In verse 34 Jesus said it was not necessary for him to have a man’s witness, and in this verse he states that he is not looking for human praise. The word praise is the word usually translated “glory” in this Gospel. In Greek it appears first in this sentence, and so is emphatic. In 7.18 this word appears as glory, in 8.50 as honor, and in 12.43 as approval. “Praise,” “glory,” “honor,” and “approval” all cover essentially the same area of meaning. In the present verse New English Bible renders it “honor”; Jerusalem Bible and Phillips “approval”; Moffatt “credit”; and New American Bible “praise.”

The verb looking for is literally “receive,” but it appears in a variety of ways in the translations. New English Bible translates the whole verse “I do not look to men for honor”; Moffatt “I accept no credit from men”; Jerusalem Bible “As for human approval, this means nothing to me.”

I am not looking for human praise involves certain subtle problems of translation: (1) looking must not be understood in the literal sense of “seeing”; (2) it is normal for an expression of praise to require men as a subject. It is possible to restructure the sentence in some languages as “I am not trying to get people to praise me” or “It is not my desire that people honor me.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on the Gospel of John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1980. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .