2 Corinthians 3:17
New International Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

New Living Translation
For the Lord is the Spirit, and wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

English Standard Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Berean Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Berean Literal Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

King James Bible
Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

New King James Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

New American Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

NASB 1995
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

NASB 1977
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Legacy Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Amplified Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty [emancipation from bondage, true freedom].

Christian Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

American Standard Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Aramaic Bible in Plain English
But The Spirit is THE LORD JEHOVAH, and wherever The Spirit of THE LORD JEHOVAH is, there is freedom.

Contemporary English Version
The Lord and the Spirit are one and the same, and the Lord's Spirit sets us free.

Douay-Rheims Bible
Now the Lord is a Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

English Revised Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

GOD'S WORD® Translation
This Lord is the Spirit. Wherever the Lord's Spirit is, there is freedom.

Good News Translation
Now, "the Lord" in this passage is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is present, there is freedom.

International Standard Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Lord's Spirit is, there is freedom.

Literal Standard Version
And the LORD is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the LORD [is], there [is] liberty;

Majority Standard Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

New American Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

NET Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is present, there is freedom.

New Revised Standard Version
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

New Heart English Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Webster's Bible Translation
Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Weymouth New Testament
Now by "the Lord" is meant the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, freedom is enjoyed.

World English Bible
Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Young's Literal Translation
And the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;

Additional Translations ...
Audio Bible



Context
The Glory of the New Covenant
16But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His image with intensifying glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.…

Cross References
Isaiah 61:1
The Spirit of the Lord GOD is on Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent Me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and freedom to the prisoners,

John 8:32
Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

2 Corinthians 3:18
And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into His image with intensifying glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

Galatians 4:6
And because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying out, "Abba, Father!"

Galatians 5:1
It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not be encumbered once more by a yoke of slavery.

Galatians 5:13
For you, brothers, were called to freedom; but do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. Rather, serve one another in love.


Treasury of Scripture

Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

the Lord.

2 Corinthians 3:6
Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.

John 6:63
It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

1 Corinthians 15:45
And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

where.

Psalm 51:12
Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit.

Isaiah 61:1
The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;

Romans 8:2,15,16
For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death…

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2 Corinthians 3
1. Lest their false teachers should charge him with vain glory,
2. he shows the faith of the Corinthians to be a sufficient commendation of his ministry.
6. Whereupon entering a comparison between the ministers of the law and of the gospel,
12. he proves that his ministry is so far the more excellent,
17. as the gospel of life and liberty is more glorious than the law of condemnation.














(17) Now the Lord is that Spirit.--Better, the Lord is the Spirit. The words seem at first inconsistent with the formulated precision of the Church's creeds, distinguishing the persons of the Godhead from each other. We apply the term "Lord," it is true, as a predicate of the Holy Spirit when we speak, as in the Nicene Creed, of the Holy Ghost as "the Lord, and Giver of life," or say, as in the pseudo-Athanasian, that "the Holy Ghost is Lord;" but using the term "the Lord" as the subject of a sentence, those who have been trained in the theology of those creeds would hardly say, "The Lord" (the term commonly applied to the Father in the Old Testament, and to the Son in the New) "is the Spirit." We have, accordingly, to remember that St. Paul did not contemplate the precise language of these later formularies. He had spoken, in 2Corinthians 3:16, of Israel's "turning to the Lord;" he had spoken also of his own work as "the ministration of the Spirit" (2Corinthians 3:8). To turn to the Lord--i.e., to the Lord Jesus--was to turn to Him whose essential being, as one with the Father, was Spirit (John 4:24), who was in one sense, the Spirit, the life-giving energy, as contrasted with the letter that killeth. So we may note that the attribute of "quickening," which is here specially connected with the name of the Spirit (2Corinthians 3:6), is in John 5:21 connected also with the names of the Father and the Son. The thoughts of the Apostle move in a region in which the Lord Jesus, not less than the Holy Ghost, is contemplated as Spirit. This gives, it is believed, the true sequence of St. Paul's thoughts. The whole verse may be considered as parenthetical, explaining that the "turning to the Lord" coincides with the "ministration of the Spirit." Another interpretation, inverting the terms, and taking the sentence as "the Spirit is the Lord," is tenable grammatically, and was probably adopted by the framers of the expanded form of the Nicene Creed at the Council of Constantinople (A.D. 380). It is obvious, however, that the difficulty of tracing the sequence of thought becomes much greater on this method of interpretation.

Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.--The Apostle returns to the more familiar language. To turn to the Lord, who is Spirit, is to turn to the Spirit which is His, which dwelt in Him, and which He gives. And he assumes, almost as an axiom of the spiritual life, that the presence of that Spirit gives freedom, as contrasted with the bondage of the letter--freedom from slavish fear, freedom from the guilt and burden of sin, freedom from the tyranny of the Law. Compare the aspect of the same thought in the two Epistles nearly contemporary with this:--the Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are the children of God, those children being partakers of a glorious liberty (Romans 8:16-21); the connection between walking in the Spirit and being called to liberty (Galatians 5:13-16). The underlying sequence of thought would seem to be something like this: "Israel, after all, with all its seeming greatness and high prerogatives, was in bondage, because it had the letter, not the Spirit; we who have the Spirit can claim our citizenship in the Jerusalem which is above and which is free" (Galatians 4:24-31). . . .

Verse 17. - Now the Lord is that Spirit. The "but" (Authorized Version, "now") introduces an explanation. To whom shall they turn? To the Lord. "But the Lord is the Spirit." The word "spirit" could not be introduced thus abruptly and vaguely; it must refer to something already said, and therefore to the last mention of the word "spirit" in ver. 3. The Lord is the Spirit, who giveth life and freedom, in antithesis to the spirit of death and legal bondage (see ver. 6; and comp. 1 Corinthians 15:45). The best comment on the verse is Romans 8:2, "For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." All life and all religion had become to St. Paul a vision of all things in Christ. He has just said that the spirit giveth life, and, after the digression about the moral blindness which prevented the Jews from being emancipated from the bondage of the letter, it was quite natural for him to add, "Now the Lord is the Spirit to which I alluded." The connection in which the verse stands excludes a host of untenable meanings which have been attached to it. There is liberty. The liberty of confidence (ver. 4), and of frank speech (ver. 12), and of sonship (Galatians 4:6, 7), and of freedom from guilt (John 8:36); so that the Law itself, obeyed no longer in the mere letter but also in the spirit, becomes a royal law of liberty, and not a yoke which gendereth to bondage (James 1:25; James 2:12) - a service, indeed, but one which is perfect freedom (Romans 5:1-21; 1 Peter 2:16).

Parallel Commentaries ...


Greek
Now
δὲ (de)
Conjunction
Strong's 1161: A primary particle; but, and, etc.

the
(Ho)
Article - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

Lord
Κύριος (Kyrios)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 2962: Lord, master, sir; the Lord. From kuros; supreme in authority, i.e. controller; by implication, Master.

is
ἐστιν (estin)
Verb - Present Indicative Active - 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 1510: I am, exist. The first person singular present indicative; a prolonged form of a primary and defective verb; I exist.

the
τὸ (to)
Article - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

Spirit,
Πνεῦμά (Pneuma)
Noun - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 4151: Wind, breath, spirit.

and
δὲ (de)
Conjunction
Strong's 1161: A primary particle; but, and, etc.

where
οὗ (hou)
Adverb
Strong's 3757: Where, whither, when, in what place. Genitive case of hos as adverb; at which place, i.e. Where.

the
τὸ (to)
Article - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

Spirit
Πνεῦμα (Pneuma)
Noun - Nominative Neuter Singular
Strong's 4151: Wind, breath, spirit.

of [the] Lord [is],
Κυρίου (Kyriou)
Noun - Genitive Masculine Singular
Strong's 2962: Lord, master, sir; the Lord. From kuros; supreme in authority, i.e. controller; by implication, Master.

[there is] freedom.
ἐλευθερία (eleutheria)
Noun - Nominative Feminine Singular
Strong's 1657: Freedom, liberty, especially: a state of freedom from slavery. From eleutheros; freedom.


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NT Letters: 2 Corinthians 3:17 Now the Lord is the Spirit (2 Cor. 2C iiC 2Cor ii cor iicor)
2 Corinthians 3:16
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