Special care must be used in translating No one hides what he is doing. A literal translation may imply that Jesus was hiding away in some secret place things he had been making. The meaning of hides in this context is “to do something without letting people know what one is doing.” An equivalent rendering may be “No one keeps people from knowing what he is doing, if he wants people to know who he really is.”

To be well known is more literally rendered “to be known publicly” (New American Bible) or “to be known openly” (Revised Standard Version). Moffatt translates this phrase “aims at public recognition” and New English Bible “to be in the public eye.” It may be rendered simply “in order for many people to know about you” or “in order that everyone will know who you are.”

Since (so also Moffatt and Jerusalem Bible) is “if” in most translations. In Greek the “if” clause indicates that the condition stated is true. This meaning is more clearly indicated in English by since. New English Bible implies doubt (“If you really are doing such things as these”), which seems not to be in keeping with the force of the Greek.

Let the whole world know about you is literally “show yourself to the world.” The whole world is equivalent to “the world of mankind” (see 1.10). The verb let may suggest mere permission in some languages, and a more appropriate rendering may be an expression of cause, for example, “cause everyone in the world to know about you.”

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 .