1 John 3:5

Since February, I've been going through 1 John in the archives of the Daily Dose of Greek.  A few weeks ago, I copied out 1 John 3:5 and then read it in a few different translations.  The ESV made me cringe.  The Greek text is καὶ οἴδατε ὅτι ἐκεῖνος ἐφανερώθη ἵνα τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἄρῃ, καὶ ἁμαρτία ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστιν. but the ESV renders this as "You know that he appeared to take away sins, and in him there is no sin."  In the intended reading, "appeared" has the sense of "showed up," and "to take" is an infinitive of purpose, but this translation could be misread so that "appeared" has the sense of "seemed" and (if my parsing is right) "to take" is an epexegetical infinitive.  Understood this way, the clause is saying that this "tak[ing] away [of] sins" was merely an illusion ("he seemed to take away sins"), but this is obviously not the meaning of the Greek text.  Simply adding "in order to" clears up this ambiguity:  "You know that he appeared in order to take away sins...."

The NIV has a much better translation:  "But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins.  And in him is no sin."