John 2:7 — ExegesisTAB

The verse begins with the historical-present verb legei {λέγει | lé-gei}, a common Johannine device that introduces direct speech with a sense of vivid immediacy. The dative pronoun autois {αὐτοῖς | au-toîs} marks the indirect object, referring to the servants in the broader narrative context. The subject is expressed by the articular proper name ho Iesous {ὁ Ἰησοῦς | ho Iē-soûs}, which appears after the verb, a word order that keeps the focus initially on the speech act itself. Within the quotation, the second person plural imperative Gemisate {Γεμίσατε | Ge-mí-sa-te} directly addresses a group and is followed by the accusative object phrase tas hydrias {τὰς ὑδρίας | tàs hy-drí-as}. The genitive hydatos {ὕδατος | hý-da-tos} functions as a genitive of content, yielding the sense “fill the jars with water.” The coordinating conjunction kai {καὶ | kaí} links the command to its narrative fulfillment, and the aorist verb egemisan {ἐγέμισαν | e-gé-mi-san} presents their obedience as a complete, decisive action. The prepositional expression heos ano {ἕως ἄνω | hé-ōs á-nō}, literally “up to above,” is an idiomatic way of saying that the jars were filled right to the very top. In English, subject–verb–object order is regularized and the idiom is rendered with explicit language of completeness so that the thoroughness of the response is clearly communicated.