everything nicely. That not only points toward common widespread early teaching, but even to an common widespread early oral tradition. And the Prologue is nothing if not kerygma of some kind (maybe conflated from different hymns and proclamations) designed for oral performance (a factor commonly obvious in millennia of translation into liturgical and devotional useage since then!)
CON) Well, if it comes to oral stylism, the Evangelist often likes to start sentences with an “in” prepositional phrase. So this fits his style.
PRO) Except that this style is almost absent from the heavily poetic Prologue aside from the contested example, and the very beginning (“In the beginning”) which might as well be explained as the obvious lift from Genesis 1:1.
CON) Not entirely absent!–1:10 starts with an “in” prepositional phrase, too (matching the verbal grammar, not incidentally!): “In the world He was”. (Also not incidental, the exactly parallel phrase {di’ autou egeneto}, with 1:3 deploying it as “all though Him came into being” and 1:10 deploying it as “and the cosmos through Him came into being”!)
PRO) Which… uh… might be explained again as a parallel to Genesis 1:1…?
CON) Weak retort.
PRO) All right, since we’re talking about strong poetic style effects, you have a match for two locally I admit; but there are many more local stylistic effects of the sort where a sentence or clause ends with Topic A and then the next sentence or clause starts with Topic A or A-variant. This is practically the MAIN poetic style used in the Prologue (not to say in poetic commentary later). Guess which theory fits this usage. Go ahead. You can have three guesses. 
CON) uh… well… the usage isn’t ironclad from sentence to sentence…
PRO) Now who has the weak retort? 
In what we generally recognize as the first paragraph (down to verse 5), this would practically be the only time the style is broken! So overall, I’d have to say I have the stronger stylistic argument.
CON) Okay; but he breaks that stylistic unity in the paragraph to start the second half of it with the “in the x” stylistic habit! After starting the first half of that paragraph this way! So this wouldn’t just be a clumsy style gaffe.
PRO) Yes; but neither would this be quite “in the x”, would it? Your two examples from the Prologue are prepositional phrases; but this phrase is “in + demonstrative pronoun”.
CON) He has a habit of starting sentences and independent clauses that way, too! See 13:35, 15:8 and 16:26. And more than seven times in the 1st John epistle, while we’re at it!
PRO) A habit of doing that which, by your own evidence, is otherwise restricted to the late second half of his text! Not here in the Prologue or anywhere else for the first thirteen chapters. (He also starts using “straightway” in a very Markan manner in that scene at 13:35 after not doing it at all anywhere else before then; which is one of a number of stylistic shifts which start around then, for whatever reason.) It isn’t impossible he might do it here first, especially if he composed the prologue after an initial composition of the narrative material; but this would still be a way hugely outlying data point. (Interrupting another and far more frequent stylistic flourish which is not only heavily represented in the prologue but which is apparently being established in the first five verses!)
CON) Well, theology is a compositional style, too (to say the least)! And the Evangelist is very insistent that Jesus has life in Himself, and eonian life at that. Compare with 5:26, 5:39 and 6:53 for example.
PRO) Certainly examples of this sort could be greatly multiplied from the Johannine texts: even more famously than the above examples, “I AM the Way, the Truth and the Life” and “I AM the Resurrection and the Life”! However, your first example also indicates a clear Johannine theme, that the Son has nothing but what He receives from the Father (and indeed does nothing except what He sees the Father does, etc.) And that includes having life in Himself. In 5:26 the Father gives to the Son the ability to have Life in Himself as the Father has Life in Himself. The pre-Nicene consensus of punctuation comports with that idea, regardless of what it otherwise means for Life to have been ‘made’ in the Son. Whereas statically (or at best neutrally) having Life in Himself does not directly (at best) comport with that idea. (Another strong Pro point in my estimation.)
CON) But the Evangelist is quite insistent that the Holy Spirit is not a created entity!
PRO) Taking the contexts into account I agree, though this is hardly clearly evident at a casual reading. 
He also indicates (just as complexly and subtly) that the Spirit/Paraclete isn’t the same Person as the Father or the Son.
CON) But if the Life is the Light, and the Spirit is the Light, then the Light has been made and so is a creation, by this punctuation use!
PRO) The term really only means ‘generated’; whether or not the generation in question is a creation or something substantially uncreated, is a contextual issue. (An emphatic cognate of the same term is used about the Son, for example, including here in the Prologue!) Besides, it is not overly clear that the Light in the Prologue is supposed to be the Spirit anyway. That’s a reasonable theological guess, and makes some good sense in other regards, but isn’t altogether necessary as an exegetical meaning from the Prologue material.
CON) But the Spirit only proceeds from the Father, not from the Father and the Son!
PRO) That’s an Eastern Orthodox problem, which might ought to be revised in favor of the filioque anyway. It’s highly debated whether John is trying to say this (or at least was inspired in a fashion that would indicate this) later in the text. This might admittedly tip the scales in favor of the filioque, but it shouldn’t be primarily preferred for purposes of bolstering one or another side of that contested doctrine; that would be very ad hoc. (This doesn’t appear to be one of Metzger’s own problems, but I wanted to be comprehensive about critiques pro and con. 
)
That lays out all the issues I can think of in a dialogue format. All things considered, while the Con side has some good points, I think the balance comes out in favor of the Pro. (It wouldn’t bother me if the Con turned out to be right after all however.)
